Stereophile Tests $45k D'Augostino Monoblocks

[sarumbear]

I looked for it but couldn't find the reference, but this is what I read before.

From D'augistino. Customers complained that the VU meters barely moved so he kept the look but changed them so they would move a lot at low volume level. He admits the meters are just for looks now and are not accurate to the labeling.

You pay $90,000 and got meters that just dance with the music. These people are taking the micky.

 

[GimeDsp]

Found it for you guys.

"In use you'll regularly see that needle flicking up beyond 300W, but this is 'fake news' – the meters are made to move all the time so that 'users are confident something is going on', admitted Dan, 'fun to look at, but please don't take the numbers too seriously'."

D'Agostino Relentless Mono Power Amplifier

The culmination of one man's 'relentless' quest to develop his 'dream amplifier – an amplifier without any limits' is revealed in this special six-page, in-depth review... It is not unusual for products featured in Hi-Fi News to rival a family car for cost. But a pair of monoblocks that weigh as...

www.hifinews.com

 

[MakeMineVinyl]

Found it for you guys.

"In use you'll regularly see that needle flicking up beyond 300W, but this is 'fake news' – the meters are made to move all the time so that 'users are confident something is going on', admitted Dan, 'fun to look at, but please don't take the numbers too seriously'."

D'Agostino Relentless Mono Power Amplifier

The culmination of one man's 'relentless' quest to develop his 'dream amplifier – an amplifier without any limits' is revealed in this special six-page, in-depth review... It is not unusual for products featured in Hi-Fi News to rival a family car for cost. But a pair of monoblocks that weigh as...

www.hifinews.com

Oh man, that is so bad, especially at the price when other manufacturers can make log meters which have useful scales. So bad on so many levels.

 

[Galliardist]

Oh man, that is so bad, especially at the price when other manufacturers can make log meters which have useful scales. So bad on so many levels.

Well, I guess that the target market for this model doesn't include meter obsessives, objectivists, people with technical knowledge, anyone who sees and understands even parts of the Stereophile review, or anyone else who could hear the difference between the two amps that the reviewer noted.
Since the vast majority of such people also fall into the "I'm not spending that much on power amps" group anyway, nothing lost.

 

[Galliardist]

You pay $90,000 and got meters that just dance with the music. These people are taking the micky.

That's £125,000 (each) in the UK for the amp in the HiFi News review as well.

 

[Descartes]

These are just jewelry audio no body cares about measurements or science when spending so much money on an amp, it is just a show piece! The super rich Jones

 

[restorer-john]

I found that the generic Chinese pots that look like Bourns pots, same blue color but the name was something like Boata, had a very high defect rate

Baoter IIRC. Nasty things.

 

[restorer-john]

Oh man, that is so bad, especially at the price when other manufacturers can make log meters which have useful scales. So bad on so many levels.

Unbelievable. I have plenty of amplifiers with switchable ranges on the power meters. Not hard to have a x1, x10, x100 switch and a proper log scale.

 

[Galliardist]

Unbelievable. I have plenty of amplifiers with switchable ranges on the power meters. Not hard to have a x1, x10, x100 switch and a proper log scale.

switches? No way, the modern luxury amp buyers would have to have iPhone app control to see and use a feature like that, and it would spoil the case aesthetics.

Mind you, if you did have an app, you could just put multiple meters on the screen including one to tell you how much nice sound-improving distortion you're listening to.

 

[bluefuzz]

I generally don't judge people's taste in music but if they're listening to Diana Krall on an expensive stereo I doubt I have much in common with them.

How 'bout if they're listening on a cheap stereo? While my musical tastes are ravenously catholic and at times wilfully obscure I do on occasion enjoy both Diana Krall and Norah Jones or even Dire Straits. Can't listen to Merzbow all the time ...

Steely Dan is definitely beyond the pale though.

 

[bluefuzz]

And as such have a rather vivid imagination when it comes to old farts listening to hot vocalists half their age

Um, Rickie Lee Jones is 66. If this amp includes the secret to eternal youth then maybe $45K isn't so bad ... ;-)

 

[GimeDsp]

How 'bout if they're listening on a cheap stereo? While my musical tastes are ravenously catholic and at times wilfully obscure I do on occasion enjoy both Diana Krall and Norah Jones or even Dire Straits. Can't listen to Merzbow all the time ...

Steely Dan is definitely beyond the pale though.

You just don't have the look of love for them D'agostino amps.

 

[mhardy6647]

Mind you, if you did have an app, you could just put multiple meters on the screen including one to tell you how much nice sound-improving distortion you're listening to.

or just go with, you know, virtual meters.

 

[MRC01]

My reaction to Diana Krall, Rebecca Pidgeon and Steely Dan for the most part. I do like RLJ tho

To me, those recordings don't sound natural or realistic at all. They sound artificially enhanced, likely due to close-micing or other recording/engineering methods. Seems a lot of audiophiles like that sound. Each to his own!

 

[Chrispy]

To me, those recordings don't sound natural or realistic at all. They sound artificially enhanced, likely due to close-micing or other recording/engineering methods. Seems a lot of audiophiles like that sound. Each to his own!

It's more the bland music that gets to me.

 

[mhardy6647]

To me, those recordings don't sound natural or realistic at all. They sound artificially enhanced, likely due to close-micing or other recording/engineering methods. Seems a lot of audiophiles like that sound. Each to his own!

Well, you know... there's always Jacintha, Sara K, and Holly Cole.
Oh, oh! ... and Tuck and Patti.

 

[SIY]

Well, you know... there's always Jacintha, Sara K, and Holly Cole.
Oh, oh! ... and Tuck and Patti.

I'm not normally a violent man...

 

[bluefuzz]

To me, those recordings don't sound natural or realistic at all.

Why on earth should a recording sound natural or realistic? That's like saying all paintings should employ a naturalistc style, three-point perspective and morally edifying subject matter ...

 

[MRC01]

Why on earth should a recording sound natural or realistic? That's like saying all paintings should employ a naturalistc style, three-point perspective and morally edifying subject matter ...

I have no problem with this. People have preferences, they don't have to be realism. That's why I said, "Each to his own".
What gets to me is when audiophiles tout these recordings as examples of "high fidelity". If one acknowledges they don't sound natural or realistic, that is the first step. But then one must ask, fidelity to what?

 

[egellings]

Bourns makes multiturn pots that would never have that problem. Some pots come with a lock nut that can be adjusted to jam the pot's shaft once it is set to the desired position.