It's baaaaack!
Week 1 of ModWright HAPZ1 burn in. ~ 20 hours burn in.
Summary:
Reduction of grain and improved depth of sound stage over stock unit perceived. Improvement in dynamics and resolution to be monitored.
Developed an album transfer strategy and supporting protocol enabling use of aiff and wav where advantageous.
Details:
I am going to be paying particular attention to grain and depth of soundstage. I've already gotten an indication that I can expect an improvement over the stock unit in these areas with only 20 hrs burn in. Dynamics also may be improved, but this may be tough to accurately discern. I bought a cryoed new production Gold Lion GZ34 rectifier for the power supply. The 6922s are the stock Sovtech tubes, which I will continue to use for a while. Dan indicated that 6GC7s can also be used, and probably fall somewhere between the 6922s and 6SN7s in character. This could be just what I'm looking for. Recall that the stock HAPZ1 suffered by comparison with my ModWright sony 5400 with respect to upper harmonics. I have a matched pair of NOS RCA clear top 6GC7s on the way from Brent Jesse. I'm hoping these tubes will give me a bit of that tube sweetness and body laking in the stock unit.
During the 3 week absence of the HAPZ1 I had some time to reflect on all of the file transfer woes I had initially. (Nice having time to think while engaged in mindless wall paper stripping) I think I have developed a protocol that will permit me to do what I want to do with respect to use of aiff files and possibly wav files.
As a reminder, I had substantial problems with wav transfers being corrupted and aiff files not transferring. Specifically, failure to keep tracks together as a single album, poor artwork recognition, etc was a common occurrence. Further, I found the even those files that were successfully transferred were subject to subsequent corruption as new albums were imported.
I think I have developed a protocol that will, with a little effort, permit me to export whichever file type I prefer to use and maintain the integrity of those transfers once successfully completed. Keep in mind that the sonic advantage of wav over alac was subtle and sporadic. I am happy to transfer the bulk of my library in ALAC (which is flawless in terms of album integrity), reserving wav (or aiff) only for special favorites where the difference is perceptible. This is not some huge concession. The ALAC files in most cases, played back using the DSD conversion engine with the stock unit were arguably superior to my ModWright Sony 5400. One would certainly expect that performance gap to increase as the modded HAPZ1 breaks in.
With respect to AIFF, I found that one must select both AIFF and AIF file types in the HAPZ1 transfer software in order to reliably transfer albums as AIFF files to the HAPZ1. The HAPZ1 transfer software allows one to exclude transferring certain file types, eg,, MP3s, movies, etc to the HAPZ1. I had deselected all file types other than ALAC, wav, flac, and AIFF in order to avoid importation of this unwanted stuff. After restoring AIF as a type to be transferred, AIFF transfer has been pretty good, if not perfect.
My current protocol is as follows. After transferring a batch of files, regardless of file type, I ensure the transfer has been properly made. For those albums transferred successfully, I purge the album from iTunes by deletion or by moving to a folder outside iTunes. This prevents any after the fact corruption of the album by an attempted reimportation. Note that this should not happen, as the HAPZ1 transfer program keeps a list of files transferred, so that once a file is transferred, it is not transferred again. The fact that reimportation (and corruption) does occur suggests something is not quite right in the HAPZ1 music transfer program. However, purging transferred albums from iTunes and clearing the transferred files list in the HAPZ1 music transfer program, obviates any opportunity for after the fact album corruption. For those files (Aiff and wav) that do not transfer properly, I simply delete the corrupted transfers from the HAPZ1, clear the transferred files list, and repeat the transfer. So far, I have not had to transfer an album more than twice to get a good copy.
I think this protocol has gotten me past some of the frustrating quirks with respect to use of the HAPZ1 for importation of a large classical music library. By the time I have 400 hours of burn in on the mod, I should have a substantial portion of my favorite music transferred. Importation of album artwork remains an area where one would like to see substantial improvement, but I think this is an issue with gracenotes, not the Sony per se. One can edit the composition, composer, artist, and specific track information easily in iTunes, and these edits are preserved in the transfer (usually!).
Stay tuned. I will try to post some thoughts on a weekly basis as the modded unit breaks in.
Week 1 of ModWright HAPZ1 burn in. ~ 20 hours burn in.
Summary:
Reduction of grain and improved depth of sound stage over stock unit perceived. Improvement in dynamics and resolution to be monitored.
Developed an album transfer strategy and supporting protocol enabling use of aiff and wav where advantageous.
Details:
I am going to be paying particular attention to grain and depth of soundstage. I've already gotten an indication that I can expect an improvement over the stock unit in these areas with only 20 hrs burn in. Dynamics also may be improved, but this may be tough to accurately discern. I bought a cryoed new production Gold Lion GZ34 rectifier for the power supply. The 6922s are the stock Sovtech tubes, which I will continue to use for a while. Dan indicated that 6GC7s can also be used, and probably fall somewhere between the 6922s and 6SN7s in character. This could be just what I'm looking for. Recall that the stock HAPZ1 suffered by comparison with my ModWright sony 5400 with respect to upper harmonics. I have a matched pair of NOS RCA clear top 6GC7s on the way from Brent Jesse. I'm hoping these tubes will give me a bit of that tube sweetness and body laking in the stock unit.
During the 3 week absence of the HAPZ1 I had some time to reflect on all of the file transfer woes I had initially. (Nice having time to think while engaged in mindless wall paper stripping) I think I have developed a protocol that will permit me to do what I want to do with respect to use of aiff files and possibly wav files.
As a reminder, I had substantial problems with wav transfers being corrupted and aiff files not transferring. Specifically, failure to keep tracks together as a single album, poor artwork recognition, etc was a common occurrence. Further, I found the even those files that were successfully transferred were subject to subsequent corruption as new albums were imported.
I think I have developed a protocol that will, with a little effort, permit me to export whichever file type I prefer to use and maintain the integrity of those transfers once successfully completed. Keep in mind that the sonic advantage of wav over alac was subtle and sporadic. I am happy to transfer the bulk of my library in ALAC (which is flawless in terms of album integrity), reserving wav (or aiff) only for special favorites where the difference is perceptible. This is not some huge concession. The ALAC files in most cases, played back using the DSD conversion engine with the stock unit were arguably superior to my ModWright Sony 5400. One would certainly expect that performance gap to increase as the modded HAPZ1 breaks in.
With respect to AIFF, I found that one must select both AIFF and AIF file types in the HAPZ1 transfer software in order to reliably transfer albums as AIFF files to the HAPZ1. The HAPZ1 transfer software allows one to exclude transferring certain file types, eg,, MP3s, movies, etc to the HAPZ1. I had deselected all file types other than ALAC, wav, flac, and AIFF in order to avoid importation of this unwanted stuff. After restoring AIF as a type to be transferred, AIFF transfer has been pretty good, if not perfect.
My current protocol is as follows. After transferring a batch of files, regardless of file type, I ensure the transfer has been properly made. For those albums transferred successfully, I purge the album from iTunes by deletion or by moving to a folder outside iTunes. This prevents any after the fact corruption of the album by an attempted reimportation. Note that this should not happen, as the HAPZ1 transfer program keeps a list of files transferred, so that once a file is transferred, it is not transferred again. The fact that reimportation (and corruption) does occur suggests something is not quite right in the HAPZ1 music transfer program. However, purging transferred albums from iTunes and clearing the transferred files list in the HAPZ1 music transfer program, obviates any opportunity for after the fact album corruption. For those files (Aiff and wav) that do not transfer properly, I simply delete the corrupted transfers from the HAPZ1, clear the transferred files list, and repeat the transfer. So far, I have not had to transfer an album more than twice to get a good copy.
I think this protocol has gotten me past some of the frustrating quirks with respect to use of the HAPZ1 for importation of a large classical music library. By the time I have 400 hours of burn in on the mod, I should have a substantial portion of my favorite music transferred. Importation of album artwork remains an area where one would like to see substantial improvement, but I think this is an issue with gracenotes, not the Sony per se. One can edit the composition, composer, artist, and specific track information easily in iTunes, and these edits are preserved in the transfer (usually!).
Stay tuned. I will try to post some thoughts on a weekly basis as the modded unit breaks in.