To these ears and after a few days of run-in, my table was actually starched white linens and red roses. Where class A might suggest a warmer sweeter comfort sound, this circuit is calibrated for more quicksilvery reflexes. On that score it's lighter, meaning faster. Yet the colour palette's black values from fully resolved bass and absentee noise are strongly saturated. That blackness supports a densely materialized sound for proper weight and substance. It envelops a highly feathered-out top end flush with detail. That simply integrates with the overall substance to not telegraph as a top-down—or separate layer of—airiness. Yet it prevents any sense of darkness. Another facet of the same observation is excellent even-handed control. You rightly expect this from a circuit with gobs of power. Sometimes though what is quite extreme power for a given app bakes a beefcake. He's big but poorly defined and somewhat of a muscle-bound stiff. The P1x defied that archetype with a vengeance. Stephane Wrembel, a Gallic guitarist mining the Jazz Manouche genre of Django's descendants, played with the flashy swagger and fine tone modulations I know from my wide-bandwidth class AB amps. La pompe as Gipsy Jazz's trademark accompaniment had properly rocking verve whilst a wily cross-rhythm piano stomped all across it for the intended timing tension. Fine percussive stick trills in the treble put the needle work on growing layer complexity and the P1x kept all of it equally illuminated like a stacked Bach fugue where no recurring motif is more or less important than any other. It all sums to one tapestry yet at will our attention can zoom into any strand and follow its tendrilled path through all the others which occur simultaneously.

Volume setting represents my SPL on Susvara. 

Though guessing parts turns to a quick fail whenever implementations bend common expectations, I'd still peg these power transistors bipolar not Mosfet. If that speaks to you, no more needs saying. If it doesn't, never mind. It's audiophile geek speak so already off the table again. Back to Susvara, of all planarmagnetics I've heard it's the most electrostatic. How much that signature lucidity and litheness shifts into the domain of premium over-ear dynamics speaks directly to the driving amplifier and how it handles this infamous load. The P1x was such a maximally shifty type. If we link 'substance' to its direct verbal meaning not the providing of evidence or proof, the P1x substantiated Susvara without stealing from resolution. It intensified substance to step away from the slightly more spectral feel of e-stats. Whenever an amp does that, my immediate question is, in what currency am I expected to pay? Will rhythmic rigor soften? Will the treble haze over to give the midband more emphasis? Will bass ponce out? Will separation take a hit? The P1x's victory lap was having none of it. Image heft, colour saturation, grip, easy let go of notes, excellent treble resolution without forwardness, taut not big-bottomed bass – it all coexisted in quite ideal harmony.

Requiring a click or two less volume, the same held true for the ultra-resolution Serbian Immanis with its triple-paralleled well-vented ribbons. There were no divaesque tendencies to cater to with selective music picks. The low-mass corrugated aluminium foils danced as finely as they do on my upstairs Cen.Grand Silver Fox. This demanded a direct comparison to the far bigger countryman from Shenzhen. Already before I made that short trek up the stairs, I somewhat regretted my sour cherries. Not that they were imaginary.  Actual listening to this petite deck simply made griping over its outdated design feel small. Yet small certainly wasn't the case for its sonic prowess; neither in substance, on resolution nor ultimate drive ambitions.

Immanis on its impedance interface stand.

To get more specific now required contrast to my Kinki and Cen.Grand amps. I already knew that the Soundaware packs the highest gain/power quotient of my residents to require the most attenuation and leave the most untapped headroom.

FiiO R7 SD transport via USB to Soundaware D300Ref bridge into Cen.Grand DSDAC 1.0 Deluxe XLR out into Cen.Grand Silver Fox, P1x or THR-1.