catscratch

Tripel Karmeliet. All the TK I've found locally up till now has been in green bottles - it's skunked well before it hits the shelf. But this was fresh on tap, and man, it's good. Quite a spicy and multi-layered tripel. Rochefort 10 not long before.

My impressions are generally concurrent with the general opinion of this thread. "Unforced and natural" I think is right on the money. It's not without flaws but on its own, it is a very enjoyable and musical sounding DAC. It draws you into the music rather than making you sit and take notice of what's wrong with its presentation, and that is always a sign of a good source. In terms of tonal balance, I find the mids a bit emphasized and both deep bass and upper highs a bit rolled off. The mids in general are what stand out here: very open, clear, warmish though not quite warm, with good texture and generally a high degree of realism/believability. Throw in the soundstage, which is fairly big, open, and airy, and you have a very inviting and natural presentation with a clear focus on vocals and midrange-heavy instruments. The highs are smooth and precise without harshness, digital glare, or artificial sheen, though they can also lack sparkle at times. The bass is pretty even, without excessive bloom or boominess but it could also use a bit more depth and heft. I don't have much experience with DACs in the price range and don't have too many other sources lying around at the moment. The only thing I can really compare this DAC to is the Opus 21, which is more than twice as expensive. The Opus is also a source that's generally considered to sound analog and is praised for natural detail without harshness, and the two sources unsurprisingly sound similar. The main edge for the Opus is extra detail, better dynamics, better performance at the frequency extremes and significantly more heft and weight to the sound. Tonally, the Opus is a touch warmer but both sources are pretty close to neutral. The Opus has more focused imaging but the D100 is a bit more airy and open sounding, though having less emphasized deep bass will (I think) generally make things sound a bit more open on first listen. The D100 also has smoother highs and seems to be a little bit cleaner sounding in general, though maybe the Opus just makes background noise on recordings more evident. Either way, the most immediate impression when listening to the D100 is openness, midrange clarity, and natural tonality, whereas with the Opus the impression is of great resolution across the board, natural tonality and effortless dynamics. I think it's safe to say that while the Opus is the better source the D100 comes close and is something I could easily live with. I had an Assemblage 2.7 DAC here for a while and going from memory, I'd give the Assemblage the edge in overall tonal balance, but the Neko is more open and airy and has the better mids. I'll probably sell mine at some point given that I don't really need it, but it's a very good source in my book. It's a somewhat specialized presentation but one I like a lot. If you have a system that could use a touch more midrange emphasis it will probably be a good match.

I have a similar, simpler setup - logitech g27, ps3, gt5. Wish I had more time to play it though. More Zonda R goodness: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4egoNtLNX6M http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEz1jxIgmsM&feature=related Jay Leno's Garage also had a few videos on it and the new Huayra - the build quality on these cars looks absolutely stunning. It's definitely a handful but I also suck. Best time around Laguna Seca on racing hard tires is 1:23.9 (no electronic aids used). Don't remember the time on soft tires but it was faster. There's a ton of room for improvement still. I'm also a fan of the Mazda Furai; I really didn't expect it to be as fast as it is, but I suppose if you shove a turbo three-rotor into a chassis that weighs less than 1500lbs it's gonna go. The chassis is very well-behaved, too. I think I did 1:08.something on the top gear track, though I don't remember the tires I used. Of course nothing in the game is as insane, stupid, and wonderful as the Red Bull X1. Now if only it was real... 0:46.7 around laguna seca?

Superb article Tyll, though it's helping my decision to hold off on the 009 one bit. I also like how you can sum up these headphones so concisely without resorting to the usual audiophile blather. If only more reviews followed that style instead of going the Gary Farmer route - "he who talks loud, saying nothing" (one of my favorite movies, incidentally).

My problem with the 007, if there even is one, is that it's too laid-back. With sources that are too polite it's easy to make a rig that sounds distant and dull. But with bolder, ballsier sources it's more engaging, though I would still prefer a more forward sound. On the other hand I find the tonal balance near perfect and anything substantially brighter would be an issue. All joking aside I listen fairly loudly but nowhere near rock concert levels; those I can't ever go to without earplugs. A headphone without treble/bass emphasis does sound more linear the louder you push it, and the 007 does open up more and more as you crank it up.

Heh that's exactly my take on them - the ultimate Grado. Uber forward but with the right tonal balance and some killer mids. I just wish they were more comfortable - or maybe less comfortable just to make the fit even more comical. Some long-winded impressions coming at some point in the Stax thread.

I'm with Spritzer on the whole brightness thing - I find the 007 to be just right and most headphones too bright. On the other hand I also find the 007 to be far too polite and laid-back; with polite sources especially it can sound remote and not very engaging. What I would want is tonal balance that's not far off the 007 but with a way more forward overall presentation. Incidentally, sort of like the SR-X Mk3 Pro that I've been listening to for a while (which are great cans) or the 003, which is even warmer than the 007 if anything. I can see the brightness thing being a problem with rock or metal, but even more a problem with volume - I'm guessing it's the Fletcher-Munson effect or whatever you call it, and as someone with a penchant for listening to electronica at unreasonable levels, extra brightness is a big turn-off. I probably wouldn't mind an uber-revealing headphone given that electronica, or at the very least the psychill-ish stuff I listen to is usually at least decently produced. The bigger issue I have is forking out 5 large for a headphone that may not necessarily be better than my $1.5k 007, but then again we all left reason behind in this hobby a long time ago.

Definitely any Elder Scrolls game. Ditto on Deus Ex - I don't know how many times I replayed it, but it was a lot. Atmospheric single-player games like that are always enjoyable to replay as long as you give them enough time to not make them feel repetitive. I'd add to that Thief 1 and 2, as well as System Shock 2; they're not quite as polished as Deus Ex but even more atmospheric if anything. I also really liked Gothic 1 and 2. I never played 3 or 4 but the combination of atmosphere, great world-building, interesting and actually intelligent dialogue, and unpredictable story (at least in the first game) really carried these games despite the endless bugs and clunky controls. Of course, Heroes of Might and Magic 3 is still the biggest time-waster known to man. "Addicting" doesn't even begin to describe it. Too bad that the sequels sucked (well 4 was ok). I have little hope for the latest version, whenever that comes out.

I liked it when I watched it but not enough of it sticks out in my mind afterwards. The Marauder bit was amazing and the Rowan Atkinson interview was heroic. The rest was nice but a bit uninspired. I do like that the guys are acting more themselves rather than the silly stereotypes they were becoming in 12-14. Top Gear was my favorite show too but I was just about fed up and ready to jump ship. Also: am kinda annoyed at the treatment the Oz & James shows are getting from BBC America. It's nice that they're showing them but these shows are Oz and James, not just James. They're undermining Oz to capitalize on James' celebrity. Typical arrogant market-driven attitude.

Happy (belated) birthday man. I don't believe in birthdays, especially my own, but I'll pretend they exist just this once.

Not a bad chug. The record for 1 liter of beer is 1.3 seconds however, held by this man:

A sizable tree missed our house by a few yards, and we won't have power for a while. Otherwise it's all fine. Power outage mostly seems confined to our development.

Got a fairly mild shake (NJ), nothing serious. I hope this isn't what Obama meant when he said he wanted to shake things up in Washington.

I kinda wrote off Melechesh after Sphynx; there were some great tracks on that disk but on the whole it felt like Melechesh really didn't have the songwriting sophistication to pull off what they wanted to do. So, I kinda forgot about them for a while. Well, they learned. I don't know if this is necessarily a brilliant album but there certainly is nothing quite like them these days. Totally distinctive black thrash (I guess that's the closest genre equivalent) with middle eastern melody woven into the riffs themselves; in fact this is modal music and if I remembered any music theory at all I could probably guess as to what mode it's in. Regardless, Melechesh does for black metal what Nile did for death metal, except that they still have the freshness and originality that Nile has recently lacked. They also have a lot of class - something in which most metal was always found wanting. Been kinda in a metal phase lately so there are a few recent additions.

Hopefully they don't do the typical Russian customs thing, which is to take your items hostage and demand a bribe to let them through. Always fun, shipping things to Russia.

First impressions: wow, what an analog-sounding DAC! Warm(ish), full, smooth. Kinda reminds me of the Rega sound, maybe a tad warmer and not quite as dynamic but the overall feel is similar. More detailed impressions to come soon.

Finished A Dance with Dragons. It's pretty much book 4, part 2. Compared to the first 3 GRRM got a bit better at describing internal monologue and his prose remains accomplished as ever, but in terms of plotting aDwD is pretty fail. It does pick up towards the end, but only just, and ends, unsurprisingly, on a cliffhanger. The series is badly in need of a good editor, and although there still are occasional flashes of brilliance the inspiration has definitely gone out of the books, and it feels like GRRM really has no idea where he's going with the story nor how to resolve the myriad subplots that he's dragged his characters into. Atmospherically successful; story-wise, a mess.

Both episodes were pretty solid so far.

I agree that the LoTR movies were weak. IMO it's not so much that the source material is unfilmable (I think it's borderline) but Peter Jackson is an overrated hack. He turned LoTR into essentially a bunch of Hollywood parlor tricks for the lowest common denominator. That might work in a horror B-movie but not in this.

K340 also had pretty bad reverb issues. Very echoey and colored sound in general. Not that I mind, it's still one of my favorite headphones.

Pretty much this. DT770s are certainly far from terrible but also far from great. I use mine mostly for gaming. They're amazingly comfortable and the isolation is good. Build quality is fairly tanklike but mine did develop a rattle in the left driver over time, and this is not an isolated incident. The bass is overblown but fairly well controlled. The mids actually have nice tone but are recessed overall. Highs are bit harsh and overemphasized but not as badly as some. Resolution isn't bad for a dynamic I guess, and they do sound spacious for closed headphones. Aside from not being very linear and a little harsh up top they don't sound that bad to me, at least as far as closed dynamics go. Certainly better than Ultrasones but that isn't very hard.

What? Top Gear fabricated? No! (insert sarcastic shocked expression here) Considering TG's apparent pro-British anti-everything else bias (especially anti-American) and penchant for fabricating, well, just about anything, it was only a matter of time. However in the interest of free speech I will side with TG on this. People should know better than to take them seriously. Plus as the article said, it stinks more of a PR move on Tesla's part. I think the whole Hawk Stratos debacle was far more telling of how TG operates (from what I've gathered, they instructed the Stig to spin the car twice and recover on the timed lap, plus there's a strong possibility that they intentionally sabotaged the car's brakes and generally portrayed it as a bucket of bolts built in a shack when really it wasn't. Of course the difference here is, Hawk was a small-scale manufacturer that got more sales and publicity from TG whereas Tesla may very well have lost money). To me the current Top Gear is like an old annoying but somehow lovable dog. It shits on your carpet and doesn't remember its own name anymore but somehow you can't get (too) mad at it.

Gah this is what I get for not having internet... but I would have backed out anyway. I'll pick one up later. Very much looking forward to impressions.

$4725 isn't enough savings to jump on it right away. If the price was better I'd say go for it but right now it makes sense to wait. Especially since this is not - as I understand - a limited edition headphone.

If it's less than $4k I may be in too. I'll have to check and get back to you.