Storytime: NITSCH x Schiit Magni Piety, Magni Pi, etc.

To listen at 3:00 with low gain on 6XXs, I had to apply 24db of digital attenuation at the source.. That's a lot.

Do you have something attenuating earlier in the chain that makes you push the Piety so loud?

 

That is alot.
No attenuation on my end. Just straight from the Yggdrasil OG rca outs. Volume control is disabled on my digital front end.
Not sure what is going on there.

 

If anyone in the UK/EU might be selling a piety in future please let me know.
Sad I didn't order one initially

 

If I declutter (in London), I might cut mine loose. Enjoying it thus far.

 

Definitely let me know if you do!

It's not mine to lend unfortunately. It's just here for the review then is heading back

 

I've had the Piety for a bit over a week now, and I agree that it's good! I think it's a great value for sure. It has a nice sound signature that's laid back, but not overly so. I like it more than the Vali 2+ that I had for a little while, which was nice sounding but it was overly laid back and lacked macrodynamics.

The Piety sounds a bit rich, but not too rich, but I see why people say that it sounds tubey. It's very easy to put on music and just forget about the signal chain, which is nice. However, I've had trouble spending enough time with it to generate extensive impressions because I like my ECP DSHA-3F significantly more. In that sense, I think the Piety a little bit over-hyped. It's not a giant killer. My main gripe is that the treble is a little bit etched and scratchy relative to my 3F. It's not to the point where it annoys me, but it does make me miss my other amps a bit, which is often why I turn the Piety off. The other main downside is that the sonic image is noticeably smaller when compared side-by-side with the 3F.

Overall, it's an excellent amp considering the price and form factor, and I'll be using it as part of a semi-portable Schiit stack with my Modi 2 Uber (which will soon be upgraded to a Modi Multibit 2). Happy listening!

Edit: I just want to add that I think the Piety, while projecting a relatively small sonic image, manages to project a three-dimensional sonic image with good depth. Many lower priced amps that I’ve heard (especially solid-state amps) tend to project a very two-dimensional image without enough depth, but the Piety avoids this pitfall. I think this is another reason that it sounds tubey, because this is a characteristic common among tube amps in my experience.

 

For headphones, I'm finding Piety is similar to, perhaps just behind the Vali 2 with my favourite tube.

It is distinctly better than Vali 2 as a preamp into my mini-electrostat speakers. Electrostats are sometimes described as too revealing, and the Piety seems to moderate that aspect without sounding smoothed-over.

 

Whats This?!



The thought for this was first put into my head by Jason on release of one of the previous generation Magni amps a year/years ago. More recently (in this thread actually) @Armaegis re-inspired me to give it a go. The Piety seemed like the perfect amp to give it a go on. For one, I had heard it prior to release and knew it was a great sounding, reasonably priced piece of gear, and second, it was reasonably priced and thus buying two of them would be easy enough. Thirdly, it would be fun!

After securing the two Piety amps, I asked a few folks, including Armaegis to confirm the wiring, and then made up the XLR to RCA phase splitters and had @Azimuth put together the dual RCA to 4-pin XLR output adapter.

The initial setup used a Lokius to convert SE to balanced prior to going into the Pietys, but a stroke of fortune by @sheldaze meant I could quickly have a 2541 in the setup for balanced output, and bonus, volume control. Testing also included the Lokius...it was both fun to use some EQ, and somehow felt like a safer way of doing this.


(Dual small chassis to damn wide to sit on one medium chassis...too bad)

Using an abundance of caution by way of a volt meter, measuring the output voltage at each step of the setup I convinced myself all was working as intended and plugged in some headphones. The only ones on hand with a balanced cable were my JAR800s, and I really didnt want the drivers to blow. Happily, it all worked out well and now I have a dual mono Piety setup that is basically a fun little setup. I dont imagine its going to stay together in this setup, but the proof of concept means that I can try other amp combos as well.



As to the sonic changes. The presentation became much wider and instrument placement more precise. I was using low gain on the JAR800 in the single amp setup and thought it sounded better than high gain. In the single setup, high gain was a bit too hard sounding and the low gain "bloom" was just the right flavor to tame the JARs.



In the dual setup, the high gain is now preferable to low. Low gain is a bit gritty and too loose while high gain is airy, light and controlled. The high gain setting is awfully revealing though. Bad recordings are revealed and its honestly a bit too much. I picked up a set of Ether Flows, and they seem to be a better match overall with the dual setup than the JAR800. Low gain again is not the best matchup on the Ethers, but on high gain, the headphones really come to life; great resolve and impact are realized. I look forward to the end of the JAR660s so I can hear them on the dual setup. The single Piety/JAR660S setup I heard during my demo with the Piety was really a great combo and could be considered "all you need" so I imagine two Pietys into the JAR660s could only be betterer!

 

Hooray for proof of concept and not letting the magic smoke out!

 

I am not well versed in this kind of thing. Does the digital volume control of the Soekris allow you to bypass the need for a transformer in this specific case?

I have a Soekris 1541, and a Piety. I really want to try and hear how this sounds.

 

I don’t think this is just balanced to SE, so jumping in directly with XLR to RCA can result in magic smoke.

 

I remember somebody did this with two Zana Deuxs back in the day.

 

Do not attempt without either deep research into how not to f**k up your gear, or without a more experienced member doing some serious hand-holding. This is indeed how gear gets ruined unless you know exactly what the f**k you want and exactly what the f**k you are doing. You should be an aficionado before attempting this.

 

I understand. Thank you.

 

I have rotated a few headphones with Piety since its arrival. Across them, Piety has shown itself to be a resolving, agile amp with pleasant, natural tonality and excellent separation of sonic elements. Despite limited depth with respect to headstage, the width is quite good, which, in combination with the nice separation, makes the amp sound open. Moreover, in the lateral dimension, the soundstage is not 3-blob but rather forms a continuous space. With all the headphones I tried, later sound seems coming from outside of my head and headphone shell.


As Cee Tee reminds users and others also commented, the amp sounds quite considerably different between high and low gain. The match with headphones is not only a matter of headphone sensitivity (and impedance) but also has to do with their sonic character.


I prefer Piety at high gain with three planars (Verum 1, HE500, and LCD-4) and three dynamics (HD650, K701, Mini C). For instance, Verum 1 is good at tonality, speed, and a large-scale presentation but its imaging tends to be not adequately sharp and precise. Piety at high gain seems to be able to enhance the Verum’s separation and imaging focus. LCD-4 can sound too reserved and over-dampened, Piety at high gain adds some liveliness to its sound. Although I won’t say Piety can fully drive the LCD-4, the sound from this combo is still enjoyable. Piety at high gain accentuates, or at least preserves, the magical smooth midrange of the HD650; it also sounds quite spacious and clear with the veil removed to some extent.


At low gain, Piety works well with Grado RS1i and Sony R10. These headphones don’t need any extra amplification help with speed and treble energy. The relatively laid-back sound signature of the amp at low gain is a good match. With R10, just like with HD650, Piety shows its talent in producing harmonically rich mids.


At the cost of a moderately priced tube, Piety is an exceptional value. Exceeding the Mini C as an excellent, reasonably priced headphone product, Piety is my nomination for best budget product of the year.


The rest of my chain: Apple music via iPad—UpTone ISO Regen—Eitr—DAC in Cary 306 SACD player—Piety.

 

So the answer is for @CEE TEE to design and build a dual-mono Piety (the Charity?) for the rest of us, with XLR input and output? I'm really enjoying 2541>Piety, but why not go for x2?

 

This is actually a great idea. Dual mono Piety. But make this one with a LPS.

 

How would you compare the Paradisea to the Enog 2 and J2?