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Zikra Audio Preamplifier English ver.

Link do zapowiedzi (en): Zikra Audio Preamplifier

Opinion 1

All audio maniacs, who know me better, probably are aware of my approach to vacuum tube audio. Yes, you can say that I like the presentation they offer. In fact, I might even admire it. However, currently, in the perspective of everyday life, it presents an overly beautiful sound, at least for me. It is a vision of a world of music, which is too sugar-coated – and of course, I only think of well-made devices here. Theoretically, everything is fine, because it is full of essence, palpable and airy, but usually it is lacking one important thing – sometimes to a lesser extent, some times more. To make it easier for you to guess what I mean, I will mention, that it is all about the element that allows you to listen comfortably to both very soft music and rock madness. What am I talking about? It’s probably obvious, I am meaning a good quality lower end. And it is not about quantity of it, because an avalanche is very easy to make, but about its quality, in the sense of reach, energy, well-understood hardness and appropriate resolution. And while until recently the situation seemed hopeless, currently much more often, the designers of tube solutions show that when you have the right knowledge, electrons enclosed in a glass tube are able to stand up to good transistors in many aspects of bass projection. Impossible? Not at all, as I found out again after the recent test of the Destination Audio phonostage – it was a great example of what my tube master should sounds – during the test of today’s hero. Whom, or rather what are we talking about? Well, the brand just started making its way towards our market, but if it keeps doing it in this way – more on that later – I do not have any questions. Ladies and gentlemen, here is a representative of the Danish technical thought, from whose portfolio, thanks to the Olsztyn distributor Prestige Audio, we have received the Zikra Audio Preamplifier, obviously a line preamplifier, which shows that nothing is impossible for a tube.

As befits a high-end design, our hero consists of two separate units. Of course, the main reason for this, is the separation of the adequately worked out power section from the main part of the preamplifier that controls the signal, ensuring the best possible sound results. Their enclosures are typical, flat platforms made of polished aluminum, and the only difference between them is the hidden circuitry inside and the hardware placed on the upper surface. Everything is so well thought out, that despite performing different tasks, and usage of different tubes, both modules are visually very similar to each other. In both cases, series of chokes are hidden in black boxes on the sides and a transformer is centrally mounted in the power supply, while the electron tubes appropriate for each product are mounted between them. When it comes to the equipment of the power supply in any manipulators, then, due to the simple task of feeding the device with life-giving energy, we realize, that it is equipped only with a mains switch on the right side, as well as a fused power supply socket and a cable terminated with a multi-pin plug for connection to the control section. On the other hand, the main preamp section, offers us two control knobs on the front panel – gain and a line input selector, while on the back there is a socket receiving electrical energy from the power supply, XLR signal outputs with separate toggle switches for each channel, and, this time on the upper surface right next to the back panel, a set of RCA inputs and outputs including a phono preamplifier, which is available in RCA version only. This, in a nutshell, is our tested unit. I think you will admit that our hero not only looks impressive, but also shows how you can visually unify two constructions dealing with completely different tasks in an interesting way. Colloquially speaking, I plainly love it.

When the time has come to write a few sentences about the sound of the preamplifier in question, I think that my statement will be very important for the test. If at any point in time, for any reason ever, I would need to deal with vacuum tube designs, in the area of audio pre-amplification the Zikra Audio Amplifier would be one of the very few, if not the only one I would consider – this would naturally depend on the final sound of the rest of the setup. The reason is of course, the aspect of how this type of construction is dealing with the low registers, which I am very insistent about. Does this mean that the rest of the acoustic spectrum is less important to me? Of course absolutely not, but even a moderately knowledgeable audio enthusiast will quite easily be able to create a system, which puts the aesthetics of beauty above everything else in the sound. It will be juicy, pleasant, airy and thus phenomenally palpable, but there will be nothing that would allow you to put something on the player or turntable platter, what comes from both sides of the musical barricade. Of course, such a „pleasure maker” of life will seemingly play everything. But it is one thing to listen to music because it is pretty, yet completely another being exposed to the full range of its unpredictability. And unfortunately, the latter is very much determined by the approach of a given device to the foundations of the sound, being the right proportions of impact, edge and control. It cannot be the boring, soft massage of the your guts, because rock and electronic music really hate it, but it must be skillful dosing of the aforementioned softness alternating with concentrated energy, depending on the material listened to. That is why, from the very beginning, I have been mentioning the issue of good bass reproduction like a mantra. And this ability, so much awaited, was shown to me by the reviewed Danish preamplifier. Personally, I catch it from the first strong chords. I turn on any record, even with slow jazz, and I know if this is what I expect from a good device, especially from an exceptional, extreme High End one. It is about a kind of well-understood hardness of sound, combined with a well-defined energy, especially in the domain of the edge and the signal raise rate, without which, to quote a classic: „It’s nice because it’s nice”, it becomes a sound, which in the long run turns into boredom squared. Fortunately, Zikra mastered this issue in a perfect way, which meant that the testing process did not focus on looking for its advantages, because from the very sonorous and freely presented treble, through the vivid, essential and full of the smallest information midrange, to the low-reaching, fully controlled, energetic and powerful bass, those were beyond the reach of many of the competition’s designs. Instead this review concentrated on controlling my amazement at how brilliantly it competed with a solid state. Just to make sure we understand each other well, I am talking about how well it managed showing different states of my mind while listening to a variety of music. The romantic one and the aggressive one, both in a way that is adequate for each of them, and this is really a feat.
The first very good example to prove the above thesis is the latest AC/DC album „Power Up”. The music is not easy to reproduce, because it not overly well recorded and mastered, but even this kind of recording, when it is presented well, can make skeptics fall in love with it. However, in order for this to happen, it is not enough to warm it up and saturate it so that it is not clamoring anymore, because in such case we will get something like an advertisement for Żywiec beer, where the term „almost” always makes a big difference. Unfortunately, in order to adequately meet the requirements of the aforementioned group, it is necessary to slightly turn up the level of vividness, spice up the whole thing with a pinch of essentiality and energetic, tight and low-reaching, point-like bass. Otherwise, instead of a joyful display of musical rebels, we will get warm noodles à la „Hard rock”. And I do not just mean tuning up the kick drum to make it kick more bluntly, but also the weight of the guitars. Yes, they have to be juicy, but the riffs have to have the right weight and hardness to be able speak to the listener uncompromisingly. And it was exactly how the music of this group, cherished by me since my youth, was presented by the Zikra preamplifier. There was aggression and a corresponding pulse, the former as a result of skillfully shaped clarity, and the latter thanks to well-embedded in the mass, fully controlled energy as feedback of maintaining the rising and falling speed of the sound.
Another, literally and figuratively from the opposite pole, candidate for defending the thesis of the excellent performance of the eponymous construction is Leszek Możdżer’s album „Kaczmarek”, which I often exploit. It seems to be just one instrument, but a very demanding one, and in the case of the virtuoso’s skills, an instrument which is crushing a lot of evaluated system. When it is supposed to enchant, it shimmers with a million aliquots caused by the brushing of the keys by the maestro, lasting forever, like a mist floating between the loudspeakers. But when there is desire to induce some unbridled cavalcade of emotions, out of nowhere real earthquakes come. And while it may seem to be a trivial task, once we collide with this music, and its full spectrum of alternating emotions, from dilemma, through grief, to rage, it turns out that sometimes volatility and enchantment with the flickering of individual notes and a seemingly solid, but too round and not low enough bass, served with the typical aesthetics of a vacuum tube, always beautiful sounding, is not enough, or you may even say something is broken. Am I writing nonsense? Not at all, because even when the upper and middle ranges presented by a given vacuum tube design have good chances to shine, without a proper presentation of the lower octaves, something which also helps the rock musicians, the sound will remain only a substitute to what can be achieved by the fiercely dignified piano, which can sometimes be very subtle while at other times it is breaking down walls with hard and immediate chords. Well rendered in the matter of low registers, it can even corner drums. And I assure you, I don’t mean the sheer level of generated Hertz, but of course the quantity and quality of information contained in the material. This is an evident killer, which was mastered at such level of quality by a tubed device only for the second time in my listening room. How is it possible that this is such a rare feeling? Looking at the huge range of this type of devices on the market, I have no idea. However, if this is the second case, which I had the opportunity to listen to in my audio sanctuary and was a jaw-dropping experience. So we can only be glad that the designers are finally beginning to understand that the electron tube is a technology that allows us to reach the truth in music, and not just something that is supposed to “stigmatize” the sound of the device that uses it.

What will be the punchline of the above text? Well, very telling. The Danish Zikra Audio linear preamplifier supplied by the Olsztyn distributor is so universal thanks to the aesthetics of its presentation that I do not see the slightest problem with winning the hearts of literally every music lover. On the one hand, it offers the advantages of a well-applied tube, i.e. it vibrates beautifully and thus phenomenally illuminates the space of a wide and deep virtual stage, while on the other hand, it is very good at rendering a tight bass, descending to hell. Thanks to this, it easily shows not only a set of emotions associated with romanticism, but also other, often expressive emotions of all kinds of music, and which, in the end, has a very good chance of convincing music lovers from both sides of the barricade – both the eulogist of electron tubes and the thoroughbred admirers of solid state. I know from experience that it is not that easy, because usually in the case of the latter, this are about lower range, I so often mentioned in my description. And since in my opinion the Danes do shine in this aspect, so I am strangely calm when it comes to predicting the target customer.

Jacek Pazio

Opinion 2

In addition to the well-known biggest players, the audio market consists of countless mini and micro manufactures, the lion’s share of which has a chance to appear only among local communities, at least until recently. Of course, usually through word of mouth and/or travelling/moving, or even a pure stroke of luck, some minute percentage of them broke through to the awareness of a wider audience, but still the range of such activities leaves much to be desired. However, now the era of the Internet has arrived, the world has shrunk to the form of the nearest parcel locker, so whether a given device is manufactured just across the border or in Bali, which is mainly associated with holiday destinations, becomes, if not completely irrelevant, then at least a non-critical criterion during the decision-making and purchasing process. And today we are dealing with precisely such an entity, maybe not necessarily exotic, but undoubtedly existing on a micro scale and having a truly underground recognizability. Thanks to the courtesy of Prestige Audio from Olsztyn we are taking a peek at the Danish Zikra Audio, a manufacturer based in the town of Jyllinge, located on the Roskilde Fjord, from which portfolio we have extracted the 2 chasis Preamplifer LCR Riaa Nano X Core Silver Wired tube line preamplifier, the name of which, for the purposes of this text, we will allow ourselves to shorten to “Preamplifier”.

Michael Zingenberg, the man behind Zikra Audio, is an advocate of the most advanced minimalism, so both the design and construction of his products are far from Byzantine splendor and overload with all sorts of complications. However, it focuses on solidity, which guarantees longevity, and thus the chasses are made of polished aluminum. Since the plural has appeared, it is clear that we are dealing with a separated construction, but it does not separate the channels from each other, but the power supply and signal sections. Fortunately, both sections have been unified in terms of design and dimensions, so when placed next to each other, they create a harmonious whole. Thus, we are dealing with polished bases with rows of cuboidal, matte silos running along the side and rear edges, hiding transformers and chokes inside, and an appropriate set of lamps between them. For obvious reasons, resulting from the performed function, the front plate of the power supply was deprived of any manipulators by moving the main switch to the right side, and the power socket and fuse chamber to the back, together with the power cable for the signal module. And in the signal part, the front is decorated with two solid knobs responsible for source selection and volume control, between which the company logo is located.
In the power supply module you will find a transformer powering two 5R4WGA rectifier tubes (GZ34 or 657G), then four double chokes for high voltage and two chokes for the heating voltage. The ground „floats” holding only the neutral point of the transformer through the chokes. Both transformers and chokes are ordered according to Zikra’s specifications from Monolith Magnetics, Belgium. The 200V voltage treated in this way is delivered to the signal module via a 1.5m cable armed with a multi-pin, military type connector. In the preamplifier itself there are additional RC shunts to lower the supply voltage down to approx. 170V. The signal section is the realm of four single triodes EC88010, permalloy transformers and pure silver cabling in a cotton braid, signed by the American company Jupiter. The volume is controlled by a high-end Alps RK50 potentiometer, and there is no capacitor in the signal path.

However, as it happens, the visual qualities, although undeniably important, cannot overshadow the sound issues, and full happiness can only be achieved when they are joined by exemplary ergonomics. And a little ahead of the facts, I dare say that Michael Zingenberg has achieved this ambitious goal. Of course, everyone should evaluate the exterior design on their own, but it’s hard to find fault with anything here. The same goes for ergonomics, which focuses on logic and intuitiveness, and the only thing that is lacking, at least from my point of view, is the descriptions of I/O terminals. But the sound … it automatically evokes memories of the equally underground design of the Audio Tekne TFA 9501, but compared to its Japanese competitor it goes a step or two further in terms of realism and truly holographic resolution. Moreover, under no circumstances should we look for stereotypical features of a tube in its sound, or even worse, we should not go into denial that as an orthodox solid state lover, that what Zikra represents, to put it mildly, would not be our fairy tale. Why? Because we will simply hurt ourselves by excluding the possibility of contact, if not with the absolute, then with a construction that is by all means outstanding. But just to be clear. The Danish preamp sounds extremely transparent and resolving, so that it is closer to the freshness of a spring alpine morning than to the lazy naturalness of a Tuscan afternoon. On the other hand, it is incredibly vital, energetic and free to convey even the biggest sudden jumps in dynamics. However, instead of zooming in on the foreground, turning up the tempo, or blowing up the virtual sources, the tested preamplifier clings on to the facts on one hand, while on the other is so faithful to them that we are dangerously close to the level, where the boundary between participation in a live music event and reproduction ceases to have any meaning. And we do not need polished, ultra-audiophile, gold-pressed albums for such intensity, because even TOOL’s „Fear Inoculum”, which is extremely far from such ambitions, showed the class of the Danish design, releasing both the intricate web of murmurs, whispers and reverbs, usually hidden in the background, as well as the almost infrasound bass rumbles. The effect was simply shocking – on one hand, quite confusing melodic lines and dark atmospheres, and on the other hand, a stunning package of information, the existence of which we could only guess until now. And here we got them not only with surprising intensity and tangibility, but served almost on a silver platter. In addition, this happened without artificial contrast enhancement or equally painful exaggeration. Similarly, on the thrash-metal and madly galloping „Palace For The Insane” by the English band Shrapnel, it was easy to extract individual instrumental parts and, if someone felt like it, follow them easily. However, the key thing was that even during the most breakneck, truly cacophonous accumulation of sounds, there was an exemplary order on the stage, and each sound reaching our ears had its precisely defined place in three-dimensional space, its own time and, most importantly, kept the assigned role in the overarching whole. Therefore, the above-mentioned resolution did not consist of selecting individual components and presenting them to the listener „in bulk”; but by presenting a fully coherent whole, in such a form that every, even the smallest cog in its composition is visible on an equal footing with it, this whole. The key aspect was however, the intimidating differentiation and precision of the lowest frequencies, which could not be attributed with even the slightest tube softening, or thickening of the edges in defining the virtual sources. There was also no question of any drying out of the sound, so if someone was afraid that Zikra, renouncing its undeniable tubeness, was trying to escape into the stereotypical „transistor” sharpness, those people should easily get rid of those fears.
The same goes for the midrange and the highest frequencies, where crystal clarity and vitality reign supreme, so that even on „’Round M: Monteverdi Meets Jazz” by Roberta Mameli’s vocals smoothly transitions from deep timbre and captivating saturation to registers that make wine glasses burst. And it’s not about some kind of excessive offensiveness, but only about the ability to give back the full force of the emission, not a protective withdrawal that makes it „nice and smooth” all the time, but not necessarily true. And as I have already mentioned, Zikra sticks to the truth and conveys only the truth, so if you manage to configure the system in such a way that the other components also exhibit such features, I dare say that after just a few listens to your favorite albums, you will be on very friendly, or even familiar terms with the musicians participating on them.

Maybe the Zikra Audio brand has not known to you at all, and the name 2 Chasis Preamplifer LCR Riaa Nano X Core Silver Wired seemed too long, but just a few dozen minutes with the tested Danish preamplifier in the system will make it clear that it will be extremely difficult for you to find a sparring partner worthy of it. Not only does it shock with its realism, but it is also an extremely silent device, not only among tube competitors, but in global terms, so lovers of high-efficiency loudspeakers should also pay attention to it.

Marcin Olszewski

System used in this test:
Source:
– transport: CEC TL 0 3.0
– streamer: Lumin U2 Mini + switch Silent Angel Bonn N8
– DAC: dCS Vivaldi DAC 2.0
– Master clock: Mutec REF 10 SE-120
– reclocker: Mutec MC-3+USB
– Shunyata Research Omega Clock
– Shunyata Sigma V2 NR
– Preamplifier: Gryphon Audio Pandora
– Power amplifier: Gryphon Audio Apex Stereo
– Loudspeakers: Gauder Akustik Berlina RC-11 Black Edition
– Speaker cables: Furutech Nanoflux-NCF Speaker Cable
IC RCA: Hijiri Million „Kiwami”, Vermouth Audio Reference
IC XLR: Tellurium Q Silver Diamond, Hijiri Milion „Kiwami”, Furutech DAS-4.1
Digital IC: Hijiri HDG-X Milion
Ethernet cable: NxLT LAN FLAME
Power cables: Hijiri Takumi Maestro, Furutech Project-V1, Furutech NanoFlux NCF, Furutech DPS-4.1 + FI-E50 NCF(R)/ FI-50(R), Hijiri Nagomi, Vermouth Audio Reference Power Cord, Acrolink 8N-PC8100 Performante, Synergistic Research Galileo SX AC
– Table: BASE AUDIO 2
– Accessories: Harmonix TU 505EX MK II, Stillpoints ULTRA SS, Stillpoints ULTRA MINI, antivibration platform by SOLID TECH, Harmonix AC Enacom Improved for 100-240V, Harmonix Room Tuning Mini Disk RFA-80i
– Power distribution board: POWER BASE HIGH END
– Acoustic treatments by Artnovion
Analog stage:
– Drive: Clearaudio Concept
– Cartridge: Dynavector DV20X2H
– Phonostage: Sensor 2 mk II
– Eccentricity Detection Stabilizer: DS Audio ES-001
– Tape recorder: Studer A80

Distributor: Prestige Audio
Manufacturer: Zikra Audio
Price: 40 000 €

Technical details
– Tubes: 4 x EC8010; power supply – 2 x GZ34 or 2 x 657G (rectifier)
– Inputs: RIAA (MM), 2 pairs RCA (line)
– Outputs: RCA, XLR
– Frequency response: 12-115 kHz
– Dimensions (W x D x H): 440 x 330 x 210 mm
– Weight: 25 kg + 28 kg (power supply)

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