HiFiKenobi’s System

by hifikenobi on TADAccuphaseEsotericJVCMadVRREL
TAD + Accuphase + Esoteric
Upgrading from CR1TX to R1TX
TAD + Accuphase + Esoteric

Description

This is my carefully matched Japanese HiFi system, with flagship TAD, Accuphase and Esoteric components. Cables all either Zonotone, SAEC or Esoteric, continuing the Japanese theme. Treated room.

The system doubles down as two channel sound for home theatre, but its main purpose is stereo listening.
Read more...

Components Toggle details

    • TAD R1TX

    These speakers replace my TAD Compact Reference speakers still seen in some photos. I fell in love with the TAD sound with the CR1, and this continues now with the R1TX. Same precision and naturalness, with more scale and authority.

    Audiophilia is full of flowery and exaggerated descriptions, but Japanese companies are largely immune to this and TAD is particularly matter of fact. When they say “ astonishingly transparent, direct, and precise” it is literally that, without being analytical. The only downside is how unforgiving they can be with poor recordings, as are most speakers with a studio monitoring heritage.
    • Accuphase A-300

    2x Accuphase flagship 50th Anniversary Class A monoblocs. The ultimate expression of the Accuphase house sound - silky smooth, leaning on the warm side, with the power and high damping factor to drive any speaker. A perfect match for the TADs.
    • Accuphase C-3900

    Accuphase flagship 50th Anniversary Preamplifier with state of the art dual balanced AAVA volume control. 

    The C-3900 has been called the finest pre-amp in the world. https://trueaudiophile.com/accuphase-c-3900-the-finest-pre-amp-in-the-world/ I can’t say if this is true or not because I’ve only ever had a few pre-amps. But as expected it pairs beautifully with the A-300 monoblocs. 
    • Esoteric Grandioso N1
    https://www.esoteric.jp/en/product/n1/feature

    In Japan it’s well known that nobody Class A better than Accuphase and nobody does digital better than Esoteric. I’m not a vinyl guy but I value the organic feel of analogue sources. This DAC is the best of both worlds - convenience of digital with analogue playback quality. I upgraded from an N01XDSE, brought more liquidity and I’m able to skip Ethernet and go SFP direct to the network engine. 
    • Esoteric Grandioso G1X
    https://www.esoteric.jp/en/product/g1x/feature

    My Esoteric N01XDSE network DAC already has an award winning clock (the basis for the SE designation) so I didn’t expect the addition of a high precision 10MHz clock to make a huge difference. It was meant to be icing on the cake. In reality it was a significant jump in “naturalness”, there’s no other way to describe it. Everything sounded a little more “real”. A most delightful icing on the cake indeed. 

    • Esoteric Grandioso PS1
    https://www.esoteric.jp/en/product/ps1/feature

    The PS1 adds even more power separation and isolation to the already excellent power supply architecture of the N1. 

    I can’t tell you for sure exactly what difference it makes because I didn’t listen to the N1 without the PS1 for long. I can tell you the Esoteric Grandioso digital stack (N1 + G1X + PS1) is nothing short of spectacular. 
    • Accuphase PS-1250
    https://www.accuphase.com/model/ps-1250.html 

    2x Accuphase PS-1250 power conditioners, that clean and generates and perfect sine wave using waveform shaping technology that doesn’t affect dynamics. In my experience, clean power is an essential part of maximizing system performance. 

    For the same reason, I run a dedicated line from the distribution panel (Doepke Audio RCCB) to the system using high gauge solid copper cable (Oyaide FS EE 2.6 v2) to minimize noise from other circuits in the home. 
    • Torus Power RM 20

    Additional power conditioning with large toroidal isolation transformer with extra high capacity (custom spec)
    • JVC NZ-9
    https://www.jvc.com/usa/projectors/procision/dla-nz9/

    State of the art 8K D-ILA home theater projector that throws a very cinematic and pleasing image. 
    • MadVR Envy Extreme
    https://madvrenvy.com/

    This is one of those rare cases where the product name sort of makes sense. Mad, Extreme, Video Processing that can cause Envy :-D

    In my system, the most important feature is MotionAI. I’m very sensitive to motion judder and this is the best motion interpolation available, as far as I know. Sure all the other features are great, the tone mapping and everything else MadVR can do. But MotionAI is the killer feature, at least for me. 
    • Kaleidescape Strato V
    https://www.kaleidescape.com/strato-v-movie-player/

    State of the art reference quality media player that enables download and playback of studio master quality high bitrate 4K media. 
    • AudioPraise VanityPro HDMI Audio
    https://audiopraise.com/projects/internal/vanitypro/

    High quality HDMI audio extractor and reclocker that I use instead of an AVR.  Lipsync can be an issue without an AVR, so I also use an AES EBU matrix mixer (MiniDSP DDRC88BM) to sync everything up nice.
    • REL Carbon Special
    https://rel.net/products/carbon-special

    2x highly musical subs to fill in the low end, mainly for movies. For stereo, the CR1TX do not require augmentation for nearly all types of music. 
    • PSI Audio AVAA C20

    3x PSI Audio AVAA active bass traps

Comments 25

Showing all comments by hifikenobi.

View all comments

Sign in to comment
Owner
@spoonman16510, @reynolds853, @hiendmmoe, @tcutter, @scott8667, @tomic601 - thank you all. The system has developed very nicely. 

@tcutter yes the AVAA make an audible and measurable difference. 

hifikenobi

Owner
@mitch2 thanks for the kind words. It’s indeed a great system and we enjoy it a lot. Have since upgraded to TAD floorstanders so it’s no longer stand mounts + subs but I do know what you mean. It’s a different sound, trading off different benefits. Also upgraded to Esoteric’s new streamer DAC recently.

hifikenobi

Owner
@emergingsoul I’m very happy with the VanityPro. I’m not sure it made a huge difference in my system, since my DAC is already super well isolated and clocked. But there is no better or more capable HDMI audio extractor. It’s in a different league to the many consumer extractors out there, and better than 99% of AVRs.

hifikenobi

Owner
@emergingsoul I’m very happy with the VanityPro. I’m not sure it made a huge difference in my system, since my DAC is already super well isolated and clocked. But there is no better or more capable HDMI audio extractor. It’s in a different league to the many consumer extractors out there, and better than 99% of AVRs.

hifikenobi

Owner

@emergingsoul MadVR is video only, does nothing for audio. It’s an incredible product but don’t know much about its use with a TV. The HDR tone mapping will probably help any TV, but the Extreme costs 15x a decent 65” so that wouldn’t make much sense. There’s a cheaper Envy Core that has most of the features. MadVR benefits with projectors and larger screens are well documented. My screens are 130” and 160” and MadVR makes a huge difference, particularly MotionAI.

hifikenobi

Owner
Hi @emergingsoul 

Kaleidescape video and audio quality is unmatched. The audio quality boost over streaming is particularly startling, similar to BluRay but without needing physical media. Video quality is very very high, but probably only relevant on a large screen. I also use Apple TV for content not available on Kaleidescape, but for anything available on Kaleidescape there is no contest. 

hifikenobi

Owner
Thank you for the kind comments. Welcome to visit and listen in Switzerland. Toro3 - it’s an illusion, in reality they are balanced. Imaging is fantastic :)

hifikenobi

Owner
Oh thank you! I’m an old audiophile but new on Audiogon and was just playing with the virtual systems feature. Will add some info about the components :)

hifikenobi

  • 4 Thousand
  • 25
  •  3
© 2026 Audiogon.com