When Ayre founder Charley Hansen handed in late 2017, Ariel Brown, who’s now Ayre’s vp and chief know-how officer, was prepared, ready within the wings. Brown has labored for Ayre since he was a sophomore in school. As John Atkinson wrote in his February 2019 overview of Ayre’s EX-8 Built-in Hub, “Brown says that for higher or worse, he was indoctrinated in Hansen’s mind-set and design. ‘I solely know the Charley means! Charley by no means wished to introduce a product except we had one thing new to supply with that product. ‘NewHigherCompletely different’ was his philosophy; each product needed to be a step up from earlier than.'”
To my mind-set (and listening), the Ayre home sound is as visible as it’s audible, or virtually so. The sound of Ayre amplification, together with the element I’ve in-house for overview, the VX-8 stereo energy amplifier ($6800), which debuted in April at AXPONA 2023, is supremely quiet, deep-space black, aerodynamic, even futuristic.
Talking with Brown through e mail, I requested if in design phrases, the VX-8 bears extra of his fingerprints or Hansen’s?
“I labored with and discovered from Charley for 21 years, so my core design considering isn’t going to radically diverge from the trail Charley solid,” Brown wrote. “The adjustments usually tend to be continued delicate refinements to the topology we already consider to be second to none.
“I consider that a few of my greater contributions, lately and upcoming, are within the energy provide and implementation particulars. The X-8 sequence, together with the Codex”Ayre’s mixture DAC/headphone amp/digital preamplifier”and the latest QB-9 Twenty DAC improve, exhibit fairly a little bit of my design considering in these areas.
“I’ve no intention of straying from the sound Ayre is thought and beloved for, however relatively [to] attempt to extract and reveal much more,” Brown continued. “Yearly, we shock ourselves by lifting one other metaphorical veil on the sound that we did not notice was there. With out compromising the sound, we’re persevering with to design extra dependable and related merchandise.”
At $6800, the VX-8 is not low cost, but it surely’s cheapercheaper, that’s, than every little thing else in Ayre’s amplification lineup: At its AXPONA introduction, it joined the VX-5 Twenty ($14,000) and VX-R Twenty ($37,000) stereo amplifiers. Beginning on the cheaper finish was an intentional strategic transfer, in line with Brown’s intention to make the Ayre sound “accessible to extra music lovers by increasing our product line and increasing the markets we design for.”
Reaching the Ayre sound
Ayre elements sound the best way a Concorde appears: Modern. Silent. Distinctive. Highly effective. They mix spectacular spatial efficiency with tubelike texture and an natural presentation, with good bass however no sonic boomsexcept it is on the recording.
“I give quite a lot of the credit score for the ‘Ayre sound,’ as you describe it, to the zero-feedback design,” Brown famous. “That’s supported by consideration to each element within the design, from components and supplies choice to cautious circuit board layouts. The factor I’ve seen most in our year-over-year evolution in energy provide enhancements is the elevated sense of low-end management.”
Different elements that carry over from Charley’s design considering: totally balanced, discrete circuitry; the Double Diamond output stage; the Equilock achieve stage, a linear analog energy provide; and the corporate’s AyreLink communication system. I requested Brown to elucidate these applied sciences, beginning with the Double Diamond.
“The ‘Diamond Buffer’ is a reasonably well-known circuit block normally electronics, although much less particularly in audio,” Brown defined. “One of many drawbacks of the circuit is its comparatively excessive bias present wants and the ensuing energy dissipation. That is completely acceptable for line-level indicators in a high-end audio product however turns into problematic making an attempt to implement it as an influence amplifier output stage. The Double Diamond output stage combines a number of diamond buffers throughout the total diamond topology to raised delegate the power-dissipation must extra appropriately sized transistors.”
What about Equilock?
“The ‘parasitic’ traits of a transistor rely upon the voltage utilized to/throughout them,” Brown stated. “Subsequently, adjustments in sign (music!) will modulate these parasitics, inflicting the transistors to be nonlinear and contribute distortion. Ayre’s Equilock achieve stage reduces these nonlinearities, therefore distortion, by minimizing the voltage ‘swing’ seen by the transistors, making an attempt to make use of them primarily in ‘present mode’.”
And that linear analog energy provide?
“The linear energy provide begins on the energy inlet, the place we instantly apply our personal radio frequency (RF) filtering,” Brown wrote. “We use a customized EI-core transformer, which additional rejects RF noise. A number of secondaries are used to isolate energy areas. Full-wave rectification makes use of discrete gadgets adopted by a closely paralleled pi filter for additional noise and ripple rejection with very low equal sequence inductance and equal sequence resistance. Voltage regulation follows our audio-amplifier philosophies and different topologies, utilizing discrete, zero-feedback circuits and ultralow-noise voltage references based mostly on LEDs. Then the assorted energy rails are distributed across the board utilizing low-impedance inner circuit board planes.”
Brown described the AyreLink communication system as “Ayre Acoustics’ methodology for receiving management messages in our gear. It permits us to not solely ship and obtain easy triggers, however it would additionally talk info that might be seen on a show upstream. One other distinctive product providing is our ‘AyreLink Isolator,’ which may take RS232 command information and ship it through a RJ11 telephone jack to combine our merchandise into just about any good dwelling/leisure system.”
The VX-8 is a purebred spinoff of the EX-8 built-in with much less noise and energy draw, achieved “by stripping the extraneous capabilities,” Brown stated. “The core amplifier circuit topology is almost equivalent to our different present amps. The place the VX-8 is definitely forward of our different amps is within the newest iteration (evolution) of our discrete, zero-feedback, linear energy provide regulation.
“It makes use of the identical complementary junction area impact transistor (JFET) differential enter circuit” as Ayre’s dearer amps, Brown added, “and the identical Double Diamond output stage utilizing equivalent output energy transistors (simply fewer within the VX-8). Clearly, components high quality is considerably decrease to have the ability to hit the ‘entry stage’ worth level. And being a more recent and extra advanced design, it has some know-how that we hope to trickle as much as our different amps.”
The VX-8 boasts “FR4 equal” PCBs: high-spec, heavy fiberglass-plus-resin development. Moreover, the amp makes use of customized transformers produced by Mercury Magnetics; all Ayre elements come customary with Cardas wiring.
The VX-8 is obtainable in silver- or black-anodized finishes. It weighs 24lb and stands 4.5″ excessive, 17.25″ broad, and 13″ deep. Its slim aluminum case appeared to vanish into the sight traces of my Salamander rack. It outputs 100Wpc into 8 ohms or 170Wpc into 4 ohms; no score into 2 ohms is specified.
A single energy button decorates the VX-8’s entrance panel; a tiny adjoining LED signifies whether or not the amp is powered on (blue) or in standby mode (inexperienced). The again panel of the VX-8 will appear acquainted to an EX-8 proprietor; it features a pair of slant-mounted Cardas patented binding posts (CPBP), which settle for bananas, spades, or naked wire. Additionally on the again panel: a mix IEC receptacle and grasp energy change; pairs of balanced (XLR) and unbalanced (RCA) inputs; pairs of balanced (XLR) and unbalanced (RCA) subwoofer outputs; and two small sliding switches for choosing enter sort (balanced or single-ended) and subwoofer mode (stereo or mono). Two AyreLink Ethernet ports and a USB connection (for firmware updates) full the connections.
Deliberately or not, the VX-8 evokes ’70s-era American muscle automobiles, with the quantity 8 and, extra subtly, with two 6″ × 1½” top-panel, mesh-lined cooling vents. (Additionally evocative of Nineteen Seventies muscle automobiles: The wire mesh on the EX-8 got here unglued.)
Setup
Ayre despatched alongside the Ok-5xeMP preamplifier in order that I may expertise an Ayre amplification pair. Technical Editor John Atkinson reviewed the Ok-5xeMP in July 2011, writing, “It provides a lot of the sound high quality you may get from the megabucks solid-state preamps.” The KX-5 complemented my Sugden LA-4 line preamplifier. Small for an influence amp, the VX-8 simply slid onto the underside tier of my five-shelf Salamander rack.
Oddly, if trivially, enter and output connectors on the again of the amp aren’t designated Left or Proper. “Every half-side is one channel, and no sign crosses the center, due to this fact every channel is no matter you assign it by connecting the enter,” Brown stated after I requested him about this. “There may be nothing stopping you from connecting the ‘Left’ channel enter to the best aspect (referencing the entrance), as long as you additionally join the left speaker to the identical aspect.”
The Ayre VX-8 ran sizzling.
