The Truth about Modern Class D

Can you tell us about the speakers you evaluated with when you say the Parasound took the Devialet to school?

I have had the opportunity of trying in my own system a late pre-production of the brand new Merrill Element 118 monos... All amps of the new Oganessom series have class D output stage circuits totally designed in house by Merril... They employ Gallium nitrite transistors switching in the Mhz range.

In spite of the units that I demoed being pre-production, and not yet sporting all the circuit details of the very final implementation, the tone of the monos was absolutely delectable for all parameters I an think of.... From delicacy and extension of treble, to the complexity of the midrange, to the depth and tunefulness of the bass... And let us not forget a quite phenomenal authority, staging and imaging.

Element 118 were immersive and mesmerizing, with a complex resolution and musical tonality  that I have experienced only in rare cases. The element 118  prototypes seemed to rank with flagship devices from some of my favorite brands, such as amplifiers from Soloution, the ARC reference series, and my own Rowland M925 monos.

On the other hand, if what you seek is a classic warm tube sound, none of the above will do.... It is not a matter of such designs as the Merrill Oganessom series, Rowland M925 and Daemon, or even the class A/B Soulution amps, or even the reference seiries ARC tube amps. "not being there" yet for a reason or another....

Rather, the designers of any of these devices are not aiming at the slightly euphonic warmth of the classic tube sound.

While general goals at Rowland, ARC, and Soulution include, amongst other parameters, harmonic complexity and minimization of intermodulative distortions in the treble, they aim to maintain an even treatment of harmonics across the spectrum, without preferencial emphasis of any particular region of the audible band. But designers achieve their flagship goals with very different sophisticated strategies, which employ Tubes at ARC, class A/B output stages with Soulution, NCore NC1200 or Pascal X-Pro2 in Rowland, and completely custom design of class D output stage on the Merrill Oganessom series.

Bottomline... Do not get fixated on topologies, and keep an open mind. Keep auditioning to amps of different tonality, designs, and vintage... You never know what might capture your heart *Grins!*

Remember that the worst enemy of audiophiles, and humans in general, is what is sometimes called the false induction step... That is judging an entire class of complex objects based on characteristics of some small number of samples. Even less reliable a technique when the samples are out of date or otherwise obsolete.

Saluti, G.