Sell your $$$ cables and conditioners... affordable LITHIUM is here!


I wanted to give you a frame of reference as to where I'm coming from and most importantly a first impression after 24hrs!
I've been an addict since my first system of KEF Concord speakers, Crimson Electric amps and an Ariston turntable back in college in '81. Since then I've been down the entire Linn system with Active Kabers, Full Meridian active system with DSP5200's as well as some burly NZ Perraux mono blocks with Sonus Faber when I lived in NZ. Since moving to the US in 2001 I've been through years of altercations between solid state camps from Bel Canto, Levinson stereo 336 to mono 436's, 532H and Mac 452 to speakers from B&W 802N and D2 to Wilson Sophia 2's, Sonus Faber Amati Homage and Revel Studio 2's. I've tried conditioners from Transparent, AQ Niagra, Isotek and others and every time come back to a decent cable straight from the wall.
Three years ago I took the plunge and went down the Devialet rabbit hole, streaming direct from a MacBook Air with ROON my Devialet D200 (soon to become a D400) drives my Focal Utopia Diablos via Analysis Plus Solo Crystal 8 speaker cables (and that's another whole can of worms with enormous cable differences), a JL Audio Fathom F110 (also about to be doubled up) rounds it out. My livening room is about 22x25 with 10ft ceilings and partially treated as best I can accommodate. 
Suffice to say, I've been around the block with hifi, listened to way more than my fair share at dealers and friends with diverse systems and currently run one of the most reveling systems I've ever heard. Sure, there's not that thick syrupy warmth the tube guys will clammer for, but then I'm hearing so much further into not just tonality but intent within the playing. 

If you read the review in Enjoy the Music from Tom Lyle, you'd see he equates the GZ Yeti to the $30k Stromtank. His review was the $400 Yeti 400. The Yeti 1000 was $1099, the 3kW Yeti 3000 is $2999 and will power almost anything. So, like Tom I took the plunge and bought a Yeti 1000 figuring it'd have plenty of 'headroom' for my meagre 600w consumption. (Though I have since plugged my JL Audio Fathom in too)

After playing the "FedEx f'ed up" again game, I finally went to their depot and picked up my new toy myself. After a handful of songs to establish a baseline for the evening, I simply plugged the Yeti 1000 in, reconnected the Devialet and sat back... My girlfriend was first to break the silence and then immediately regretted it as I couldn't help myself interrupting her for the next half hour of gushing over what a profound difference it was making.
H-U-G-E. Truly component level and an absolute game changer. 

I was immediately texting my good friend with his PS Audio Directstream, Gryphon Diablo, Audio Physic Avantera III all powered by the latest Synergistic Research Powercell 12SE and Gallileo power cord with AQ Hurricane to each component - SELL- SELL- SELL it all, get a Goal Zero! 

We stayed up until 2am listening, flipped it back for a handful of now unlistenable tracks and then back again to Yeti 1000 happiness. In over six hours of powering my Devialet and Fathom at 90+db levels it'd dropped to a laughable 98%. I'm guessing that means it'd run off the grid for 300hrs or more? That's probably a several months of listening for most people. Who even cares, it simply sounds spectacular and the single biggest improvement I've ever heard from anything less than a major amp or speaker upgrade. 

I know my system is fairly frugal and green running, my buddy Matts, Gryphon would probably need the 3000W Yeti as his amp pulls 1900W at full song and his full stack of components albeit front end certainly add a few hundred more.   He's headed down to me in a couple of week with a stack of exotic power cables and conditioners  to try and I can't wait to share my results - I'm guessing he'll want to steal it away for his own demo right after. I would imagine he'd even get away with the Yeti 1000, so long as he doesn't run it too hard?
leeagc
Big, I used the 1000 with an AudioValve Assistent 100 MK2 tube amp. I really didn’t notice much difference sonically - maybe just a slightly quieter background but the fan of course killed that. My DAC and amp are plugged into a Core Power Tech CPT1800 balanced conditioner which plugs into the 1000.
"Thanks for reaching out to Goal Zero! In the specs for the inverter, it is listed as a max of 5% Total Harmonic Distortion."
So- about 10x the distortion of an Elgar power conditioner.
mantis007 :
Have you tried plugging the your DAC and amp directly into the 1000, without the CPT 1800? If not, give it a try and see what happens before sending it back. I had a CPT 300 for a short while myself, but found that it softened transients a bit too much for my taste. 
Stephendunn:
I suggest trying quiet USB fans to cool the Yeti, and maybe the internal fans will stay turned off. I recently purchased "AC Infinity Multifan S Series - Quiet USB Cooling Fans S4" on Amazon for $13.99 each. I use them to cool my MFA Luminescence tube pre-amp and Pass Labs XA-25 amp. The fans are very quiet, and maintain air flow that draws heat from my equipment. I'm amazed how effective they are. For example, the Pass Labs XA-25 runs class A, and its heat sinks get hot, but with the fans they only get warm. I power the USB fans with an Anker PowerCore from Amazon, but the fans can also be plugged into a USB wall wart charger. Hopefully, the Yeti's heat disbursement design is efficient enough for the Multifans to be effective. 
runeenur
Thanks for the tip, but the odd thing about the fan on the Yeti 400 is that it comes on immediately with a load over 130 watts or so.  Meaning the battery is totally at room temperature.  Then it will stay on for 20 minutes or so and go off--even though, theoretically, the battery is continuing to get warmer.  So the fan appears not to be entirely thermostatically controlled.

I've been listening with just my pre amp powered by the Yeti and the improvement in SQ is not as great when I have my digital front end plugged in.  Mainly a loss of the richer tone and texture.  But most of the sound stage improvement is there.  Interesting.