Bringin' Home The Minimax CD

Digital Drive

Upsamplers, DACs, jitter, shakes and analogue withdrawals, this is it.

I had been running the Minimax CD non-stop for over a week at my parents' place. It acquitted itself well, and I was ready to bring it over to my own home. Along with the Minimax CD, I also brought over some CDs [which are not the same as the ones I have at my home]. Some of the more memorable songs included:
Amber, "This Is Your Night"
Femme Fatale, "Falling In And Out Of Love"
Hapa, "Ku'u Home O Kahalu'u"
Herman's Hermits, "I'm Into Something Good"
Keola Beamer, "Shells"
Labouche, "Where Do You Go"
Robert Miles, "Children"
Savatage, "Gutter Ballet"
Sepultura, "Dead Embryonic Cells"
Testament, "D.N.R."
I set the Minimax CD on a glass shelf of the Salamander Synergy rack. I retained the stock powercord and EH 6922s. Wall outlet was an Oyaide SWO-XXX. Powercord to the Power Wing (with Hubbell 8300 outlets) was an Acrolink P/C-046. The rest of the system started with another Oyaide SWO-XXX, but Shunyata Anaconda Helix Alpha was used throughout. Another Power Wing 8300 fed power to the components. Preamp was a Simaudio P-8, power amp was a Meridian G57, and speakers were Thiel CS2.4s. Shunyata Antares and Orion held the system together, but I did not have a spare single-ended Antares, so I used the XLO LE-1 instead.
First up was Femme Fatale's "Falling In And Out Of Love," standard late-80s hair metal, but fronted by a woman (Lorraine Lewis). This song kind of chugged, wasn't as open and wide as it should have been. I was putting aside the analog gear, so I took the Shunyata Anaconda Helix Alpha that was on the EAR 324 phonostage, and stuck that on the Minimax CD.
Whoa! Lorraine Lewis solidified her position, and the band seemed to belt out the song better. Herman's Hermit's "I'm Into Something Good" was appropriately full, but it didn't bounce along as well as it should. Robert Miles' "Children" starts with a simple piano line. There wasn't as much reverb as I'm used to hearing, though the sound was weighty.
So, to keep things uniform, I brought in another Acrolink P/C-046. Hmmm, the Acrolink P/C-046, though 1/4 the price of an Anaconda Helix Alpha, sounded more focused, less bass-insistent, and more transparent. I stuck with the Acrolink on the Minimax CD.
I could clearly "see" all the details within "Children." It wasn't as powerful and panoramically atmospheric as with other CD players I've tried, but I still felt the spirit and proportion (though smaller-scaled) of the music.
Savatage's "Gutter Ballet" wasn't as fleshed-out as it should have been, but there was nothing to prevent me from playing along to the guitar parts that mimic a violin.
Labouche's "Where Do You Go" was a bit too glossy, but at least it wasn't thick and boomy. The Minimax CD's portrayal was still enough to differentiate this song from No Mercy's version. I followed this up with Amber's "This Is Your Night," which was fast, and just slightly less full-bodied as it should be.
Mid-fi CD players have a tendency to make Sepultura's "Dead Embryonic Cells" paper thin. High-end CD players often make this song too controlled, too pretty. The Minimax CD seemed to split the difference. But then, OMFG, we cued up Testament's "D.N.R.," and the Minimax CD effortlessly banged out this awesome tune.
We needed to recover from such an ass-kicking, so we decided to switch gears, and play some Hawaiian music. Unusually for slack-key guitar, Keola Beamer's "Shells" is cool and focused. The Minimax CD unflinchingly captured that quality. But when we played the lush-sounding "Ku'u Home O Kahalu'u" by Hapa, the Minimax CD lost some of that warm liquid texture.
By this time, the Minimax CD certainly did not sound run-of-the-mill, and exhibited more positive than negative traits. No, it did not "draw" the music a sharply as my Naim CDX2/XPS2. No, it wasn't as harmonically true as my Meridian G08. No, it did not display that easy refinement of the Cary CD 303/300. But the Minimax CD had good image depth, competent separation of musical threads, full extension up top, decent enthusiasm and energy, and no noises at either the headphone or RCA jacks. It worked quickly ('cept for the fast search, which mutes and takes a little while to ramp up), and did not seem out of place (sonically) in the company of components (heck, the interconnects cost more than the Minimax CD itself!) costing many times its $1,099 retail price. It was time for me to find an appropriate interconnect for the Minimax CD, as well as do some tube rolling. I'll save those experiences for another post.
-Lummy The Seahorse

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Topic - Bringin' Home The Minimax CD - Luminator 15:34:43 06/14/06 (2)

Re: Bringin' Home The Minimax CD - jammie 18:47:52 06/16/06 (0)

Re: Bringin' Home The Minimax CD - tkg 04:01:31 06/15/06 (0)

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