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Merrill Audio ELEMENT 118 on Tour

As some of you know I had to deal with a serious family medical issue which has been miraculously cured. So the new ELEMENT amplifiers are getting out to all those asking about them and the few lucky ones that have purchased them.

The ELEMENT 118 and ELEMENT 116 will be going out to reviewers and on tour to various audiophiles and dealers. So more will be showing up. I will provide a short trail and welcome questions and comments, all in good spirit.

After years of research and using OEMS, we have a proprietary design that we believe is an order of magnitude improvement over the previous amps and also sets a standard across all the classes of amps in terms on sonics. Of course taking a listen and doing a comparison is the best way to confirm this.

The new design is an open loop, zero feedback, and zero deadtime, using the Gallium Nitride Transistors - which unlike other transistors have close to zero capacitance and hence allow very fast switching. Additionally the PCB and layout is a highly advanced layout that reduces the parasitic capacitance and inductance to near zero, allow close to zero overshoot and ring, and of course the zero deadtime. The open loop, zero feedback, zero deadtime allows a spacious and precision stage with long detailed decays, very fast attack without the parasitics causing other distortions. The first 10 seconds impresses the listener with a musical tone, that is open, wide and fast. The rest is musical immersion.

I will post the systems as they are run through as best I can. Enjoy and I hope you get to listen to the ELEMENT Series of Power Amplifiers near you.
merrillaudio
aolmrd1241
1,042 posts
 
viber7...  Did you buy the Merrills? Or are you moving on?
ricred1
2,045 posts
 
viber7,
I usually don't read long post, but I read your entire post/review. It's great to read thoughtful reviews that differentiate between components without the hyperbole.

ricevs
1,543 posts
 

The new Totaldac amps would be a nice A/B with the 118s. They are about the same price ($40K per pair for balanced inputs only, single stereo amp is $20K and rca input only). Zero feedback tube/solid state versus zero feedback fast GAN. I would bet the Totaldac pair would be more musical.....but as dynamic, clear and fast? Never know till you try. So far, everyone who has heard the Totaldac amp is raving.

http://www.totaldac.com/amp-1-en.htm

What is for sure is that class D has finally arrived.  The Merrill may not be perfect but it is really good.  There will be cheaper class d amps in the future that will be better.....that, I have no doubt.  There is really very little inside a Class D amp that would warrant such money.  You are paying for being the first and the sexy box and packaging.  I am not saying that what is on the inside is junk.....just saying you could put the same insides in less sexy boxes and sell them direct for about one quarter the price......or way less.  Can someone please open the Merrill amps and take a pic so we can see all the stuff in there?  You notice, there are no pics anywhere, at this point.  I predict that within a few years (or sooner) you will see class D amps sounding as good or better for $5K or less......maybe highly modded Purifi modules....or whatever.   Class D should not be expensive.  Once you get rid of monster heatsinks, banks of output transistors and super large linear transformers (none of these things inside a Merrill), then the amps are way smaller, lighter and less expensive.  GAN transistors are not expensive and because they are so efficient you only need very few of them and even less heatsinking than mosfets.  The revolution has begun.  Remember, the first calculator was hundreds of dollars....now they give them away.  Here is a link to mono GAN amps that will be available for $1K the pair....I am sure they are not in the league of the Merrill amps...but this is just the beginning.

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/bosc-hifi-monoblock-class-d-amp/coming_soon

rsf507
2,332 posts
 
@Viber7 just curious what ac cords did you use with the Element 118’s since they require a 220 plug at the amp end even though it’s a 120v design? We all know (don’t we) that power cords can make a BIG difference.
BTW great write-up.
viber7
25 posts
 
Viber6, 

Neutral, cool, warm, grey, etc. mean different things to different people and so I don't always know what people mean when they use these terms.  Right or wrong, I define neutrality as a flat frequency response where no part of the frequency response is exaggerated in any way and so this is more of an ideal rather than something that can be realistically achieved.  I define warmth as a sound that is tilted more toward the bass frequencies where the treble, while present is quieter and more subdued.  The opposite of warm is bright.  Forced to choose, I would pick warmth over brightness.  I'm not exactly sure what "cool" or "grey" means when people use these terms.  Perhaps a U-shaped curve where both the bass and treble are rolled off?  Regardless, I find these terms useful only when compared against some known reference.

In my case, my reference is the piano in my listening room and so this is "neutral."  Since I have never heard an electronic audio system sound exactly like my piano, I have never heard anything sound completely neutral.  When I listen to a piece of audio gear, I will play a piano track and compare it against my own piano and establish tonal temperature from there.  The problem with this is that some piano tracks that I have were recorded in warm environments (i.e. Carnegie Hall) and can come across as warm while other performances can sound relatively brighter and so what I have done is I have recordings of my own piano playing in my room and so I compare these recordings to the real thing.  

Using this technique, I found each of these amplifiers to sound warm relative to my piano with the Soulution sounding warmest of all followed by the D'Agostino.  The CH Precision and Element 118 sounded the closest to neutral.  As none of these combinations sounded "bright," I found none of them to be objectionable.  

Regarding this "soft landing," while the Christine preamp sounds rounded, the Element 118s do not.  Using my DAVE DAC to directly drive the Element 118s, these amps will express sharp transients as sharp transients to the point of fatigue.  These are truly transparent amps.

As for live classical music, I agree that a full orchestra has the potential to sound too loud and fatiguing if you are seated right next to the horn section.  As a frequent patron of the Davies Hall in San Francisco, the most expensive and most desired seats do not include the front row and so the front row is often available and so my wife and I deliberately choose these seats.  The beauty of this position is that with violin concertos, for example, the full emotion of the violinist comes through from these seats in a way that cannot be gleaned from further back.  I can even hear the performers breath.  Moreover, the depth perception between the 1st and 2nd violinist is easily discernible from this position but not from further back and so I find the complexity of the sounds that I hear to be better layered and more easily discerned and it is this detail delineation and depth of field that separates the best audio systems from more mediocre ones for me.  Fortunately, the stage has enough depth where the horns aren't blaring in my ears from this position.  Even after a 2.5 hour performance, I have never experienced fatigue from these seats.  The exception to the rule might be a spectacle like Mahler's 8th where the perspective from further back might be better than the front row but given the choice, almost always I prefer the front row.  The same thing applies to my home audio system but obviously, at home, you can control the volume.
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