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Post by zippy on Oct 27, 2014 10:53:38 GMT
for a car, I've always been a Goodyear fan.
for a 4x4 then my current favourite is the Bridgstone Dueler
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Post by zippy on Oct 23, 2014 9:08:12 GMT
If you'd asked me last year, I'd have said pretty much the whole system (Linn Karik/Numerik/Kairn) but after about 20 years old age took hold of it and eventually I replaced almost everything.
So now it's the KEF speakers at 10 years old.
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Post by zippy on Oct 21, 2014 16:32:33 GMT
I don't think it's the right stuff to use inside a speaker, for 2 reasons:
1. it sets pretty hard so might cause internal sound reflections etc. 2. are we sure the chemicals don't have an adverse effect on the speaker cones ? I have heard that the fumes created as it cures can eat away at rubber surrounds.
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Post by zippy on Oct 21, 2014 9:25:37 GMT
Alas no, Father Christmas refuses to call any more after he gave himself a hernia trying to squeeze a pair of speakers down the chimney.
but seriously, I don't have any relatives rich enough to buy me the sort of kit I'd like !
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Post by zippy on Oct 14, 2014 12:10:40 GMT
There's a few lookup sites like this, and they're all useful.
For myself I've got to the point where I reject all calls now unless they're in my contacts list, or I know they're from someone bona-fide.
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Post by zippy on Oct 13, 2014 9:18:13 GMT
The end point is surely when you run out of money.
I can't think of anything else that would stop me!
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Post by zippy on Oct 6, 2014 12:00:12 GMT
Did Peter Belt have any good ideas ? I remember the rules for No other speakers in the room 1.5 winds of tape around any batteries Was green felt pen on the edge of CDs his ? I remember the green felt pen thing - seems like a long time ago ..
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Post by zippy on Oct 6, 2014 9:31:42 GMT
Now there's a frustrating thing - I feel that I ought to be able to improve my speakers (KEF reference) but I've listened to everything I can find up to 5 times what the KEFs cost me when new, and none of them sound any better to my ears, and many of them worse.
I know that indicates that I should be content with what I have, but this hifi hobby just doesn't work like that.
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Post by zippy on Oct 3, 2014 18:05:23 GMT
Aren't they called Sleeve Bolts or barrel bolts?
You often get them in a flat pack for joining 2 cabinets together..
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Post by zippy on Oct 3, 2014 13:21:50 GMT
When companies come up with a product like this, how do you reckon they do it ?
Do they start with theory based on sound understanding of electronics, then work out how to put that into practice ? Or do they simply 'play about' with all sorts of combinations and treatments until they have something they figure is an improvement ?
I fear the latter is the case, and part of my scepticism as indicated above is that I want to understand WHY something sounds better, and the techno babble that they put out really puts me off (Quantum Tunneling anyone ?)
- it's the scientist in me, I need to know !!!
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Post by zippy on Sept 29, 2014 18:41:33 GMT
I don't dispute the improvements necessarily, just that the amount of money asked does not to my mind justify them. Nearly missed this. It's a good question to ask. I've just ordered a bundle of AMR Gold fuses. Five of them will go in key equipment cables in the main replay chain (the five components which are connected to the regenerator).
So, for the cost of £75, what else could I spend it on in my system to yield the improvement I expect to hear?
I was mainly thinking of £1000 cables etc - I'd find it more difficult to argue that fancy AMR fuses at £15 a time are not vfm (as long as they do actually do something). Worth a punt at that price
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Post by zippy on Sept 29, 2014 14:51:07 GMT
Those were the days (my friends !)
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Post by zippy on Sept 29, 2014 9:12:27 GMT
I'm highly sceptical about the vfm for esoteric items such as silly price cables, etc, and now there's fuses.
I don't dispute the improvements necessarily, just that the amount of money asked does not to my mind justify them.
Having said that, as I'm thinking about it, however wonderful your house mains wiring, and whatever fancy mains cables you might employ, the fuse is undoubtedly the weakest link (sic) being a single strand of wire about 1mm thick.
I'm wondering if any hifi manufacturers have considered whether there are alternatives to the standard 'piece of thin wire' fuse, such as a micro circuit breaker or electronic cutout ? Or maybe they wouldn't be legal ?
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Post by zippy on Sept 27, 2014 10:29:22 GMT
It's probably a very personal thing, but I've tried various combinations of active and passive preamplification and I've always found the passive sound to be inferior, usually lacking in 'oomph'.
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Post by zippy on Sept 20, 2014 15:49:14 GMT
What I don't get is that speaker manufacturers test their speakers using the feet provided by them. Assuming they 'tune' their designs to sound best when set up that way, surely using any other type of support may give you a different sound, but it won't be the one the makers intended you to hear ?
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Post by zippy on Sept 18, 2014 8:29:52 GMT
I've owned many watches including fancy TAG/Omega/Breitling but by far the most accurate is the £90 Citizen eco solar powered watch which is my 'everyday' watch. I check the exact time once a month and it's rarely more than a second or two out and of course never needs batteries.
Currently also using a Tissot touch watch just for the fun of it (I did actually use the compass function for real last week though !)
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Post by zippy on Sept 18, 2014 8:25:09 GMT
For us oldies who can remember the amazement at watching the first moon landing, its truly remarkable. The accuracy to which these things have to work is almost unbelievable. Just one tiny error and Rosetta would have missed by miles. As you say the most difficult is yet to come, and I'll be watching that too.
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Post by zippy on Sept 17, 2014 15:54:47 GMT
Look on the bright side - at least you have the luck to know about the power outage in advance.
A while ago we had an outage of several hours - the UPS couldn't keep going that long and although most of the servers shut down gracefully, we had problems starting up again from the backups.
The most annoying thing was that the outage was scheduled, but nobody thought to tell us !
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Post by zippy on Sept 17, 2014 13:09:49 GMT
Gents, these comments have made me think about hooking up a cheap DAC to the 2 channel amp I'm using with my TV. Ideally I would connect my freeview box and blu-ray player straight to the DAC but this gives me a problem - no remote control sound. The amp has a dodgy volume pot and no remote facility. If I leave the box and blu-ray connected as they are via HDMI to my TV, is there any benefit in taking the optical out from the TV to a DAC? I am currently using a mini-jack to RCA from TV headphone socket to amp. I can control the sound level fed to the amp via the TV remote this way. Indeed I did try that at one stage to replay the DVD sound to a DAC via the TV. It worked fine although I believe the sound was not quite as good as connecting the DVD direct to the DAC.
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Post by zippy on Sept 17, 2014 10:24:09 GMT
My stereo sounds different every time I listen to it. I’ve even tried playing the same track at every start up. Sometimes it sounds so different that I could easily believe someone had crept in and swapped some components. I listen to it most days so I can’t believe I’m not familiar with how I think it sounds when I think it sounds its best. Ffs, I should know, I built a lot of it. I’ll have to pick a good day to evaluate warm up times.......hang on, I won’t know if it’s a good day until I’ve listened to it for a while..... Do we think ambient temperature may have an influence? It gets pretty hot here during the day. Maybe all the components need to be at their nominal specified operating temperature. Good grief, there’s going to be an awful lot of stuff to measure in order to be certain that it is changes in the equipment rather than my mood, hearing, ambient noise, stress levels etc etc. Nope, this one is beyond me. I think I’ll just have to settle for some days it sounds fantastic and other days; well, just unsatisfactory and I really have no idea why. --------------------------------------- - Lots of things that may, or may not, affect the sound quality get discussed (room effects, etc) but to my knowledge you're the first person to mention atmospheric conditions ! As it happens I think you're right - room temperature, humidity, atmospheric pressure must surely affect loudspeakers though I doubt they do anything to electronics. Now there's a whole new topic for discussion...
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