Now I ' m truly lost !
I read again all the Stereophiles articles about Shindo gear yesterday and I' m really craving to buy the CCQ and at the same time, I cannot ignore what Matt told me and all the messages I received telling me that this was a crazy project.
Opposite to many, I like the idea of units built by hand by a company of 6 persons, with passion and love and a mind dedicated to music.
I like the idea of using old components.
I'm impressed by all the comments I read on the web both by owners and pro reviewers ( even if the last are pretty rare ) and those comments are very different from the usual ones you read about most products.
I looked at the discussion about the impedance of the EB1i and it does not seem to me that my speakers have the type of impedance that Shindo amps would love....
Basically, I have 3 choices :
- follow my instinct and order them. This is based on the love I had for the Verdier 845 class A Set amps. They managed the EB1i pretty good in the bass and the treble and were only 20 W in class A. So how come the Shindo CCQ could not do the job ? As I mentioned already, the 2301's will stay anyway so the Shindo won't have to play loud. Still, all amps are different. The Shindo could have more trouble than the Verdier !
- look elsewhere for an other flavor. At 15700 euros, there are many other amps I can consider to get an other flavor of sound. The first to come to mind is the Burmester 911 MK3 which retails in Europe for 15900 euros taxes included. This is not a low power option I know, but my goal is first of all "an other flavor" and not necessarily "lower power". All the things I read on this amp are just stunning and the flavor seems to be rather different than the typical Mc sound which I adore should I mention. But I could also consider second hand Lamm monoblocks....
- buy a Shindo preamp. But here, all my system falls down in an illogical path.
No more passthru for HT. No remote ! Sorry if I'm old fashionned here guys but I live in a real world with kids and wife than can enter the room anytime to talk to me....Moreover, I just bought a high end phono stage with balanced outputs.
I would have to sell it if the Shindo pre is equivalent for the phono section ( but seriously, even with the great things I read about them, I have serious doubts that the Shindo phono stage could be as good as the REF 2....).
So this is actually the last thing I would do.
- the option my wife would love to hear : stay exactly where I am since I love the sound of my system. I had a wonderful listening session yesterday night and I thought "why the hell do you want to change anything to this sound ? You have a killer system ! The 2301's will put down on their knees many many amps on the market ! ". And once really tired of my system, sell it all and buy a pair of Canterburys with a full Shindo set up !
Finally this last option seems to be the most logical to me.
In the meantime, I really want to hear the REF5 in my system and compare it to the C1000. This could also be an easy switch.
What do you think my friends ?
Please speak with honesty but respect towards people who have some gear that you may dislike. I don't want to start any polemic debate here.
Cheers,