The included 80cm umbilical proved just long enough for the stand height I'd selected. To be on the safe side, Horten shoppers adding this LHY box might want to ask for a 1m specimen; or even longer if the supply is meant to house farther away out of sight.
Why might they want to? Quoting from my review of this PSU, as I heard them, the main benefits of LHYing were twofold. One was general so gestalt based and most obvious in the extreme nearfield of the desktop. The other was specific so most noted across a particular band. The wholesale change was a more tacit sense of serene calm as though subliminal sizzle in a hot pan had quieted down. Accepted hifi lingo refers to it as grit. It's a certain metallic flavor more easily noted when it leaves. Massed strings tend to be very sensitive to its presence. They sound noticeably more natural in its absence. Perhaps the best word for the switcher's key signature outed by contrast is wiry. With it the tunes felt wirier. They were slightly more on edge/etch. Something clearly relaxed whenever I connected the Linear PSU.
On the more specific sonic score sat a more elucidated sophisticated treble. It was more brilliant, crystalline and decayed longer like on those glittering sympathetic strings of Jasdeep Singh Degun's sitar on his fabulous Anomaly album. With the stock supply, high tones and overtones were dirtier, wet atmospherics of lazily fading treble reflections more damped so drier. On recordings with overt venue ambience, the LHY acted a bit like lights in the far reaches of the soundstage coming on. The audibility of space as mapped by HF reflections lit up. Exceptionally pure voices like Debipriya Das's and Yarlinie Thana's on "Sajanava" which execute very little vibrato show up even very fine intrusions of electronic sand. It shouldn't be there but if our gear creates it, we no longer detect it. Our ear/brain has learnt how to overlook it. We've long since tuned it out. That's why it's most easily caught when it suddenly disappears for a spell, then returns. In the reappearance we now sense it as a subtle chafing. What should be smooth and without grain grows microscopic grit like very fine sandpaper. A woman might say it's like kissing one-day stubble.
A side effect of this and the associated wiriness was that particularly synth bass felt slightly more shredded. With the Linear PSU that too relaxed to give up some agitated tension. I can imagine some listeners preferring the 'full-on class D' effect especially with electronica. If these descriptions don't suggest a night-became-day revelation, it's because actual changes were rather finer. It simply made them no less relevant. In some ways they paralleled what upgrading to a beryllium or diamond tweeter accomplishes. By shifting first breakup modes to 50kHz or 75kHz, the treble loses the grit which a titanium dome that breaks up at 23kHz will inject into the audible range via intermodulation. A superior tweeter doesn't magically extend our human hearing. It simply purifies the range we do hear. The LHY LPS160VA had some of that impact. Good luck chasing it with actual diamond domes. They'd cost you at least an extra zero. As to the greater calm, that paralleled upgraded digital where ultrasonic noise pollution is shown a locked door. The musical gestalt is allowed to relax and a typical phrase for the overall feel thereof is 'more organic'.
Conclusion. In one corner of the ring paces Big Corp. with KEF's LS50 Wireless and competing equivalents dressed in shiny spandex. In the other stretches Boutique Man in sweat pants with Vintage Horten. Root for one and you bet against the other. Framing it thus stops belaboring the absence of USB, remote control and anything digital beyond a coaxial input which is optional in the first place. The core attraction of this contender from Krakow is comfort sound massaged expertly by a high-end designer serving the midfield not bleeding edge for a change. This informed what to leave out and what to put in. If you agree with his choices, Jarek is your new uncle while Bob's out.
Linear vs switching power supply of identical rating and equivalent for Vintage Horten.
To paraphrase from the preceding pages, Ancient Audio's Vintage Horten is friendly push/pull valve sound distilled then injected into a class D-driven, DSP-compensated classic 2-way monitor with rear port. You can reach that destination by detour through separates with actual tubes into passive boxes; or direct with just this set of actives. Some love the scenic route with its switchbacks and education by trial and error. Others couldn't care less about the journey. They are all about the destination. You know who you are. If the latter and today's budget is you 'n' yours, you now have a new option to mull over. It's Ancient Audio's Vintage Horten D. It can get creative atop standard camera tripods. And whilst you could—that's what the mono sub out is for—I concur with Jarek. Most people will never hear a need to sub out. It's really a turn-key deal. Turn the key. Open the door. Move in. Tell your friends your new address.
The end. What more do you want?
