2. amps-preamps
  3. 137890-3674

Lyngdorf TDAI-3400

Well, after reading all the rave reviews of the Lyngdorf TDAI-2170 both here and other places, I decided to order a TDAI-3400 for myself.  I must admit I am still skeptical that such a diminutive piece of equipment can sound better than the Primaluna Dialogue Premium HP tube amp weighing more than 50 lbs, but I have been so intrigued by everything I have read I simply had to pull the trigger. 
I just unboxed it today, hooked everything up, and am listening to it for a while before setting up Room Perfect. 
I really want to hear the what the amp sounds like as-is for a bit to understand it better. 
First impressions:  Without Room Perfect it sounds like very nice solid state amps I've owned in the past, but to be honest, I don't find the sound to be particularly moving.  I moved to tubes after years of solid state, and I swore I would never go back.  That is where I'm coming from.  I should also add that I always try to keep an open mind.  While my initial take on it might sound like I don't like it, I hope folks just read this as me being as honest as possible about what I hear.  I know the tendency when buying new gear is to want so badly to love it in order to justify the expense that it's easy to fool oneself into believing it's an improvement over what you had before, even when it's not.  Of course I really want it to be as mind blowing as it has been built up in my mind to be, but if it's not I am OK with simply moving back to what I have liked so far.   
I have only been playing records through it so far.  Analog makes up 98% of my listening so that's where I am starting with it.  I have a nice CD transport that I will connect to it in the next day or so just to hear the DAC in the unit.  I will also experiment with playing files from USB sticks, computer audio from my MacBook Pro, and whatever else I decide.  I am not prepared to purchase a music server just yet, but it's something I have thought about for a while.  
My system:  speakers are Harbeth Monitor 40.1's.  Turntable is an SME 20/2 with SME IV.iv tonearm and Kiseki Purple Heart cartridge, fed to a Parasound JC-3+ phono preamp.  Power conditioner is Audioqest Niagara 7000.  CD transport is a Wadia 8.  
I will report back as I have more time to experiment and let the amp break in.  

128x128snackeyp
amirits's avatar
amirits
1 posts
 
Own the tdai 2200 running a pair of dynaudio 3.4.
Wonderful amp. Cables are critical and room perfect sometimes tenders the music and sometimes flats it. 
Can always flip between focus/global/bypass so no trouble. 
All in all,  one of the best amps out there. 
velomane
3 posts
 
A question for my fellow 3400 owners: I've got a headphone amp coming. Can I use the XLR output of the 3400 to input a signal to the headphone amp? Will this signal have been processed by the 3400? Do I need to adjust the output signal level? I want to use the headphone amp's volume control.
jcarcopo's avatar
jcarcopo
501 posts
 
@velomane - you are allowed 2 Roon Perfect Setups so setup the secondary with the output to the XLR ACTIVE in the GUI WEB MENU. No need to do any measurements. Alternatively, you could also activate the XLR preamp output on Room Perfect profile 1 and just switch it to bypass mode. Whichever you choose or think is more simple. Turning Roomperfect off via bypass while XLR Preamp mode is enabled or creating a 2ndary RoomPerfect Profile with no measurements and also with the XLR Preamp outputs enabled. In this instance you would switch between Roomperfect profile 1 or 2 and have bypass engaged even though it’s sort of moot since you would not have stored any mic measurements anyway for that headphone profile. Hope this helps you out.

As far as output level you are allowed variable or fixed output gain settings and also gain compensation settings. Since you wish to use the headphone amp's volume control set it to fixed on the Lyngdorf. 
velomane
3 posts
 
Thanks jcarcopo,
I really appreciate the help. After doing some reading, it would seem that a fixed output level of -10dB is industry standard, yet the software defaults to -12. Is there any risk of damaging my headphone amp with either of these settings?
As an aside, the Lyngdorf software is quite amazing in its versatility. This machine just continues to impress me in all respects.
jcarcopo's avatar
jcarcopo
501 posts
 
@velomane No there’s no risk in hurting anything as -12db is lower in gain than -10db. There are also gain compensations per input, per profile, should you which to compensate, but -2db is pretty negligible so I would just simply increase the volume gain on your headphone amp to compensate if I were you.
More to discover