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Hi folks! I’ve been experimenting with using Dolby Surround to upmix stereo music during playback. Some stereo tracks decode with very discrete surround channels, others have almost nothing in the surrounds. What makes a stereo mix yield active surrounds? Are there mixing decisions around phase...

Hi folks! I’m putting together a little 5.1 system in our bedroom, and would like to be able to play multichannel FLAC files on a hard drive through my Denon s760h AVR. I do this easily in my main system with an Oppo BluRay player, using usb from the drive to the Oppo and HDMI out to the AVR...

Hi, I’d like to place a small subwoofer in a 11 x 13 foot bedroom, either the SVS PB-1000 or SB-1000 Pro. Is room size a consideration when choosing? I’ve read up and believe I understand the trade offs, but will a ported sub overload or behave worse in a small, nearly square room? My goal is to...

Our bedroom TV setup is simple. DirectTV and Firestick feeding a Vizio TV and a little amplifier and speakers (volume controlled from variable analog output from TV). I need one remote each for DirectTV and Firestick and the TV remote to switch inputs between them. I’ve researched this and...

I see some speaker brands claiming to be physically time-aligned, usually by titling the speaker back so the tweeter is farther from the listener. Is this truly effective? It seems if there’s a positive effect, it would be for only one narrow listening position (which may not be where you’re...

Hi all, I need a subwoofer for my small bedroom (4m x 4m) that can fit under a chest of drawers or under the bed. I came upon this Monoprice SSW-12 low-profile subwoofer. Does anyone have any experience with this line of subs? This is purely for music, and I won’t be trying to shake the rafters...

Hello all, I’m interested in any work done in transforming music into visual sequences, or videos. An example would be a visualizer used with a music player, but I’ve found most of them crude and predictable. What I have in mind is reflecting sound visually in a way that’s subtle, responsive...

Thanks to Amir and other contributors, we’ve gotten a fair number of reviews on the forum. Would it be possible to index these reviews by product type (DAC, DAC/headphone amp, speakers, etc.)? That would help readers more easily find reviews of products under consideration. And, this would...

Hi all, I’m heavily invested in streaming ripped music in iTunes over Airplay to various devices around the house. But, the Sound Check feature does not appear to work over Airplay, as it does through a wired connection to my Mac. Is there any way to get an Airplay receiver to read and apply the...

Is there any risk in running a signal through an OTL tubed headphone amp (DarkVoice 336se) with no headphones? I know it’s normally not a good idea, because it could damage the transformer. But there’s not one here. I’d like to do some quick comparisons between the headphone amp on my DAC and...

I’ve been looking around for small amp I can mount behind my wall-mounted TV in the bedroom with two switchable analog audio inputs. Anyone have any suggestions? I’d like to run both TV sound and the output of an Airport Express through the amp, and be able to select the input. Something like...

I’m very much enjoying my new DarkVoice 336se tube headphone amp, and part of the fun is rolling in different 6SN7s I have on hand with my Sennheiser 6xx cans. Perhaps it’s folly, but I do think I detect differences in sound depending on the tube. Ken-Rads tend to have deeper bass, RCAs are...

Can anyone recommend an inexpensive, well measuring DAC with these features? I’d like to reduce the gain going to my DarkVoice amp. Thanks!

I have an old Assemblage 300B single-ended speaker amp I’m not using at the moment. Is there any way to use or adapt this amp to drive my Sennheiser 6xx headphones? It outputs at best 8 Watts per channel, and is currently wired for 8 ohm speakers. I did some research and found the with a...

Happy upcoming new year y’all! I’ve gotten a copy of Sound Reproduction: The Acoustics and Psychoacoustics of Loudspeakers and Rooms by Floyd Toole, and have been educating myself a little on all the factors that go into loudspeaker measurement and design. Sean Olive has done great work as well...

A few days ago I received a new Sennheiser 6xx. After listening to it many hours, there are things it does very well. I’ll call it “tonality” - the ability to hear the particular characteristics of each instrument. That’s stellar with the 6xx. It’s a non-fatiguing listen for sure. But going back...

I’m enjoying my V6 headphones, but for fun I’d like to get an alternate pair that’s a little warmer, without losing detail. The V6’s seem ruthlessly accurate, perhaps lean with a lower treble peak, and I’m looking for something with more bass and midrange body, and less sizzle. Over ear under...

Is it really inadvisable to drive headphones with what are essentially preamp outputs? Here’s why I ask. Until I got my headphone amp, I was driving my headphones with the analog out of an Airport Express, using iTunes to control the volume. It sounded OK. A frequent use case is to hook up an...

I’ve just started looking into using this platform to build my dream, one-box headphone amp: wireless Airplay input with digital DSP including equalizer and variable crossfeed. The stuff from Hifiberry looks look; The missing link seems to be a board to serve as the headphone amp. Has anyone...

What are your views on the use of crossfeed for headphones? Being brand new to extended headphone listening, I’ve not yet fully adjusted to the presentation of music through headphones, finding it sometimes stunning and other times unnaturally polarized to each channel. To experiment, I...