Ross - you cannot believe how much improved the Odin 2’s are from the 1’s let alone comparing them to Valhalla 2’s. I only ventured with Odin 2’s AES/EBU’s on AES 1 & 2 on dCS Rossini CD/SACD Transport to the Rossini APEX DAC for an astronomical $28K.
These were burned in on a Nordost Vidar for a week and once in place on the dCS, they strutted their prowess immediately & significantly noticeable.
They thew out a wider soundstage, the bass was tauter, richer harmonics, the interpretation of sensing real instruments, the silence was blacker than I knew possible. Soaring dynamics with immediate impact, and unbelievable surgical scalpel sharp focus of the details in all sonic effects.
They are so good; it pains me that I believe it’s best I stop there – it’s fall time and the tree is bare.
I believe you that the improvement is big, and I am glad you enjoy it so much…But, don’t you think that buying a Vivaldi dac and Upsampler would have improved the sound way better than a set of cables, even the best set of cables ? Did you discuss that possibility with your local dealer ?
Definitely as there is more gained with the Vivaldi Upsampler and DAC than the cables. However, it must be noted, I’ve ordered the Vivaldi Upsampler, APEX DAC & Clock from my dealer and have my Rossini APEX DAC & Clock for sale. I intend to buy 3 more Odin 2 AES/EBU Cables and 2 more Valhalla 2 75 ohm clock cables. I’ll keep my Rossini CD/SACD Transport simply because it has the newer/available D&M mechanism rather going to a Vivaldi Transport sporting a mechanism that is in short or could be in short supply in the future.
My inference of stopping with that one Odin 2 AES/EBU meant that I’ll probably never go beyond adding Odin 2’s such as XLR’s, Speaker & Power Cables.
Traded my Bartok for a Rossini Apex + Clock a wee while ago, had home loans of a Bartok Apex and Rossini, felt the Rossini Apex was the best vfm upgrade. The day I went to collect it a Clock was traded in so snapped it up straight away.
I feel like one of the biggest differences I made when i went to Valhalla 2 was the Speaker wire and the Power Cord to the DAC. I might think about changing the power cord to the DAC if you wanted to add just one more cable. Also in the hierarchy of cables, Power cords seem to be the “cheapest”
Aargh, just missed out on a Vivaldi Upsampler that I wanted to buy while I was moving some funds around to be able to make the purchase. Was a really good deal at the music room. Well I guess I just have to bide my time until another good deal comes up.
You’re absolutely correct on that - a 1M Odin 2 speaker cable is nearing $40K USD, a 2M Odin 2 speaker cable is a staggering $50,159.99 and a 3M is $60,719.99.
Nothing quite like them to our ears, bought 6 years ago after comparing to a number of well reviewed competitors. The only speaker that came close for me were Wilsons but the Mrs preferred the Logans. Hey Now by London Grammer sounded fabulous and more or less had us decided, air, space, texture, soundstage were better than anything else we’d heard. If/when I change speakers the ML 15a are top of the list to demo along with a pair of big Maggies.
I’m a big fan of soundstage, imaging and detail - what used to be called Round Earth when I was a kid. I had read about folk not getting on with Logans as they could detect a “gap” between the bass and mid/treble, I believe this generation of MLs has that sorted. The Anthem ARC EQ works really well and allowed me to move on my Lyngdorf amps so I could scratch a big Japanese Class A amp and not worry about room issues.
Had a few demo’s of amps recently and am struggling to find one that I prefer driving Logans to my 590AXII so for now I’ll sit back and enjoy this stage of the system.
ML lover over here too, ML Spires -depending on mood and music in combination with Rel sub- driven by Audio Research Ref 160S (dCs Vivaldi Apex direct).
I can wholeheartedly recommend ML combined with a high quality tube stage.
Hadn’t considered a valve amp with my MLs, at the moment the D’Agostino integrated is in the running, had second demo of it, same everything bar the rack, first time it was on a solid steel rack and we were a bit underwhelmed, second time it was on a Quadraspire X-Ref and sounded quite a lot better, especially the lower end - deeper and texture that wasn’t there in the first demo.
I’ll have a word with my dealer about what valve amps they carry.
Hi Angus, Electrostatics like voltage whereas dynamic speakers like current. This is of course a bit of generalisation but like most generalisations there is a lot of truth in it. Tubes are good at producing voltage whereas transistors are good at producing current. This is another generalisation but there is probably even more truth in that one. There are very few transistors that exhibit genuinely “valve-like” behaviour. If you look at the aftermarket and DIY market for Stax headphone amps for example you will see that most of the upper end units are valve-based, at the very highest end it is all valves.
So I would strongly recommend trying some good valve amps with your Logans. Any of the better brands such as Audio Research, VTL, Lamm etc should be an excellent match.
I believe Mjölnir (and, by association, Gilmore) use MOSFETs for their Stax amps, which is an alternative voltage-based solution. That said, one day in the not too distant future, I’d like to get my hands on a replica T2…
As a previous owner of Stax SR-009S and now SR-X9000, I have to admit I’m really intrigued by this option. While the SR-009’s were a little clinical, the SR-X9000’s are sublime.
I would love to compare your choice of electrostatics with something in the Wilson range (and compare both with my experience of the Meridian DSP8000XE’s).
I’ll stick with Odin 1’s.
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