Odyssey Candela Pre Amp Arriving today!!!

[nikolas812]

I have been looking out the window every five minutes all day waiting for the UPS man to pull up. Wish he would get here.........

I am hoping this Pre Ends my upgradeitis for awhile. I'm getting very tired of the vicious cycle of buying and selling gear......

I'll post some pics when I get it and a short review after I have some time with it.


Cheers


Nick

[VR3]

great pre - congrats

J tesla are great tubes for it

[SolidSqual]

Nice! Did you get the remote?

[haimoc]

Nice.... Congrats..

[nikolas812]

Nice! Did you get the remote?

No remote.

But if the Pre is a keeper I was thinking of calling Klaus to see if he could modify it for remote use.


Nick

[SolidSqual]

Cool. Get your Khartago upgraded and converted to mono as well.

[AndyGwis]

No remote. But if the Pre is a keeper I was thinking of calling Klaus to see if he could modify it for remote use.

Just have Klaus modify it when you send it in for repair :)

[SolidSqual]

Just have Klaus modify it when you send it in for repair :)

Oh God . . . I was waiting for this to start. Poor Klaus.

[zombie boy 2000]

Congrats!! My dad has virtually the same rig you have (Khartago Extreme, Lsi9's and an OPPO as a source). I'll be interested to hear how your pre fairs, considering that he's still running with a HK avr for a pre.

[nikolas812]

Other than the Volume knob falling off during shipping everything appears to be OK. I am getting ready to go hook everything up after I type this..


Heres a few pics.


Cheers

[zombie boy 2000]

That is a gorgeous piece of gear, but hurry up and hook that bad boy up!

[SolidSqual]

Well what do ya' think?

[nikolas812]

I am still trying to take it all in....

But I think I have surpassed any other setup I have ever had. By a lot. And I am using the Oppo for a source!! Granted there is a tube buffer between it and the Pre which helps... But still.. Its an Oppo..

I can't give you guys any more information than that right now. Like I said. I am still trying to let it all sink in. And trust me there is a lot to sink in. I have never heard anything like it so am trying to figure what I am hearing.. If that makes sense..

Here are a couple more pics of the setup...


Oh by the. Thanks a million Mike!!!! I never would have even considered the Candela if wasn't for you.


Cheers

[leroyjr1]

Nice setup!!! When are you getting the wood sides put on? (LSI 9's). What kind of source do you plan on getting?

[nikolas812]

Thanks.

I have no idea when I am getting my side panels.

I'll probably go with a Jolida JD100..


Nick

[SolidSqual]

Looks pretty good to me man. When's the projector going to be functioning?

[Ern Dog]

Sharp looking preamp. I like the little window to see the glowing tubes- that's pretty cool. Congrats!

[nikolas812]

Thanks.

I have no idea when I will be able to get the projector. I planned to have a new source, speakers and a projector by now. But I have pretty much been laid off of work for over a month now. So my cash is extremely depleted and I am starting to get a little nervous about bills. Hopefully things will pick back up....


As for the setup I have been working on speaker and seating position. The speakers are 3 1/2 feet from the back wall and 6 1/2 feet apart and the seat is 6 1/2 feet away from the speakers. So it makes a perfect triangle. It sounds pretty good right now. Tomorrow I am going to try and spread them apart to about 7 1/2 to 8 feet and adjust the listening position accordingly..

The Candela is amazing. I don't think I have the vocabulary to describe what I am hearing. But it sounds amazing. Dead quite! And when listening today I realized how much that matters. From low to high volume the noise floor makes a huge difference. For example. If at the beginning of a song there was a piano playing. The dead silence between each note made it sound much much more believable. That goes for every note, instrument, words, whatever. The music sounds very very real. I have never heard music reproduced this way before.

I also realize there is a lot more to be had. I feel the Oppo is really holding me back. But thats what I can't get over. If it sounds this good now..... I can't even imagine what it would sound like with a good source..

I also feel like the Lsi's are holding me back also. But I am not going to write them off yet. I am going to give them every chance they deserve. I won't write them off until I get a good source in the mix and the foundation of the system completed. If they are still letting me down after that point. I think I will be moving past Polk onto something else.

But for now I am quite satisfied with where it is at. It's at least to a point where I can listen and thoroughly enjoy the music. So I can least enjoy some good tunes while saving for a source.






Nick

[SolidSqual]

I give it a month. But, I'm glad you're happy . . . for now. If you need support for your addiction just give EarlyB or myself a PM. We understand and can't help.

[Early B.]

I give it a month. But, I'm glad you're happy . . . for now. If you need support for your addiction just give EarlyB or myself a PM. We understand and can't help.

SS --

I'm in remission.:p

NIc --

It's interesting that you think your Oppo is holding the sound back. That's true. It's equally interesting that you think the 9's are holding your system back, too. It's amazing what happens when you introduce a component that's a level ot two above what you already have. You immediately contemplate upgrading everything to compensate for it -- and upgrade you will, that's for certain.;)

[VR3]

Whoever thinks Odyssey gear has a high failure rate needs to get it together...

His gear is tight and made to last...

I havnt had a problem yet.

My candela was kind of funky with noise -- but I think it was the tubes. It went away with the J Tesla tubes...

Definitely get the J Tesla tubes though, for a measly 25 dollars your music will sound alot better.. :)

Just a fwiw - the Tyler acoustics Taylo line up goes GREAT with Odyssey...

Ask Treitz - if you were in the area, youd be welcome for a listen!

[Early B.]

Just a fwiw - the Tyler acoustics Taylo line up goes GREAT with Odyssey...

Those speakers go great with just about anything. You're good for at least 10 more years.

[treitz3]

No issues with my Odyssey gear and yes, anybody's welcome to come and get their ears on. Congrat's nick!

[SolidSqual]

Odyssey is pretty damn good stuff. It is no longer the cheapest high end stuff with the presence of Emotiva and others in the market, but the Odyssey sound is still more refined and musical IMO. Of course, we'll see if that changes with the release of the RPA-2 from Emotiva.

[agfrost]

Enjoy, Nick!

Jay <---- Slightly jealous

[VR3]

Well since sheep like people want to down Odyssey on supposed reliability issues that dont exist - you can get Odyssey gear rather inexpensively on the used market... which is cool.

When you can get 4,000 dollar amps for around 1,500 -- hard to beat there! :)

[nikolas812]

I give it a month. But, I'm glad you're happy . . . for now. If you need support for your addiction just give EarlyB or myself a PM. We understand and can't help.

I really have a good feeling about this peice. I can honestly say I don't think I will be upgrading anytime soon.

But.... you never know...

Early B

It's interesting that you think your Oppo is holding the sound back. That's true. It's equally interesting that you think the 9's are holding your system back, too. It's amazing what happens when you introduce a component that's a level ot two above what you already have. You immediately contemplate upgrading everything to compensate for it -- and upgrade you will, that's for certain.

This peice had nothing to do with any of my thoughts on either peice of gear. I have been unimpressed with 9's for while now. And knew how the Oppo performed going into this. I never bought the Oppo to use as a source. The Oppo will be strictly for DVD viewing. The Oppo is just getting me by until I can get a source. So don't think I bought this peice and then suddenly decided I had to upgrade everything. This has been part of a plan for a while now. Its just taking me some time to afford some of this higher end gear..... Thanks SS.......



Later.


Nick

[steveinaz]

Thanks to big brother, I can't see your pics--but Congrats on the new pre!

[nikolas812]

Thanks to big brother, I can't see your pics--but Congrats on the new pre!

Thanks.

Why can't you see the pics?




Nick

[SolidSqual]

Office computer probably has him locked out.