I can't speak to how it compares to what anyone else does, but I'm certainly happy to supply details on what we do.
The modifications first and foremost are not to correct anything that is in any way lacking in the stock unit from a design standpoint. Our approach is simply to give that excellent circuit design the best environment to do it's thing. It simply would not have been possible to incorporate these kinds of things into a CD player at anywhere near the price of the Opus.
In our best mod (the Reference level upgrade) this means extremely exhaustive vibration control of the transport (trust me, nobody can damp a transport the way we do it through Allison Dynamics who has been working with us on damping CD mechanisms for I think 7 or 8 years now), we also damp key components, transformers, both chassis, etc. Also it means adding local energy reservoirs and filtering right where you need it in the circuit for the greatest dynamic capabilities and cleanest power. We employ noise reduction techniques, power filtering on the AC input, upgrade the AC power buss, etc.
Our less costly Standard mod is a subset of this upgrade but if you asked me, the better value is the Reference mod because with that additional budget, we can simply accomplish a lot more.
We really don't think an approach that changes the basic design of the unit would be beneficial. We decided to put some of our focus and resources on developing these mods because it is such a good platform to begin with. Our approach was to spend an awful lot of time developing a modification that accomplished the exact sonic results we were trying to acheive (and offers a great value in the process). I think there is plenty that's been said in this forum and elsewhere about the results we acheive. We also provide full support for the units we modify...an extremely important part of the equation.
Hope this provides some clarification of our approach and what is unique about what we offer.
Respectfully,
Steve Huntley
The modifications first and foremost are not to correct anything that is in any way lacking in the stock unit from a design standpoint. Our approach is simply to give that excellent circuit design the best environment to do it's thing. It simply would not have been possible to incorporate these kinds of things into a CD player at anywhere near the price of the Opus.
In our best mod (the Reference level upgrade) this means extremely exhaustive vibration control of the transport (trust me, nobody can damp a transport the way we do it through Allison Dynamics who has been working with us on damping CD mechanisms for I think 7 or 8 years now), we also damp key components, transformers, both chassis, etc. Also it means adding local energy reservoirs and filtering right where you need it in the circuit for the greatest dynamic capabilities and cleanest power. We employ noise reduction techniques, power filtering on the AC input, upgrade the AC power buss, etc.
Our less costly Standard mod is a subset of this upgrade but if you asked me, the better value is the Reference mod because with that additional budget, we can simply accomplish a lot more.
We really don't think an approach that changes the basic design of the unit would be beneficial. We decided to put some of our focus and resources on developing these mods because it is such a good platform to begin with. Our approach was to spend an awful lot of time developing a modification that accomplished the exact sonic results we were trying to acheive (and offers a great value in the process). I think there is plenty that's been said in this forum and elsewhere about the results we acheive. We also provide full support for the units we modify...an extremely important part of the equation.
Hope this provides some clarification of our approach and what is unique about what we offer.
Respectfully,
Steve Huntley