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Good morning from Sweden!

audioBliss

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I recently joined the forum after seeing the amount of great content on here! There also seems to be quite the number of interesting individuals hanging around here :) I have been interested in audio all my life basically but the last 10 years or so I've really started to pursue audio nirvarna.

Since my speakers are quite rare even in Sweden I thought I'd give you some background.

My current setup consists of speakers designed by Ingvar Öhman who might be one of the most intelligent and interesting people I've ever met. He has a small company in Stockholm Sweden catered mainly to hardcore audiophiles called Ino Audio. He's also designed the speakers by Guru (and helped out with some Carlsson designs (I think)) which is basically commercial versions of his Ino Audio speakers(but with a few compromises).

All the drivers of his speakers are designed by him and then constructed by Scan Speak. The cabinets are designed by Ingvar and made by his personal carpenter. The finish can be whatever you like. I know one person who got his whole cabinet made by some rare stone from South America and another who got his in a Porsche white pearl car paint.

My current setup:
Front Speakers: Ino Audio i32s - it's a sealed speakers designed to be crossed over to multiple subwoofers. It has dual 8.8" drivers + tweeter.
i32s.jpeg


Center Speaker: Ino Audio i16s - sealed, same drivers as i32s but less output, still extreme output though since it's designed to be crossed over to subs as well.
i16s.jpeg


Surround speakers: Ino Audio a2 - I have six of these, two in parallel for the side surrounds and one for each back channel. I have never heard a surround speaker like this, on a good surround mix I'm in a complete sound bubble with astonishing realism. I never think about that the speakers are there I'm basically inside the movie. These are designed to be high Ohm so that you can connect up to three in parallel per surround channel(so up to 12 of these for the base layer). You place them at different heights(lower in the front of the room and gradually higher as you move further back, of course according to exact angles and heights that you calculate depending upon your room) and evenly distributed for the 300 degrees that the front sound stage doesn't cover.
a2.jpg



Subwoofers: Ino Audio Infra Y-6(six Y subs with 12" long throw drivers). He sells both ported and sealed subs. He recommends the ported due to higher output per unit but he also sells sealed systems where the minimum about you can buy is six at a time. This is because or else there would be no point in them basically since you need really high output for the infra sound to be felt. The Y drivers are his biggest and nicest driver but I "only" got six of them. I got them mostly because I love the transient response of sealed subs but I do have enough output to shake my whole couch when I play a 7Hz test tone.

Here are three of them, you can also see some Sonic Design pads that all my speakers are standing on. Different pads for all speakers since they weigh differently. Isolates the speakers from the room. Excuse the mess..I just got a new room and need to rebuild it from scratch :)

InfraY.jpg


Electronics:
Preamp/AVR: Arcam AVR390
Power amp for fronts: Emotiva XPA-2 Gen 2
Power amp for subs: Behringer EP4000
CD player/UHD player: Panasonic UB700
2-channel streamer/DAC: Allo Katana + Isolator 1.2 + SQ board (Roon/TIDAL/NAS)

Currently looking at upgrading my amps which are my weakest link along with the room of course. Ingvar also sells a really high end analog crossover filter to cross over the speakers to the subs but I currently use the Arcams inferior filter but Dirac Live 2.0 which I've found to be really useful under 300Hz. I've opted to put my money into the speakers and room so electronics are lacking behind. But I find it also quite nice to have this part of the equation left and with this website I think I can make some excellent choices :) The Katana was the first.
 
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Blumlein 88

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A belated welcome to ASR. Your system looks very interesting. Glad you are doing the multi-channel setup. I've mostly done stereo my whole life, but have been more interested in MCH recently.

Dirac is very nice indeed.

This site can probably help with you finding high performing electronics that aren't terribly expensive. A friend has the Emotiva XMC-1 which is multi-channel and has Dirac built into it. He gets very nice sound, and I help him use the Dirac room correction.

So welcome and look forward to your postings.
 
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audioBliss

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I decided to go with the Ncore NC400 monoblock kits from Hypex for the LCRs, also ordered RCA-XLR cables from Nordacoustics. Really looking forward to hearing the results!
 
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audioBliss

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Well I've been listening to my nc400s for a while now and in combination with the Katana SQ + Isolator 1.2 it does sound amazing. Basically on all levels it's really good! My room right now is not really good enough to judge imaging but I can say even now it's still very good with a calm stable image.

The main difference I'm hearing compare to my previous Emotiva XPA-2 Gen 2 is the grip of the music. The bass is tighter with a dryer sound but with more slam/force. In the treble region it's less grainy with a very high resolution and clarity. On this particular test track I run to check phase (which I've heard so many times at this point) I noticed that I heard something different. When I listened more closely I heard it was the persons lips slightly smacking together when he was saying left channel, right channel etc. I've never heard this before and it came as a slight surprise.

Overall the sound is more relaxed at higher volumes and where there was sometimes a slight edge or grain (or whatever you want to call it) in the treble before it's not there now. When watching movies I've found that the speech intelligibility is better.

It's kind of hard to put into words what I'm hearing but I can very strongly recommend the nc400 monoblocks from Hypex.
 

RayDunzl

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Opinion:

That's the impression a good amp gives...

Congratulations.

(then, if you go back to the old amp, you might hear much of what you learned to hear when listening intently for changes)

Experiment:
Try one channel of old amp and one channel of new amp (level matched), play music, and see if one side is "better".
 

FrantzM

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There was a fellow back in the days at AVS Forum who swore by ino Audio. Interesting design concepts .. I am partial to multiple subs. IMO this is the only way to get smooth response in the bass ... I tend to believe , no data that I have come across that we hear in the bass is whole room thing... If the bass is not smooth in the room it cannot be heard as such at the listening position even if it measures well at the MLP.
Welcome to the forum!
 

amirm

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My current setup consists of speakers designed by Ingvar Öhman who might be one of the most intelligent and interesting people I've ever met.
I have known of Ingvar for years. It started because as you probably know, he built the dummy load and the setup for AB (F/E) testing of amplifiers for LTS (swedish audio society). I watched some of his interviews and read a ton of his posts online (though machine translation which at the time was pretty terrible). Definitely a smart guy who has a solid leg in objectivity when it comes to audio.
 

Tircuit

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Welcome!

I recently sold a vintage pair of Stig Carlsson’s Sonab speakers to a buyer in San Francisco who was blown away by their "wall of sound". Good stuff.
 
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audioBliss

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Opinion:

That's the impression a good amp gives...

Congratulations.

(then, if you go back to the old amp, you might hear much of what you learned to hear when listening intently for changes)

Experiment:
Try one channel of old amp and one channel of new amp (level matched), play music, and see if one side is "better".

I have no need to try that. I know what you are saying but no :) Of course amps only make a minor difference on the whole and I thought I made that clear in my first post. I've basically been driving my quite expensive speakers with a receiver for years so yes I know. But that said after being in the hobby for a long time now the small differences I perceive are enough for me to make it worth it.
 

RayDunzl

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I have no need to try that. I know what you are saying but no :) Of course amps only make a minor difference on the whole and I thought I made that clear in my first post. I've basically been driving my quite expensive speakers with a receiver for years so yes I know. But that said after being in the hobby for a long time now the small differences I perceive are enough for me to make it worth it.

I understand.

I didn't start with what I have now, either...
 

mgood

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Hi @audioBliss,

I'm looking to replace my Anthem MRX 710. Are you happy with the AVR 390? Any quirks, noises or other issues?
 
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audioBliss

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Hi @audioBliss,

I'm looking to replace my Anthem MRX 710. Are you happy with the AVR 390? Any quirks, noises or other issues?

It has some issues but all receivers do basically. I wish there was something that was the ultimate but I have not really found it. That said I have not owned a receiver that is better than the AVR 390. I have owned/used/listened to Marantz, Denon, Rotel, NAD, Anthem, etc. I think the AVR390 is basically the cheapest AVR with Dirac 2.0 and 7.1.4 Atmos and decodes everything except Auro 3D. I find the preamp good...at least compared to other AVRs I've owned in the past. The new line from Arcam is expensive and in beta. There is other stuff out there but it's very expensive. But even the AVR390 has more features than 99% of people will use. I use all features basically so I find it worth it.
 

mgood

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It has some issues but all receivers do basically. I wish there was something that was the ultimate but I have not really found it. That said I have not owned a receiver that is better than the AVR 390. I have owned/used/listened to Marantz, Denon, Rotel, NAD, Anthem, etc. I think the AVR390 is basically the cheapest AVR with Dirac 2.0 and 7.1.4 Atmos and decodes everything except Auro 3D. I find the preamp good...at least compared to other AVRs I've owned in the past. The new line from Arcam is expensive and in beta. There is other stuff out there but it's very expensive. But even the AVR390 has more features than 99% of people will use. I use all features basically so I find it worth it.
Thanks a lot for the feedback! Have you compared the AVR 390 to the NAD T777 v3?
 

amirm

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My current setup consists of speakers designed by Ingvar Öhman who might be one of the most intelligent and interesting people I've ever met.
Welcome aboard. I have known of Ingvar for a decade or more. First through his work with Swedish LTS in blind testing of electronics and then later with accolades about this speakers. At the time the waiting time was one year or more for his speakers? I also heard he has gotten out of speaker making business. True?
 
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audioBliss

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Welcome aboard. I have known of Ingvar for a decade or more. First through his work with Swedish LTS in blind testing of electronics and then later with accolades about this speakers. At the time the waiting time was one year or more for his speakers? I also heard he has gotten out of speaker making business. True?

That's pretty cool, it's a small world :) Depending upon what speakers you are buying and if you want them to be built by his company or you want to buy the DIY kit it will take different amount of time. Some of his smaller speakers you can basically just drive to him and buy the DIY kit. The larger stuff is made to order and it's possible to get extremely crazy finishes and so on since he works with different professional shops. In my case the i32s for instance took 9 months to get as a DIY kit and would have taken a lot longer as a finished product. They are quite special speakers.

Some of the smaller speakers were all in stock as DIY kits so I've painted them my self and so on. You can also choose what level of DIY kit you want so the subs for instance I even built the boxes. But sealed subs are quite easy to make :)

As far as I know he still has his company Ino Audio which sells the speakers above. But it does basically only cater to the the extreme enthusiasts and I think he wants to keep it that way. Ingvar does a lot of room acoustics work and designs a lot of home theater rooms. It's pretty cool cause he can optimise the room perfectly for you since he also designed the speakers. I think he also designs professional studios. He was involved with Guru audio and designed those speakers but I don't think he works with that company any more.
 
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