The T+A Symphonia is based on the aesthetic of the "future of retro", and harks back to T+A's R Series.
The Symphony of Symphonia
Sometimes 'all-in-one' doesn't mean lo-fi or mid-fi. It's hi-fi in every sense.
In our newsletter on class-D amps last week, we mentioned the T+A Elektroakustik Symphonia. This beauty is a 'just add speakers' music player with enough inputs—from analog line to USB hard disk—to be called a "hub", and good looks you can proudly display in the chicest living room.
We've talked about how "switching" is no longer necessarily a bad word in audio, and the Symphonia does a lot of high-quality switching inside. From the Purifi Eigentakt class-D output modules, and a highly engineered power supply with capacitors that recharge at a crazy rate, this is an amp that uses the best of modern technology without losing the heart of the music.
Taking Symphonia Home
We have several in-house T+A fans who were eager to take the Symphonia home. One of them is our content manager, Gautam Raja, who first encountered the German brand about nine years ago at a previous workplace.
"My first memory of a T+A all-in-one player was a bad one," says Gautam with a grin. He explains: He had a basic but well-curated separates system, and believed that separates were inherently better than any all-in-one. "Then that T+A R-Series music player stomped all over my monoblocks and streaming preamp. I just sat there listening, reprogramming my brain, trying to accept that this single box was so far ahead of my three-box setup that it was in a different world."
We're glad he mentioned the R Series, because T+A has leaned on that aesthetic for the otherwise ultra-modern Symphonia, creating a look that embodies T+A’s “Future of Retro” philosophy. Look at the beveled aluminum front panels, analog VU meters, and rotary push-controls built around all that swish circuitry.
Our demo silver Symphonia during testing at Gautam's home.
Listening to Symphonia
While confident that the Symphonia would sound great, one source of trepidation for Gautam was the T+A control software. "When I last encountered it, it was one of the worst apps I'd ever seen. Even for its time."
Luckily, the all-new MusicNavigator G3 is a huge improvement. "It's quirky, but not horrible," says Gautam, "And it responds really quickly." Plus, the Symphonia is Roon Ready. "It immediately appeared on my network for the T+A app and for Roon, and I had music going in minutes."
Worth noting, Roon accesses T+A native streaming, so there's no discernible SQ difference between Roon and Music Navigator. (You can check this with your streamer by seeing if playing a track on Roon causes the native app to respond.)
"Set aside all preconceptions about class-D amps," said Gautam on a recent afternoon as he turned up the volume on 'Comfortably Numb' from This Is Not a Drill – Live From Prague by Roger Waters. The sound soared into the room; tight and controlled, but filled with weight and emotion. This is playback that forces you to stop and listen. As a helicopter sound segued us into the brutal kicks in the chest of 'The Happiest Days of Our Lives', we talked about how rare it is to find systems that combine this level of attack with tear-jerking emotion.
At $9,900, the T+A Elektroakustik Symphonia is not cheap. But if you're in the market for, say, a streaming DAC, preamp, and power amp, or perhaps, streamer, DAC, and integrated amp, it's going to be a long, difficult game of juggling investment in components, cables, and rack to get to this level of quality at that price. That's the magic of T+A Elektroakustik and its ability to annoy you at how good it is even when the technology is (you believe) not on its side.