2. amps-preamps
  3. 165274-130

Are these exceptionally well recorded, or what?

I don’t know what just happened. My system suddenly started to sound much, much better. Particularly on the last three Qobuz hi-Rez downloads. What happened? The last change in my system was two months ago—added the new Bel Canto PRE5 preamp. It sounded great right from the start, and I probably have 120-150 hours on it. Can it have “snapped in” all of a sudden?  Is my power suddenly cleaner? Or did I stumble on three exceptionally well-recorded albums.  I’ll listen to my old standard references, but in the meantime, I’d like you opinion of these three:

Marie Stockman Becker: JS Bach Sonatas for Viola (on this album I can distinguish between filters on my Cambridge 851N, for the first time).

Veronica Swift: This Better Earth (opening song—she’s right there in the room)

Rattle and the LSO: Rachmaninoff 2nd (best sound staging I’ve heard on this system).

whattya think?
tomaswv
Post removed 
lalitk's avatar
lalitk
5,053 posts
 
@tomaswv,

How many hours do you have now on BC Preamp? Typically preamp has 200-300 hours break-in period.

As far recording goes, Veronica Swift’s ‘This Better Earth’ is one of my favorite song.....so I concur she is right there in the room and how about the piano, beautifully rendered just like her haunting voice.

Qobuz has exceptional SQ, downloads or streaming. Enjoy!
tomaswv OP
205 posts
 
Possibly 200 hours, so it could be coming in to its own. 
erik_squires
15,630 posts
 
If your amps are class D, it takes about that long for them to warm up.  If you normally turn them off overnight but started leaving them on overnight this can happen.
tomaswv OP
205 posts
 
They are class D (Bel Canto ref500m) and I do leave them on all the time. But they were off quite a while when I installed the preamp and reconfigured my cables. 
More to discover