Solo Diamond Ultra Linear - Oh My God!

No harm at all but some people will immediately assume that I'm off my rocker... I'm generally ignored by people in real life, even when I do have something useful to say, let alone when I suggest something that is difficult to believe.

My perception alone that there seems to be a difference is not satisfactory evidence/proof that this is the truth. This is a test that the individual customer must perform themselves, in the asbence of other people.

I was listening to my Solo ULDE the other day through HD540II, thinking "Wow, this is great. This is how headphones were always meant to sound. This amplifier is certainly a product of excellent judgement." I listened further and was starting to think "This Solo ULDE clearly needs alot more use though because it doesn't yet sound as pure as I think it is capable of... I think Graham would say that the intelligibility of the subtleties needs to be allowed some time to improve from 'cold'." Then I thought "Hang on a minute, will it still sound the same if I start swapping cable directions around?" So I swapped the AC cable around to start with, listened again then thought "Wasn't this more congested before? It sounds pure now (Why?? O_o) but does still need more use to enhance the sound immersion even further."

I'm quite a rational person most of the time so I'm not so sure that I'm imagining this...

As I've said: "We don't see things as they are. We see things as WE are."

The Solo ULDE differs from other amps because of its stability. Many an amplifier designer will push the phase margins to obtain a "wow factor" that is no part of the music - it envelopes it with a false halo (technically referred to as ringing). The Solo ULDE is so stable that little if any halo can exist, so the wow-factor is the music, period.

That is the difference I have been labouring over all these years - to bring out the full performance extremes of the music, whilst adding as little as possible of the artifacts of the electronics doing the job.

OK, some prefer electronic sounds and the market is full of equipment that will do that, often at very high prices to be considered high-end.

To those people my sympathies ... but there is an alternative.

LOINER wrote: Graham nobody is doubting your ability as a designer and yes your equipment does have the WOW factor that's why we are all customers and we have all experienced that WOW factor.What we were discussing was something that even you have admitted is something beyond your control,namely the polarity of the transformer windings and if by turning the plug through 180 degrees gives us a WOW WOW Factor then......