FEZZ AUDIO MIRA CETI

What they say ...

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Wall of Sound

David Neice | April 2022

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"A Drum Roll Please"   

 Wow – what an amplifier!  Right away I knew that I was certainly not going to buck the general opinions expressed over the years by many seasoned audiophiles about 300B SET amplifier designs.

 

The Fezz 300B unit offers a true single-ended triode sound field, which means enormous delicacy and a full organic sound presentation. In comparison, the EL34s found in my Unison ‘Simply Italy’ seem to spit out the notes, while they just float out of these 300Bs. 

 

This experience is immersive in the extreme. From the very first notes you just want to shut down any critical mind function that you might be having – and listen. Subsequently, an array of organic and fresh sounds then just roll out of the speakers, much to the listener’s delight.  

Immediately I sensed that this is an ‘ensemble amplifier’. It wants to convey to you the joy of ensemble playing and communicate the resulting emotion, even the feeling of that type of music. Consequently, I lined up a whole series of ensemble selections, ranging from the modernist bluegrass of Alison Brown, to the classic ensemble jazz of Count Basie’s live band.  

 

In the process of reviewing these selections, I noted that bass articulation with the Fezz is exceptional. Triode bass isn’t wall-rattling, but what you get here is clear and tactile. I found that I get better bass with the Fezz without using a sub, than I get with the ‘Simply Italy’ with a sub. This was a real eye opener, even though I was aware that bass extension is the weakest point of my beloved Unison amplifier. Female vocals are absolutely to-die-for with the Fezz. I worked through my entire catalogue of CDs by Eva Cassidy and Jenn Grant. I just kept playing disc after disc until well over a dozen CDs had been spun. In the process, I discovered new gems. 

 

In fact, as a reviewer, this is one of the ‘tells’ which occurs when auditioning gear, that separates the ‘nice to have’ component from the ‘exceptional’ component. We are all aware that we spin our favorite tracks when trying out a new piece of gear. But what happens with the best components is that you rediscover new gems that you had overlooked before. It is as if they were being presented completely afresh while your ears never really appreciated them before. When this happens to me I know I am listening to something special. The Fezz easily fills that role. 

 

The Mira Ceti is also dead quiet. Even with (connected) line level inputs at maximum volume I detected virtually nothing coming out of the speakers save for the whish of a few ions. The music just emerges from the speakers with a deep black background, and fade-outs at the end of tracks are long and sharply delineated. 

 

" But Can It Rock? " 

Eventually though, I thought – but can the Fezz rock? Lo and behold, it can, within limits. Much depends on what you count as ‘rock.’ For instance, easy rock, such as JJ Cale and Eric Clapton (The Road to Enscondido) is firmly within its limits. Harder-edged stuff such as Bob Seger (Greatest Hits) is also an easy play. But really blunt-edged rock like AC/DC and the thrash metal genre are possibly a small problem, Why is this? 

 

Rock requires ‘grunt’ as well as ‘crunch and edge’. The grunt side of the equation is easily handled by the excellent bass response of the Fezz and it’s 300B tubes. But the crunch and edge so crucial to wailing guitars is an artifact of harmonic distortion. In this case the Fezz wants to smooth out some of the pain. Those 300B tubes, which render glorious the sound of female voice, also seek to remove the rougher edges from hard core rock, or else they dampen the harmonic distortions that give hard rock its edge. There is a kind of sweet mist that they spray over everything, and hard rock and really tough R&B is essentially ‘gnarly music’. 

 

I note that the Fezz is listed as having potentially up to 0.4% harmonic distrortion. This will be primarily second order harmonics, thus likely sweetening the underlying sound field. However, the full potential of 300B SET designs, it is believed by some, requires careful matching with +92 dB efficiency speakers, and such speakers were unavailable during this review. 

As always, buyers should be aware that not all components can cover all the musical bases with equal finesse. You need to be sensitive to your main preferences in musical styles and seek components that fit that profile.  

 

Swapping Speakers

Next up the line are to swap in my J.M. Reynaud Jubilees. The Reynauds are 4 Ohm speakers, so I utilized the 4 Ohm amplifier taps, thus giving the 300Bs a bit more breathing room. I have said it many times before but the JMRs are intimacy-seeking speakers. They are one of the few speakers I have heard that can readily communicate musical emotion and their shiver factor is always present. With the Fezz amplifier, the JMR’s were as good as I have ever heard them. Using the same vinyl and CD sources I used with the DALIs, the Fezz would spin its magic time and time again. Of considerable note was the delicacy of the music when appropriate content required it, and the levels of inner detail revealed.

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As noted above, some might say that the 300B tubes cast a certain hypnotic mist over the music, but that mist is very attractive and even supremely addictive. Switching off the Fezz and replacing it with my Unison Research ‘Simply Italy’ was almost a jarring experience as I had been so effectively seduced by the Fezz’s presentation.  

 

Conclusion

The Fezz really spoiled me for the 300B SET experience. I was sorry to say farewell to this amp. So now what do I do?  In summary, the Fezz Mira Ceti is a highly recommended amplifier that will provide you with eight glorious watts per channel of single-ended power. If your speakers are reasonably efficient you will likely be transported to heaven. 

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Our comment at Atelier 13 Audio

Constantin Gregg-Saad | February 2023

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"The Fezz Sound"

Considering all of the above, we recalled the observations made by the reviewer of the Fezz Torus 5060, their remarkable $2,250 solid state integrated amplifier. In that review the conclusion was that there was such a thing as a "Fezz Sound" -- regardless of wether tube or solid state -- a sound that is modern, refined, dynamic and extremely musical with all genres. If you take the Fezz Mira Ceti, Silver Luna and Alfa Lupi amps for a real spin, you will definitely hear what the reviewer was talking about.

 

 

"The Fezz Value Proposition"

What is crazy here, is that these things are beautifully built, but are priced to kill ... and they are made in the EU ... not in China ! ... ???

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Thinking the issue through as to why such a price is at all possible to achieve - at least to a certain extent - could be explained by who the people are that are behind the brand ... or rather, who the company is : 

 

It is in fact a well known company, both in Poland and in multiple countries around the world, called Toroidy, a company run by the Lachowski family, by the father Lech and two of his sons, Matthias (Maciej) and Thomas (Tomek).

 

As the name suggests, they are producers of toroidal transformers. It is their power transformers and, for quite some time now, their output speaker transformers (also toroidal!) which are most widely known and respected among both DIY enthusiasts as well as well renowned audio companies.

 

These may be found inside products of companies such as Baltlab, Lampizator, Ancient Audio, Amare Musica, or even Mytek ... so basically in both, very reasonably priced units, as well as in the high-end ones.

 

The company also manufactures enclosures for audio equipment, and in addition thereto, it has its own paint shop. So we think that the emergence of amplifiers that use their company's components ... transformers and enclosures ... components which proved their class when used in products of other brands ... was only a matter of time.

 

For those of us who have the slightest bit of experience with vacuum tube components, it is needless to explain how important a role the output transformer plays in obtaining a high quality of sound.

 

It is for very good reasons that many top global manufacturers wind all their transformers "in-house" ... or, at the least, have them made by dedicated professionals, whilst paying the significant price associated therewith, and suffering from really big subassembly costs.

 

But Fezz Audio does not need to outsource the production of their transformers to anyone, and the idea of building their own amplifiers arose at a time when the product portfolio was extended by a series of very rarely produced speaker output transformers, ones based on toroidal cores. The production of these special cores is extremely difficult, so in spite of the advantages that they offer over traditional transformers, such as a much broader bandwidth, they are generally very rarely used.

 

The Lachowskis decided to take up the challenge and prove that a Polish company can actually make these to very high standard. So, they fiercely jumped into the matter and invented a method of how to properly produce such output transformers, for each and every vacuum tube type.

 

From there, it was only but one small step to "practical application". The more so that they did not need to purchase chassis from other companies, and in addition, because they had their own state of the art paint-shop,  they could afford to offer very attractive, and numerous, color schemes.

... all this without incurring higher production costs.

 

Q.E.D. applies here ... from the latin term "quod erat demonstrandum" = "Which was to be demonstrated" ... or, the proof is in the Fezz Pudding :=))

 

 So, we now have the simple and clear answer to the question as to how is it possible for Fezz Audio to offer such attractive prices given that their production is located in the EU. Essentially, and in a nutshell :

On the essential subassemblies of the amplifier - or at least on some of them - external companies do not make a profit. Coupled with this cost efficiency, Fezz then resists the temptation to add high mark-ups to their cost base ... a temptation not resisted by too many in the High End.

 

There is another saying from a US movie starring Kevin Costner : 
 

" Build it..and they will come"
 

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But what are the differences between the 300B and the 2A3 versions of the Mira Ceti ?

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