Audio Note Ongaku amp on Kharma Mini Exquisite speakers
Well, well, well… it is working a heckuva lot better than anticipated.
Actually, it sounds really excellent.
We are really performing two tests here:
Can the little Kharma fill our large room with sound? Yes.
Can the Ongaku integrated drive the Mini Exquisites. Yes, for the most part.
The highs and mids are extremely lovely. We have not heard the Kharmas sound like this before. The 6C33C tubes on the Lamm ML1 and ML2 amps, and even the 300B on the audio Note Kegons, just do not have the amazingly seductive quality of the 211 tube on the Ongaku. Combined with the Kharma’s natural seductive qualities, along with its very, very high resolution in these frequencies – it is just a joy to listen to.
As for the bass – the bass is present – and satisfactory. Enough to not take away from the rest of the frequencies. But seriously, bass is not why a person has these littler Kharmas nor a tube amp. So I would give it a ‘B’ for bass. An A+ for the rest.
Finally – there is some slight congestion during very loud, complex passages… this started to diminish over time, so perhaps the amps were still warming up from when we turned them off to hook them up. We’ll hear how far things have improved in a few days….
The upstream components… mostly using the Emmlabs CDSD/ DCC2 combo, with the Audio Aero Capitole stepping in for comparison purposes.
