Musical fidelity Nu Vista M3 vs Ayre AX-7e


Dear AGon fellows,

I am going to upgrade my MF M1 DAC/V-Link to Ayre QB-9 24/96 soon. I am currently having Nuvista M3 connected to M1 DAC via unblanced RCAs. As I heard Ayre QB-9 will perform the best only if unblanced XLR is used. So I am not considering let my M3 and get a matching AX-7e. My question is, is it definitely worth doing, please share some of your advices on Ayre vs MF integrated. I know the power handling are totally different, but considering all the factores, which set up can give me the best SQ for classical/jazz music.

Many thanks!
dancingking

Showing 4 responses by bo1972

It depends of your speaker. The have both one thing in common. They both do not have a very deep and wide stage. That is why they are both never gonna get to the Essentials of the absolute sound. They are good, but not exeptional.
I am talking about talents/properties of amps. Every brand and even single unit has it's own properties/talents. Wenn you compared amps, sources, spakers and cables etc for 15 years in hundreds of tests you understand the differences between them. I have own Nu-vista, sold a lot of MF and even done audio shows for MF. I can compare many brands and know exactly the difference between them.
That is true, I am addicted to music and sound since I was 6. But I make a living of it since 15 years. MF is more musical and Ayre has more air in the high freq. A brand like Pass Labs has a much bigger stage. Pass Labs gives you more focus on the instruments. I give you an example; recording of 2 acoustic guitars. a Pass Labs can let you hear eassily the difference in sound. I played for a long time with a modified MF Nu-Vista 300 poweramp. After this I bought a Pass Labs XA100.5 set. This makes you aware of the difference in Stage and in sound. A few months I had Ayre amps to test. Even a presentation of the MX-R with Wilson Audio Alexandria 2 did not convince me. I listend for over 2 hours with my own music. I missed the sound realism. The acoustic guitars sounded almost the same. These days I am a lot further in sound. Because the quality of cables is improving a lot. This gives you new levels in black and in 3-dimensional image.
Sound will Always be a personal taste. But the last time I try to learn people the difference between 2 and 3 dimensional. People understand it very well. And also what it makes listening to music more thrilling and emotional. For classical music the mid freq. are very important. I played and loved classical music a lot with my modified Nu-vista 300 and B&W 800S in the past. With Ayre I did not like the sound for classical music at all.