The moment you have all been waiting for is drawing closer! (what's he babbling about now???) so pull your chairs closer to the fire and tales of the weird and wonderful will soon be told. To keep you in thrall, I'll pass around trays of "amuses gueules" (appetisers) and bottles of your favourite mind-altering liquids.
Reading here and there about Ice-module amps, I have been getting enthusiastic about my soon-to-arrive amp. Anyone read about the Wyred amp on 6 Moons? Well what I'm getting is going to be of that ilk. The difference being that it is an integrated, with a passive pot in front and of course M. Mardis magic applied here and there. For those of you coming in late, this will be a special order version of an amp now being sold by AudioMagus, the Aeolus. I started this epic voyage with a modified Trend (the little fellow), which proved to be woefully underpowered for my none-too-efficient Transmission Lines.The result of that was not very happy. When pushed, the Tripath amps shout unpleasantly, so I was looking for more power, more headroom, more everything (and as little expense as possible). According to M. this could well be the end of my neurotic longings. I haven't a clue what an Ice-module based amp sounds like so this will be an adventure in more ways than one. A slight caveat is on order. For those of you with experience with passive front ends, you will know that the options are well-understood and fairly limited. The bottom of the list being your standard (Alps etc.) pot and the top being hand built resistor-based ones. The latter must needs be very carefully assembled and mechanically top notch. The sound will be determined by the quality of the resistors. There are only a handful of names here to chose from; Vishay, Shinko, caddock being the best-known. Mine is Vishay-based. This is not necessarily the "best" (in my experience Shinko is or at least was when last I had the means to hear the dif.), but Vishay is a known very reliable standard. Re-reading the review of the Wyred amps I have a feeling this is going to be a very nice amp indeed and knowing M. Mardis long experience with tweaking; his extensive knowledge of capacitors and their flavours, I have no doubt this rather bizarre and long-running saga will have a happy end. More pizza anyone? It's going to be a long night...
