Dear sir,
i am Paolo Verzegnassi from Trieste, Italy. I am writing you because, like you had advised me, I have read all your reviews on Metrum and Aqua products to understand the difference. I own a Metrum Hex and find it explicit and dynamic but lacking in refinement, balance (too much bass) and sweetness. I would like to change after some years of honoured service. I really feel the necessity to upgrade to another level but without loosing the pace, rhythm and timing factor. I have built my system with great effort and am terrorized to make a mistake. If I should change the actual preamplifier too (Esoteric C03 xs, upgraded version of your previous one), please feel free to tell me without any reserve.
Kind regards
Paolo Verzegnassi
Your "too much bass" comment suggests to me that you might first look into your speaker/room interaction because that's not how the Hex ever behaved for me. Rather than focusing on the DAC as the culprit, it's more likely that your speaker (per se or how, due to setup, it behaves in the room) is responsible for any overly rich bass. Of course if you have the Esoteric preamp and if it retains the adaptable gain (0,12, 24dB) of my earlier model, you can easily change the tonal balance by using zero gain. The more gain I used on mine, the heavier and thicker the sound became.
Srajan
