 The Moran's Model 40N is a true looker, but it's more than just a pretty face. It's built like a tank, does two times 70 watts in class AB, has HEO streaming, AG My Arc and Phono input. Over the years I have owned several Moran's products. The CD94 has been my reference in the 80s, followed up by, if I recall well, a CD81. And the PMKI Perl light has been my reference in setup 2 for over a decade and still is. For good amps last very long. The Model 40N has the new Moran's design language with a dual layered front plate. The front one is of anodized aluminium and the sub-front behind it has a structure. Between the two subtle lightning reinforces the spatial effect. Of course the display in the porthole, a reference to old Moran's receivers, is present too. There is a silver and a black version and although I usually prefer the black version, I like the silver version too. The Model 40N of course needs a set of loudspeakers unless you listen to headphones. Since it is a streaming amplifier it needs to be connected to your home network over either a network cable or wifi. This way you can play music from streaming services, listen to internet radio and play music stored on your computer or NAS using a DLNA server program. An infrared remote control comes with the unit but for streaming the use of a free Heels amp on a tablet or smartphone is to be used. Nothing more is needed to enjoy music. But the possibilities can be expanded. Music from a USB stick or drive can be played too. A CD player can be connected over spitive, tostling or analog interlinks. A portable player or smartphone can be connected wirelessly over AirPlay or Bluetooth. Analog interlinks can be used to connect an FM tuner. There even is a phono input so playing vinyl is facilitated too. Last but not least the TV can be connected over tostling or even better HDMI audio return channel. The Model 40 can be set in a way that it automatically switches on and switches to HDMI input when the TV is switched on. A fine way to get a better TV sound. Support for Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant and Apple Siri voice control is also included. Just like the front, the sides are of aluminium too, depending on the version in grey or black. It's 443mm wide, 382mm deep and 192mm tall. It weighs a hefty 16.7kg. Left on the recessed front we find the power button or actually the standby button. A real power button lacks, also on the rear. Then the input selector, the source direct switch that bypasses tone control, the bass control, the display, the treble control, balance control and volume. Finally on the recessed front the 6.3mm headphone jack. Here we find the IC main socket with below it the Made in Japan label, remarkable in these times of Chinese production. In the middle the speaker terminals that accept stripped wires, forks and banana plugs. Then the analog inputs, labeled CD, line and recorder. Depending on the quality of your CD player a digital connection would be the better choice. There even is a recorder output, haven't seen that for a while. Then the subwoofer output, a left and right power amp input and a moving magnet phono input. As is often the case with RC5-RC6 infrared control devices, this amp can share remote control signals with other RC5-RC6 devices using these RCAs. Then the digital inputs, optical and toss link, electrical and split-if and HDMI arc on HDMI. The network cable is to be connected here, with next to it a USB socket for storage devices. Two Wi-Fi and Bluetooth antenna sockets complete the tour. One look into the inside makes it clear this is a well designed amp. It is more or less a classical setup. On the left the power supply, in the middle the power amp mounted against the cooling profile that at the same time provides shielding from the power supply. On the right shielded in a metal case the low level electronics. Let's look at the power supply first and start with the toroidal transformer. It is a sizable piece of copper windings, 13 cm in diameter and weighting 3.4 kg. If you know that the current copper price is €650 per kilo, this transformer contains €22 of raw copper material. It is very tightly wound and packed to limit the risk of vibrations and stray magnetic fields. Then the power supply circuits, for there are two. Next to the linear power supply for the analog electronics, there is a switch mode power supply for digital electronics and for the standby mode. Switch mode power supplies are faster and therefore more suited for digital circuits. But making them sound as good in analog electronics is rather difficult. The switch mode power supply is also used for the standby mode since the power consumption is clearly lower, 0.5 watts in this case. Then the power amplifier. The circuit board is mounted against the cooling profile. This way the power transistor that has to be mounted against the cooling profile to dissipate heat, are closer to the circuit board. Critical high current connections are not done over circuit board tracks but over thicker copper strips while the large custom made ELNA capacitors are also mounted directly on the power amp board so they can provide current as direct as possible. Let's zoom out again and go to the metal shell that holds three compartments, each with its own function. The top board inside does the digital interfacing. Digital inputs, USB, network and the HEOS module. Using a standard module in all HEOS equipped products makes it easier to keep all those products updated and behave identical. At the layer below this board, shielded again, we find a board divided in two with on the right side the digital-to-analog conversion which is built around the ESS Sabre ES9016K2M DAC chip. This chip allows for user programmable filters and bypassing the oversampling filter. Merantz replaced the standard filtering by two filters of their own design. The first filter rolls off about 2 dBs at 20 kHz, the second only 1 dB. Why not have it straight up to 20 kHz? Well that is because of the influence it has on the phase response and subsequently the pre-ringing and post-ringing. Filter 1, the one that drops 2 dBs at 20 kHz has almost no pre- and post-ringing. Filter 2, that only drops 1 dB at 20 kHz has a short pre-ringing but a very long post-ringing and if you look closely you see that the positive pulse is also lower. That is because of the energy spread over the post-ringing. You won't measure that in distortion but it surely is audible. Let's look at the DAC board again. On the right you see four identical circuits, meaning that the differential output of the ESS chip is maintained. Then to the phono board, that is on the same board but with a metal separator between them. I haven't played vinyl for years so I didn't listen to it but it looks seriously built. The analog preamp isn't very easily looked at but the photos provided by Marantz show quality capacitors and of course the hyper-dynamic amplifier module, HZAM for short. Here the HZAM S8 III version is used and it is a clever system. To explain it, let's first see how normal amplifier sets volume. A digital source has about 120 dB of dynamic range and standard two-folds output. If the two-folds would have sent at the same level to the power amp, the sound would be very loud. So between the input selector and often a buffer amp that has zero gain and the power amp, the variable resistor is inserted, the so called potential meter or potmeter. That functions as a volume control. It attenuates the level so that the power amp outputs less power. Let's say that the potmeter attenuates 10 dB. This not only reduces the sound level, it also brings it closer to the noise floor so that in this example the signal to noise is reduced with 10 dB's too. And if the level is further reduced, the signal to noise is equally reduced. But what if you replace the potmeter with a variable gain amplifier and change the gain structure. This way the full dynamic range remains intact. The system by Merence is somewhere in between these. As is often the case with streaming amplifiers, the Model 40N can be operated from the front using the Infrared Remote or the Heels app on a tablet or smartphone. For streaming only, the app is needed to choose the music. For all other sources and for setting preferences, the beautifully built Infrared Remote can be used. It lets you select inputs, control streaming, set volume and set preferences and even lets you select tracks if you have a Merence CD player. I used my iPad Pro and downloaded the Heels app. After startup this screen shows the Heels devices in the network. In my network it is only the Model 40N but if you have an entire house full of Heels it looks like this. When you have selected the streamer you want to control, this screen appears. Let's go to the music server and select the DNA server on the SynAid NAS. I could browse through the artist like this but it's quicker to go to the search menu and look for Pink Floyd to see I have 65 albums. Yes, I am a Pink Floyd fan. Let's go for Echoes, the best of Pink Floyd. Tapping play now does what it says without erasing what's already in the play queue. Volume can be varied here, just like shuffle play and repeat. As always I muted the music not to lose copyright and thus payment on my video. Tapping music along the bottom of the screen brings you back one level, tapping it twice brings you to the sources screen. Let's show you Tidal. If you want to select a physical input, that can be arranged too, as can be seen here. It all works the same in other sources, like for instance tuning radio for internet radio. Local stations show the Dutch stations. It's a simple app, limited in features but as a result of that easy to understand and use. If you would like to use another app, all DLNA apps will do, while programs like Audiafana and J River Media Center can send music to it since they all can address DLNA renderers. Roon is not supported. I started in my setup too, where it took the place of my trusty Marans PMKI Perl Lite to drive the acoustic energy radians one loudspeaker. They are supported by the Rail T5 subwoofer this time connected to the sub-out of the Model 40N. The crossover frequency was set to 60Hz. The network connection was made using a CAT6 patch cable to the uptown ether regen, powered by the uptown UltraCAPs 1.2. On the dirty side, the ether regen is connected to the cable modem over a long CAT6 patch cable and to the central switch on the third floor and from there to the internet modem. The DLNA server program MinimServer was running on a Synology DS1819 plus NAS. The equipment was placed in a target rack. All listening was done using the reconstruction filter 1 and an iPad Pro was used to run the HiOS app. It's a Marans app, that was immediately clear. It has the natural flow, the clean midrange and highs I know from the KI Perl Lite. The stereo image is at least 70% of what I get from my setup 1A. It's rather deep and wide and has good focus and even air around the instruments is rather good in this class. Pace and rhythm are very good. I wish I had one class higher set of loudspeakers here. Given my experiences with the KI Perl Lite in my setup 1 during the 2023 Volumeo Prima review I was curious how the Model 40N would perform on these €21.000 costing speakers. So the Model 40N was taken downstairs and connected to the PMC's on-stack audio over 70 isolators using AudioQuest Robinhood 0 loudspeaker cable. The network connection was over the network acoustic mu-on streaming system to the Zistel GS1900-10HP that was connected over CAT 6 cable to the ZIGO internet modem. The Synology DS1890 plus NAS, running Minim server again, was the DNA source. All was operated from the Apple iPad Pro. And since we are downstairs now I could also test the HDMI ARC using my 56 inch Panasonic Plasma TV. I know it's an unfair test field, with €21.000 loudspeakers and a €70.000 amp. But the PMKI Perl Lite did quite well although of course certainly not to the level of the air amp. The same goes for the Model 40N but having said that, it was impressive how a €2500 amp can sound on these speakers. Again the mids and highs are clean, voices sound good, brass sounds good, glockenspiel sounds rather good. I can mention all these properties but it's the flow, the pace and the rhythm and the ease that is most impressive. Just to be sure, you don't think this is the right amp for these speakers, it's not. But what is achieved by the Model 40N is very good. It's a Class A B amp, so a Class D amp of the same money could sound more impressive in the lows. But certainly would lose on all other properties I like about the Model 40N. Let's start with the practical matters. Apart from the loudspeakers and a network connection, you need no more to have a complete stereo. That's the advantage of a streaming amp. You can also hook up your TV and have the amp switched on to switch to the TV input automatically and switch off again. Your family won't even notice the amp does the TV sound. The volume control of the TV remote controls the amp volume while watching TV. But if you want to build a full stereo with a turntable, CD player, subwoofer and what have you, that's possible too. Given the 2499 MSRP including VAT, this is a very good sounding musical amp for those like me that love fluidity, musicality and a rounded sound without losing resolution. And for those that love a well-built amplifier, replace the top cover with the Persevix one to enjoy the inside. And on that one we come to the end of this video. See you next week, Friday 5 PM, Central European Time. If you don't want to miss that, subscribe to this channel or follow me on the social media so you will be informed when new videos are out. Help me reach even more people by giving this video a thumb up or link to this video on the social media. It is much appreciated. Many thanks to those viewers that support this channel financially, especially in these times. It keeps me independent and lets me improve the channel further. If that makes you feel like supporting my work too, the links are in the comments below this video on YouTube. I am Hans Beekhuyzen, thank you for watching and see you in the next show or on theHBproject.com. And whatever you do, enjoy the music.