I was granted the opportunity to do some listening to one of the latest op amps available from Burson, the Supreme Sound V6 Classic, and I was pleasantly surprised.
This was done on my modest home system, which is made up of a digital (sd card reader) source, ak4495 dac board, jc-2 clone pre amp, and a modified Hafler 500 amplifier.
The one, dual op amp that is part of the dac output filter is but one stage of all that, and frankly, I certainly wasn’t expecting the differences that I have heard.
I had figured that the one op amp’s contribution to the overall sound would have been swamped by the rest of the system. Not that I have any reason to doubt these parts, I use multiple of the older V4 models in another dac/headphone amp where a more pronounced difference would be more understandable as to their contribution to the overall sound.
Previously I had been using another discrete op amp, and it basically sounded like a crisper, less fuzzy ne5532. Not the worst by any means, seemed balanced, anyways.
The differences are heard immediately, after installing, having the previous setup used daily for the past year or so with mostly the same variety of music selections.
These immediate differences are 1) better perception of tones. 2) complete lack of sibilant sounds 3) noticeably quieter at certain points where the music allows.
I will allow these to run for a few days before making some more comparisons, back to back...
So after some time playing and comparing, the spectrum has nicely filled out on both ends. The V6 Classic has a great way of providing strong, crisp dynamics, all while maintaining a lack of any piercing sibilant sounds, and presenting some very nice detail.
The quality of tones, or timbre, as it is commonly described, really shines with these parts. Another nice step towards the goal of realism!
I can tell that there is a decent amount of forward bias, the heat coming out confirmed that. The quiescent current is fairly low at 14ma for the dual unit, so we’re not talking about a lot of heat by any means.
The ne5532, and it’s seemingly near equal discrete part just sounds quite dull in comparison. I also tried an ad827 just for fun, and it was also pretty muted sounding compared to the V6.
Having not heard better, I would definitely recommend these to replace audio op amps.
This was done on my modest home system, which is made up of a digital (sd card reader) source, ak4495 dac board, jc-2 clone pre amp, and a modified Hafler 500 amplifier.
The one, dual op amp that is part of the dac output filter is but one stage of all that, and frankly, I certainly wasn’t expecting the differences that I have heard.
I had figured that the one op amp’s contribution to the overall sound would have been swamped by the rest of the system. Not that I have any reason to doubt these parts, I use multiple of the older V4 models in another dac/headphone amp where a more pronounced difference would be more understandable as to their contribution to the overall sound.
Previously I had been using another discrete op amp, and it basically sounded like a crisper, less fuzzy ne5532. Not the worst by any means, seemed balanced, anyways.
The differences are heard immediately, after installing, having the previous setup used daily for the past year or so with mostly the same variety of music selections.
These immediate differences are 1) better perception of tones. 2) complete lack of sibilant sounds 3) noticeably quieter at certain points where the music allows.
I will allow these to run for a few days before making some more comparisons, back to back...
So after some time playing and comparing, the spectrum has nicely filled out on both ends. The V6 Classic has a great way of providing strong, crisp dynamics, all while maintaining a lack of any piercing sibilant sounds, and presenting some very nice detail.
The quality of tones, or timbre, as it is commonly described, really shines with these parts. Another nice step towards the goal of realism!
I can tell that there is a decent amount of forward bias, the heat coming out confirmed that. The quiescent current is fairly low at 14ma for the dual unit, so we’re not talking about a lot of heat by any means.
The ne5532, and it’s seemingly near equal discrete part just sounds quite dull in comparison. I also tried an ad827 just for fun, and it was also pretty muted sounding compared to the V6.
Having not heard better, I would definitely recommend these to replace audio op amps.
Adding a couple pictures of my SD card player/DAC, with the V6 Classic towering over things.
Now digging in to some more live recordings here, I am pretty astounded by the way this thing works, all while never having to get out the soldering iron...
Now digging in to some more live recordings here, I am pretty astounded by the way this thing works, all while never having to get out the soldering iron...
Attachments
I have had some additional exposure to the V6 Classic discrete op amps, in another headphone amplifier/DAC, this time one that uses three op amps; a dual unit for I/V, buffer on each channel, and another dual unit for a DC servo.
The parts that had been installed before this were some of the Burson V4, at least in the I/V and buffer positions. The bass provided by these had been pretty addictive, and I seriously had my doubts as to wether or not any new replacement would fill that gap. Being used solely as a headphone amplifier, I was skeptical.
Once again, pretty blown away by what I had been missing, the bass has changed to a more accurate, crisp response that is clearly an improvement over the older generation of parts. The progression through the years for me with this device had been such that with the generic op amps, the general perception while listening was that you were in the lobby of the building where the performance was. Moving ahead to better parts you at least entered the general seating, and finally with these latest parts, it does give an impression that you are very close to the performance. Maybe that’s what other reviews had meant about giving an “intimate” sound. Not sure how else to describe the way these function, other than that, and that piano is now amazing as well. I did also notice that the newer generations consume much less for power than the older V4, and I didn’t make any changes other than plugging these in and letting them run.
I do recommend that if you have a DAC with an active filter (and a servo too) with +\-15 volts, or less, down to +\- 5 volts I believe, that you find a way to give these parts a shot, I suspect that you will likely be impressed.
The parts that had been installed before this were some of the Burson V4, at least in the I/V and buffer positions. The bass provided by these had been pretty addictive, and I seriously had my doubts as to wether or not any new replacement would fill that gap. Being used solely as a headphone amplifier, I was skeptical.
Once again, pretty blown away by what I had been missing, the bass has changed to a more accurate, crisp response that is clearly an improvement over the older generation of parts. The progression through the years for me with this device had been such that with the generic op amps, the general perception while listening was that you were in the lobby of the building where the performance was. Moving ahead to better parts you at least entered the general seating, and finally with these latest parts, it does give an impression that you are very close to the performance. Maybe that’s what other reviews had meant about giving an “intimate” sound. Not sure how else to describe the way these function, other than that, and that piano is now amazing as well. I did also notice that the newer generations consume much less for power than the older V4, and I didn’t make any changes other than plugging these in and letting them run.
I do recommend that if you have a DAC with an active filter (and a servo too) with +\-15 volts, or less, down to +\- 5 volts I believe, that you find a way to give these parts a shot, I suspect that you will likely be impressed.
Attachments
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I was also fortunate to be able to try these op-amps in my DAC.
I am using a JL Sounds AK4490 with I2SoverUSB. I am using the JL Sounds LME49710 filter board for analog output.
All the boards are powered by Salas regulators.
The Burson Supreme Sound V6 was compared to the stock IC and also a pair of Sparkos Labs.
In this application, I preferred the sound of the Burson V6. To me, it appeared to have a greater dynamic range, a lower noise floor and an extended low end.
I am very pleased with the sound of these op amps in this useage. I will not be changing them.
I will urge others to give these op-amps a try in their gear.
Thank you for the opportunity to use these.
I am using a JL Sounds AK4490 with I2SoverUSB. I am using the JL Sounds LME49710 filter board for analog output.
All the boards are powered by Salas regulators.
The Burson Supreme Sound V6 was compared to the stock IC and also a pair of Sparkos Labs.
In this application, I preferred the sound of the Burson V6. To me, it appeared to have a greater dynamic range, a lower noise floor and an extended low end.
I am very pleased with the sound of these op amps in this useage. I will not be changing them.
I will urge others to give these op-amps a try in their gear.
Thank you for the opportunity to use these.
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An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Here are the images.
I am not sure what the problem may be. The second post works fine in the Firefox browser I use.
Here is a link to a post I made at AudioCircle.com with the same pictures. Hopefully you can see them there.
Burson V6 Supreme op-amps
Here is a link to a post I made at AudioCircle.com with the same pictures. Hopefully you can see them there.
Burson V6 Supreme op-amps
The first links hot-link into another forum, which understandably declines image requests from strange places.
The second set seems to link from smile.amazon.com (why??), and may work for you (you put them there), but I get the message "Invalid Session Token:".
DIYA forum has a fine attachment system.
Aargh! I've just ordered 2 V6 singles (as a NE5534/OPA627 replacement) in a buffer I'm experimenting with.
Maybe next time...
Review of V6 Vivid Dual
Thank you to Burson Audio and Charles for making this review happen.
I received a sample of 2 V6 Vivid Dual for my Soundblaster ZXR sound card. I bought a total of 4 V5 last year to try and hear if there is a difference with the sound and I was blown away by just the V5. I didn't buy the V6 atm because it was out of my budget. I found this website and Charles is giving away samples to review so I reluctantly signed in.
My rig consists of the ZXR, Kef Q100 speakers and a Marantz PM5005 amp.
Sampled songs from CD collections ripped in wma format at the highest quality and Spotify at very high settings on music quality.
Songs are: Eminem: Stan
Fugees: Fu-gee-la
Wu-Tang Clan: CREAM
Norah Jones: Come Away With Me
John Splithoff: Sing to you
C2C: Down the Road
Three Plus: Undercover Lover
Right of the bat, songs like Stan and Undercover Lover have a more live sound stage. Like the song popped out more and like they are singing to me. The V6 compared to the V5 have a more presence. The V5s were great but just using the V6 dual with V5 singles already sound really good. Norah Jone's Come away with me has a more soothing tone to it that I can't really explain.
Wu-Tang Clan's CREAM or the whole album rather was recorded really low quality but the V6 still brings out what I haven't heard in a while with again vocals standing out more.
Honestly, Burson really outdid themselves with these op-amps. I am still new into the audio world and learning new things. I love these things and I'm not sure there is anything else better than this for a plug and play upgrade.
Please feel free to comment or criticize me. I am open to any comments and will change if it makes things better.
Best Regards
Thank you to Burson Audio and Charles for making this review happen.
I received a sample of 2 V6 Vivid Dual for my Soundblaster ZXR sound card. I bought a total of 4 V5 last year to try and hear if there is a difference with the sound and I was blown away by just the V5. I didn't buy the V6 atm because it was out of my budget. I found this website and Charles is giving away samples to review so I reluctantly signed in.
My rig consists of the ZXR, Kef Q100 speakers and a Marantz PM5005 amp.
Sampled songs from CD collections ripped in wma format at the highest quality and Spotify at very high settings on music quality.
Songs are: Eminem: Stan
Fugees: Fu-gee-la
Wu-Tang Clan: CREAM
Norah Jones: Come Away With Me
John Splithoff: Sing to you
C2C: Down the Road
Three Plus: Undercover Lover
Right of the bat, songs like Stan and Undercover Lover have a more live sound stage. Like the song popped out more and like they are singing to me. The V6 compared to the V5 have a more presence. The V5s were great but just using the V6 dual with V5 singles already sound really good. Norah Jone's Come away with me has a more soothing tone to it that I can't really explain.
Wu-Tang Clan's CREAM or the whole album rather was recorded really low quality but the V6 still brings out what I haven't heard in a while with again vocals standing out more.
Honestly, Burson really outdid themselves with these op-amps. I am still new into the audio world and learning new things. I love these things and I'm not sure there is anything else better than this for a plug and play upgrade.
Please feel free to comment or criticize me. I am open to any comments and will change if it makes things better.
Best Regards
Attachments
Thank you to Burson and their rep Charles for helping me out getting a pair of V6 Vivid Single.
So I've been playing with these op-amp along with the V6 Vivid Dual that I received last 2 months ago. I've re-tested all of the music that I listened to from my previous review. All I can say is that there is more life to and really brings out the vocals even more. I can't believe how easy sounding these are. I can play them loudly and they don't give me any fatigue at all.
The difference with the combo of V5 single x2 + V6 Vivid Dual x2 vs V6 Vivid Single and Dual x2 is more on the pronounced vocals. Like its something I haven't heard before. The clarity is definitely there. Also, bad recording with these will really bring out the ugly in them. I'm at a loss for words about how these make my speakers really sound good. It makes me want to upgrade to a Kef LS50 just so I can really bring out how these would sound with those.
Thank You very much for giving me the opportunity to review these and share my honest opinion. If there is anything I missed, feel free to comment/criticize my review.
Best Regards
So I've been playing with these op-amp along with the V6 Vivid Dual that I received last 2 months ago. I've re-tested all of the music that I listened to from my previous review. All I can say is that there is more life to and really brings out the vocals even more. I can't believe how easy sounding these are. I can play them loudly and they don't give me any fatigue at all.
The difference with the combo of V5 single x2 + V6 Vivid Dual x2 vs V6 Vivid Single and Dual x2 is more on the pronounced vocals. Like its something I haven't heard before. The clarity is definitely there. Also, bad recording with these will really bring out the ugly in them. I'm at a loss for words about how these make my speakers really sound good. It makes me want to upgrade to a Kef LS50 just so I can really bring out how these would sound with those.
Thank You very much for giving me the opportunity to review these and share my honest opinion. If there is anything I missed, feel free to comment/criticize my review.
Best Regards
