NITSCH Sound Pietus Maximus Optimus Prime Review - The Touch

You got the touch. You got the power.


I haven't really been on top of things and from what I understand, many of you guys have already been tipped off about this or possibly even heard it before me! @jexby sent this to me in a box and after sitting on it for weeks (I have a ton of other boxes of stuff, mostly crap), I finally opened it. It wasn't like @CEE TEE was pressuring me or anything, but I did finally set it up in my bedside rig. I immediately texted Christian. I figured I'd post it here because my first impressions are often the best ones (speaking of myself, because I don't remember ever changing my mind after 1000 hours burn-in, and I kind of know how the burn-in or warm-up deal goes)


Basically the Pietus, Big Pietus, Optimus Maximus, or whatever, is the diminutive Nitsch x Schiit Piety all growed up. It was my understanding that Christian worked with Jason for its final voicing. As of this time, I have no idea what the pricing will be. I would expect a couple hundred below a grand depending upon configuration.

The Pietus Maximus still retains the midrange wetness and bloom of the Piety. The highs are smoother. The delivery is more liquid and effortless. The lows are less raw, more articulate, and as a result more restrained. The bloom isn't as evident on as the Piety because Pietus has much better clarity, but it's definitely there, especially when we go back to a drier sounding amp. The Piety has a bit of fuzzy warmth that makes the bloom more obvious. The overall effect is that the Pietus Maximus is now much more sensitive to source. I preferred the LIM, MMB1, the built-in MB card, and believe it or not, the Modius E (which has an inner-warm, liquidity, and elegance unexpected from a DAC based on an ESS part - @JK47 was right - it gets even getter with XLR->SE using the affordable Cinemags). I have yet to hear the Pietus with the ESS card, but I would assume it gets somewhere between a Modi+ and Modius E.

FWIW, I didn't feel the Pietus Maximus synergized well with the MIB, which I use with the Mjolnir 3. Take this for what you will - that is triangulate for yourself. Also, I LOVE the Pietus with the Modius E (no need for Cinemags). This using a wide variety of headphones (i.e., Caldera, JAR600, HD650, Atrium). The Pietus feels no different from the Mjolnir 3, once you get that synergy right, it's oh so good. Nitsch and Schiit knocked out one of the park again. And I'm not referring to Piety (which some people seemed to think I was implying it to be a giant killer - it never was - I wish people would read what I write and ask me questions if it seems I am unclear), but rather Mjolnir 3. TL;DR: there's no f'ing way the Pietus is this good for the price (expected). Again I don't know, Christian can price it at $899 and it would be fair, compared to the Mjolnir 3. Yes, it's 85%-90% as good as the Mjolnir 3, although the presentation is different with its own strengths and weaknesses. The Pietus is all about nuance, touch, and feeling, but it trades off a bit of raw slam for it. Stuff like Sara Bareilles Live at the Variety Playhouse or Rostropovich Bach Cello Suites will be ideal.

FYI there are three gains: all my impressions were done on high gain

Distortion surfaces: https://www.superbestaudiofriends.o...mus-prime-review-the-touch.13957/#post-419576
Notes with a few planars: https://www.superbestaudiofriends.o...ime-review-the-touch.13957/page-2#post-419685
Built-in DAC options: https://www.superbestaudiofriends.o...ime-review-the-touch.13957/page-4#post-420941
In a nutshell: https://www.superbestaudiofriends.o...ime-review-the-touch.13957/page-4#post-420943

 

Just came back from dinner. Let's try with the more difficult 29-ohm load first. High gain. Give me a bit ...

 

I don’t know what device @purr1n is talking about but hope to hear it one day.

 

Nitsch Sound Pietus Maximus Headphone Amplifier

• HIGH-GAIN
• 29-ohm load
• 90kHz bandwidth
• APx555 "cheat" HPSA mode on
• Volume knob of headphone amp was set for unity gain
• Input signal output set on the APx555
• APx555 "cheat" HPSA mode on

H2 - second harmonic distortion product


H3 - third harmonic distortion product


H4-H10 distortion product


Notes:
H2, H3, and H4+ above do not include noise
H2 and H3 tend to be dominant over the higher orders, additional graphs will be added if this is not the case
H2 and H3 do sound different from each other, as to how, that's another discussion
H4+, the higher order distortions can be considered to be "crap" factor
There is thought that higher order distortion may have an outsized negative affect on sound quality
THD+N does include the noise component as well as THD (sum of H2, H3, and H4 and above)
Distortion is signal that is not supposed to be there
H2 or second order at 100Hz means there is a signal at 200Hz that is not supposed to be there
H3 or third order at 100Hz means there is a signal at 300Hz that is not supposed to be there
This graphs tells us how loud the distortion is at that harmonic
Distortion that lands in the ultrasonic region matters, if SOTA chip companies like TI care, then so should you.
0dBu (0.775Vrms) output level on most headphones will cause hearing damage after a few minutes of exposure
0dBu output level may burn out the voice coil on sensitive headphones with extended use

THDN


COMMENTS

This is highest gain into an low impedance load, so distortion and noise will be a bit higher. Noise does push THDN higher than H2, H3, H4+ components. This is from AC mains hum which I don't stress about (because the inside of our houses hum like crazy - it's something you notice when you live on a reef island subject to constant power failures). Overall harmonics look low. H3 and H4 are low for their respective output levels. We do see H2 start to rise past -12dBu output level, which is about 0.2Vrms, with H3 rising past -6dBu output. H4+ stays calm throughout and doesn't rise as we increase output. It will be easier to make more definitive calls after we get more data from other amps. We are still learning.

 

Let me get back to you on MMB2. Will try it in a few minutes.

 

Here are the 300-ohm load results. Still high-gain. Low gain will measure better, but I prefer to listen at high-gain. The measurements are more than good enough, so I am not going to bother to measure at low-gain.

• HIGH-GAIN
• 300-ohm load
• 90kHz bandwidth
• APx555 "cheat" HPSA mode on
• Volume knob of headphone amp was set for unity gain
• Input signal output set on the APx555
• APx555 "cheat" HPSA mode on

H2 - second harmonic distortion product


H3 - third harmonic distortion product


H4-H10 harmonic distortion product


THDN


Comments:

With a 300-ohm load, distortion is basically non-existent, however there's a bit of noise. All related to AC mains. See below. If you are a SINAD freak, go buy a Topping L50 or Schiit Midgard. This amp isn't for you.

Vertical units in dBu, 300-ohm load

 

The BF2/64 and MMB2 DACs tend to have more prickly highs, the former a bit more. NOS mode works to mellow this out and I rather like the effect on the MMB2 (I didn't think it worked well on the BF2/64).

The MMB2 (Modi Multibit 2) in NOS works well with the Pietus. I tried out some recordings with some sibilance like Alanis MTV Unplugged just to make sure. However, I still can't help but feel the built-in MMB card is a better match. The MMB2, even in NOS mode, with the Pietus Maximus still exhibits a tiny bit of glare. Both the MMB card and external Modius E (and by extension the ESS card) do not have this glare**. The MMB card is slightly less technically proficient in some ways (less rumble, less clarity, less resolving), a bit thicker tonally despite not having an NOS option, but it flows better than the external MMB2 DAC.

I am really digging the Modius E though. I remember @CEE TEE telling me about offering the ESS card option. I thought he was insane because "multibit is better". However, I totally get it now. The Modius E SE outputs are very very good (so by extension the ESS card too). There's some magical synergy going on here. It's not a headbangers or basshead setup, but damn, it does some amazing things. I can see the ESS card (or MMB card) with the Pietus making a great AIO.

*The Modius E BAL outputs converted to SE with the CInemag CMLI15s are magical. This is another conversation that is worth exploring in a separate thread. Credit goes to @JK47 on this one.

**It's going to depend on headphones too. Laid-back stuff like Audezes and Verite Open won't have this issue.

 

Yeah. Really nice liquid refined treble. Silky but not "smoothed-over" like B22 (to a minor extent), LAu (moderate extent) V100 (to major extent) . Exquisite is the word that comes to mind. The tiny transients are there, the pricks are there, but the very tips of the edges are rounded.

However, keep in mind the less "grunty" nature of the lows. Pietus Maximus can sound lean or upper mid-forward on the wrong set up. Then again Piety can sound scratchy bright on the wrong set up.

Headstage is like to Piety, close up. There a bit wider sense of space, but more or less like Piety.

I didn't want to let on too much about this in earlier statements. As you know, I prefer readers to ask for further clarification. In a nutshell, plankton and microdynamics is simply amazeballs. Easily top 3-5 in the solid state world. Yes, it's this good!

There's a reason why I personally gravitated toward the Modius E instead of BF2OG or MMB1/2 as a source for the Pietus. The other DACs are not resolving and involving enough. The Modius E is a hidden gem, it's crazy resolving and nuanced. This is something I started to noticed when a local person replaced their entry/mid level multibit DACs with the Modius E. I was like wow.

The play between the Modius E and Pietus is more about enhancing the strengths of both components. Modius E being capable of microdetail and microdynamics, and delivering smooth highs with a dose of inner warm throughout. The Modius E can at times have funky digititus in the top octave, but Pietus takes care of this. Because the Pietus has a cleaner, more effortless, less grainy presentation, the Modius E's inner warm doesn't come off as murky.

Something like the BF2OG would be the opposite approach: addressing the slam aspect. The Yggdrasil LIM takes care of everything (slam and touch), but the LIM x3 to 4 the price of the Pietus. Beside the Modius E (or ESS card which comes close) is the stackable form factor DAC.

Finally, of course headphones will matter too and will be final piece of the puzzle when it comes to synergy.

Dual-mono Piety doesn't exist. It's a Hacking Nitsch project, and as such, the sound of any such "Dual-mono Piety" will vary depending upon implementation.

 

From what I understand, same thing as Piety, a Continuity variant. Just moar and/or bigger output devices, larger power transformer, filtering, etc.

 

Usual suspects. Outside of DIY: DSHA 3F, MHA150, Mjolnir 3. Rag 1.x gets honorable mention. There's more that is probably on that list that I haven't heard yet like Ferrum.

It's not that anywhere that bad. It's like not the amp is thin, bass light, or has zero balls. Bass sustain is good no matter what source. It's more just more of consideration with it comes to putting together a system. For example, I don't feel the Pietus Maximus is any more bass light than the v0.80B of the Piety (which had different transistors than the production Nitsch version). In fact, I still prefer the v0.80B version of the Piety, because it's more mid-centric with dialed down lows and highs (it was more graceful sounding). However @CEE TEE found through public opinion that most people preferred the harder hitting and incisive sounding version of the small Piety (it wasn't like there was much of a choice back then given transistor availability - this has now since changed and I am hoping @CEE TEE eventually decides to release the Marv Piety version - which I expect people are going to bitch that its bass light or rolled up top.)

Also, I noted that many people complained about the treble of the small Piety being too solid-state. I know I said that the Piety had Magni+ highs. (Sure, some people have commented that Piety highs may even be slightly more prickly than the Magni+ highs). Point is that this time around, I to make sure everything is explicitly clear, and also remind readers of the importance of "total system". FWIW, the small Piety which was demonstrated at various meets was paired with final run Modi Multibit 1.

Finally if this thing were not sufficiently dynamic in the lows, I would have thrown it into the trash. Limp dick or badly-implemented thin sounding gear like Chi-Fi ESS sends me into murderous rages. @insidious meme can attest what happens when I hate shit: After less than 15 seconds (because it's really doesn't take that long) I take off headphones and walk off, without comment or a mutter under my breath: f**k this shit.

FWIW, the ZMF Atrium still hits like a freight train, and I prefer the brighter open mesh with the Modius E -> Pietus Maximus. Whereas I run the darker closed mesh on the Atrium with the MIB -> Mjolnir 3, so go figure.