TRL Marantz Sa-14

Commonalities:

Air between instruments
Lack of harshness
Soundstage depth especially good on both
Instrument placement is excellent
Recording venue is heard (room reverb quality)
Smoothness
Acoustic instruments esp. horns and bass sound real
Engaging and involving, but not overly lush or rolled off

Differences:

More bass extension and depth on SA14 (The SA14 has incredibly musical deep bass)
More detail on SA14
Still something about a great LP that is magical that is different than digital
The SA14 is still breaking in (350 hours) so I am still assessing, but some recordings have some digital sound still. None of my LP's really sound edgy-even the ones that used digital recording process (i.e.Donald Fagen, Talking Heads).

Of course, CD's and SACD's are uniformly clean and without ticks and pops; but that is part of the LP experience I don't mind really.

Just talking out loud here. I really am very very pleased with both. Listening to music is a real treat these days.

Hello everyone,

Just back from vacation and now have my Marantz SA-14 back from TRL. Will hook it up later tonight or sometime tomorrow and will report back my initial impressions.

Jack

Hi,

LKdog, thanks for sharing your impressions on the differences. I just heard the Marantz SA-1 player side by side comparison to a Technics table (highly modified) and great LP playback system. Vinyl rules and the difference in this system is a 'character' that digital has yet to achieve and may not achieve. Sacd does this character at the surface level but the intrinsic 'character' is deep within the music itself. The LP seems to grab this by the throat.

The Marantz player is very impressive indeed. Sacd playback was outstanding and cd's had lots of bounce in the midrange but sacd just trounces it in the lower midrange and very top end areas. The LP just elevates all aspects of music beyond sacd. They each satify on different levels however and I can live with the Marantz or LP since they both make it easy.

This is just my observation on comparing the experience of the two mediums.

La45- Yes, the mediums are different for sure. My Technics has the KAB modified arm with the trough/paddle thing to address the alleged tonearm refinement complaints. The Hagerman Cornet tube phono stage was a revelation when I added that. Wonderful piece of gear. The Dyna 10X5 moving coil is sweet. Very satisfying to me, although quite modest setup.

I love both mediums, but sometimes that character thing you talk about can only be satisfied with a great LP.

Jes45- Let us know what you think about your SA14 as it runs in. I have about 350 hours on mine after a little break.

Lkdog- You are so right on the "a great LP" will hit the target. So many more great LP sources than what I have seen on modern day redbook. Your set up sounds like its cooking though and I would love to get back into vinyl again.

Jes45- Hope you are trying cycle-burning the SA-14. Play system 24 hours 3 days then turn completely off for 1 whole day. Slower but nice results IMHO.