It was brand new at first, but loosened up dramatically after a couple hours. It has a big clear, relaxed presentation, tonally balanced, ballsy firm bass, clear mids and highs, no noticeable distortion at all on the highs. It is the only SS amp I've heard to be totally free of treble artifacts, but the oversampling Oracle DAC has a slightly aggressive signature sound that is easily hear through any amp, so I look forward to giving the LFD a thorough audition on the Ushers to know for sure that the highs are as good as it seems. No doubt the amp will continue to get better for a few more hours.
But the best part about the amp is not the sound. It's the feeling. The music comes alive, there's a real person playing the music, the intent of the composer, the feeling of the performer are much more easily felt, than on the comparison amps last night, Belles 30W classA and Manley Neo 300B 22W classA. The LFD has a feeling of being a solid chunk or iron, so balanced and truthful, the others have obvious personalities that sound like amps.
The LFD is less resolving than the Belles, and less warm than the 300Bs. More dynamic than both. But within a minute to adjust to the swap to LFD, the focus on the music becomes more intense, relaxation into the music is easy and fast. The other two take 30 minutes to get to temp before they relax and do their best. The LFD has the basic sonic character in place from first turn on, but it does improve some when warmed up. But all of that is during break in, so who knows. The LFD gives a very real, palpable, organic, dense tone feeling. Combined with great midbass detail it is very satisfying the listen to. That's probably the overlying impression, satisfying.
All three amps sounded good on the Harbeths, they make anything sound good. But the more powerful LFD took better control of the bass, while not emphasizing it as did Belles. The 300Bs sound a lot better on my easier Ushers than on the Harbeths due to the power limitations. But Ushers are very demanding of amps, but 300Bs might be overkill in the love department, so the LFD is intriguing to me. I hope it sounds as good when the Ushers drop its drawers. Still, $7,500 is out of my budget. Intro price is $6k. It's probably worth it, time will tell. But no remote is a deal breaker for some people. Logic level electronics seem to be the weakness of so many analog genius designers. It is a completely different discipline, but more necessary now than ever.
Hmmmm what else? It is small, like a 75W integrated! Euro hifi all the way. Nice build quality, beautiful dark gray color with a touch of brown in it, or olive. Very pretty. Knobs feel nice. Stays cool. Inputs and speaker posts are jammed close together, but I don't think there was much trouble using them.
