ECP Audio T4 Headphone Amplifier

Discussion in 'Headphone Amplifiers and Combo (DAC/Amp) Units' started by TomB, Aug 6, 2018.

  1. Ice-man

    Ice-man Friend

    Pyrate Banned
    Joined:
    Oct 12, 2015
    Likes Received:
    3,455
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Well, shit. Now I'm making moves to work the t4 into my collection. :rolleyes:
     
  2. Vtory

    Vtory Audiophile™

    Pyrate MZR
    Joined:
    Sep 12, 2016
    Likes Received:
    10,831
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Location:
    East Coast
    @Ice-man Can you take some photos of the unit you're testing? I want to see how aesthetically the amp will look like with actual headphones!
     
  3. Ice-man

    Ice-man Friend

    Pyrate Banned
    Joined:
    Oct 12, 2015
    Likes Received:
    3,455
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Yep...give me a few minutes.
     
  4. Ice-man

    Ice-man Friend

    Pyrate Banned
    Joined:
    Oct 12, 2015
    Likes Received:
    3,455
    Trophy Points:
    113
    [​IMG]
     
  5. Ice-man

    Ice-man Friend

    Pyrate Banned
    Joined:
    Oct 12, 2015
    Likes Received:
    3,455
    Trophy Points:
    113
    [​IMG]
     
  6. jexby

    jexby Posole Prince

    Staff Member Pyrate Contributor
    Joined:
    Sep 28, 2015
    Likes Received:
    8,145
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Location:
    Exit stage left....
    yah until you sell it once the shine wears off.
     
  7. Ice-man

    Ice-man Friend

    Pyrate Banned
    Joined:
    Oct 12, 2015
    Likes Received:
    3,455
    Trophy Points:
    113
    You might be surprised at the permanency of my next few moves. My retirement is imminent. It's been a great ride however, and I'll finish with some great gear to sit back and enjoy the music more than ever.
     
  8. Clemmaster

    Clemmaster Friend

    Pyrate Contributor
    Joined:
    Sep 28, 2015
    Likes Received:
    3,268
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Let me guess: Ether C + objective 2!
     
  9. Elnrik

    Elnrik Super Friendly

    Pyrate
    Joined:
    Jan 10, 2017
    Likes Received:
    8,973
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Location:
    Denver CO
    Home Page:
    Naw, back to basics. M50x + CMOY.
     
  10. Ice-man

    Ice-man Friend

    Pyrate Banned
    Joined:
    Oct 12, 2015
    Likes Received:
    3,455
    Trophy Points:
    113
    haha...I always hated that f'ing amp. Nails on the chalkboard bad.
     
  11. bazelio

    bazelio Friend

    Pyrate
    Joined:
    Nov 16, 2015
    Likes Received:
    3,417
    Trophy Points:
    113
    It didn't have enough irrrrrnnnnn. Luckily, though, Doug loves his irrrrnnnnn. So we're all good here.
     
  12. ButtUglyJeff

    ButtUglyJeff Stunningly beautiful IRL

    Pyrate
    Joined:
    Oct 12, 2015
    Likes Received:
    2,637
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Location:
    Rochester, NY
    Shhhhhhh, I might want this one...
     
  13. JeremiahS

    JeremiahS Almost "Made"

    Contributor
    Joined:
    Sep 30, 2015
    Likes Received:
    286
    Trophy Points:
    63
    Location:
    Jakarta, Singapore
    Is this amp going to be tuned like the ECP L2? That amp sounds quite nice but a bit too polite.
     
  14. BillD

    BillD New

    Joined:
    Oct 16, 2018
    Likes Received:
    24
    Trophy Points:
    3
    Location:
    Atlanta, GA
    I received the T4 from @TomB this morning. First thing I noticed is that the casework and finish is top notch. Like the ECP amplifiers that can go for twice as much. I also prefer the T4’s housing which matches standard components versus the elongated version of the T3.

    Next think I noticed when I fired the unit up is the dead quiet black background. No hiss or static throughout the volume range. I decided to start off with my HD800’s and a track I know very well- ‘S Wonderful by Diana Krall. Well…Damn! I’ve never heard such an expansive soundstage with the ability to pinpoint each instrument and the exact placement of each instrument. As others have stated the tonality of this amp beyond reproach and I agree whole heartedly. It also helps that onboard are the Mullard 12AT7/CV4024s which I believe are the finest of the NOS tubes available for the T3 and now the T4. In fact, I may have turned Tom on to these little gems

    Hours later... there’s still a huge smile on my face and another thing I notice is there is absolutely No listening fatigue. Too bad I cannot say for my Naim Headline. I do love the Naim’s signature sound and PRAT that Naim is known for, but after listening for an hour or so I’m toast. I would add that the T4 amp has no special flavor. As far as I can tell it’s completely neutral, transparent to the source, with no coloration or emphasis at all.

    I think the T4 and H800’s are a match made in heaven. This may very well be my end game amp (at least until the T5 comes along;)
     
  15. deserat

    deserat Acquaintance

    Joined:
    Sep 6, 2017
    Likes Received:
    67
    Trophy Points:
    18
    Location:
    Californai
    What source? What do you regularly feed the HD800 with?
     
  16. BillD

    BillD New

    Joined:
    Oct 16, 2018
    Likes Received:
    24
    Trophy Points:
    3
    Location:
    Atlanta, GA
    Source is a Naim DAC with Teddy XPS power supply. I regularly feed my HD800's with that source and either a Naim Headline/ TeddyCap or T3 amp.
     
  17. SoupRKnowva

    SoupRKnowva Official SBAF South Korean Ambassador

    Pyrate Contributor
    Joined:
    Sep 26, 2015
    Likes Received:
    4,249
    Trophy Points:
    93
    Location:
    Austin, TX
    @dsavitsk would you be willing to go into any more detail about the improvements/changes of the T4 vs a maxed out T3 and even the L2? You mentioned newer, better, output transformers. I notice there are only two parafeed caps this time around, which I was thinking was because the solid state section is the differential stage, but I thought it was in the T3 too.

    Anyway, anything you're willing to share would be cool
     
  18. Ice-man

    Ice-man Friend

    Pyrate Banned
    Joined:
    Oct 12, 2015
    Likes Received:
    3,455
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Sorry that I haven't had much time to post after the audition. I mostly wanted to share some thoughts on the hd800/t4 pairing. While the 650 offers considerable scale with better amps (as evidenced when I plugged it into the t4), it also remains a very friendly and forgiving headphone. Friendly with regard to the source as well as the amp.

    The hd800 is a whole different animal altogether. Friendly an forgiving are not adjectives that are well suited for the hd800. Without the right upstream gear, I don't enjoy the hd800 all that much. The treble and lack of warmth is often fatiguing and overbearing. That's where heavy EQ usually comes in for me. With the t4 in the chain, I didn't need much more than light EQ at most.

    The tone of the t4/hd800 combo is pretty neutral with just a hint of tube warmth and wetness. Classical, jazz, acoustic folk and the like were all tremendous over the hd800 using the t4. This is not an overly warm and syrupy sounding amp. It's quick and with impressive staging.

    If I just had the hd650 and 800 this could easily by my end game. Really really, nice amp from ECP. :punk:
     
  19. dsavitsk

    dsavitsk Friend

    Pyrate
    Joined:
    Oct 2, 2015
    Likes Received:
    1,616
    Trophy Points:
    93
    Home Page:
    My experience designing circuits has been that some of the things that initially jump out to make a circuit seem exceptional are the same things that cause fatigue in the long term. In particular, distortion in the high harmonics, even when it is so low that THD is low, seems to make voices initially sound very real and present. But in the long term, it makes the sound fatiguing. So when I design, I try not to evaluate things too much until I've been listening for a long time. If, at 4 a.m. I still want to hear more instead of going to bed, then I feel like I'm on the right track.

    The dual parafeed caps in the T3 were required because the transformers were not designed to have a high voltage differential between the primaries and secondaries. So the dual caps were for safety. However, because they were in series, it required 2x 10u caps to end up with a 5u parafeed cap. The Lundahls do not have that same limitation. As a consequence, not only can we use a single 5u cap instead of 2x 10u (even within the same line, smaller caps tend to sound better than large ones), we can also fit a higher quality cap into the same amount of space. And since we have more space, we can fit a much better cap in there anyway.

    In addition, the Lundahls are just better transformers. This is in part due to the core shape used, in part due to the winding geometry, and in part due to the lower DCR which interacts less with headphone loads. I have been trying to get someone to make a transformer like these for a decade. The OPTs used in the L2, the T1, and the T3 were all quite good, but I think these are a real step up. I am extremely pleased with them, and extremely pleased with Lundahl for figuring out how to make them.

    There are also some circuit differences from the T3 to the T4. The parts used are a bit better, the power supplies have been refined for less noise, and since there is better heat dissipation we were able to up the current a little which makes the transistors perform better.

    With regard to the L2, I think the T4 is better in every way. The L2 is a nice example of a spud amp, but it requires the tube to do a lot of heavy lifting while the T4 really uses tubes where they perform best, and sand where it does.
     
  20. Taverius

    Taverius Smells like sausages

    Pyrate
    Joined:
    Dec 27, 2017
    Likes Received:
    3,026
    Trophy Points:
    113
    Location:
    Rapallo, Italy
    @dsavitsk iirc the t3 did pretty well with eh 12ay7s, it's that still the case with the 4?

    My paranoia really doesn't let me sleep if I'm relying on nos tubes, so I'm limited to the new sensor/jj/psvane/shuguang offerings.
     

Share This Page