Who's the biggest Audiophile on ILX?

I'm not sure I'd go that far meself. The Nait3's a lovely little amp, after all.

I've gone through my grisly flirtation with audio idiocy before in these pages, so I shan't wheel out the stats again. Suffice to say, I'd have had ATC SCM50 active monitors, an Orbe/Graham/Lyra vinyl front-end and a dedicated listening room by now if it hadn't been for you pesky meddling kids. Er, I mean the collapse of the IT job market.

At least he doesn't appear to be guilt-wracked or embarrassed about spending all that money. An audiophile's audiophile!

Dear ILM autiophiles, wanna get rich? Here's your chance!

http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/calling-bullshit/james-randi-offers-1-million-if-audiophiles-can-prove-7250-speaker-cables-are-better-305549.php?

if i had the money i'd get a fancy set up.

but $7250 speaker cables? wtf?

http://www.referenceaudiomods.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=NOB_C37_C

I think any proper music lover needs a decent stereo setup, but it seems that after a certain point, the more expensive your system is, the less you care about music and the more about mere snobbery.

those cables are pretty danceable though

That's deep, man. (xpost)

I'm too deaf for this kind of thing.

A friend of mine insists that his headphone cables (or any electrical audio cables) need a certain period of "burn-in". He runs medium-volume white (and perhaps other color) noise thru new cables for a couple weeks before using them, and claims there's a world of difference afterward.

Eh, as long as his superstition isn't costing him $8000.

I've heard about burning in headphones and earphones, but not because of the cables (and it's still controversial) : http://www.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=58157

i'm very proud of my speaker cables.

i went to the hardware store and bought 15 feet of heavy outdoor insulated electrical cable. the stuff is like as big around as your thumb. you strip it open and there's two very thick insulated copper cables on the inside. i got some nice gold prongs from radio shack and connected it up. looks nice, thicker and more insulated than $100 cables, only cost about $20 and it's got a nice DIY thing going on too.

But don't they hurt your speakers' ohms?

??

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impedance_matching

(nevermind, probably doesn't matter/happen that way)

Tonight I am going to take a few pictures of my stereo-- frankenstein/diy/cheapo's wet dream, audiophile's nightmare (i was too cheap to buy an RCA extension once, so I plugged an rca-to-mini-jack into it and a mini-jack-to-rca to that just to make the distance). i've got a nearly broken crossfader controlling the sound but i still have to switch out cables whenever i switch from ps2 to xbox 360 because there aren't enough inputs on it or my receiver.

whoever's most appalled by said pics is the biggest audiophile on ILX, is where iwas going with that

i just got these ridiculous-sounding speakers in a raffle at work, these bowers & wilkins matrix 804s. i have never heard records sound so good.

http://www.canuckaudiomart.com/image.php?image=129995&is_user=0

are those tweeters part of the same speakers the top, or are they seperate? what in the world is taking up all the space in the cases if there are no tweeters in there, a multitude of midrange speakers?

send them to me i need some speakers

Do you mean ridiculous-looking? Do they play Carl Stalling regardless of what you have on the t'table?

oh I looked them up, those are crazy

and crazy expensive, good raffle gift!

dude i had no idea, the other stuff they were giving away was laserdisc players and used direct tv boxes. i figured i would take these just because i needed to pick something.

the tweeters are on top, yeah

woah those look hot.

this is my stereo:

cambridge azur 540A integrated amp

old but good sounding NAD 5770 CD player i got off craigslist

epos ELS-3 minimonitors

Rega P1 turntable (with glass platter i bought and Denon DL-160 cartridge)

grado SR-60 headphones

douchey post but all this shit sounds awesome.

Where is good for Cambridge repairs? Mine needs a good clean and some tightening up. Speakers are good old Sonys that sound so rich, deep and fat. I love them so...

I have that Cambridge Audio amp. I guess I either need to sort out my speaker placement (currently terrible, need to put brackets up so I at least get some semblance of stereo field, but my room has more than the obvious number of corners) or buy new ears because as yet it hasn't knocked me out or anything. Sounded nice if not amazing through the same speakers in the shop though so I guess it is just the placement.

Suffers from the same problem as every proper hi-fi amplifier I've tried of having a minimum volume setting which is just a tiny bit too loud for a recent rock/pop/electronic CD in a small room. I suppose that is my fault for wanting to sit a metre away from the speakers and read a book. Real audiophiles would never dream of doing anything while listening to music except to sit crosslegged in their large and perfectly symmetrical rooms listening to every last cymbal tap.

I have all this stuff I got second-hand. It sounds fabulous to me (not an audiophile), although the turntable doesn't like stuff cut too loud, and the whole thing lacks a bit of bass at low volumes. Anyway, it's quirky and I like it.

Naim nait 1 amplifier + Naim cables

Rogers LS2 speakers

Systemdek IIx 900 turntable

OK...

Lounge:

Celestion 300 floorstanding speakers

Quad 34 Pre-amp
Quad 306 Power-Amp
http://www.vinylconnections.co.uk/quad34and306.jpg

Pioneer PL800 turntable
http://www.zenn.com.sg/PL800I.jpg

And a Macbook (which does all the CD/DVD/MP3/AVI etc. work) At some point I'd like to get a better soundcard than the inbuilt jack, but I can't afford it.

And in the office/music room:

Celestion SL-700 speakers
http://www2.wbs.ne.jp/~souleyes/IMG_2167.JPG

Arcam Alpha 10 Amp

Attached to:

with

And a PC for mixing with Traktor, music production and all other music playing with a pro-quality soundcard.

I've got some £5ish a metre speaker cables, bi-wired in the music room, but mostly quite generic everywhere else

-----------------------

What a sad bastard. lol. It was mostly second hand at very good prices as my dad used to own a hi-fi shop so I'm not nearly as wealthy as the gear may suggest.

Hmm, it missed these images:

http://www.dolphinmusic.co.uk/shop_image/product/3920a9468def7878989363c9f7fae4c6.jpg

http://www.dmcworld.co.nz/images/standard/technics-sl1210-mk5g.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v134/tracerhand/Hi-Fi.jpg

i wanna live there

I don't own anything cool due to the unrealistic standards I have from working at one of the top audio shops in the world. I am reminded five days a week why it is worth spending $20,000+ on a system and I don't have that kind of money. So, in some roundabout way... me?

Anyways, it is so slow in the industry now that I am coming back here to post after reducing myself to lurker three years ago. Can I answer any audio-related questions for anyone today? 'Cause I sure as hell can't do that for the people that are not walking through the door today.

I know audio cabling prices etc have been done to death on other threads, but this still provides amusement:

http://www.usa.denon.com/productdetails/3429.asp#

So that's $499 for a Cat5 Ethernet cable, the same as the one sticking out the back of most people's PC. Srsly, the Denon R&D person that dreamed that up must have been *inspired*.

Shh!, can you offer any defence for this insanity? Or is this just snake oil for rich folks?

Shh!, why do people buy very expensive and large speakers when they can buy Alesis studio monitors that sound better for a fraction of the price?

I think the usual argument, Tracer, is that studio monitors are there to show you what's wrong with the recording, not just what's right. The notion that their very neutrality and transparency makes them a bit fatiguing to listen to for pleasure. So, instead, we spend more on speakers that bloom the bass or smooth off the upper-mid or whatever - and look nicer as furniture. Daft, yes.

If I had the money, I wouldn't hesitate to surround myself with active ATC monitors (of the sort found in many studios).

Shh!, how's the market these days for two-box CD players? I remember, back in the late-'80s/early-'90s, that was considered the way to go for the digital audiophile - Roksan Attessa transport/DAC and the like. Around the point I lost interest in high-end audio (about 10 years ago), I got the impression that the one-box player was now supreme. Do people still buy CD-only players?

I remember a lot of silliness about DACs and transports - "oh, these DAC is *very* revealing of poor sources and needs to be carefully matched to a good-quality transport". Er, no, if the DAC is "revealing" of poor sources it just isn't doing its job properly. It was that kind of twisted logic that sent me running from the Usenet audio forums.

I bought a CD-only player in January 2007!

True! Silly question, really - I mean, I know they sell them. I was wondering whether the high-enders only look at SACD or wireless streaming gizmos like the Slim Devices Transporter thesedays. Perhaps SACD was the death-knell of the two-box system, seeing as it doesn't have a digital out? Or do people like their DACs in 5.1/7.1 home-theater (sic) pre-amps nowadays?

The first 25% or so of that post was really quite comprehensible.

From my brief time working in a hifi shop, the opinion from the nineties onwards was that a separate DAC introduced too much jitter.

I think that the hi-end dacs in amps/speakers get around this by re-clocking the signal to their own internal clock, but I haven't kept up with this stuff for a long time.

My father has a two-box CD system which he bought about a year ago. He got very evangelical about how every single part of the chain made an important difference to the sound, including the expensive shiny digital interconnect.

Funny to an IT nerd when you can buy a £15 optical drive with free data cable for a computer, spin a CD at 52x, and still read the data accurately enough that yr computer does not crash six times daily because it misread a byte in an executable file on CDROM. Sure the DAC ought to be better, but the rest?

(PS, I love that pic, Tracer! Where's it from?)

It's an illustration from the April 15th 1958 issue of Look magazine, made to accompany a feature called "Records", and it's by Roy Doty.

I have a separate DAC on my 10-year-old Marantz, but only cos the analogue out is fuXXored.

I listened to some £15,000 Naim speakers the other month, running off a similarly-priced Naim system with numerous pre and power amps, and I wasn't fussed by it.

Wow I went away for Thanksgiving and come back to some fun questions...

Cable pricing seems silly on paper, but they can make a difference. Better materials and better isolation, seems to bring the music into sharper focus. There is a motto that the honest people in this business have, which is "if you haven't heard it, you don't have an opinion", and cables certainly test this saying more than most components. I usually advise my customers to get the system where they want it to be in terms of the major components, familiarize themselves with how their system sounds, and then find a dealer (usually me) who will lend them a few different cables with the option of a full-credit return so they can experiment at home. I can't justify any piece of audio gear based on any of the marketing bullshit that companies spew, or an of the either esoteric or specious (or both) technical claims that they espouse. If adding a new set of cables to your system makes the system sound more accurate, then they are worth it. The one thing to look out for with cables is that some companies are buying bulk cable, putting pretty connectors on them, and then marking them up x000%. The better cables are usually the ones made by the company itself, regardless of price.

As for speakers, MJ is mostly correct. Studio monitors are very flat, and can be fatiguing. They are also, for the most part, fairly ugly. Pro audio also has a much slimmer margin than hifi. Good, pretty cabinetry costs a lot of money, and I don't think a customer is unjustified in wanting something fairly nice looking to go in their living room. There are a couple of other things to keep in mind. Some studio monitors exist to be references to other speakers. They are not always about accurate reproduction of the initial signal (some are of course!). The popularity of the Yamaha NS-10, for instance, is not due to the fact that it is accurate, but because if you can engineer a record to sound good on them, they will sound good on other shitty speakers. Lastly, what you are paying for with more costly hifi speakers is bass extension. The M1 actives go down to 45hz, which is not bad, but not all of the audible spectrum. Usually, to get a lower response, you need a larger cabinet, and more drivers. That adds a LOT of cost, especially since any time you add drivers, you add the possibility that they are not built to the same tolerances and therefore will not respond similarly. More testing is therefore required, again adding cost.

I think that nearfield active monitors are a great value (I listen to music on active Dynaudios myself) but, at a certain point hifi speakers can sound better unless you are putting them up against the soffit-mount farfield monitors in a recording studio which, like hifi speakers, cost loadsa money.

For what its worth, Abbey Road uses the top-of-the-line B&W and Classe consumer speakers and amps for monitoring in their studios. Dynaudio, Bryston and Focal are all companies that started in consumer audio and have made inroads into the pro world.

Some hifi speakers may have a tendency to sweeten things a little bit but accuracy is important in the high-end. A company making a $600 pair of speakers know that that speaker will not be able to reproduce the entirety of the recorded event, and may voice the speaker simply to do the best at what it can do.

As for CD players, since clocks have been improving and at the very high-end, separating the DAC and transport (and even the clock) is still fairly common. As I mentioned before, I don't tend to buy into any ideology or even any rational technical explanation, I really just listen. At my shop, we have a room with 4 cd players that range in price from $45,000-$70,000, and they are all in different configurations. The single-box player with separate power supply is sometimes preferred to the three-box behemoth sitting next to it. And my favorite one is the most affordable. I prefer listening to it playing standard cds (it doesn't play SACD) instead of the more expensive player playing SACDs.

As for SACD, some people still care. I do not personally. Most SACDs I hear sound like the engineer was digging so hard more detail that they ended up accentuating the problems with the physical tape itself (hiss, distortion). And yes, SACD players can have digital outs and be used with separate DACs. In most cases, the company will utilize some sort of proprietary connection to allow this to happen.

Naim makes some cool stuff but I think the best values are at the lower end of their product lines. If you wanted to spend 30,000 on a stereo system, there are a lot of places I would direct you first.

Cable pricing seems silly on paper, but they can make a difference. Better materials and better isolation, seems to bring the music into sharper focus.

"Seems" is the key word, I think. It's quite tricky to do effective quick A/B comparisons at home when you're changing interconnects (or, worse, speaker cables, where you're unlikely to have two paths you can switch between and will probably want to power down the amp before unplugging/plugging cables) and quite difficult to really determine if you're hearing a difference. I once borrowed some SonicLink, Nordost, Chord Co and Audioquest cables for a week when I switched to pre-amp/monoblocs and after initially being fairly convinced of their individual signatures (Nordost Red Dawn was too bright, Audioquest too warm, etc), by day five I could no longer reliably tell them apart. It seemed to me that when I knew what was in the circuit I heard what I expected to hear (I had some preconceived notions of how these companies "voiced" their cables) and when I didn't know (friend doing the switching), I couldn't pinpoint any differences. I ended up buying the cheapest (if only my audiophilia nervosa had ended there! A year later and I had a Cardas loom in my tonearm and van den Hul cables out the back of my CD player).

There's a question of what actually constitutes "better materials and better isolation" when the job of carrying audible-range electrical signals a few feet is not exactly rocket science. But then again, there's long been the notion of the "blameless amp" in solid-state circles, but that doesn't seem to stop manufacturers improving on perfection!

(Sorry, just an ex-smoker can quickly assume the missionary zeal of the anti-smoker, I became pretty hardline on what I perceived as mad high-end esoterica for a while (around the time I ran out of money!). I don't really mind what people spend their money on - the "you wouldn't drink fine wine from a paper cup" argument gets a lot of play in audiophile circles, explaining/excusing the expensive and technically-dubious accessories - but I've seen systems with high-end cables and lousy speaker positioning, which is more like dumping half a can of Sprite in yr beaujolais...)

So I am not audiophile but I have dumb and perplexing question.

My setup:

Marantz 2215 receiver
http://www.wensy.com/uploaded/rad71E4F0705090086.JPG

Paradigm Titan bookshelf speakers:
http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volume_6_3/images/paradigm-titan-speakers-main-photo.jpg

I hook a Vestax turntable, Kenwood cd changer and airtunes through that and all has been golden for the two months I have had this stuff.

UNTIL

The last few days when my right speaker started exhibiting horrible bass distortion even at low volumes - thuds, farts and bumps instead of crisp, clear bass. I tried switching the channels and the same speaker had the same problem, no matter what I was playing through them. I listened to the receiver through headphones and that sounded fine. So I assumed I had to replace my bass cone or something. I don't really play at very high volumes and I can't think of any specific time when I would have blown the speaker, but I was resigned to replacing the cone or the speaker (the Titans were only $65 used so maybe not worth paying to fix?).

HOWEVER

Just today, the right speaker has begun to sound fine and the bass distortion has migrated to the left speaker. So...what the fuck is going on? Is it a receiver issue? Do I have a pair of dud speakers? ILX audiophiles I need your help!!!!

Oh I did wonder if I could be the speaker wire? It's standard Radio Shack speaker wire.

Also, I did notice that the speakers have been popping whenever we turn on other appliances in the house - space heater, even gas oven! I doubt this has anything to do with it but figured I should mention.

If anyone has any advice, I would greatly appreciate it. This is the first "real" stereo I have had in 4-5 years and it makes me so happy. The bass farts are seriously bumming me out and making me hate music and life.

Thanks,
ADAMRL

Oh - also, for anyone who doesn't know these speakers, the grills don't just pop off so I can't really look for cracks or damage. I'm just hoping for some home diagnostics.

the speakers have been popping whenever we turn on other appliances in the house - space heater, even gas oven

perhaps your house is on fire

just a suggestion

my brain is on fire

Maybe I'll put your record on and play it back to you over the phone. Ever thought your stuff needed more farting in it?

there is nothing in my life that could possibly use more farting, believe me.

you should see if you can borrow some (shitty) speakers and see if the problem still exists. it could be something in the receiver. that is not terribly helpful I know.

is it possible that your stereo is on the same circuit as these other appliances? because what you are describing (well at least the appliance stuff) sounds a lot like AC problems to me.

in a perfect world yer stereo would be on its own independent 20 amp circuit, but yeah, i know, reality and all

Reading this thread makes me realize that I need a turntable. And a receiver.

"is it possible that your stereo is on the same circuit as these other appliances?"

Very possibly, but so long as the popping isn't doing any permanent damage, I'm cool with it. And yeah, there's not much I can do if so.

welll, it might cause some permanent damage (sorry). depends on how loud the pops are, but if they're really loud, they could cause excursion damage (basically the speaker goes far enough forward to escape the voice coil gap and whacks into it when the surround brings it back). on a brighter note, it would have to be really loud, so...

Considering a Rega Apollo. Would be "last ever" cd player. Jonesy?

nick, do you have a 5.1 home cinema setup w/HD audio?

No. Little interest in it, especially while I live above someone (even if he's never there). We've got a nice 26" Panasonic LCD TV and a good Denon DVD player with upscaling, which just runs through the stereo amp.

I dunno, Nick. Would it be any kind of noticeable upgrade over what you currently have? A good chunk of marketing fluff for this unit goes on about it's amazing abilities to, y'know, read the data on the disc ("ultra high memory capacity meaning that error correction need not affect sound quality" - error correction does not affect sound quality, that's why it's called correction) which sets alarm bells ringing. I'm sure they've voiced the analogue output stage in some way so it sounds subtly different to other £500 CD players but I'm very dubious about high-end audio in general thesedays. But hey - it plays MP3s and I've always fancied a good player that did that (which is why I think I'd get something like a Squeezebox Transporter if I ever changed my set-up).

I want an HD audio av receiver plus 5.1 so bad

if you're going to do it do it right - get a meridian G02! :p

I've had the Rega Apollo for a while now and it is rock-solid and worth every penny, IMO, would not hesitate recommending

And can't speak from solid technical ground on its promises of error correction, but I've never had a single CD skip in this thing, even a few i thought were previously lost causes

It would replace a 5 year old NAD that was entry-level, and which in turn would go into the backroom to replace an ancient Marantz. I decided against another camera or lens so this would be my post-nuptials present to myself; we're back from NYC on Tuesday so I'll test it and see what I think.

Ah fuck it; I've put a deposit down.

I want an HD audio av receiver plus 5.1 so bad

― cozen, Tuesday, 27 April 2010 20:52 (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

You would not believe..

Last year, we were at a local summer fete, a bring and buy stall. One box full of audio bits, yep it's a 5.1 deconverter. I ask how much, the guy shrugs and says £2.

He even agrees to hold it for me until the end. Had to catch a bus home with this big box...

(i.e. plus speakers, etc)

always tempted to upgrade but I feel suspiciously like the "sprite in wine" guy w/r/t speaker positioning (b&w 603s stuck in a small and oddly shaped room).

Audiophiles I need your help!

My setup: Paradigm titans w/ a vintage Marantz receiver. Both speakers have been recently reconed. My house is older and has weird electrics which may have something to do with my problem.

Problem: REALLY low audio in one speaker and the other one distorts with even the slightest bass. Thought the speakers had gone but I took them in and they were fine. So I'm guessing it is a receiver problem? I have tried every combination of settings/wire configurations, but to no avail.

Also, not sure how relevant this is, but my speakers will pop often when other electrics in the house (ceiling fan, stove, etc.) are turned on or off.

Any help would be appreciated!

evil spirits, contact a shaman

Rewire the house, get a new amp.