Recently, I decided to pick up a collection of units from Parasound’s Zcustom component series. These tiny components are manufactured “half-rack” sized, so that two units can be joined to fit side-by-side in a standard 19” component rack, if desired. Each one is also only one standard racking unit tall, so you can’t really get any smaller packaging for A/V equipment. The Zcustom models’ size, variety, and modularity make them ideal solutions for many custom setup needs.
For my main home theater, I went with Parasound’s HDMI solution, the Zhd, and a Zbreeze rack cooling unit. I’ll be taking advantage of the dual racking capability, mounting these units together into my theater’s equipment rack. (I have reviewed the Zhd separately here: http://www.htguide.com/forum/showthread.php4?t=21693) At the same time, I also bought a compilation of other Zcustom models, for use in an office setup (a “Zetup?”) or other system where I need to save space. I picked up a Ztuner in a brand new v.2 model, pre-amplifier Zpre2, two Zamp v.3 amplifiers, and another Zbreeze cooling unit to fight heat in the new stack. Although Parasound offers other Zcustom models including a phono pre-amp and speaker selector, I don’t have a need for these in my setup.
I received all of the Zcustom units at once, arriving in separate boxes. Right off the bat, Parasound’s renowned quality was quite evident. Each unit was individually packaged, bagged and double-boxed in sturdy styrofoam inserts and thick boxes. As I’ve become familiar Parasound’s manner of creating consumer products, I suspect the company would respond to this with a surprised, “Why yes, of course. How else would we package it?” But it really adds a nice touch and ensures the customer will get their product securely. Each small unit was packaged just as well as my C1 Halo processor was, Parasound’s $6,000 flagship A/V pre/pro, missing only the velvet casing bag that cloaked my C1 inside all other packaging.
Now, when you think of mini-equipment of similar size, automatically one seems to expect a certain level of quality and performance, or more precisely, the lack of it. Pick up any “boom box” or mini-system, and you’ll instinctively expect to feel a lightweight build, with the typical plastic casing that creaks a bit when jostled and echoes with a “thunk” when set down. Not so with the Zcustom units; just one touch shows that these units came to play hardball. Each piece has a machined metal casing, with sturdy black gunmetal front and rear panels that one would expect from any high-end A/V equipment. There’s some mass to the units as well—the Zamp especially belies its hefty innards with a 7 lb listed weight that feels much heavier. Looking closer at the hardware on these models, gold-plated connectors, 5-way speaker connectors, oil-damped knobs, and thick power cords suggest that these are no mass-market products.
Setup was very straightforward, each component being ready-to-go right out of the box. Only the Ztuner came with a delivery note, requiring power-up and a selection of the region switch to the proper setting to receive local stations. Each unit included all required accessories such as 1/8” plug cables for 12V trigger activation, tuner antennae, and batteries for the remote controls. I chose to complete the “Zetup” with Coppercat interconnects and Cattail speaker cables from Cat Cable, and an old set of Klipsch KSB 1.1 bookshelf speakers that I had unused in storage. After a quick push of my “Zetup’s” power button, I immediately found all operations to be quite intuitive, on both the front panels and the remotes. A perusal of each instruction manual added some background information, and enabled a more detailed setup of the 12V power-on triggers, but really wasn’t necessary for basic operation.
About the remote controls—the Zpre2 included a “PTZ1” remote with functions for both the Zpre2 and the Ztuner. My Ztuner came with a duplicate “PTZ2” remote, but added a few additional button functions. As my Ztuner is the brand-new “v.2” model, the remote has apparently been updated and upgraded from the Zpre2 version. The additional buttons proved useful, such as the ability to scroll through the tuner’s station presets. The Zpre2 flashes a green feedback light every time it receives a recognized IR signal, and since it flashes a red indicator every time I use a tuner button on PTZ2 remote, the new Ztuner v.2 must use a new set of IR commands. No worries, though, the Ztuner receives IR directly as well, so it doesn’t need to go through the Zpre2. I would have preferred slightly smaller remotes, particularly in width, since there’s plenty of unused real estate on the face, but as designed they fit well enough into one hand.
Okay, enough drudgery already, how well does it work? Well… fantastic. Immediately I was struck by the rich, full sound of the Zetup, even through the small bookshelf speakers. The Ztuner pulled in every local radio station in my area, clean and strong. The Zpre2 worked like a charm, switching between all sources I connected--the Ztuner, DVD player, TV, or computer, making each one sound like a charm.
I originally bought two Zamps, as each one is rated at 45W for both of its channels at 8 Ohms, intending to bridge both units to mono amps at 90W each. However, using only one amp and turning the Zpre2 up to ear-splitting volumes, the sound stayed rich and solid with no evidence of distortion or clipping. There appeared to be headroom still left in the amp, and the motorized volume knob certainly wasn’t maxed out, so doubling up the amps seems unnecessary after all. Other reviews of the Zamp have been VERY particular with technical design details, (and quite favorable) so I’ll just let stand what’s already been said before.
I quickly noticed that my Zetup puts off a decent amount of heat in operation, mostly coming from the Zamp, even when turned on but just sitting idle. Perhaps this is in good part due to the size of the unit, providing less surface area for cooling opportunity. For aesthetics, I originally put the Zamp on the bottom of my Zetup stack, but moving it to the top helped with temperatures. This is where the Zbreeze proved its necessity too—operating it on top of the Zetup stack really lowered unit temperatures. In the low or medium speeds, the fan noise is negligible too, so I use medium. I’ll be rack-mounting my second Zbreeze with my Zhd in my theater equipment rack to assist with rack airflow. As with the other Zcustom units, the Zbreeze has various 12V trigger and/or signal-sensing auto power control options on the back panel, but also adds the capability of running for 10 minutes after being turned off to sustain that cooling airflow. Very nice.
Just a few weeks after buying my Zcustom equipment, I left on an overseas military deployment, and decided to take the “Zetup” with me. In my tiny room overseas, I found my Zetup to be just the bit of home comfort I needed, taking up virtually no space, but providing me with top-end music and movies during my down-time. All components are dual-voltage, so I had no problem with foreign 220V, 50Hz electricity. The Ztuner even switched effortlessly to its European reception setting, allowing me to listen to overseas radio. Now if I can just find a station that doesn’t play weird sitar music 24 hours a day…
Most issues I have with my “Zetup” are minor or purely preferential. When powered off, the Ztuner’s small display reads “AC” to let you know that it’s plugged in, adding “12 Trigger” if you’ve enabled the 12V trigger power-on function. I really don’t need to constantly be reminded that’s how the unit’s configured, so I would have liked to have seen something more useful, such as a typical digital clock. Overall, I like the front-panel buttons on each unit. The Ztuner v.2, being the newest model, gets rid of the small wiggle in the other units’ buttons, but loses a bit of the slight rubberized feel of the other buttons which I do like. While I would like to have small notch detents in the Zpre2’s volume knob, such a feature would probably prohibit its motorized function. I do like the knob’s sturdiness, though. My only other concern is, that I’ve noticed my Zpre2 creating a bit of flicker in the composite video display on my TV when I turn up the volume.
Zcustom units have other features such as RS-232 connectivity and multiple zone capability that make them ideal for custom setup needs. I just don’t have use for these features yet, and thus haven’t been able to evaluate them. Perhaps Parasound will be pursuing the high-def radio format in the future as well?
Bottom line, these deceptively small units actually are full-blown higher-end A/V components in disguise. That’s it—there’s no comparison between the Zcustom units and anything else their size. Whether you need high-end performance from a boom-box sized setup, multiple units to power a custom multi-zone system, or just the most jammin’ system you’ve ever heard for a jail cell-sized dorm room, you owe it to yourself to check out Parasound’s Zcustom equipment.
For my main home theater, I went with Parasound’s HDMI solution, the Zhd, and a Zbreeze rack cooling unit. I’ll be taking advantage of the dual racking capability, mounting these units together into my theater’s equipment rack. (I have reviewed the Zhd separately here: http://www.htguide.com/forum/showthread.php4?t=21693) At the same time, I also bought a compilation of other Zcustom models, for use in an office setup (a “Zetup?”) or other system where I need to save space. I picked up a Ztuner in a brand new v.2 model, pre-amplifier Zpre2, two Zamp v.3 amplifiers, and another Zbreeze cooling unit to fight heat in the new stack. Although Parasound offers other Zcustom models including a phono pre-amp and speaker selector, I don’t have a need for these in my setup.
I received all of the Zcustom units at once, arriving in separate boxes. Right off the bat, Parasound’s renowned quality was quite evident. Each unit was individually packaged, bagged and double-boxed in sturdy styrofoam inserts and thick boxes. As I’ve become familiar Parasound’s manner of creating consumer products, I suspect the company would respond to this with a surprised, “Why yes, of course. How else would we package it?” But it really adds a nice touch and ensures the customer will get their product securely. Each small unit was packaged just as well as my C1 Halo processor was, Parasound’s $6,000 flagship A/V pre/pro, missing only the velvet casing bag that cloaked my C1 inside all other packaging.
Now, when you think of mini-equipment of similar size, automatically one seems to expect a certain level of quality and performance, or more precisely, the lack of it. Pick up any “boom box” or mini-system, and you’ll instinctively expect to feel a lightweight build, with the typical plastic casing that creaks a bit when jostled and echoes with a “thunk” when set down. Not so with the Zcustom units; just one touch shows that these units came to play hardball. Each piece has a machined metal casing, with sturdy black gunmetal front and rear panels that one would expect from any high-end A/V equipment. There’s some mass to the units as well—the Zamp especially belies its hefty innards with a 7 lb listed weight that feels much heavier. Looking closer at the hardware on these models, gold-plated connectors, 5-way speaker connectors, oil-damped knobs, and thick power cords suggest that these are no mass-market products.
Setup was very straightforward, each component being ready-to-go right out of the box. Only the Ztuner came with a delivery note, requiring power-up and a selection of the region switch to the proper setting to receive local stations. Each unit included all required accessories such as 1/8” plug cables for 12V trigger activation, tuner antennae, and batteries for the remote controls. I chose to complete the “Zetup” with Coppercat interconnects and Cattail speaker cables from Cat Cable, and an old set of Klipsch KSB 1.1 bookshelf speakers that I had unused in storage. After a quick push of my “Zetup’s” power button, I immediately found all operations to be quite intuitive, on both the front panels and the remotes. A perusal of each instruction manual added some background information, and enabled a more detailed setup of the 12V power-on triggers, but really wasn’t necessary for basic operation.
About the remote controls—the Zpre2 included a “PTZ1” remote with functions for both the Zpre2 and the Ztuner. My Ztuner came with a duplicate “PTZ2” remote, but added a few additional button functions. As my Ztuner is the brand-new “v.2” model, the remote has apparently been updated and upgraded from the Zpre2 version. The additional buttons proved useful, such as the ability to scroll through the tuner’s station presets. The Zpre2 flashes a green feedback light every time it receives a recognized IR signal, and since it flashes a red indicator every time I use a tuner button on PTZ2 remote, the new Ztuner v.2 must use a new set of IR commands. No worries, though, the Ztuner receives IR directly as well, so it doesn’t need to go through the Zpre2. I would have preferred slightly smaller remotes, particularly in width, since there’s plenty of unused real estate on the face, but as designed they fit well enough into one hand.
Okay, enough drudgery already, how well does it work? Well… fantastic. Immediately I was struck by the rich, full sound of the Zetup, even through the small bookshelf speakers. The Ztuner pulled in every local radio station in my area, clean and strong. The Zpre2 worked like a charm, switching between all sources I connected--the Ztuner, DVD player, TV, or computer, making each one sound like a charm.
I originally bought two Zamps, as each one is rated at 45W for both of its channels at 8 Ohms, intending to bridge both units to mono amps at 90W each. However, using only one amp and turning the Zpre2 up to ear-splitting volumes, the sound stayed rich and solid with no evidence of distortion or clipping. There appeared to be headroom still left in the amp, and the motorized volume knob certainly wasn’t maxed out, so doubling up the amps seems unnecessary after all. Other reviews of the Zamp have been VERY particular with technical design details, (and quite favorable) so I’ll just let stand what’s already been said before.
I quickly noticed that my Zetup puts off a decent amount of heat in operation, mostly coming from the Zamp, even when turned on but just sitting idle. Perhaps this is in good part due to the size of the unit, providing less surface area for cooling opportunity. For aesthetics, I originally put the Zamp on the bottom of my Zetup stack, but moving it to the top helped with temperatures. This is where the Zbreeze proved its necessity too—operating it on top of the Zetup stack really lowered unit temperatures. In the low or medium speeds, the fan noise is negligible too, so I use medium. I’ll be rack-mounting my second Zbreeze with my Zhd in my theater equipment rack to assist with rack airflow. As with the other Zcustom units, the Zbreeze has various 12V trigger and/or signal-sensing auto power control options on the back panel, but also adds the capability of running for 10 minutes after being turned off to sustain that cooling airflow. Very nice.
Just a few weeks after buying my Zcustom equipment, I left on an overseas military deployment, and decided to take the “Zetup” with me. In my tiny room overseas, I found my Zetup to be just the bit of home comfort I needed, taking up virtually no space, but providing me with top-end music and movies during my down-time. All components are dual-voltage, so I had no problem with foreign 220V, 50Hz electricity. The Ztuner even switched effortlessly to its European reception setting, allowing me to listen to overseas radio. Now if I can just find a station that doesn’t play weird sitar music 24 hours a day…
Most issues I have with my “Zetup” are minor or purely preferential. When powered off, the Ztuner’s small display reads “AC” to let you know that it’s plugged in, adding “12 Trigger” if you’ve enabled the 12V trigger power-on function. I really don’t need to constantly be reminded that’s how the unit’s configured, so I would have liked to have seen something more useful, such as a typical digital clock. Overall, I like the front-panel buttons on each unit. The Ztuner v.2, being the newest model, gets rid of the small wiggle in the other units’ buttons, but loses a bit of the slight rubberized feel of the other buttons which I do like. While I would like to have small notch detents in the Zpre2’s volume knob, such a feature would probably prohibit its motorized function. I do like the knob’s sturdiness, though. My only other concern is, that I’ve noticed my Zpre2 creating a bit of flicker in the composite video display on my TV when I turn up the volume.
Zcustom units have other features such as RS-232 connectivity and multiple zone capability that make them ideal for custom setup needs. I just don’t have use for these features yet, and thus haven’t been able to evaluate them. Perhaps Parasound will be pursuing the high-def radio format in the future as well?
Bottom line, these deceptively small units actually are full-blown higher-end A/V components in disguise. That’s it—there’s no comparison between the Zcustom units and anything else their size. Whether you need high-end performance from a boom-box sized setup, multiple units to power a custom multi-zone system, or just the most jammin’ system you’ve ever heard for a jail cell-sized dorm room, you owe it to yourself to check out Parasound’s Zcustom equipment.
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