Audia Flight
Pre, The preamplifier from Italy,
Yep, here’s another Audia story … Those of you visiting our website
regularly cannot have missed my Flight One and Flight 50 experiences. Still
waiting for my Flight One to arrive (good things take long), I had to bring home
a preamplifier, while my Krell had found a new owner … I needed a good preamp
to match to my Copland CTA504, because of two reasons: 1) I cannot live a single
day without listening to music and 2) since a few months the AH!
development team is working on a loudspeaker and guess who is one of the people
to be so lucky to evaluate these?
In my Flight One story I mentioned my curiosity about it’s capability to work
as a stand alone pre-amp, and how it reminded me of the period I had the Flight
50 in my system, where the former preamp (KSL2/KPE) probably had restricted the
maximum potential of the Audia power amp. I am sure I am going to experience the
impact of Audia in the front end, while all sonic qualities of my Copland
poweramp are familiar to me. It has no secrets to me anymore, and while waiting
for my new baby (the Flight One, but you already knew that) the time has come to
share some last intimate moments with my old time friend CTA504 … Sad, isn’t
it?
Unpacking was like a “home-match” to me, so the electric screwdriver did
it’s job and out popped the Flight Pre. The AH! Basis Classic
was empty now, and the Audia fitted very nice in the footprints of my former
Krell KSL. I had to make some adjustments to the springsetting of the shelf, but
than it was in complete balance again. Connections were made the same as in my
old “set-up”, but I insisted on changing the AH! KB10 power
chord to the Audia original. Later I will figure out the differences in this
typical context where all power chords are AH!. Warming up (it
already had a little more than 350 hours burning-in) and waking up were done by
a 24 hour period of “CD” burn in stress. Did I ever mention the importance
of the “acclimatizing” of a specific product within an existing system? Oh,
maybe it’s me, going a little to far now, but I am almost sure the sound
improvements you hear the first hours or so, are not completely caused by
warming up. Can’t explain, but it’s instinctively, I guess …
Sunday morning very early, I was ready to feed my 4 year old son. I know how
much he enjoys hearing some music (or TV commercials,
or just noise …) so I put on the new
“Kinderklassiek” CD we bought. (“Kinderklassiek”
is Dutch for “ChildrenClassical Music”) The is a five disc set, containing
classical music specially for children, combined with spoken “tales” and a
very entertaining explanation of the different instruments and their adventures
in an orchestra. Can you imagine? Be sure this daddy had some fun hours
listening to this marvelous discset! So, while not seated in the “sweet
spot”, I constantly had to pay attention to the music and the male voice
telling his nice story. And I had trouble to concentrate on giving my boy his
breakfast! The recording is absolutely no audiophile quality, but the
“whole” was so convincing and easy, even my son forgot to open his mouth,
because he was checking out what was distracting him!
Than it was time to do some serious listening, and
several discs found their way to the Njoe Tjoeb 4000 CD player. The EOX Guitar
quartet (Divox) 4 seasons … disc is one of my “2die4” discs, and with the
first notes it became obvious there was some magic going on here. The Flight
preamp and the Copland matched so well, I was hearing a whole new CTA504 here
… Before, I noticed this preamp to work very well with different poweramps
(even to digital class D power amps), which is a very good property for a
control amplifier. It integrates very easily and I can only describe it as
“the absolute connection”. When there is a power amp it will not team up
with, let me know. There is none yet I know of …
My description of stagewidth in the Flight 50 review is about to repeated here
… Feels exactly the same. Very broad but not “unnatural” larger than real
life. The placement of the four guitar players in the studio was so convincing
and realistic, reminding me a Lumen White / Conrad Johnson demonstration we used
to have at our shop. That specific demo still is in my “Top 5” BEST demos of
all time! The Lumen White “White Light” outperforms ANY loudspeaker I know
of (oops …) and I hope to find time to wire it up to the “big Audia”
system in the near future … Anyway, hearing this EOX performance in my
personal environment is a very special event, since it was certain the mentioned
Conrad Johnson / Lumen White performance was not going to be repeated, ever! But
now a part of this history is repeated! But not only the “stereo
performance”, also the sheer musicality. Limitless speed and transparency.
What I hear right now is only to be improved by pre-amps costing at least 3
times as much. I really love acoustical guitar music. And I think I know how it
sounds. What I don’t know is how this recording was made, but it is very, very
close to what I know from real life … Including the acoustical space around
and above the four guitarists. I “feel” the resonances and the vibes of the
strings. Every single note, every single bow and every single detail is
presented with so much realism, I just wanted to put this particular CD on
repeat and listen to it all day!
But there were so many CD’s waiting for a play, I had to
move on. I grabbed my Conjunto Ibérico cello octet “Glass reflections” CD
(Et’cetera, KTC1258, highly recommended!) and gave it a spin. This
“minimalist” music is performed “at the max”; so overwhelmingly
beautiful. It was recorded in a church in Amsterdam and is registered with lots
of space. The recording itself is detailed, alive and full colored. Every single
cello is placed within reasonable proportions and the musical interaction
between the celli is perfectly captured.
When listening to it on several systems in the shop during
the past 3 weeks, I gained enough information about its quality to already use
it as a reference CD. Not smart, because the music is so beautiful, I have
trouble concentrating on “analytical” listening. But hey: it’s about the
musicality and the fidelity, sounding as real as possible. And it is … My
former preamp kind of messed it up. All those celli playing together, resonating
and vibrating real low notes into the room, the KSL2 just lost control. So at
first I took it for granted and blamed the recording quality. Several amplifiers
in the shop showed the same “problematic” loss of control. But not the
Flight Pre. It remained to sound clean, open and controlled even in the most
hectic moments and never was “in the way” of the musical message! Human
flesh and warmth were presented horrifying realistic. The choir singing on this
CD existing of seven singers, almost showed human beings present in my room …
Only had to open my eyes to convince myself I was listening to a hifi system …
Okay, I am a little over the top here. But simply no other personal system I
owned ever made me feel like this. Of course it is not only the preamp
responsible for this close encounter; the prototype loudspeakers are doing a
terrific job! And these are also in no way comparable to any loudspeaker I still
own, or used to own, period! It’s good that Herman’s good old friend
Mark Levinson is still alive, otherwise he would for sure turn in his grave …
Why? (A)HAH! Just wait, see and listen …
I cannot say too much about the AH!
prototype loudspeakers yet (but soon will), but it has an extended bandwidth and
I am allowed to use it without my “super tweeters”. I am sure it has
something to do with what is happening here …
One thing is sure; I am NOT going to take the Flight 50 and the Flight
Pre to set up together in my private rig, because it will probably bring me
(financial) problems. And I strongly believe the Flight One has certain
advantages and properties not going to be found in the pre/power combo. But if
you might want to know what the Pre can do for you; you will not believe your
ears. Even if you don’t own a 50 or a 100. Highly recommended and I know
that’s a cliché. But I can live with cliché’s. Can you?
Audia Flight Pre in Silver and Black, € 4225,-
(and I dare to add: only!)
Ps Klik hier
voor de website van Audia.