135s vs Supercap

Luckily for me a guy I'd been corresponding with over over the last year or so, Rob, had just opened his own Hi-Fi shop, become the newest Naim dealer, and had 4 recent 135s to sell second hand. Trouble was his new shop (Adventures in Hi-Fi) was in Wigan and I'm based in Sussex ... but he was quite happy to trundle down with the 135s and a supercap to let me listen to the various options.

So he arrived on Sunday with his partner in Crime Steve, and after giving my system the once over and tweaking it to make sure it was performing at its best, we tried the Supercap first.

Quite a noticeable difference. There was a lot more detail evident, and the tendancy of the top end to sound a little harsh sometimes had gone. This was perhaps the thing I was most hoping to inprove, so we both thought that the supercap option was looking favourite.

Rob had also brought down a couple of modded quadraspire shelves (the rest of my system is on QS), which we then tried on the CDS2 and 52 (we'd also gone back to the Hi-Cap). Wow - again a very noticeable difference. A much more cohereant sound - the music seemed to flow much better - perhaps a more analog sound. Rob is a Mana user himself, and rates the stuff ... but thought that although it would add space round the instruments, it would probably also emphasise what I didn't like about the top end. The modded QS ceratinly seemed to help with that.

So he finally got round to replacing the 250s with 135s. From the first few seconds of Concrete Jungle from the special edition jamaican version of Catch A Fire (What a great CD that is !!!) it was obvious what I was going to go for. The music was transformed. Although they didn't calm the treble down much, it was suddenly not such a problem. There was a filling out of the Mid which seem to make the treble sound more natural. And the Bass - as soon as it came in I had a huge smile from ear to ear. It seemed to have added extra depth, extra groove and the amps were in total control. The 135s are ceratinly a completely different beast to the 250s.

I'm sure the Supercap would have made it even better still, but without the cash to go for both options I didn't dare to try it.

So I'm now happily re-exploring my CD collection - and turning the volume up even louder !!!

I must thank Rob and Steve, who were really helpful, patient, very thorough ... and just plain nice. They were only too happy to help out with anything I wanted to try out, and have been extremely helpful via e-mail. Its a pity they are so far away, although they have already suggested they come back in a few weeks to see how things are settling in. I would seriously recommend them to anyone ... and if you live anywhere near Wigan I'd suggest you drop by and say hello. Good dealers are hard to find.