丹麥 Densen Club 俱樂部

[Ted Chen]

我們聽的是音樂，而不是系統。追隨他人的系統，不如自己體會真正的音樂。

We need to listen to the Music, not Hi-Fi system!
- Densen’s Integrated Amplifier and CD Player -

The founder of Densen, Thomas Sillesen made his first amplifier when he was just 13 years old. This genius head-honcho decided to make his own Hi-Fi products after doing business on importing and distributing audio in Denmark. He also mentioned the below, in order to emphasize the importance of HiFi that needs to go along with Music, itself.

“Hi-Fi and its way of listening are very simple, but listening to timing and music is, on the other hand, very difficult. Not that it is so difficult to hear. The problem is that when Hi-Fi enthusiasts learn to listen to Hi-Fi, they forget how to listen to timing and music. This is shown in many ways, but most Hi-Fi enthusiasts will most likely recognize the following. When their friends, who do not find Hi-Fi interesting, think that their sound system is rather good, but not good enough to spend so much time and money on it. Even when they try to prove the qualities of the sound system, the friends praise it, but they are not overwhelmed. This is because no High End system can play music, they play Hi-Fi. And “normal” people listen to music, not Hi-Fi.”

I fully agree with him. Most of us have experienced going to a friend’s house seeing highly-priced Hi-End system that makes surreal sound not music itself. How deep or wide the sound stage should be in order to get the great sound out of a piece of Mozart or Beethoven? Music is an art of timing and rhythm. Getting the micro-universal sound that cannot be heard in reality, should not be the goal of HiFi. This is Densen’s audio philosophy.

The B-110 is the successor to the B-100, which became one of the best sold high-end amplifier ever. It has power output of 120W at 4ohm. And it is13kg weight with 440mm-wide. I say it is compact design at moderate size. For the review, I matched B-420XS, the new CDP from Densen and PMC 22 speaker as reference system.

The things that I liked most on this review were:
- attenuator that uses vishay resistance
- extreme control by 0.5dB to 200 volume levels
- there is not much noise even at low sound.

Listening to Lang-Lang’s “The River, Hwang Ho Concerto” from the album called “Dragon Songs” at 100volume level, there was no distortion among Chinese traditional flute, Lang-Lang’s piano and orchestra’s symphony. There was a flowing harmony of sound wave that was so natural. The reason that this kind of transparency and spontaneously live detail were possible, seemed to be because of attenuator and Non-Feedback design by Densen. Non-magnetic solid aluminum cabinet has been used to restrain the vibration and this eliminates signal-distortion from magnetic field. That comes to high level of sound perfection.

How did they eliminated the integrated amplifier’s inevitable noise comes from power supply? In order to overcome the low level output of 60W at 8ohm, they need to find the solution from the transformer. According to the distributor, customized transformer and specialized winding technology have been applied to prevent the drop of electric-pressure even excessive current. Also they said DC-filter has been applied at power supply to control humming.

A part from B-110 plus amplifier, we tested a talented and pricey B-420 XS CDP as well. When it is compared with the discontinued model B-420+, this CDP has 24-bit DAC and supports 2 coaxial digital outputs. There are not many fans overwhelmed only by the specifications. The best way to get impressed is to listen to it with your own ears.

I started with my usual Julia Fischer’s Violin Concerto A Minor. All of the conventional Hi-End words passed by...neutrality, transparency, dynamic, sophistication, resolution... This is because of me being a fussy audiophile, the head-honcho suggested to just listen to the music and forget about everything else! After clearing out all the fussy words out of my head, I replayed Julia Fischer’s Violin Concerto. My intention was to listen only the beginning, but in the end I had a sweet date with Julia for 13 minutes and 22 seconds.

“That is why all our products give you the soul in music, not the revelation of poor recordings. As a result you can listen to all kinds of music on our equipment. During our development we listen to everything from Punk to Mozart and from Folk to The Beatles.”

This is from Densen’s introductory phrase from their internet homepage. I didn’t have any other words come up to me, so I quoted. And now I listened to “Bo Peep Bo Peep” one of K-Pop music from T-Ara, remastered by D4A Sound. As I closed my eyes, those girls from T-Ara singing and dancing right in front of me wearing those cute cat gloves that they always wear for the song. Before I realized, I was smiling.

Densen’s customized non-feedback A grade 6W has been applied to analogue stage. 300VA transformer on the power supply can even be compared with many other power amplifiers! 40,000uF capacitor, 8 individual regulators and 4 bridges are all packed. Microprocessor and display are separately supplied. DAC and analogue board are divided from main CPU board. Because DAC is installed in a shielded box, it can avoid analogue’s interference.

After checking through the specifications, I tried again the first piece of Lang-Lang’s “The River, Hwang Ho Concerto” and enjoyed the Densen sound. Of course, I was moved again just like the first time.

If you are spending too much time on audio system rather than the music itself, please remember the message from Densen.

“We design audio equipment which is fun to listen to: Life is too short for boring Hi-Fi. ”

[sound196]

簽到！同為丹麥之子的愛好者！！！