Feliks Audio Euforia

I love drunk @Hands ....

I don't think anyone here is questioning the engineering, its just the inflation in price if far greater then the small improvements warrant.

 

i still feel this amp is overpriced. Especially considering you need to upgrade tubes. Im having a transformer coupled(lundahl) el3n amplifier with a few upgrades being built for a couple hundred more than this. No need to upgrade tubes. Like to see a bom on this amp

 

Impressions from my time with the loaner, big thanks to @E_Schaaf for arranging this. I mostly was curious because someone on Discord was saying how Empyrean and Euforia was the next best thing since sliced bread and since I also had an Empyrean on demo and a little bored, I decided to give it a shot.

TL;DR: It's pleasant, but I've heard better sounding Crack builds, so the value proposition is way busted.

I don't really want to say too much about the Empy and Euforia combo other than it sounds grossly underpowered, but you still got some nice bass moments here and there with it. It also bears mentioning the Euforia was a bit sensitive to RF noise, but not completely unexpected for a tube amp.

Most of my impressions are made using my modded 6xx. I tried the Euforia with both stock and NOS tubes (CBS side getter 6SN7 and JAN 6080). The stock tubes make it a warm and mushy affair with boosted bass, but the NOS tube set gave it a decent amount of clarity and resolution while leaning it up a bit and flattened the bass. Dynamics (both macro and micro) on Senns were decent, but even then, the SW51 still had the edge on clarity, resolution and microdynamics. It was hard listening to Euforia without thinking it was somehow gimped by a really cheap output cap. Perhaps if you really felt like making this work, rolling the coupling and output cap could make it worthwhile since it does have a good sense of immediacy and "engagement", but I couldn't justify paying the price new and still have to mod it further.

 

Just a quick question:
I don't have a baseline to put your review in to a frame of reference. What amp(s) do you use now?

 

Elekit 8600S, SW51, Pass INT25

 

I've heard the SW51. Very helpful, thank you!

 

I fiinally got to listen to the Feliks Euforia driving the Utopias yesterday. Can confirm it matches fairly well but with multiple caveats. For timbre-heads, I think it does quite well smoothening out that metallic tinge. I think this was my biggest takeaway in terms of positives. That said, the downsides are, you are giving up some of that dynamism, punch and most importantly, ultimate resolution. It's warmpoo, but synergistic warmpoo. For the price though, I'd rather go with EC.

 

Were these the OG Utopias you were listening?

 

This. Feliks units are so blatantly overpriced. There's nothing particularly special inside. Chassis is nice, but that kind of money nice? Nah, that just goes into Feliks' pockets.

At the risk of sounding like a fanboy, searching for value for money, or actually more value than money, is what brought me to Eufonika tube amps. Looked into doing a Bottlehead build, but thought the import taxes were prohibitive. Was recommended the Eufonika and never looked back.

 

Yes was using it with the OG Utopias. I would imagine the 2022 version would even sound worse on the Euforias. The 2022 is already warmer than the OG to begin with + the warmpoo of the Euforia = warmer warmpoo.

 

I'd agree that it is a pairing that loses its luster pretty quickly and doesn't amaze - Euforia + Utopia. I tried all kinds of drivers but trebly 40s Sylvanias seemed the only way to go to somewhat mitigate the heavy dampening of Utopia. Also, it seemed to require 5998s as the stock powers - while usable for ZMFs and Senns - aren't clean enough to help out the that heavy dampening of Utopia. Basically, I liked listening to the Misfits on Utopia for whatever reason, and music that lent itself to that kind of rich, damped, bassy, euphonic sound. Certainly didn't do a lot of genres any favors, some it could work. I wouldn't describe it as warmpoo though if you set it up right. That would be Atticus or something on a badly matched OTL setup or something.

 

I’ve had the Utopia / Euforia Anniversary Edition combo for about 2 years. “Synergistic warmpoo” is a great description. This is the opposite of the wire with gain concept, it’s extremely colored. It’s just as much about hearing the tubes as the music. Not really a daily driver combo, but it can be a fun, engaging, nonfatiguing listen if you’re in the mood for it. I went for this combo more often than Utopia and Stellaris.

 

I'd be interested in hearing the power and driver tubes to accomplish synergistic warmpoo. I could certainly get it fairly neutral though still obviously damped but it was just never quite right for me, I'm glad it is right for others. It is very euphonic but it seemed like ZMF was the way to go with Euforia, all the way.