Thanks for posting. I have an AHB2 and the DAC3 and I find others impressions interesting as I chart out my upgrade path. For what it is and what it costs, the AHB2 is pretty amazing. I am not suggesting it the best amp ever. The fact that you can buy a second AHB2 for less then your new cables made me smile.
CODA #16 vs Benchmark AHB2 | Yamaha NS500 Speaker
Last week I purchased a 11-month-old Benchmark AHB2 for the 6th time. I am actually $$ positive on the other 5 cumulative buys. The reason I got it again was that I love the sound of this amp, especially on the top end. My prior speakers were Thiel CS3.7 and KEF LS50. The LS50 sounded great with the AHB2 but it is not full range and the AHB2 was not really taxed that much. I even had AHB2 monos with both speakers. The Thiel was not as dynamic as I wanted it to be with both the stereo and mono AHB2 (especially on the low end).
My KRELL DUO 175XD (sold), CODA #8 (sold), and Parasound A21+ (sold) sounded more alive with the Thiel CS3.7. It was the bottom end that those amps sounded better than the AHB2. However, the AHB2 was preferred to all those amps in the top-end, though the KRELL’s super buttery smoothness is something I miss.
I now have 2 new speakers, the Yamaha NS5000 and the Magnepan LRS+. The Yamaha is in my kid’s playroom / audio room (Livingroom), 15x20x25. The LRS+ is in a small office, 12x11x9 (plus a 4-foot closet for desk and monitors). The LRS+ is like the Thiel CS3.7 with regards to the amp requirements, so I never even considered the AHB2. The 2 best amps I have had on the LRS+ are the CODA #16 and the Sanders Magtech.
The Yamaha NS5000 is another story. It is a much better speaker than the LRS+. It is also better than my RAAL SR1a earphones + RAAL VM-1a amp, which I never thought I would say. This speaker is also not that hard to drive. The Yamaha M5000 amp that is recommended for the NS5000 (I heard it) has 100-watts.
My setup is as follow:
- Yggi+ Less is More DAC + Sonore OpticalRendu streamer
- Holo Serene preamp
- CODA #16 amp
- Yamaha NS5000 speakers (long wall placement with no first reflection issues and a very high ceiling that I think mitigates the speaker being only 18 inches from the front wall. No DSP used but, in the future, I will call Mitch Barnett from AcurateSound.ca to take a look at my setup to get his opinion. He does ROON compliant Convolution filters (DSP).
- Cables used were Benchmark XLR between the DAC and preamp and preamp and amp. I normally use Audience AU24 SE from DAC to preamp but not this time due to placement issues for the test.
- Speaker cable is WyWire Platinum. I sold WyWire Diamond a few weeks ago and put the Platinum with the NS5000. It is an OK cable.
The contender was the used AHB2 with the Benchmark speaker cables ($150).
Replacing the CODA #16 with the AHB2 and the Benchmark speaker cables revealed that the AHB2 is still the king on top. Just so smooth and beautiful. The surprise was the bass. Tons of bass, I was not aware that the AHB2 could do bass like this. It was almost like CODA #16 bass. However, there was a hardness to the sound that I could physically feel in my ears.
I should have mentioned that I normally have a Benchmark DAC3B in the Livingroom system streamed via a PlayBack Designs Streamer-IF. The plan is to get the PBD Dream DAC in the future. I first did a ROON grouped stream with the Yggi+ and the DAC3B getting the same signal to do quick A/B comparisons. It was easy to see that the DAC3B was too hot on top for the AHB2. For the CODA #16 that hotness is masked a bit, and it is not a problem.
I left the Benchmark DAC3B behind and just went with the Yggi+ LIM (my office DAC). I was still getting a hint of hardness in the sound. It was not in the top end but in the lower end. For example, on the Eagles Hotel California the drum hits were sounding too hard (physically irritating). It was not as bad as the DAC3B (also bad on top) but still not perfect. Though I was wondering if I could live with it. It sounded pretty good though not perfect.
The next thing I did was try the Yggi+ in NOS mode. That sounded dull to me, and I dropped that as an option.
Then I thought let’s try the WyWire Platinum speaker cable on the AHB2. On the same Eagles song, the drum hits sounded different but still a bit irritating in a different area of the sound.
This got me thinking that the AHB2 is really revealing deficiencies in my speaker cables and maybe with great cables this setup would work. I so happen to have great cables. I have very short Audience FrontRow speaker cables from years ago that I luckily got low balled when I tried to sell. I bought them to use with my old RAAL SR1a setup, but great speaker cables are no longer needed for the SR1a (new solution available).
I converted the AHB2 to mono and tried only 1 speaker with the FrontRow. Now this is not really an apples-to-apples comparison but the irritation I got from the drum hits totally disappeared. I actually did not want to stop listening even though it was only 1 speaker. It sounded amazing, as good as the CODA #16 with the WyWire cables. Now maybe the CODA #16 with longer FrontRow speaker cables, goes ahead again.
I will be buying a second AHB2 to use with the existing short FrontRow cable. Buying a longer FrontRow is much more expensive than getting a second used AHB2. I will move the CODA #16 to the office LRS+ system.
This was a very satisfying result. A couple of things to note. With the AHB2 I prefer a very quiet preamp such as the Holo Serene or Benchmark LA4. I liked the AHB2 with the CODA 07x preamp (sold) but not as much as the quieter Serene and LA4. The AHB2 in stereo mode is not that loud, there are 3 gain settings on the amp. I tried the lowest and middle settings. Getting AHB2 monos gives 6dB more loudness. I would use monos on the lowest setting, where the amp measures the best. The PlayBack Designs DAC with the AHB2 should be killer with this combo. I was not sure if my personal tastes would match the Dream DAC with the CODA #16.
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Your favorable coment about Krell duo XD made me go for one. Ha Ha I got the hunch that it will work well with Scaena main tower.
It had been 25 years since I used Krell last time.
Krell KSA 150 worked wonder with Apogee Duetta Sig from 1990 to 1999.
But it sounded too bright with Avalon Ascent Mark II.
Since I also have Raal Sr1a, I am curious how Yamaha NS5000 sound.
Could you upload youtube video here like below one?
Thomas |
@shkong78 I do not have anything to record my system with. When I was looking to get the NS5000 it was the worst demo I ever had, but I thought the speaker had potential as I listened to it in near-field almost like headphones. It was not ideal, but I could sense the musicality and coherence of this speaker. I had the worst headache from that demo because the room was terrible. No respect for Yamaha. I emailed some reviewers that had heard the NS5000 and asked them to compare it with some other speakers that I also knew. Even though I had heard it I was not sure if it was great. One reviewer loved it but said they would take the Vivid Kaya 90 over it (a close call). Hearing what I have now with the #16 and AHB2, there is no chance I take the Vivid (which I have heard). Some people told me that the speaker needs to be far from the front wall. A lot of things that I now feel are not correct based on my room’s dimensions. ************************************************** Last year, I sold the best amp for the RAAL SR1a, the RAAL VM-1a. I needed the cash to buy an amp for my Magnepan LRS+ speaker, the Sanders Magtech. It was the right choice to make at that time since I listen more to the LRS+ while I work during the day. This upcoming Sat I get delivery of a replacement VM-1a, this amp is likely the last new RAAL VM-1a available. RAAL will no longer brand it since they are only doing headphones. If you have not done so already buy the RAAL Star8 headphone cable and the Tl-1b or Tl-1c amp interface box. The old box is left in the dust by the new box. The person delivering the VM-1a has an incredible ear and is a former musician and now audio hardware designer. He had come over a few years back and heard my office gear when I had the KRELL i300 integrated amp (the first Duo XD amp), the CODA #8, and AHB2 monos. He hated the AHB2 and loved the KRELL. He was not that enthusiastic about the CODA after hearing the KRELL. We were listening with the SR1a and the old RAAL interface box. The AHB2 are awful with the old box, which is interesting since the Alex the designer in Serbia used the AHB2 to design the SR1a. The KRELL was the best sounding amp I had for the SR1a until the VM-1a came out, then all 2-channel amps were left behind. The new amp interface box I mentioned can bring the 2-channel amps to almost VM-1a levels, which is an amazing achievement. I currently use a $800 Schitt Aegir Class A amp that is 20-watts. The new box allows low wattage amps to work with the SR1a unlike the old interface box that required at least 100 watts and 200-watts being my standard. The CODA #16 is also great with the new interface box, though still not VM-1a level. I have an open offer with a dealer to trade in my CODA #16 for the new KRELL KSA i400 amp + $20k. Now that I have made peace with the AHB2 I am not going to do that. I should add that the SR1a and the NS5000 had some similarity for me. The coherence of the 3 drivers on the NS5000 sounds very much like the SR1a. However, the NS5000 is a bass monster that allows you to physically feel the sound waves hit you. The famous Maxwell poster comes to life in my room.
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