Nailed it.

mcrushing · 839

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Offline mcrushing

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on: March 02, 2022, 03:57:33 PM
Attached is a shot of my 6AS7G making music.

Just a note to thank everybody - especially "the Pauls," Birkeland and Joppa, and of course Doc - who chimed in on my posts here as I worked my way through my first-ever electronics build. (Still gotta finish the base, but...)

I'm sure some of my solder joints would get scoffs, but late last night I got through the resistance and voltage checks with only one hiccup, Terminal 22, which from the search results seems to be a tricky one for a lot of people. (It was reading 1.6 ohms, but after reading a few threads I re-crimped and re-soldered Terminal 12, muscled down the transformer bolts a bit, and sure enough 22 read safe n sane 0.3).

This thing sounds great, you guys.

There's space, separation, touch and texture. I stayed up late last night just buzzing through a universe of different material via Roon - Jazz to soul to hip hop to psych rock. Miles to Aretha to Talk Talk to Tinariwen to the Violent Femmes. If I *had* to pick nits, maybe rock mixes get a bit squashed when the amp drives a big crescendo through the cans. (Something I imagine the speedball tackles, standby for an order.) And this is from a laptop plugged into a monitor plugged into a Meridian dongle dac. Soon the amp will move into the big rack - with cleaner power, better cables and semi-serious analog gear upstream.

But right now, Coltrane's Ole is coming through my 6xx's and I'm marveling at the shifting textures as Art Davis and Reggie Workman both play bass on the title track. If you don't know the piece, it's unique in that you've got two big double basses trading plucked and bowed phrases back and forth. So you've got the tone of each instrument, the rosin-y drone of the bows, the fleshy attack and woody, harmonic decay of the plucked notes... and I'm hearing a completely distinct tone and style from each bass - and bassist.

When a piece of gear can illuminate not just the sense of an instrument, but a sense of what that instrument is made of and a sense of an actual human being playing it -- Hifi doesn't get much better.

I'm going to hit "post" before I give myself a chance to stop and think over the fact that this thing is a sub $450 kit that can be assembled by a total noob. It doesn't matter: The Crack delivers the goods.

Cheers, Bottlehead folks. I'm converted.



Offline Mucker

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Reply #1 on: March 02, 2022, 08:01:38 PM
Looks great! To say the Crack is legendary is an understatement.

My 3 favorite headphone amplifiers are:

Bottlehead Crack with Speedball
Bottlehead S3X with C4S
Woo Audio WA2

I listen to alot of vinyl with tube phono pre's into those amps and it's still amazing after many years. I also run some high resolving SS DAC's and amps, but the tube audio is what I enjoy the most.

Congrats on your build and enjoy!



Offline Paul Birkeland

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Reply #2 on: March 03, 2022, 04:45:25 AM
Awesome!

Paul "PB" Birkeland

Bottlehead Grunt & The Repro Man


Offline Doc B.

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Reply #3 on: March 03, 2022, 04:54:58 AM
Thanks so much for the kind words!

Dan "Doc B." Schmalle
President For Life
Bottlehead Corp.


Offline Natural Sound

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Reply #4 on: March 03, 2022, 05:26:52 AM
Good Job! The crack amp is a very special amplifier. I listen to mine almost every day. It has been instrumental in getting me through the isolation of the COVID-19 crisis.

If you haven't done so, allow the 6xx and the tubes some break in time before any critical listening. The general and rather subjective rule of thumb is around 100 hrs. The amp/headphone combo usually sounds good "out of the box" but like a fine wine gets better with age. Enjoy.



Offline Karl5150

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Reply #5 on: March 03, 2022, 10:20:04 AM
Looks like a very nice finish, enjoy.
Karl

Karl
Downstairs: Planar3>PH-16>Stereomour II>OB Betsy+
Upstairs: RP1>Eros/CD5004>Seductor (2x Monoblocks)>FH3
Office: Modi Uber 2/Sirius>SEX2.1.1>µFonken FF85WK + DC160 subs
BR: FiiO M6>SEX3.0.1>ScanSpeak 10F + TangBand W6 (Mono)/DT770Pro
Garage: X12 streamer>Quicksand>Minimus 77


Offline Deluk

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Reply #6 on: March 04, 2022, 04:32:28 AM
The Loudness Wars, especially with rock music is the main reason you are finding the crescendos are compressed and blurred. The equipment you are using can't do much about that. Often it just accentuates it.



Offline Natural Sound

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Reply #7 on: March 04, 2022, 10:31:55 AM
The Loudness Wars, especially with rock music is the main reason you are finding the crescendos are compressed and blurred. The equipment you are using can't do much about that. Often it just accentuates it.

That's sadly true. By making recordings louder they crushed the dynamic range. Such a shame really.



Offline audioguy

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Reply #8 on: March 15, 2022, 05:51:58 PM
This is true. It's why I have turned mostly to unplugged versions of rock/alt, and enjoy my classical/jazz or older remasters the best.