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Post by ChrisB on Dec 11, 2019 20:54:52 GMT
That would be from Brighton HiFi, on the corner of Trafalgar Street. My girlfriend lived just a few doors up from there. Come to think of it, so did my wife (same house, different people!)
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Post by liffy99 on Dec 12, 2019 21:32:16 GMT
Yep, that’s the one. Takes me back a few years. Used to go to the steam bakery there and the King and Queen was a regular meeting place.
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Post by liffy99 on Dec 13, 2019 13:57:35 GMT
EPISODE 5 Living just outside Newbury, next to the woods, was great - loads of walks on the doorstep, wildlife in the woods and garden, a bit of peace and quiet, what wasn’t to like ? I suppose the sheer convenience of London was missed but Ealing was already shifting from a hitherto ‘villagey’ sort of location to just a continuation of the suburban sprawl. Not to mention the council had imposed residents parking charges outside my flat.
But here I was, in a 4 bed house with a proper lounge - so, how to fill it ! The first change was to amplification. After a visit to NVA in the Nene Valley I came away with a P50 passive pre-amp and a 60W power amp. Little did I know the marital pleasure this was about to cause . . . the NVA really did not like the awkward load of the Quads, resulting in much fizzing and popping from the amp. I tried cables with as low a capacitance as I could but little improvement was made. The Quads had to go . . and in their place a pair of 6’ tall ribbon planars, the Magneplanar 2.5r. Overall I felt this was a step in the right direction - they presented an even bigger soundstage, went louder and deeper and were easy to move around if need be. They may have lost some of the midrange clarity of the Quads but I felt the balance was a good compromise. Being 6” narrower also made them fit a narrow lounge that little bit better - and we all know what difference 6” can make ! In an effort to improve the system a little more I swapped the 60W NVA for a pair of their 70W mono blocks, but to be honest there was not very much improvement.
About this time, 1990 I think, I dabbled in the dark side - and bought my first CD player, a Marantz CD80. Built like a brick it sounded pretty good to my ears with its NOS DAC (not that I knew a DAC from the back of a bus back then).. I remember the first disc I ever played on it was a purely vocal affair from Bobby McFerrin. Curious music but hey, it was only meant as a test. The Quads were sold on for the same as I had paid for them. A visit to what was then Uxbridge Audio provided a Linn LP12 with Helius Scorpio arm and a Goldring Eroica moving coil. I really wanted the Oracle Delphi they had on demo, but just could not stretch that far. No doubt it was a step up from the Rega though and was to see me through the next few years. Their demo stacked Quad 57s were good though !
And then, 1992 and redundancy ! Not very welcome although it did convince me to try and get a real career, at last and not simply hop from job to job. Whilst trying to make ends meet by refilling and selling toner cartridges (not very successfully) I took an evening class to do a Law A level and applied to Uni again. So, back to student-hood in my mid/late 30s and off to Sheffield . . .
Back soon after New Year with another tantalsing taster - more space, a spot of weightlifting and a slowly growing CD collection . . . . 'til then I'm off to France (if only I could stay there after today's grim election news . . . )
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Post by MartinT on Dec 13, 2019 14:57:07 GMT
I hope the Helius Scorpio was an improvement over the Aureus.
If we knew what we know now about arms back then, we would have ignored the SME and Linn offerings and either gone for the Acos Lustre (cheap), Syrinx (middling) or Fidelity Research (expensive). All good arms in their price category.
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Post by liffy99 on Dec 31, 2019 10:12:13 GMT
EPISODE 6 Life as a, very mature, law student. With poverty once again nipping at my heels three years passed by with no changes other than trying a couple of different signal and speaker cables. Yes, there were some small differences but, to be frank, it was hard to tell whether they were better or worse - just ‘different’. Ever since I have been very dubious about cable effects and have not pushed the boat out in this aspect at all. However I did have my very first, dedicated (as in no-one else wanted it) music room. I don’t mean I decked it out with acoustic treatments, plush sofas and ultra-expensive hi-fi racks, just that I finally had a feeling of space. The Maggies had never sounded so good now I could get an easy 4’ behind them and I spent many happy hours considering the views of the ‘man on the Clapham omnibus’ whilst slowly working through my entire record collection. Over this period in my life I seemed to rather disassociate from listening to any new music - simply sticking with the records and artists I already knew. It was a barren time for musical exploration and, looking back, seemed a grey comparison to reading the NME and Melody Maker in my late teens. All too soon the heady days of not working for a living drew to a close and, following my wife’s insistence that we return to the sunnier climes of the South, had to move. Sadly the law degree came to naught (a pretty decent 2.1 mind although all it is now is a piece of paper on the wall). I had run out of money to enrol on the obligatory Legal Practice Course and so I ended up in the NHS where I was to spend the rest of my working days in one guise or another. And so started a 4 year hiatus living in a B&B in West Sussex whilst the Hi fi sat in a Sheffield warehouse. Although Sussex was lovely we couldn’t afford housing prices that were escalating far more quickly than our modest incomes and another move came about to Somerset. That was only supposed to be an interim step but we have now been here for 19 years . . someone get me outta here ! At last, a house was bought, removal men hired and soon I was unpacking the treasures of a previous life. Having read that Maggies could really do with being driven with something better, I was lured by the offer of a Plinius combo - advertised at what I though was a great price by a Brighton dealer. The NVA was flogged to a striker from Norwich City and I called the dealer to confirm the price and availability and set off on the 300 mile round trip to bring it back. On arrival the dealer then realised he had priced it wrongly and I was to be 30% poorer than I thought. Not amused, but I was not going to waste the journey.
The amp was lovely - Class A, sweet sounding with a beautifully constructed pre-amp. The best I had owned yet. The preamp (M12 I think) was a tank; Siltech wiring throughout and so, so smooth. Was I finally inching towards ‘high end’ territory ? At that point I was made a tempting offer for the Maggies and sold them (whoops) and, for a couple of months they were replaced by a pair of Decware radial/ribbon jobbies in pyramidal enclosures. they certainly sounded open and spacious but holographic ? No ! It was all a bit diffuse. And they did not have that much in the way of bass either with their downward firing woofer, although they were quite efficient and easily driven.
Nah, not for me really and they soon went in favour of some Cadence Anina electrostatic hybrids. Chunky beasts and well made. The mids and top end were good, but in my room at least, the bass seemed completely disassociated and a little overblown. Strangely they were not that easy to drive either and I had the Plinius amp shutting down a couple of times.
So the Aninas had to go to and then I met Jerry (of Jandl100 fame) who was selling his Audiostatic Wings. I was starting to realise I had a love affair with planar speakers and to this day, these are some of the most transparent drivers I have ever owned. But they didn’t do bass or macro dynamics very well. A dalliance with a Final S200 sub proved fruitless as I just could not get then to integrate well, nor was the combo able to generate the dynamics I craved. I was really sad to see the Audiostatics go - I will for ever be haunted by their rendition of Andy Sheppard’s alto sax, but I had no choice really. I have had sporadic contact with Ben Peters since (designer of the Audiostatics) trying to find info on his new range of speakers but the company seems to come and go like a phoenix in the flames. So still little the wiser.
One other change for another year was made to satisfy my yearning for a DVD machine and a Denon 2900 universal player replaced the Marantz. Can’t say I had much of a preference for either when it came to playing CDs though and my collection of DVDs has always been very modest to say the least. S'funny but I can listen to the same piece of music many, many times but it is extremely rare that I watch a film more than once. Perhaps it is a case with me that it is all about the plot, and once out . . .
The end of this era was to say goodbye to vinyl. Over many months I gradually and painstakingly digitally recorded my album collection on to a Vortexbox ripper / streamer feeding a Logitech Squeezebox 3 (with software tweaks). Then sold the albums and the LP12 - how many more mistakes will I make ? I don’t miss the vinyl playback, other than for the sense of ritual, but I should have kept the albums, if only for posterity. Streaming over wifi immediately changed the way I listened to music . . . and not always for the better.
By the way, anyone know how I can change image sizes on these posts ?
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Post by jandl100 on Dec 31, 2019 10:42:49 GMT
Ah, my old Audiostatic Wings - yep, a real curate's egg! Exceptional transparency, but where da bass'n'dynamics go? I found them impossible to integrate successfullty with a subwoofer, they seemed to slope gently off from about 200Hz and I challenge anyone to find a sub that can meld with that!
Great speakers, though, despite their limitations.
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Post by liffy99 on Dec 31, 2019 10:51:41 GMT
Hi Jerry Wish I still had them now to try with my twin Lyngdorf bass units (passive bass corner units with two opposing 10" woofers per cabinet) driven by a 200w amp and recommemded to crossover at up to 400Hz. They are not true 'subs' in the usual sense, although they happily dig down to the mid tewnties Hertz wise. They don't fare too badly with my 2905s, albeit crossed over at 75Hz with a 48dB / oct slope.
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Post by MartinT on Dec 31, 2019 11:42:22 GMT
Thank you for Ep.6. You've certainly had your ups and downs and I can empathise with that. Life can be horrible at times.
You can edit image sizes by clicking Edit on the post, and then clicking BBCode. You will see the image URLs preceded with max-width:100%. You can vary the % and then check by Preview until you're happy, then Save.
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Post by liffy99 on Jan 2, 2020 10:35:42 GMT
EPISODE 7 Yep, streaming was, and is, very convenient and has opened up a whole new world of music I would not even have known existed. However, it has made me far too impatient. In the good old days. Like many others, listening to your latest purchase was a quite enjoyable ritual - marvel at the record sleeve, reverently place vinyl lp on turntable, sit back and listen for 20 minutes and flip. Now the ease with which I can select and play tracks has created a very short attention span and it is too easy to jump from one thing to another before properly listening. In the longer term I also fear for the choice we have as consumers. Streaming services must be a Godsend to the distributors - as our collections of physical media dwindle, what is to stop them constantly jacking up the prices, or even restricting choice ? We’ve seen it all before - is ‘pay per track’ on its way ? Anyway, the next couple of stops on the stereo express were aimed at mini systems - for the kitchen and study. First off was to buy another ‘renderer’ (is that the right parlance ?) for the kitchen - this time a Squeezebox Touch.
Output was to one of those generic Chinese tiny class D chip amps to a pair of Genexxa LX5 ribbon hybrids.
In the study output from my Mac went to a Kingrex amp / PSU duo to another set of Genexxas.
This latter setup made some small scale, but sublime sounds and I cannot rate either highly enough, especially the loudspeakers. These little marvels, in their aluminium cases, used a very similar ribbon tweeter to the far more expensive Linaeum minis coupled with a (not so good) 5” woofer. But for small spaces, and with a little tweaking (I replaced the capacitors and inductors and increased the cabinet bracing) they were brilliant. So good in fact I gradually sourced 5 pairs of the LX5s ready for a mini-surround system if ever I have a spare room. Sadly some of these have now been sold on but still have half a dozen lurking somewhere. I also grabbed an EBay bargain in the shape of a cheap KT88 Chinese valve amp just for the hell of it.
It drove the Audiostatics with kust 15 watts, just, but not very well. I also tried the sublime little Kingrex which promptly resulted in me sending it back to Taiwan for repair. The little chip amp has no output protection and did not appreciate the load of an electrostatic loudspeaker ! Lesson learned (or not, see following episodes).
In next week's gripping issue - going large !
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Post by MartinT on Jan 2, 2020 11:16:42 GMT
The Touch got me started down the streaming road and led, eventually, to now where I exclusively stream. It was ahead of its time and even better with some optimisations and a good PSU.
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Post by liffy99 on Jan 27, 2020 15:47:04 GMT
EPISODE 8 Well, after mucking about a little with a valve amp (rubbish) and enjoying a little desktop system, it was back chasing the holy grail of there always being something better along the way. I kept the Plinius pre-amp for a while and made my first (well, and only) foray into the world of importing audio gear from the States, in the shape of a pair of very large Parasound JC1s ! At the same time a van hired for the day and a jaunt back to Sussex also found me the proud owner of a pair of Martin Logan Prodigys. As you can imagine, sound levels chez Liffy took a step up and bass and volume were certainly more prodigious than ever before. Can't say I had a burning preference for the A Class mode of the JC1s (and the MLs certainly liked the headroom of 400W) but all was good. I thought the setup looked fine and loved the see-through nature of MLs to this day but, fair cop, the system was just too big for our lounge and SWMBO was less than impressed. The MLs were sold on to an estate agent a few miles away who was building a surround system and wanted these to front the two Acsents he already had. Amazingly I moved the Parasounds on for more than I paid (ah, the days when we could get two dollars to the pound) and it was on to what has become a mainstay of my system since then - Scandi Noir. Ok, Steinway gear was always going to be a pipe dream but the Lyngdorf TDAi2200 was almost a case of love at first sight. It just ticked so many boxes. An integrated with 200W a side, the ability to design a two way active crossover, completely digital signal handling up until the loudspeaker outputs, a smart black case and an utterly silent background which let even more detail shine through. I later upgraded to a version of the same with advanced analogue inputs (never used them) and, most importantly, Roomperfect room correction capability. The latter was the icing on the cake and made huge inroads into removing the bass bloom that was inherent in my lounge. A real Swiss Army penknife of an amplifier and one that pleased SWMBO to boot. Oh, and a sister SDA2175 power amp joined the party too. Now I had gone totally digital and invested in a Vortexbox to act as a music server for the system, playing through a Squeezebox 3 and Squeezebox Touch. On the software side things were managed by Logitech Media Server and Squeezepad as a remote app on my Ipad. Many happy hours were spent ripping CDs to the Vortexbox and I found myself listening again to music that I'd not played for ages (and some wondered why I ever did in the first place). I do find though that it is so easy to become impatient when such convenience is on offer - it's so tempting to flick from track to track without perhaps allowing oneself the indulgent luxury of listening to the music the way the performer had supposed. I really liked the Squeezepad app too as it provided immediate links, via the worlwide webberoony, to details about the artists - history, discography, upcoming concerts and their websites etc - a poor man's Roon perhaps. Oh, and yes I did have a new (old) pair of loudspeakers after the sad departure of the Prodigys in the shape (and a rather bulky one at that) of a pair of Tannoy DMT15 monitors. Hmmm - a mixed bag for me. Much higher efficiency and decent dynamics made them quite OK for music that needed LOUD, but I never quite good get on with the slightly tizzy treble registers. I tried removing the inbuilt crossovers and used the Lyngdorfs to b-amp the wee beasties, modelling a crossover shape as best I could. Although transparency improved a little I never could get rid of that tizz. They lasted a few months and then . . .
In next week's post Brexit edition (don't get me started - plans now in tatters) - back to the future (more planars), upcycling to Japan and a dabble with headphones.
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Post by MartinT on Jan 27, 2020 20:12:30 GMT
Fascinating - keep it coming!
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Post by jandl100 on Jan 28, 2020 7:31:48 GMT
Yes, very interesting, especially the swerve into full blown room correction. I know I'd miss my bass bloom if it was taken away! Tannoys, yuck, I agree with you there. -- how come hulking great cabinets were domestically acceptable but techno-elegant ML Prodigys weren't? Or did you pretend they were drink cabinets? Must admit I am a bit surprised about the love for the Lyngdorf power amps, I've had a 2175 a couple of times; there's a quite startling and immediate 'rightness' to the sound that is very appealing, but also what I have come to hear as a typical high power class D constraint on transparency, just that crucial bit too smooth - rather like planar magnetic headphones. Still, maybe episode 9 [the rise of the planars?] will throw further light on this. ============ I must take you up on your invitation, I'll drop you a PM.
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Post by MartinT on Jan 28, 2020 7:44:22 GMT
I've never been convinced by Tannoys either, they mostly don't do the transparency I need from my speakers. The big Westminsters are the best, because of their effortless scale, but as you say, the treble from those coaxial tweeters never sounds right to me.
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Post by John on Jan 28, 2020 8:26:03 GMT
I heard the Westminster's once They actually worked for the person as he was a big Frank Sinatra fan where that effortless mid could shine.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 3, 2020 8:47:45 GMT
An interesting story that you’ve written in a great style - keep it coming!
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Post by liffy99 on Feb 25, 2020 16:02:23 GMT
Getting near the end of the road now - but I suppose I've reached the conclusion that, without more space, there is less point in chasing the dragon (oo er missus) for a while. If ever we get to relocate to France opportunities may arise but I feel Brexit has blown a hole in the hull of that idea. Yep, the Tannoys were big too, but could be placed closer to the wall than the Prodigies, especially with the room correction software. So, in an effort to become more domestically acceptable a couple of short-term dalliances with more boxes = firstly in the shape of a pair of 1974 Tannoy Chatsworths (HPD 12" drivers with alnico magnets). These I got for free ! Whilst mooching around an auction site I noticed these dumped on the doorstep - asked if they were being sold and was told I could just take them away ! On closer inspection all was present, even the cabinets were in reasonable shape with badges, but the cone surrounds had all but disappeared. Ordered a refoaming kit, did the necessary and, voila, up and running like good uns. I actually preferred these to the DMTs - more coloured, lower power handling but they just seemed so flippin' dynamic. A bit like some Audionotes in many ways. But they were not pretty enough to satisfy SWMBO and my cabinet making skills were not up to trying to rehouse the drivers so off they went - to a bloke in Japan. Flip, they took a lot of wrapping. Wish I still had them - now worth more than double what I sold them for So, in with some Perigee FK1 ribbon hybrids - probably one of the very best box speakers I have owned. very fast, decent tight bass (although missing the very bottom octave) and very domestically acceptable with their slim, pinao black finish. Used in conjunction with my Lyngdorf W210 corner woofers I think I reached peak bass chez nous. On a bake off at Julians near Britol another chap had a pair playing there (with modified crossovers) which sounded Ok - at least until compared to Julians rebuilt Apogee Duetta Sigs. Feeling suicidal I plugged in the little Kingrex amp to see what they made of a sweet sounding little Class T box - which promptly expired. the FK1s do need a bit of welly behind them. That was the second time I had to return the amp for repair to the far end of Asia to replace the parts. It was a great amp though fr a small system (now replaced by a Topping DAC/Amp as the Kingrex was just expensive overkill sat in front of the computer. Julian's Apogees spoiled me of course so I let the Perigees go to a chap in Oz (more international shipping) and looked around for some more panels. Which I found in the shape of some smaller Final 400i. About 4' x 1' and just a couple of inches deep these fit in nicely. Sure, they did not possess quite the transparency of the Audiostatics of yore (despite upgrading the panels to some with improved coatings), nor did they have any bottom end below 200Hz but the corner woofers covered that ground in the active 2+2 configuration I have now had for some time. Last to the party a couple of years ago was a new disc spinner (I'd been using a PS4 for DVDs and all my CDs had been ripped to the Macs hard disc instead of the Vortexbox). The Oppo 103 which has done all I could ask of it although I did have to replace the laser assembly a few months ago. I don't possess any SACDs, hardly any Pure Audio discs and few DVDs, so how the laser gave up the ghost of playing probably less than 100 discs I don't know. But the most important thing was that it sort of matched the frontal layout of the Lyngdorf 2200 So, after quite a roller coaster of kit swapping over 40 years and more, I started to draw close to my current setup. It is not the last word by any means, but I feel I've reached some sort of steady state, moving from which will take a too large chunk from my meagre pension and a shift to larger premises. Oh, for a dedicated music room . . . In the next episode; the Danish love affair continues, and Stanley Kubrik is in da house . . .
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Post by liffy99 on Mar 3, 2020 10:29:53 GMT
The Final Chapter (or not . . . )
And that just about brings me up to date, with a system I have been enjoying for the past eighteen months. No, it's not perfect - like cars, or bikes, one size does not fit all needs and I would live to have the space and opportunity to switch between different systems for different music (Quad 2905s, good as they have become, are not party animals !). It took a bit of persuasion with regard to SWMBO - the Quads are a foot further out into the room than in the photo), but the improvements have been more than tangible - great imaging, sense of depth, amazing detail and stressless listening. The woofers fill out the very bottom octave (steep crossover between these and the Quads) and Roomperfect sorts out most of any tendency to cure bass bloom in the room (sometimes goes a bit too far and I turn the bass up temporarily). The latest version of the Lyngdorf (TDAi3400) is a step up from the previous model - the increased clarity was immediately apparent from the first minute - another veil lifted. And having built in connectivity to my streaming service (Qobuz) makes life so much easier - the Raspberry Pi has now left the building. The only thing I find a little weird about the amp is its logarithmic volume control. One gets so used to setting analogue amps at, typically, 11 o'clock on the dial it gives a false impression that there is much more to give. Seeing the Lyngdorf running normally at just 22dB below full output, even though that is just a couple of watts, makes me feel that the amp isn't very powerful. But of course, it all quickly cranks up as the last 22dB are explored, not that I have ever gone that far. In any case, amps are like taps - most efficient when turned fully on.
Where nest - who knows ? I can't see me changing unless a big win comes in and I can move to bigger premises, or at least one where I could create a music room. I am toying with replacing the Lyngdorf SDA2175 that is used for the woofers for their latest wholly digital version (SDA2400) but that would really just be to keep things matched in appearance as I doubt I would hear any difference as it only handles sub 120Hz frequencies. I am sure there are a few bits and pieces I have forgotten (an old Phillips 212 record deck for example) but its been a lengthy road, and not one that has been without its ups and downs. Dream system - well, I wouldn't say no to a full Steinway / Lyngdorf setup but that would cost almost as much as my house. Wouldn't mind hearing a pair of Sandersound electrostatics either as all the write ups have been good and my conversations with Roger, their creator, have been nothing but helpful. But no dealers in England and still probably beyond my retirement impoverished pockets. Anyway, its all irrelevant as it seems we are all about to die anyway . . . . .
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Post by MartinT on Mar 3, 2020 11:40:21 GMT
Great that the end result is such a pleasing system. Makes the journey to get there worthwhile and a learning experience.
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Post by liffy99 on Mar 3, 2020 16:55:11 GMT
For serious listening at night, I chuck a small blanket over the TV. Surprising how much difference it makes to the imaging - probably down to the Quads being dipoles and therefore emitting just as much sound from their rears.
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