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Product Review - Perpetual Technologies P-1A Digital Correction

Engine and P-3A DAC - September, 2000

Stacey Spears

Perpetual Technologies P-1A Digital Correction Engine

Frequency Upsampling: 96 kHz Standard, 192 kHz Option

Word Length Upsampling: 18-bit, 20-bit, 24-bit

Digital Inputs: Coax RCA, I

S, AES/EBU

Digital Outputs: Coax RCA, I

S, AES/EBU

MSRP: $950 USA, $399 Additional for Speaker Correction

Software, $699 Additional for Room Correction Software, 192 kHz

Sampling Upgrade Price To Be Determined.

Perpetual Technologies P-3A DAC

Capable of Decoding up to 96 kHz, 24-Bit Signals, 192 kHz Option

Digital Inputs: Coax RCA, I

S, Optical Toslink, AES/EBU

Analog Outputs: RCA

MSRP: $699 USA

Introduction

Perpetual Technologies (PT) is one of Mark Schifter's new companies. As you know, he founded Audio Alchemy some years ago, and then

moved on to do other things. After spending some time with Genesis, he founded PT. It is a lot like Audio Alchemy, in that the products are

state of the art, but without the price. Peter Madnick, also of Audio Alchemy, designs for Mark at PT. They don't have milled chassis and fancy

readouts. All the money is on the inside. If you have had Audio Alchemy in the past, I am not telling you anything new. If not, you are in for a

pleasant surprise. The P-1A and P-3A are PT's first products, and we have to say, "WOW!" They upsample, enhance, and adjust for your

speakers' as well as your room's deficiencies, then decode, all at leading edge levels.

P-1A

Front Panel

The front panel has two buttons, one on the top, which is the input selection, and one on the bottom, which is used

to program the 1A. It also has 7 LEDs broken out into two sections 1-3 and 4-7. Each LED is capable of three

different colors. These are used to determine the state of the 1A.

LEDs 1-3, going from the top of the 1A down, represent the input. 1 = I

S, 2 = AES/EBU, and 3 = Coax. LEDs 4-7

are used to program the 1A. Here, you select bypass, resolution enhancement, speaker/room correction, the

sampling rate (44.1, 48, 96, and 192 (an option), and the output word length (16, 18, 20, and 24-bit).

Back Panel

Summary of content (14 pages)

PAGE 1
Product Review - Perpetual Technologies P-1A Digital Correction Engine and P-3A DAC - September, 2000 Stacey Spears Perpetual Technologies P-1A Digital Correction Engine Frequency Upsampling: 96 kHz Standard, 192 kHz Option Word Length Upsampling: 18-bit, 20-bit, 24-bit Digital Inputs: Coax RCA, I2S, AES/EBU Digital Outputs: Coax RCA, I2S, AES/EBU MSRP: $950 USA, $399 Additional for Speaker Correction Software, $699 Additional for Room Correction Software, 192 kHz Sampling Upgrade Price To Be Determined.
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Inputs I 2S (5-pin mini-DIN) Balanced (AES/EBU) Unbalanced (Coax (S/PDIF) USB 12V DC I find it a bit unusual that it is missing an optical input (Toslink), but there is only so much room on the panel. There needs to be a BNC too, at some point.
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very practical application for a high quality two-channel music system. The output of the DAC would then be fed into your analog preamplifier. Another use might be in between your CD/DVD player and your digital processor. You will get the same benefit as the two-channel system. In this situation, resolution enhancement, world-length adjustment, and sample rate conversion need to be bypassed if you are listening to a compressed format like DD or DTS.
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I spend a lot of time at work, and since I grew tired of swapping CDs in and out of my ROM drive, I have switched over to MP3s to keep me entertained. (It makes me really appreciate the sound of CDs when I listen to them at home.) The resolution enhancement built into the 1A can’t cure all the ills of MP3s, but it does go along way to remove the glare that is a result of throwing away most of the data.
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The P-3A, when using the digital output of the Apex, shows DAC linearity easily to the -96 dB limit of 16 bits, and actually remains linear below that limit, although the graph eventually rises due to the content added by the noise floor caused by the desirable presence of dither, which allows encoding greater than 16 bit resolution onto a 16 bit system at the expense of a higher theoretical noise level than, say, a 20 or 24 bit system.
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Both the P-1A and P-3A come with an outboard power supply (wall warts). The Monolithic Power Plant (PP), borrowing its name from the PS Audio power plant, is a 3rd party add-on power supply that was designed to be used exclusively with the 1A and 3A. It does not regenerate the AC like the PS Audio stuff, but it's a beefier power supply than what comes with the PTs. It has two transformers inside, a large EMI filter, a couple of caps, and a full wave rectifier.
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complete surprise, not only was the gong much easier (no edginess) for my hearing to take, but it had more substance . . . more body. It was more musical. I have to say that the PT experience is as close to having all the good qualities of our classic analog LPs as I can imagine. I say good qualities, because the PT's sound lacks the pops, hisses, and clicks that plague phonograph records.
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rules with a direct-to-consumer business model that offers all the flavor and none of the fat. The ultimate “winner”of certain pending format wars (SACD vs. DVD-A) remains up-in-the-air, but still, digital audio enthusiasts have much to be happy about right now. Better still, digital-to-analog conversion technology continues to progress while the cost of entry drops like a rock – even for the good stuff. The Perpetual Technologies P-3A is a perfect example of this phenomenon.
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DACs in a variety of price ranges. A stock MSB Link DAC ($399) and Bel Canto DAC-1 ($1,295) were compared to the P-3A in my own system, while the Theta DS ProGenV ($5,600) was the competition in the listening context of a friend’s excellent system. These weren’t always apples-to-apples comparisons, but they were the best I could do. The Bel Canto, for example, upsamples to 24 bits/96 kHz, while the P-3A performs only 96 kHz upsampling by itself (you need the P-1A to get the 24 bit interpolation).
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a warmer overall tonal character and sweeter highs. The P-3A has the edge in detail retrieval, dynamics and overall realism, all its previously mentioned strong suits. Choosing between these two DACs is like deciding whether to go on a date with Elizabeth Hurley or Tyra Banks – either way you come out a winner. A good litmus test to demonstrate the differences between these two DACs is Charles Lloyd’s new (and shockingly good) CD The Water is Wide (ECM 1734).
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tandem, it’s not a veiled attempt to sell more product – it’s the stone cold truth. As arresting as the P-3A is alone, what the P-1A brings to the party is that extra sense of musical refinement, the elusive but palpable sense that what you’re listening to just became more real and alive. It enhances your chance to suspend disbelief, even momentarily. The P-1A makes complex music more intelligible by sorting out the mix more distinctly than the P-3A alone.
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to interpolate and output 24-bits, but that the sampling frequency remain at 44.1 kHz. This allows the P-3A to handle the duty of 96 kHz frequency upsampling. After lots of listening, I concur with this recommendation. 2. Each piece comes with two brackets that allow you to install and place the unit vertically on your equipment shelf. This worked fine with the P-1A. However, the P-3A really wanted to be used horizontally in my system.
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P•1A Mode Selection Routines STEP A STEP Select INPUT D 3 1 2 3 4 M Important feature: • As you select each SOCS Coefficient, you can immediately hear the sonic results without having to leave this step. This feature makes it easy to do an A-B comparison between two coefficients. A • All Input modes use the same SOCS Coefficient setting. R M A Notes: • Once you reach #9, the cycle continues with #1, #2, #3, etc.
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