Ramblings, opinions, thoughts, Musings on Audio Reproduction

[FrantzM]

Hi

This thread was inspired by my journey as an audiophile. I would like it to be active and welcome members experiences,observations and advices
Allow me to repeat a bit. I started very young, my father was an audiophile before the word... We went through the Quad ESL, Fisher, Mac Intosh, Harman Kardon , Dynaco , Lafayette, Pioneer, Phase Linear, Yamaha, Luxman, Infinity, Magnepan , Phillips, Lenco, Garrard, Empire, Ampex, etc ... THe list is longer
I inherited the disease and went on to become a classic audiophile. First preferring Tubes to the damned and mechanical SS ... and of course LP to CD .. In the midst of this, reading avidly the Absolute Sound, I committed the stupidest mistake of my audiophile life when I choose a Pink Triangle TT over a Kenwood LX-07 (!!!!!!!!!) that was being offered for about $850.. Bought the Pink Triangle for a little more .. Is there an emoji for slapping oneself ... hard ... ??? (FOUND IT , thanks

).. I went on and purchased rather expensive components:, my reference Digital stack had an MSRP way above $20K before this was fashionable ... about 15 years ago ... To this day have a soft spot for a >$20K German stereo amplifier which will remain nameless ...

Something big happened and I no longer had my classic audiophile-approved shrine-based loudspeaker system. High Fidelity is important for my love of music and I sublimed my audiophile longings to headphones for almost 7 years .. Those headphones were a revelation. Some TOL of the day or TOL period ( HifiMan HE-6 si one of the best headphones out there regardless of price ) HifiMan, Stax , Denon and recently a Kloss ESL ... Various Amps and DACs always leaning toward High End , High priced amplifiers and to some extent DACs .... Then Amirm created ASR ...
game changer.. My current system is a pair of LSR-308 driven by an Integra or Rotel Pre-Pro , DSP courtesy of miniDSp, subwoofers are the bucket subs and their amps a Rotel 5 -channel ..to be replaced by a Crown Pro amp ... And Boy~ Does it sound good to these ears and many others some of those .... audiophiles ...

The total cost of that contraption is a fraction of what I would have paid a few years ago for an interconnect cable .. I was never a Power Cables proponent but then, IMHO IC and speaker cables did make a difference a huge difference ... Now I am learning the value of proper system integration , of bass performance and equalization of speaker dispersion and of the relative insignificance or relevance of electronics ... I measured this system to be essentially flat from 20 Hz to 20 KHz in my smallish room ... What the Heck!! WTF? What's going on here ... The system has a rawness to it I would like to eliminate, seems the speakers cannot take too much of it .. They will play loud but start unraveling quite fast then ... Yet ... They sound good .. They shouldn't sound that good ... They are cheap by any audio metric .. Yet they sound good enough for my purpose of enjoying music .. they are not end of game components ... in the meantime ... they rock !!!

More to come .... Your contributions are requested

 

[hvbias]

Is this the emoji you are looking for?

All joking aside, I've valued blind testing for as long as I can remember just because I've seen how susceptible people can be to placebos, 20-40% participant improvement rates were not uncommon to see. So I've never gone off the deep end into audiophilia.

I find this forum strikes a nice balance between subjective observations and measurements. Usually forums tend to take on very far leaning views on either, particularly the very hardcore objectivist ones can be a bit unfriendly.

 

[Thomas savage]

Is this the emoji you are looking for?

This can be a surprisingly expensive pastime too.

 

[Thomas savage]

Hi

This thread was inspired by my journey as an audiophile. I would like it to be active and welcome members experiences,observations and advices
Allow me to repeat a bit. I started very young, my father was an audiophile before the word... We went through the Quad ESL, Fisher, Mac Intosh, Harman KArdon , Dynaco , Lafayette, Pioneer, Phase Linear, Yamaha, Luxman, Infinity, Magnepan , Phillips, Lenco, Garrard, Empire, Ampex, etc ... THe list is longer
I inherited the disease and went on to become a classic audiophile. First preferring Tubes to the damned and mechanical SS ... and of course LP to CD .. In hte mids of this reading avidly the Absolute Sound, I committed the stupidest mistake of my audiophile life when I choose a Pink Triangle TT over a Kenwood LX-07 (!!!!!!!!!) that was being offered for about $850.. Bought the Pink Triangle for a little more .. Is there an emoji for slapping oneself ... hard ... ???.. I went on and purchased rather expensive components:, my reference Digital stack had an MSRP way above $20K before this was fashionable ... about 15 years ago ... To this day have a soft spot for a >$20K German stereo amplifier which will remain nameless ...

Something big happen and I no longer had my classic audiophile-approved shrine-based loudspeaker system. High Fidelity is important for my love of music and I sublimed my audiophile longings to headphones for almost 7 years .. Those headphones were a revelation. Some TOL of the day or TOL period ( HifiMan HE-6 si one of the best headphones out there regardless of price ) and they are good, HifiMan, Stax , Denon and recently a Kloss ESL ... Various Amps and DACs always leaning toward High ENd , High priced amplifiers and to some extent DACs .... Then Amirm created ASR ...
game changer.. My current system is a pair of LSR-308 driven by an Integra or Rotel Pre-Pro , DSP courtesy of miniDSp, subwoofers are the bucket subs and their amps a Rotel 5 -channel ..to be replaced by a Crown Pro amp ... And Boy doesn't it sound good to these ears and many others some of those .... audiophiles ...

The total cost of that contraption is a fraction of what I would have paid a few years ago for an interconnect cable .. I was never a Power Cables person but then, IMHO IC and speaker cables did make a difference a huge difference ... Now I am learning the value of proper system integration , of bass performance and equalization of speaker dispersion and of the relative insignificance or relevance of electronics ... I measured this system to be essentially flat from 20 Hz to 20 KHz in my smallish room ... What the Heck!! WTF? What's going on here ... The system has a rawness to it I would like to eliminate, seems the speakers cannot take too much of it .. They will play loud but start unraveling quite fast then ... Yet ... They sound good .. They shouldn't sound that good ... They are cheap by any audio metric .. Yet they sound good enough for my purpose of enjoying music .. they are not end of game components ... in the meantime ... they rock !!!

More to come .... Your contributions are requested

I spent a bit of time with one of the original PT TT’s, it was purchased from mr pink himself ( forgotten his name) in loo of some marketing work. I really liked it , sounded like a CD and much preferred vs my friends linn sondek .

As for the rest I’m glad you’ve found a cure, I’m still coming to terms with my break from reality wrt HIFI. I have dreams about someone knocking at the door and buying it all off me so I can go out and buy a Mac mini and a pair of Dutch and Dutch 8c’s LoL .

I could probably renovate the house and get rid of the insane asylum that is currently inhabiting my lounge.

 

[FrantzM]

More ...

In the meantime , i got a kef LS50 and drove it with an expensive German amplifier .. I tried to mate it with some subs ,relying on the subs controls .. Results were bad .. No fault of the kef really but rather of my own self. Had I used two subs with an mini DAP or something similar, might (would) have brought better results... To my mind the LSR 308s please me more but frankly are not as refined-sounding as the Kef (Can't express it any better , sorry ).
I am going to audition an 8c .. It could be a game changer too ..

 

[Blumlein 88]

More ...

In the meantime , i got a kef LS50 and drove it with an expensive German amplifier .. I tried to mate it with some subs ,relying on the subs controls .. Results were bad .. No fault of the kef really but rather of my own self. Had I used two subs with an mini DAP or something similar, might (would) have brought better results... To my mind the LSR 308s please me more but frankly are not as refined-sounding as the Kef (Can't express it any better , sorry ).
I am going to audition an 8c .. It could be a game changer too ..

I've had the chance to hear and use the LS50. In passive version you'll need a bigger amp than you might think. ATMO, it needs a subwoofer. Need not be a large one, but you need to add a little at the low end and take some of the strain off the LS50. I also find adding a sub to the LSR speakers lets them ratchet up a notch in refinement. Still maybe a notch short of LS50+good sub. I think the LS50 really needs the sub to handle up to 120 hz for good integration.

 

[Grave]

Hi-Fi is cheap. I can spend more money on PC's.

 

[cjfrbw]

There is that saying: "Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgment."

In audio, it might read: "Good Audio comes from experience. Experience comes from a great deal of meaningless and sometimes extravagant spending."

The more you 'learn' about audio, the better you will be at being able to get a 'high end' sound, MacGyver like, from more common and less glitzy components, perhaps vintage and the great audio pieces from the past.

Being curator of an expensive and flashy pile is no longer of interest to me, but is also no longer necessary. For some, it may be necessary, and that is fine with me, too, I love to visit.
(Sez me, still with a pretty extravagant pile, but eclectic and hodge podge).

 

[Old Listener]

Good Thread, FrantzM.

I was never willing to spend vast amounts of money on audio. When I did buy gear (not very often), I tried to do as much consumer research as I could. That kept me pretty well grounded.

My current main audio system cost about 1/5 as much as the previous one bought 20 years ago. Sounds better too.

Nice to have some sane audiophiles to talk to.

 

[Thomas savage]

I've had the chance to hear and use the LS50. In passive version you'll need a bigger amp than you might think. ATMO, it needs a subwoofer. Need not be a large one, but you need to add a little at the low end and take some of the strain off the LS50. I also find adding a sub to the LSR speakers lets them ratchet up a notch in refinement. Still maybe a notch short of LS50+good sub. I think the LS50 really needs the sub to handle up to 120 hz for good integration.

I didn’t like them at all but did not try the pair them with a sub and the in store listening conditions were unfavourable.

 

[FrantzM]

Hi

The comparisons between the Kef LS50 and the LSR308 weren't neither side by side nor with the same equipments. The LS50 was in a classic shrine system. PC + DAC + Amp + speakers... The current system is more complicated:
PC to DAC (Digital to analog conversion #1) to miniDSP (Analog to Digital #1 , Digital Signal Processing and massaging followed by Digital to Analog #2) ) to PrePro (Multi-Input so no conversion) to LSR 308 ( Analog to Digital #2 followed by Digital to analog # 3 plus whatever DSP goes inside those boxes) .. I know this is supposed to be transparent but ... I can see myself in the future with a system with less conversions ...
This current system will likely remain in my HT, perhaps a change to the 708 and 705 i or P .. We'll see

What I know I am missing is a degree of purity i can hear with my numerous headphones and some speakers system. it is hard to describe but the LSR 308 are raw, rough. They start screeching and screaming at high volume (>85 dB). BTW I have noticed my average SPL has gone down ... it seems that cleaning up the bass reproduction has that effect ... a sub crossed at 90 Hz with the LSR 308 help them a lot ... I am sure that had I had this possibility I would have found the same with the Kef LS50...
With steady tome at above 85 dB my bucket-subs rattle ... it may cost me time and material to eradicate the buzzes .. I am opting for a cheaper and more aesthetic alternative....Next step is to put the subwoofer drivers in a .67 cu ft enclosure from Parts Express Parts 300-7068. Rough calculation shows that 3 inch of concrete in an inverted 5-gallons bucket is approximately the remaining volume in the bucket thus that of a similar enclosure. I haven't been able to eliminate all the rattles in the bucketsubs and the Parts Express enclosure I have in mind are cheap enough ($35 each), Keep in mind the drivers are less than $60 each .... Add a used Crown amp at $300 to that and ... you may be surprised by what $700 of sub'bing can do in a modest room.. a miniDSP or equivalent DSP is s required to get the best bass out of this ....3 of those subs may not hit 20 Hz at 110 dB but will do it at 100 dB all day long with a modest level of THD...

One additional thing: I would encourage those who have not to review their conception of bass reproduction. just dropping a pair of large "full range" speakers in a room, in the majority of cases will not yield the best results .. regardless of the inherent capability of those full range speakers .. Not an issue of Sub with small satellite thing. Most room with most speakers seems to require subwoofers .. at least 2 ... the 3rd one needs not to be identical and can be a lesser subs ... Another thing DSP is needed,in the bass and Class D reigns Supreme ...

I spent the entire day listening to music (Holliday here) .. and I had a (mostly) smile on my face and at times a frown when the thought of how much I spent on this hobby... crossed my mind. Iit is not a cheap hobby by any stretch but we have been lead to believe that a large bundle must be sent for good results ... With >$20,000 speakers being the norm
I can now calmly maintain that with forethought and knowledge it is not so. $ 2000 and a PC can provide a satisfying full range realistic SPL system.

More .. later

 

[JJB70]

I followed a similar path (but with less expense.....), going from audiophile (audiophool) to just enjoying music and deciding that to just relax and enjoy good music reproduced well really doesn't necessitate spending $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$'s. I was never into analogue or tubes though, even in my audiophoolery days I was never oblivious to the advantages of digital and issues around tubes, however there was never any shortage of over priced snake oil in digital and solid state. I think I had a bit of an epiphany when I started realising that low end and mid-fi gear from manufacturers like Sony, Kenwood, Technics, Yamaha, Denon etc basically urinated all over the high end exotica in terms of build quality and depth of engineering despite costing a fraction as much. Then I started paying attention to measurements and realized that if I tuned out all the subjectivist nonsense in most magazine reviews there was nothing there, it was all just spin and florid phrases. Then I started trying to be honest in comparing the SQ of differing equipment. And from there I ended up being extremely happy with a nice Japanese mid-fi set up which served me very well for over 20 years and saved me $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$'s.

 

[Thomas savage]

In terms of subwoofers i played about with my rel's so they were silent but the room makes several resonant sounds. Fortunately the dsp correction box they are pluged into seems to stop that from happening.

I had gone quite mad ripping walls apart dampening various sources of annoyance agrovated by unruly subs.

 

[FrantzM]

Hi

My present issues are not room rattling. It does not ..yet ... With music, most music I would say the subs are OK . Fed however with high level steady tones, they do rattle. On very rare passages they also rattle enough for some of it to be audible. It seems also that at high volume ( Dire Straits' on Every Straits and Love over Gold cuts) I heard the sign of amplifier distortion .. the Rotel I am currently use is100 w/ch and I believe it had reached its limits ... Same happens on "Pacific Rim" in the movie settings (using 3 LSR 308 up front and 2 LSR 305 in the back) ... I was enjoying 5.1 with the JBL ( they're fabulous on movies) and the subs did strain or the amps were at their limits ... I have e-Bayed a Crown (Used) 8-channel amplifier for the purpose ...
Darn! I am enjoying this ... The spending is increasing .. that is the cost of learning ..Total still isn't near what I have payed for my Stax headphones (One splurge I don't regret, the Stax is everything that has been said about it and more ...) ...

When things get settle a bit I may dress the room with drapes to provide absorption ... Maybe .... if the fiancee likes the drapes over Her living room ... My man cave is where the final , hopefully endgame 2-channel will be ... It will be treated some and I may drop an infinite baffle plus multiple sealed subs subs in it ... Again that will not cost an am and a leg

 

[FrantzM]

From Left Field

As I have said in the beginning, I come from the school of $20K component being OK or almost .... I insist on the "components" not system. Then I went into trying this cheap- ass system composed of a pair of $80 subwoofers (YES!!! the Bucket Subs) driven, now, by a $300 2nd hand but powerful amplifier (Crown CTS-8200 in bridged mode, about 400 watts in each subs , enough to fry them, I think) a miniDSP 2x4 with the advanced plug-in for a total of $105 , a pair of JBL LSR 308 at $500 or so and a UMIK microphone @ $100 or so ... There is enough conversions in this system PC to DAC [D to A} to miniDSP [A to D then D to A] to the speakers ( [A to D] then {Dto A] ) to cancel my membership to the GWA ( Gold-eared Audiophile of the World) .... This assembly (My current speakers-based one as there is also a headphones based which surprisingly cost much, much more) is quite limited (not in frequency it does the 20-20K rather well) but in many ways, satisfying.
I no longer can comprehend the entire notion of $20,000 speakers driven by 10,000 amplifiers and 10,000 DAC ... The entire $20K (plug your numbers here ) "entry-level" High End Audiophile system to which I did abide once is a HUMONGOUS Pile of Bovine Manure aka BS .... I have not even dabbled in Room Correction yet ... Those software (Audiolense or Acourate) at less than $500 (not giving any idea to their respective designers) are likely the audiophile bargain of the century.. Of course you must learn to use them and it takes time but rather than throwing money on USB cables or God Forbid Ethernet Cables ....
I believe now that $5000 is, for an enthusiast willing to learn, research and execute, THE point of diminishing returns. With that amount one does 20 to 20K @ 95 db SPL with low THD in a good sized room ... No doubt that doubling that should provide a better system but not twice as good. Of course some would tell me that there is more than those FR, SPL and THD numbers and they'll be right... THIS is the reason of this thread: To discuss

I will , perhaps, embark in building a $5000 system next (Leaning sight unseen toward the Linkwitz 521.4) ... I may do a 180 and increase the budget forudold and get a JBL M2 System or a Revel Salon to be driven by some 2nd-hand powerful audiophile amplifier shrine-like or if I get my hand on a second hand Geddes Abbey then I see my Yamaha CA 2010 (my father's) plus Good modern DAC (THX-thingie), PC-DSP (Acourate or Acoulense) Plus multiple DIY (Parts Express Denovo kits) subs driven by the Crown CTS-8200 as my endgame system ... Anyone selling a Geddes Abbey?

I would like to see more sharing from the community, especially about choice of equipment, amount spent, results, etc...

 

[Blumlein 88]

From Left Field

As I have said in the beginning, I come from the school of $20K component being OK or almost .... I insist on the "components" not system. Then I went into trying this cheap- ass system composed of a pair of $80 subwoofers (YES!!! the Bucket Subs) driven, now, by a $300 2nd hand but powerful amplifier (Crown CTS-8200 in bridged mode, about 400 watts in each subs , enough to fry them, I think) a miniDSP 2x4 with the advanced plug-in for a total of $105 , a pair of JBL LSR 308 at $500 or so and a UMIK microphone @ $100 or so ... There is enough conversions in this system PC to DAC [D to A} to miniDSP [A to D then D to A] to the speakers ( [A to D] then {Dto A] ) to cancel my membership to the GWA ( Gold-eared Audiophile of the World) .... This assembly (My current speakers-based one as there is also a headphones based which surprisingly cost much, much more) is quite limited (not in frequency it does the 20-20K rather well) but in many ways, satisfying.
I no longer can comprehend the entire notion of $20,000 speakers driven by 10,000 amplifiers and 10,000 DAC ... The entire $20K (plug your numbers here ) "entry-level" High End Audiophile system to which I did abide once is a HUMONGOUS Pile of Bovine Manure aka BS .... I have not even dabbled in Room Correction yet ... Those software (Audiolense or Acourate) at less than $500 (not giving any idea to their respective designers) are likely the audiophile bargain of the century.. Of course you must learn to use them and it takes time but rather than throwing money on USB cables or God Forbid Ethernet Cables ....
I believe now that $5000 is, for an enthusiast willing to learn, research and execute, THE point of diminishing returns. With that amount one does 20 to 20K @ 95 db SPL with low THD in a good sized room ... No doubt that doubling that should provide a better system but not twice as good. Of course some would tell me that there is more than those FR, SPL and THD numbers and they'll be right... THIS is the reason of this thread: To discuss

I will , perhaps, embark in building a $5000 system next (Leaning sight unseen toward the Linkwitz 521.4) ... I may do a 180 and increase the budget forudold and get a JBL M2 System or a Revel Salon to be driven by some 2nd-hand powerful audiophile amplifier shrine-like or if I get my hand on a second hand Geddes Abbey then I see my Yamaha CA 2010 (my father's) plus Good modern DAC (THX-thingie), PC-DSP (Acourate or Acoulense) Plus multiple DIY (Parts Express Denovo kits) subs driven by the Crown CTS-8200 as my endgame system ... Anyone selling a Geddes Abbey?

I would like to see more sharing from the community, especially about choice of equipment, amount spent, results, etc...

Bravo! An excellent post.

While not the only excellent speakers, I've heard a few and am convinced Harman's design and testing protocol is onto something. You might not get the best of anything, but you get an even excellent performing highly satisfying speaker from them usually. So I would suggest using whatever level of Revel speakers fit your budget level.

Also the book about loudspeakers by Toole indicated they had just shy of 100% correlation of their design goals with listener preference panels for small speakers that did little below 100 hz. That bass accounted for 30% of listeners opinion about speakers. So using room correction and multiple subs (which need not be too dear in cost) to even out your room's low end response combined with some of their excellent speakers should put you into a good system.

I suppose @Thomas savage experience with the 700 series JBL's is outlier result.

As for diminishing returns I think that has always been in effect. A subjective examination of that by me years ago when I had recent experience with many of the "IT" systems and "IT" gear indicated a roughly 4th power function of cost versus subjectively perceived quality. So something that sounded twice as good costs 16 times as much. I'll venture a wild guess and say that rational design might lower that to a third power function. But in addition to that I think some gear has been improved to the point it reaches effective perceptual perfection and can't be improved upon. Or that the curve of quality and been moved far down the curve of cost.

So I think the only region left that fully tracks that exponential curve would be speakers. And within power requirements for different sized spaces that may be reasonable to match physical reality needs. Amps still follow the curve somewhat. Everything else on the playback side I think has reached audible perfection unless one uses a broken design or wants something other than fidelity. We then are left with the limitations of stereo recording and playback. If one wanted to continue spending the big bucks using quality gear for more channels is more sensible. It has real payoffs that aren't wishful thinking. The bottleneck there is source material.

 

[Grave]

The point of diminishing returns for an open headphone set up is certainly <$1000.

 

[JJB70]

I think the cost equation for hifi has changed massively over the last 10 - 20 years. Many of us can take the source out now as we use computers or devices or servers as sources which are not free but which are cheap compared to the sort of audiophile sources that are still available to buy. And despite attempts to market special audiophile products most people are switched on enough to know it's snake oil. Ditto USB cables etc. Then we get to the DAC and amp, for DACs the point of diminishing returns is an awful lot nearer the £100 point than the $1000 point, and I believe the low cost DACs available from companies like Topping and SMSL are audibly transparent. Despite the disappointing reviews of amps here over the last couple of weeks I really don't think you need to spend a lot to get an audibly transparent amplifier, even the ones with digital inputs need not be expensive. So we are in a time where the source is our PC or tablet and the DAC and amp don't need to cost much at all, and obviously that assumes you buy a DAC and amp rather than active digital speakers. Active digital speakers are I think increasingly seen as the way ahead, so you remove the DAC and amp from the equation. Which brings us to speakers, the bit where a change really can change sound significantly, however a decent speaker well set up in a room will generally be better than a great speaker in an acoustic mess IMO. And you don't have to spend several thousand dollars to get a good sounding speaker. In todays market I believe you can get a properly excellent sound for $1000, recently I bought a pair of KEF X300A speakers for £250 which provide a superb desk top sound system and to be quite honest are probably well past the point of diminishing returns for that application in terms of performance IMO.

 

[cjfrbw]

I knew something had changed when I could have enjoyable listening sessions listening to compressed music. If you had told me that ten years ago, I would not have believed it.

I did have a 'blast from the past' of all things from a vinyl record from the early 80's, which had enbalmed the 'old' CD type sound aka brittle, toneless, depthless, tinny etc. There are a lot of great digitally mastered vinyl records, but this one was really from the depths. I won't mention it in case if somebody's beloved precious, but there are a few records from the day that sound as bad as the lousy CD's from the day.

The ultra expensive audio is a symptom of a world in which some individuals have prospered mightily and can afford and WANT expensive and exclusive items, all the way out to the economic stratosphere. I personally find some the best sound I have heard from my 40 year old VFET amps (complete with ridiculous zip cord) with tube drivers.

I suppose that is good news for the frugal and bad news for the guys who want status objects that also corner the market on sound quality. They are clearly not the same thing any more. The question is not to confuse the two.

 

[Grave]

I have been an audiophile for 80 years and I have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on audio and I know everything about audio and I'm telling you that Nuforce products are the best products ever.

Paraphrased argument someone made to me on Massdrop.