The iCAN PHANTOM’s capacitive battery power supply, originally developed for the Pro iESL, is intrinsic to its high level of performance. Rather than relying on a mains-powered switched-mode step-up circuit, a large battery of film capacitors rated at 1,000V DC is charged and occasionally topped up using AC mains power. This ‘virtual battery pack’ delivers pure DC power, completely free from all AC and switching noise – the perfect high-voltage supply for electrostatic headphones.
Balanced circuit design has long been considered a righteous path to audio excellence in high-end amp design, but the term ‘balanced’ is used in different ways and does not always mean the same thing. The
iCAN PHANTOM takes balanced circuit design to the extreme – fully differential from input to output, minimising noise and crosstalk in the signal path for ultimate sonic purity.
Essentially, ‘fully differential’ circuit design – or True Differential Balanced, as we call it – means that each channel (left and right) is fully separated in the circuit design, and each of these channels has two separate signals of equal level but opposite polarity (positive and negative). This requires four separate amp circuits, two for the left channel and two for the right channel – much more costly and complex to implement than single-ended circuit designs, but the sonic dividends are hugely worthwhile.
The
iCAN PHANTOM’s True Differential Balanced circuitry is coupled to a volume control with six decks – two decks for each channel (positive and negative) with the final two decks used for monitoring the volume control operation. The motorised volume control potentiometer is custom-made by ALPS in Japan and is of exceptional quality.
The
iCAN PHANTOM sports several unique features that set it apart from other headphone amps. One such facility is the incorporation of two input stages – one valve/tube-based, the other solid state – enabling the user to switch between the two in real time. These input stages are entirely separate, which means they can be kept short and direct for optimal purity rather than complicating the signal path (for example, by switching valves in and out of a single circuit).
The fully discrete Class A solid-state input stage uses J-FETs, while the all-valve Class A circuit features a hand-selected, computer-matched pair of General Electric 5670 tubes, a premium variant of the 6922 tube. This stage has two user-selectable modes – Tube and Tube+. The latter minimises overall loop-gain and thus negative feedback, giving a different trade-off between the tube’s natural harmonics and the transient performance.
Three gain settings – 0dB, 9dB and 18dB – enable the amp to precisely match the connected headphones. Unity gain (0dB) is useful to ensure low noise with more sensitive headphones and IEMs, while the higher gain settings make the most of tougher headphone loads, delivering excellent dynamic headroom.
For dynamic and planar headphones and IEMs.
The
iCAN PHANTOM includes two separate Space analogue matrices, one for headphones and the other for speakers, with automatic switching between the two.
XSpace for headphones is designed to compensate for the ‘in-head localisation’ effect that can occur when using headphones to listen to music that was mixed using a pair of speakers, effectively widening the headphone soundstage to deliver a more spacious and speaker-like experience.
XSpace for speakers increases the width of the apparent soundstage beyond the width dictated by speaker placement.
Both forms of
XSpace feature multiple levels that may be selected according to preference or switched out of the signal path completely.
XBass is a proprietary analogue circuit and it can be engaged to enhance low frequencies, its sophistication enabling it to do so whilst maintaining bass definition and without muddying the midrange. This is useful with, for example, some open-back headphones that sound bass-light; it ‘corrects’ the bass so that the listener hears the low frequencies the artist intended. The
iCAN PHANTOM offers three XBass steps – 10Hz, 20Hz and 40Hz – or it can be switched out of the signal path altogether.
Transformer quality is critical to sound quality, which is why the
iCAN PHANTOM incorporates a custom-made
PPCT (Pinstripe Permalloy Core Transformer). These incorporate a GOSS/Mu-Metal hybrid core and complicated multi-section winding with both vertical and horizontal sectioning, using extremely thin wire that is hand-wound with great precision. This transformer is capable of exceptionally wide bandwidth, ultra-low distortion and perfect linearity.
This proprietary iFi circuit attenuates the output to better suit high-sensitivity IEMs (in-ear monitors), removing potential background noise and increasing the usable volume range. This can be optionally applied to the 3.5mm and balanced 4.4mm outputs.
For dynamic and planar headphones and IEMs.
The
iCAN PHANTOM is an extraordinarily powerful headphone amplifier, capable of delivering more than 15,000mW from its balanced outputs and more than 5,760mW from its single-ended outputs in a 16-ohm load. In terms of voltage, it can supply more than 27V into a 600-ohm load; when it comes to electrostatic headphones delivers up to 640V.
