🔶 Focal Clear

[M0N]

@Joost_Eijkenboom

but only in combination with a “fun” dac like the bifrost. Is it extremely clinical?

Yes and no, the neve can be slightly hard to pair dac wise as it’s pretty dependant on the dac for it’s performance imo, and can also easily be tilted toward something too clinical or too warm and smooth, imo finding something that gives good balance is key

The bf2 ends up being pretty natural sounding overall and striking that balance well. Generally what the bf2 does with the neve is it expands the more intimate staging of the neve while maintaining most of the depth, adds more low end impact and body overall, keeps the great timbre, and slightly smooths out treble which can get hot with poor recordings. Also adds more macrodynamics to the neve which typically focuses on micro. The end result is just pretty natural neutral and a great balance between everything, it doesn’t tilt it too far one way.

@Joost_Eijkenboom

For some reason it makes more sense in my head to have a clean as possible DAC and a fun AMP

It depends, it’s moreso just finding things that have good synergy together as you want to assess the combination of the chain’s end result rather than the individual components

@Joost_Eijkenboom

The “problem” with the schiit stuff is I am in Europe and warrenty could be a problem then (shipping overseas)

Makes sense

@Joost_Eijkenboom

I do vastly prefer the looks of schiit stuff compared to RNHP though. Not extremely important, but still a factor. Something like Singxer or topping look fine, althoug not as good as schiit I think, but would be preferred over RNHP looks.

Fair lol

@Joost_Eijkenboom

My budget is around 500 right now, or maybe 700 for a stack. But 500 now and 500 in a year or so is possible.

If you were still interested in the neve with that budget, I might suggest dac wise considering an allo revolution dac with the nirvana smps, that would be an upgrade from the dac in the hel, should be attainable in eu, and is pretty high performing for the price (albeit with limited io). A handy feature of the Allo is the ability to change how it sounds a bit though oversampling filter bypass or 2nd and 3rd order harmonic control, which can be handy to tweak the sound to your liking, good synergy with the neve imo. Later on you could upgrade to a bifrost or other 1k ish dac and get more gain if you end up really enjoying something like the neve

Another more euro friendly option that I also enjoy with the clear (although not as much as the neve) is the lake people g111.

I have a more in depth comparison of how they pair with the clear here, both are great options

A Comparison between the Rupert Neve RNHP & Lake People G111

Personally I feel the rnhp has better synergy with the clear for a few reasons, I feel the rnhp more accurately represents natural presentation for the clear, it’s true that the clear doesn’t have that wide of a stage, and the g111 does end up being a wider amp than the rnhp, but the rnhp to me ends up having more precise placement and greater depth than the g111, and the g111 staging can feel unnatrual and inaccurate at times with the clear imo (as the g111 can exaggerate and artificially creat…

I would mention the little labs monotor for something more analytical but not overly so as an option. It probably isn’t winning in looks either lol. Copying a few comparisons over from another thread as well

@M0N

If I had to pull some thoughts (which are based off a short amount of time and limited headphone selection), it would potentially be in between a rnhp and g111 in terms of signature, it was very studio neutral (not neutral smooth like the g111 nor neutral-natural like the rnhp), it’s stage was accurate but not overstated (wasn’t as deep and sharp placement wise as the neve, but nor as wide and spacious as the g111 can be, but the neve can sound somewhat more intimate and the g111 more artificially wide and lack placement accuracy), it’s timbre was solid but not stand out (neve was more timbrally and tonally accurate, g111 is prob more an equal here), detail wise most likely on par with the rnhp and lake people imo but could eek out more detail in the bass possibly, for tonal density it was a slight bit dry but not an issue and still solid. It does sound better extended in the bass than the neve and better extended in the treble than the g111 (both of which though can be compensated with the proper dac pairing, same goes for other qualms mentioned with the rnhp and g111).

To me the more stand out thing about it was the control and impact it had, while still having very good microdynamics, it really did punch fairly hard and made dynamics pretty easy to judge. It felt very fast and tight especially in the bass, the g111 has more raw impact but the little labs more likely had more control

@M0N

So far, it really feels like an inbetween rnhp and g111 but more forward than both, so very solid, so another great option in this price range. If I had some qualms, it might be that it sometimes sounds a bit over emphasized in it’s resolving power and can sound a bit unnatural at times but that’s not really a downside more just a trait to note. For out of the 3, you really can’t go wrong as long as you pay attention to what cans you are using, as all 3 of them have compelling reasons over each other and it will just come down to preference so far.

To quickly touch on dac pairing, this is somewhat picky about what dac you use, not as much as the neve is, but it’s not as forgiving as the g111. So far, I’ve had the best experiences with dacs that lean either a touch warmer or are reasonably neutral, going too far analytical ends up being overwhelming and isn’t that enjoyable imo. Having the dac be a slight bit relaxed would also be a bonus. It did scale fairly well and let though some of the characteristics of a higher end dacs like the neve, so it’s fairly transparent there for the price

The allo also happens to pair well with the little labs when you tune it to oversampling filter bypass and make it a bit more relaxed and warmer

Sorry for the multiple links and quotes, I just realized I’ve already written some of this beforehand