Ayre "MP" upgrade

[BobM]

I just picked up an Ayre CX7e and am considering getting the "MP" upgrade. Ayre is backed up until the end of the year with this upgrade, but they say they have performed about 400 so far on the CX7 and CX5 units. There should be at least a few people around who can report on the effect of the change from first hand knowledge.

There have been a couple of posts on other forums (Audiogon & Audio Asylum) with some preliminary reviews of the differences/improvements, but it sounds like this mod makes a substantial difference in the overall presentation of the unit. Now I like what I am hearing currently, so I'm truly wondering if the mod is an "improvement" or a "difference", and in what way.

If anyone here has any experinec with this unit or the mod, please chime in. Or if you come across any future articles or discussion threads please link to them here.

Thanks,
Bob

[mgalusha]

I heard this at the Ayre factory a few months back. If I owned one of their players I'd opt for the upgrade. IMO it was a substantial improvement. More analog/natural sounding. The engineer providing the technical description said it's an adaptation of the apodizing (sp?) filter and removes all the pre-ringing that normally occurs. The new Meridian stuff has this as well but Ayre wanted to get rid of the post ringing as well. Supposedly their version of the filter removes all the pre ringing and has only 1 cycle of post ringing. There were perhaps 20 folks in the room and I doubt any of them didn't hear the improvement.

[bpape]

I was reading the article this month about the Meridian.  Sounded very interesting.  Never thought about it quite that way I guess. 

Having not heard this latest 'breakthrough', hard to say how much it's a 'must have' - but I trust Mike's ears.

Bryan

[BobM]

Thanks Mike. It's good to know someone who has actually heard it and compared it to the pre-MP version. The thread over at Audio Asylum seems to say that he is now turning the music up louder, possibly because the details seem to be more organic and integrated with the music, and less in your face than on most digital. It seems that the pre pulse ringing introduces and artificial emphasis to a note that we all have interpreted as increased detail, but it's actually an artifact. At least that's the way I interpret it from his posting.

Maybe that's why NOS DAC's and tubed DAC's are so popular. Compared to an oversampling DAC, which may emphasize this leading edge transient, they may "smear" it a little bit and bring the note back closer to its original organic form. This is total speculation on my part and has no basis in scientific knowledge.

Does this sound reasonable?

[bpape]

The first part of what you posted seems to very closely echo what the description of the sound was in the Meridian review.

Bryan

[mgalusha]

Maybe that's why NOS DAC's and tubed DAC's are so popular. Compared to an oversampling DAC, which may emphasize this leading edge transient, they may "smear" it a little bit and bring the note back closer to its original organic form. This is total speculation on my part and has no basis in scientific knowledge.

The Ayre engineer talked about NOS DAC's and IIRC they have either little or no pre ringing. They chose not to go that route because they were unhappy with the low frequency performance. He brought up the point that in nature, there is no sound before it occurs, unfortunately that is exactly what the pre ringing in digital is, there is a small bit of the sound before it's supposed to occur which is clearly unnatural. Removing it let digital reproduction sound much more natural and IMO the high bit 24/96 through the new filter was stellar. Good enough that buying their new USB DAC is a distinct possibility in my world. They demoed the prototype and it was at least as good as the disc player and they indicated that when it was done it may very well be better. Very cool.

[BobM]

See, I think that's where I'm a little worried about this upgrade, until I hear a bit more feedback from people who have gotten it done already. I'm not very fond of the sound of NOS DAC's, since I feel they do not have the crispness, nor the dynamics, nor the bass response of a non-NOS DAC.

I am very fond of good vinyl, which has all of that good stuff. Damn, if I get this mod and I can't differentiate between it and my vinyl rig I may have to take up another hobby (not likely).

Maybe I could become a Red Hat (oooooh, Baby!!!)

[mgalusha]

See, I think that's where I'm a little worried about this upgrade, until I hear a bit more feedback from people who have gotten it done already. I'm not very fond of the sound of NOS DAC's, since I feel they do not have the crispness, nor the dynamics, nor the bass response of a non-NOS DAC.

Yep, that was the reason they didn't go with a NOS DAC, too many other things had to be compromised IIRC. The white paper on the MP filter on their site is pretty informative but of course doesn't answer everything.

[Carlman]

Sounds like they understand and have identified 'digititis'.. kudos for figuring out how to solve it.  I can't wait to hear the USB DAC.

[ToddC]

I've had the new Ayre QB-9 USB DAC (with MP filter) for a little bit over a week.  It's still breaking in, but already the improvement over my old Benchmark DAC 1 is quite significant.  Bass is much deeper and stronger, imaging is more solid and best of all, the audible digital harshness  is 95% reduced. The soundstage and dynamics are not as good as my analog setup (VPI Classic/Benz Ruby 3/Simaudio LP5.3), but I would still consider those attributes quite exceptional for digital.   It seems like the MP filter has given it a very lush, musical and non-fatiguing presentation, which I like.