French kiss of death

In the world of culinary, the French and Chinese are considered the best of the best. These are there for two reasons, creativity and originality backed by a rich history of revolutions and civilizations.

French has long been considered unusual and quirky. It goes as far nobody (non French) understands French! French romance, this psychological affection plague anything French.

Why with all the French things? The story begins with my Marantz CD94 MKII LE temperamental behavior, picky on disc. Feeling discontented, I was out to hunt a CD transport. CD transport is a thing of a past, there aren't many out there. A paradigm shift, people listen to download music.

The cheapest dedicated CD transport can be had for RM3k+, Stello top loading CDT. RM5K gets you a Cyrus CDT. For significant more, you get CEC CD transport. Alternatively, I could buy a Chinese CD transport, hey, it is just a bloody CD transport. How complicated can the CD transport get, right?

I have my reservations on Chinese stuff. First and foremost, 220V power rating. Current voltage is the mother of good sound. Within 10% tolerance, everything is fine. However, 250V is not uncommon here, the sound will get aggressive and grumpy. Secondly, only a handful of Chinese know how. Creamy mids and exaggerated lows voicing, I can't help feeling a lit greasy. Not my type of sound.

Under the hood of a Chinese product, you see boutique caps, exotic components and complicated circuitry and this is contrary to its western counterparts. Impressive as it may seem, but let's not get carry away, it is the voicing that matters. Pass Labs uses only common parts, so is FM, so is Goldmund, so is TAD, so are many others. Their design is simple. Think of a second, if boutique parts guarantee good sound, it would be much easier achieving good sound. Absolutely not, it is all about implementation, implementation and implementation. Each of them has a unique voicing that appeal to certain group of fi.

Trust me, I had been through that path, trying to outsmart the game is not a bright idea. The audio companies do not hire engineers to produce a mediocre sound. Honestly, I do not see high level audio any difference than performance car. If you want high quality sound, you could not not spending. You are paying for the design work. There is no two ways about it.

YBA came to me by eventual consequences. Heritage is the latest series to YBA product line up. Heritage is a line up from the entry Design series, fourth line down after the flagship Signature, Passion and Genesis series. In my opinion, the offering is too wide and they should narrow their product range.

Heritage CD100 (above), Passion CDT450 CD transport (below)

I happened to test XTZ CD100, price was right. For the sake of benchmarking, the friendly dealer gladly plays YBA Heritage CD100 for me. Look, I have patronized this dealer on many occasions, never spend a penny. Soong's sales attitude is highly commendable that he entertain requests. Some dealers snobbish attitude, let just say I'll rather spend my money elsewhere even though they sell good sounding products. So what? I'd not recommend my friends to spend there too.

YBA employs a standard clean faceplate to all series, black faceplated Design series is excluded, simple and elegant. Instead of press button, YBA opts for small toggle switch. Neat, the toggle switches provide tactile response. The CD transport is located at the right side, pretty ergonomic for the righty. The drawer mechanism is smooth. The reading of TOC, table of content is blissful. Overall, the minimalist and clean faceplate of YBA spells elegance.

The heart of Heritage CD100 is Wolfson 8740, not a red hot chip for digital conversion. Knowing Yves Bernard Andre the man through media interview, Yves Bernard Andre has some serious credentials to his name, a teaching professor in a renowned university, worked in Goldmund and Audax, later went on started a luxury audio company named after his initials. Among YBA design philosophies, simple design, short signal path, thick bottom chassis plate, nonmagnetic screws, three isolation footers, anti resonance, power, thermal, electromagnetic, vibration and electrostatics distortions management, these merit how YBA sounds. Yves Bernard Andre himself, an engineer, a learned musician and a tweaker, is a rare breed on his own. He is currently teaching at Ecole Polytechnique.

Most engineers don't think outside the box, it is a real sad thing. YBA later sold to a French businessman, it did not take long to later sell his shares to Shanling. Shanling is top Chinese audio company with worldwide distribution. YBA would leverage on Shanling distribution strength to revive YBA and re-entering high end audio. Shanling later hires Yves Bernard Andre as technical consultant. Shanling gave YBA a serious second sting of life in high end audio with a new French management.
 
Well aware that Heritage CD100 would beat XTZ but I did not prepare for the significant improvement. My heart for XTZ turned cold instantly, my mind was as if being bulldozed, blank. Heritage CD100 has a sonic that reminiscence of high end audio, breathtaking clarity, pristine, clean, decoupling notes that are captivating. A sound that associate nobility.

There is a SRC feature that I could upsample to 192kHz from 44.1Hz since I omit the DA. How could this be? I wrote to YBA and they told me SRC is not applicable if I use as CD transport but my ears are telling me the obvious difference. At 192kHz indicated on the display, an expansive soundstage, a magnificent spacious 3D albeit slightly thinning of sound. That 192kHz had put the final nail in the coffin. The dealer told me he outsold YBA Heritage CD100 player, I grabbed his last unit and the new batch will see price up. Blame our weak currency.

Heritage CD100 in my system, O my God! noise floor dropped to a new level. The cleanliness has become my new pride. It helps a great deal to let the wholeness of harmonics permeate through, hearing more detail, longer decay, feeling more ambiance. The space grew in magnitude. Could it be a fresh pick len? Could it be a more accurate read? I am clueless. One thing I quite certain is a quieter transformer. A buzzing transformer? You can kiss the unit goodbye.

YBA tonal balance is vastly different from Marantz. Marantz comes with fuller mids and lows. French romance at work, more refined highs, shed off some body, more Q and dry bass. As such, the image is more pinpoint, more spacious sound field as if the crews had switched the lighting at back stage.


Conclusion
Today's audio has a peculiar polarization, entry level and high end. Middle kingdom is slowly becoming a vacuum. Audioing is not cheap no more like those days in 80s.

Quality is a repeatable standard regardless the locality of production, it is the attitude, it is the mindset. Some Chinese companies can produce good quality products too. Designed elsewhere and made in China is the way to go to beat the price. KEF LS50, Stereophile recommended class A component is an excellent globalisation example, BMC, TAD, YBA, XTZ, Audioquest, Tara Labs and many others too adopting this strategy.   

Get yourself to listen to French flavor for a change of taste. This is my last catch in 2013. French kiss of death, I am now RM5k+ short. Beware of the risk of French romance, don't blame me for not warning you. Happy New Year everyone.

Follow ups
My guests could tell the improvements brought by YBA, citing the higher resolution and darker background.