Home
AudioAsylum Trader
Tubes Asylum: REVIEW: Tron Comet Preamplifier (Tube) by Peter Earnshaw

Questions about tubes and gear that glows. FAQ

For Sale Ads

FAQ / News / Events

 

REVIEW: Tron Comet Preamplifier (Tube)

141.228.156.225


[ Follow Ups ] Thread:  [ Display   All   Email ] [ Tubes Asylum ]
[ Alert Moderator ]

Model: Comet
Category: Preamplifier (Tube)
Suggested Retail Price: $5000
Description: Tube preamplifier
Manufacturer URL: Tron
Manufacturer URL: Tron

Review by Peter Earnshaw ( A ) on April 16, 2002 at 09:34:48
IP Address: 141.228.156.225
Add Your Review
for the Comet


Summary
------------
I’ve been looking for a new preamp to replace my ageing Audio Research SP8 for a few months now. The Tron “Comet” (www.tron-electric.com) is a new design from Graham Tricker at GT Audio, and is the preamp I eventually picked as the heart of my system. It is simply superb. I have heard or owned a huge number of different amps, and this is by far the most successful design. The only preamp to come close is the Nagra PL-L, and it just isn’t in the same league sonically.

Note: I don’t think Graham has updated his website yet, so the preamp probably isn’t on there yet and you’ll see the older ones without his new power supply design. Also, I know Graham personally through his (excellent) choice of car – Porsche 964RS lightweight – in nearly the same colour as mine. I can assure you this is no cause for bias – I picked my preamp purely on sonic grounds and this is where the enthusiasm to create this review comes from!

Background
--------------
A few years ago I owned Wilson WATT/PUPPIES, and went through a painful time trying to get the sound I liked from them. I bought and home-demmed both valve and solid-state equipment; BAT, Spectral, Jeff Rowland, dCS, Transparent, Levinson, etc. Whilst undeniably excellent speakers, they just never did what I wanted and no amount of high-end equipment-swapping would give me a sound that kept me in place and stopped me switching on the TV instead.

So I sold the lot – Elgar and Purcell, Rowland Coherence II and Model 2, Wilsons – and took a hit financially. I managed to lay my hand on a second-hand set of Avantgarde Duos, and bought the SP8 and a pair of Quad II monoblocks to drive them. Shortly after I invested in a Sony SCD-1 and have sat back and enjoyed ever since. The sound is warm and lush, and most importantly, *human* - with obvious drawbacks, particularly in terms of detail retrieval and realism, I can live with these because I simply enjoy listening to music. The TV plays second fiddle to the music, which is as it should be.

My plan has always been to try and retain the sound that I like, building on the strengths of the system, whilst fixing the weaknesses noted above. To that end, I thought of changing the preamp first and power amps later. It would be easy enough to transport the SP8 to dealers to compare it with their demo products, pick a likely candidate for home dem and take it from there.

So, using the SP8 as a benchmark, I compared it with preamps from Plinuis and YBA (can’t remember which models), Mark Levinson 380S, Audio Research (LS3, LS16 mkII, LS25 mkII), Nagra PL-L, Jeff Rowland Synergy II (a home dem and direct comparison with the Tron), and my memories of the Coherence II and Consummate, Spectral DMC12, BAT VK3i and VK5i, and various other preamps heard in isolated dems or at shows from LAMM, Levinson, Krell, ARC and so on.

Unquestionably, whilst some of these preamps are very good indeed, the Tron “Comet” is my favourite. After the home dem, I asked Graham if he’d be kind enough to let me keep the one I had because I didn’t want to wait until he’d built another. Luckily he said yes!

Design
--------
The Comet comes in a simple rectangular metal box, anodised silver top and bottom plates and black at the sides. It’s currently Tron’s cheapest preamp; you could get a “Meteor” and a “Reference” at increased cost, and retails at around three thousand pounds depending on options. One day I’ll upgrade, but at this moment I see no need.

Size-wise, it’s about as big a box as a slightly longer A4 ring binder. Two large metal knobs control gain and input selection. There is an on-off toggle switch. The words “Comet” are screen printed in a stylish swirl on the front. The “Tron” logo has a red LED poking through the “o” of “Tron” to indicate power.

Around the back, there is a row of phono sockets for single-ended connection of CD, Tape in, RIAA (if fitted, which it is in mine), Tuner and Aux, and Tape out. No independent monitoring of channels is possible on the tape out. One set of outputs is fitted, and an IEC mains socket. Simple, but efficient!

This is a valve design but I haven’t taken the lid off to look inside. I’m sure it’s immaculate given the work I’ve seen Graham doing in his workshop on other equipment! Something like only one gain stage, only one valve in the line circuit, no capacitors in the signal path, transformer coupled, valve power supply, blah blah. I could be wrong, but I don’t really care! Don’t even know what valves are in there.

In a neat touch, the words “Tron” are drilled though in hundreds of perforations in the top plate to provide ventilation, once on the left side and once on the right.

As far as I know this is a new case design to keep costs down. Older cases took more time to assemble and cost more to buy. The power supply section is a new design compared with the older models, but the circuit is the same. I think……

Sound
-------
OK, I set myself a task of trying to summarise the sound of this preamp in just three words. I can’t do it! If push came to shove, I’d say: natural, dynamic, musical.

Trouble is, those words (to me) tend to be used to describe preamps that are syrupy, thick, veiled but boppy and rich. Unsophisticated, perhaps. The Comet is definitely not like that.

So, I’ve decided to go completely anal and just analyse it to death. Maybe you’ll get a better idea of the sound if I just list its characteristics in each category. Here goes……

Tone: there is no special emphasis as far as I can hear on any one tonal range – treble, midrange, bass. Treble is extended, not hard at all, but not unnaturally sweet either. Close to being just right, I reckon a touch more richness and a smidgen more transparency would seal the deal. Midrange is rich and full, possibly over-full but I suspect the Quads are at fault here! Bass is super-extended right down to the lowest levels, not plummy or full but, again, seemingly flat and powerful. Compared with the SP8, a massive improvement. Compared with the Roland Synergy II, the frequency response is just as flat, treble just as extended and bass even more extended. All frequencies are equally emphasised, nothing sticks out apart from the occasional surprising deep bass note. I rate it excellent.

Soundstage: deep and wide. Very deep, and very wide. In fact, deep enough that it goes *into* the back wall (my Duos are positioned around 70cm from the back wall) and wide enough that it passes the boundaries of the speakers and comes from *outside* their positions (they’re around 3m apart).

For example, on Nitin Sawhney’s album “Beyond Skin” there’s a track with a really, really deep echoing boom sound that rolls around the room. Actually, most of the tracks on this album are like that! I digress. In a moment of complete amazement, when this track came on I was staggered to hear it appear to come from behind me. I had to listen several times to prove the effect. Somehow, the depth and width of the soundstage was contriving to make the sound come from everywhere, and even from behind my listening position. The wonderful, integrated tonal range helped make the entire sound roll around the room, not just those rollocking bass vibes. Superb.

Detail: detail retrieval is leaps and bounds ahead of the SP8 and everything I have ever heard except possibly the Spectral, and the Jeff Rowland kit. Like the Rowlands, detail is not over-emphasised or in your face. Unlike the Spectral and the Rowlands, the easy naturalness of the preamp combines to make this detail sound just right – the pluck of individual strings in a guitar, the way a piano sounds different if its keys are thwacked or merely hit hard, countless tiny cues that increase the sense of realism – just sound like the music, not like the recording. The other two preamps contrived to make detail retrieval sound like an event that had been recorded and retrieved, not one that was just “happening” for my musical enjoyment.

Palpability: extremely good. With the PHY mains cable in place, close to excellent (see below on PHY). I see room for improvement here, but to the system as a whole, not necessarily to the preamp itself. Some vocalists sound *very nearly* like they’re in the room with me…. but not quite. It’s a close thing that’ll probably improve as the rest of my equipment improves. Part of this feeling of palpability comes from the lack of solid-state-ness, a lack of any artificial hardness or glare at any frequency. After listening to the LS3 and Synergy II at home, both solid-state, I now know what solid-state sounds like (The Plinius and YBA took solid state and made it SOLID. Ugh). Without the Tron to compare against I would never have twigged to the Synergy’s sonic signature – it is an undeniably excellent preamp, with a very small colouration – but it definitely sounds hard and unnatural in direct comparison with the Tron. Note that this does not mean the Tron sounds like a valve preamp in the sense it is warm or mushy. It just sounds right.

Dynamics: both micro and macro dynamics are excellent as you might expect from a modern valve design “voiced” with horn loudspeakers like the Avantgarde range. What more can I say? Tiny changes in volume, slight differences in the way instruments are played and struck, all contribute to the overall musical whole. No preamp I have ever heard gets close to the Tron here, although some significant contribution from the Duos has to be accounted for, of course. I’d love to have a LAMM on home dem, or one of the latest BATs, for example. But I’m confident the Tron would stand shoulder to shoulder with them if you could set them all up at home.

Noise: Dead silent. There is no noise AT ALL from this preamp, even at maximum gain. No thumps, crackles, whooshes or whistles. The phono section is similarly quiet. Only the Rowland kit gets close in this regard.

Musicality: For me, the dreaded word – if you’re as analytical as I am, it’s a cop-out because it’s a section that says “I enjoyed this, but I don’t know why”. Anyway, despite my reservations I have to say that the Comet is *the* most musical preamp it has been my pleasure to own. I just love listening to music through it. Some examples:

Music with great vocalists, doesn’t matter which so long as they sing with emotion. That emotion shines through with the Tron. Tiny little pauses in delivery to emphasise musical tension; slight indrawn breaths; sighs or exhalations at key points in a song; in fact, anything you like that enhances the emotional impact of a song. All exquisitely rendered and perfectly timed.

Pace, Rhythm And Timing (PRAT) is just superb. If Naim were to make a valve preamp, I’ll bet it would rock like this one. Tension, timing, pauses in musical flow and the exact THUMP when everyone comes together in the band and gets going into the swing of the next musical phrase– just right. Surprisingly the LS3 and the Nagra PL-L are both at least reasonable here, but, again, I prefer the Tron by a huge margin.

I hope you’re getting the idea ….

All that I’ve described is equally true of the phono section. It’s also quiet, dynamic, natural, harmonically rich yet tonally neutral (if that’s not an oxymoron), detailed, blah blah blah. The trouble is, my old Sondek doesn’t do it justice and the phono section is so transparent I start to hear the Sondek’s weaknesses. Also I’m too lazy to do anything except put on a CD or SACD, flip on the Statmat and the brass puck and hit play! One day I’ll invest in a better vinyl front end, but I’m saving my money for cables and a power amp now……

Drawbacks: Yes, there are a few...

As a tonal flavour, I get a sense of darkness from this preamp. I don’t quite know where from, but it’s there. It doesn’t bother me, but isn’t *quite* right.

Whilst the soundstage is wide and deep, it’s also slightly forward. Actually I suspect it’s dead flat in the plane of the speakers, if you had conventional speakers that is, but my Duos are quite forward-sounding and this comes across with the Tron. I suspect my room is right on the border of acceptability in terms of size, the Duos being 3m away from my listening position, and I find the residual (*very* residual) horn “honk” and driver integration problem between midrange, treble and bass enclosures are slightly exacerbated by the preamp’s forwardness. The SP8 sets its considerably smaller, flatter soundstage *behind* the plane of the speakers and manages to conceal my Duo’s arrangement slightly better as a result.

Warming-up is vital. It sounds OK in the first hour, great in the second and excellent from then on. I don’t leave it on all the time but switch it on as soon as I get home, get my shopping and gym work over and then sit down to listen.

Finally, there isn’t a home theatre pass-through input. Never mind, I just use a spare input and set the level manually using the “test tone” generator on my AV amp if I want to watch a DVD. Or, at least, I would if the other inputs worked; sadly, in the rush to get a demo preamp to me, Graham only wired in the CD and Phono stages and forgot the others! I have to drop it by some time to get them connected but can’t bear to do without it………

Now the interesting bit. On home dem, Graham supplied an unlabelled thick power cord to connect the Tron, and I used that. When I agreed to buy the preamp – begged to be allowed to keep it, that is – he asked for the power cord back as it was the one he used to connect his own power amp and he had none spare.

Sneaky bastard….. once I gave the cord back, some of the magic went. Specifically, some of the detail, some of the naturalness and palpability. I was very, very surprised. I use Russ Andrews “Yello” mains cables, which are his cheapest design using Kimber mains wire, basically on the assumption that we spend too much money on snake oil and lucky charms and don’t really *believe* in ultra-trick mains cables. But a good quality, simple cable with enough current capacity should do just fine.

Well, I was wrong. This cable worked extremely well and I missed it badly. I still miss it, since Graham is out of stock and has to order more from the factory. It comes from PHY in France, uses no plastics in its’ construction but instead has cotton as an insulator, and is supposed to “sound” (inasmuch as a mains cable can sound like anything) more natural and transparent. I would have pooh-poohed that suggestion if I hadn’t heard it myself. It lifts and enhances the Tron in exactly those parameters I want to improve.

On the strength of that mains cable’s performance and Graham’s recommendation I have ordered new PHY cables throughout – mains, interconnect and speaker cable. I await their arrival with bated breath.

Anyway, that’s an aside. In summary, I can’t recommend this preamp enough. Realistically, for UK and European users it’s a bargain, especially compared to the US high-end stuff that gets imported here. Secondly, I think you need to spend that bit extra and get the PHY mains cable to drive it. It really works well with the Tron. And I’m sorry for my US cousins, but I doubt you’ll ever get an export version for the US because it’ll push the price way too high. Shame, because you’re missing a trick….


Product Weakness: No home theatre pass through, no remote control
Product Strengths: Dynamics, naturalness, musicality, soundstage, PRAT


Associated Equipment for this Review:
Amplifier: Quad II monoblocks, original GEC KT66 valves
Preamplifier (or None if Integrated): Tron Comet
Sources (CDP/Turntable): Sony SCD1, Linn Sondek/Basik/Lyra Evolve 99
Speakers: Avantgarde Duo
Cables/Interconnects: Van den Hul D102mkIII, Maplin silver wire speaker cables
Music Used (Genre/Selections): Jazz, Rock
Room Size (LxWxH): 6m x 5m x 5m
Room Comments/Treatments: I live in an apartment, one big room with high sloping roof
Time Period/Length of Audition: 1 month
Other (Power Conditioner etc.): Ben Duncan mains filter, Russ Andrews Yello mains cables & "silencer"
Type of Audition/Review: Product Owner
Your System (if other than home audition): n/a




This post is made possible by the generous support of people like you and our sponsors:
  Schiit Audio  



Topic - REVIEW: Tron Comet Preamplifier (Tube) - Peter Earnshaw 09:34:48 04/16/02 ( 4)