Hi
Let's try to be sincere, candid and frank here ... I’ll go first
After almost 6 years without a speaker-based system with which I am comfortable ( I dabbled some with an Apogee Diva but the room could not take them and a Kef LS50 that left me pleased with what they can do but ultimately unsatisfied< I like speakers that canscale from very small to humongous big when and if the music requires it . That is not a knock on the LS50, they do some things better than any speakers one is likely to find at multiple the price but … I am readying myself for some purchase and construction and learning and anxiety for middle of next year) ...
I have been an orthodox audiophile for many years. A few years ago I had an epiphany of sort... I discovered I wasn't able to recognize the virtues of my expensive cables when knowledge was removed ... and I wasn't alone. I am speaking for myself however; thus came a change of attitude toward High End Audio orthodoxy and common but too often unverified truisms. I became a skeptic. It helped me focus more on value and on Music in general... I moved toward Headphones with élan and thought I would have one or two headphones .. I have now 5. :b ... and I would have 2 headphones amps, I have 4, 2 Dacs... Now I have 5... :b x 5.. Why 2? one for the Desk and one portable... So I admit it I am an audiophile. I suffer from the FOMO disease and I do hear differences between my h'phones and my amps and my DACs.. I have kept whatever cords were shipped with the phones but I resigned myself to acquire a few more rugged USB cables .. Do I hear a difference between these and run-of-the-mill USB cables? ... I haven’t bothered but my phone charges faster when connected with the rugged USB cables ...
I Would have loved the one appliance approach of the Devialet but progress in DAC is too lighting fast IMO to lock myself to one DAC ... I could be proven wrong but ... so I got an amp.
I have some leaning mainly the Merging Pro Hapi which is the exact same interface as the Horus or the Hapi at half the price of the NADAC... a no-brainer in my book... Cables... I will choose some well-made cable and be done .. I will not eternalize on these...
Then comes speaker and this is the subject of his thread a little bit …I will use the Geddes or Harman multisubs approach configuration (very similar) .. So ultimate intrinsic bass capabilities is not an issue, I would have preferred an essentially full range speaker because the better scale well. Small speakers in my book remains small even when helped with a sub below … When proven wrong I will bow to the evidence for now I maintain this POV.
I am a planar fan. I have come to see Dynamic speakers have advanced to the point of supplanting planars in term of SQ .. to a point and this should not be constructed dismissal of planars ... I still love them and in term of bang for the bucks ? Nothing compares and even if you remove this factor some planar do things most speakers can’t ..
But I have heard horns and those are seductive and there are the new dynamic speakers .. Things like the beguiling Magico and the Rockport … Notice that all these are usual audiophile fares… I have not yet gone out of the beaten path. … ? The point I am trying to make is that there are too many choices and little immediate information about what is out there. We may have developed a paralysis. On one side there are the audiophile-approved stuff.. Wilson , Magico, ARC, CJ, Krell , etc and on the other side Pro Stuff… Other brands whatever that mean, etc … How would someone decide between those… The mind may decide before audition as many would not want to think that a Crown would for example beat a Lamm or a Burmester .. Ohhh! The horror of thinking about these but here we are. Has anyone compared say Lab Grupen with Krell or Lamm on a Wilson? We also tend to go for what I would call conventional pairing ARC/Wilson, .. Rare are Krell and Maggies or Quad. One of the best Maggie system I have heard was with a Krell KSA-200 on Mg 1,6 or 3.6 IIRC … Or Krell and Quad.. Someone in NYC had the Krell KSA-50 driving a pair of Quad Crosby … Heaven but you rarely if ever see those.. It is implied too quickly without audition that the Pro (or not well known brand with audiophile desires) stuff is not up to the task.. Recently I re-visited the Beolab 5 and people, it sounds good… Not mid-fi good.. Simply good, touching most of the audiophile points.. of accurate rendition of voices, clear deep bass, good imaging , stupendous dynamic and wide-sweet spot and it is not a speaker but a system it has everything: Speakers, Amps, DAC, subs and DRC (to a certain extent), and there is JBL 4367 at $15K for example t seems to perform extremely on objective parameters such as Dynamic Linearity and flatness/smoothness of FR that sans DSP/DRC while sounding good in the process, so good they replace the fabled Giya G3 in one audiophile setup… And there are the virtually unknown speakers we don’t care enough about to discuss and that without hearing just one note form those. I think many who have heard these or similar design are hesitant to come forward and share their impression because those items (mainly speakers for the purpose of this discussion) are not peer-approved. So they are avoided and the discussion centers on what is approved by the community of audiophiles… What do you think? How do we go out of the beaten path? isn’t that how the High End took birth? Opinions as usual are welcome.
Let's try to be sincere, candid and frank here ... I’ll go first
After almost 6 years without a speaker-based system with which I am comfortable ( I dabbled some with an Apogee Diva but the room could not take them and a Kef LS50 that left me pleased with what they can do but ultimately unsatisfied< I like speakers that canscale from very small to humongous big when and if the music requires it . That is not a knock on the LS50, they do some things better than any speakers one is likely to find at multiple the price but … I am readying myself for some purchase and construction and learning and anxiety for middle of next year) ...
I have been an orthodox audiophile for many years. A few years ago I had an epiphany of sort... I discovered I wasn't able to recognize the virtues of my expensive cables when knowledge was removed ... and I wasn't alone. I am speaking for myself however; thus came a change of attitude toward High End Audio orthodoxy and common but too often unverified truisms. I became a skeptic. It helped me focus more on value and on Music in general... I moved toward Headphones with élan and thought I would have one or two headphones .. I have now 5. :b ... and I would have 2 headphones amps, I have 4, 2 Dacs... Now I have 5... :b x 5.. Why 2? one for the Desk and one portable... So I admit it I am an audiophile. I suffer from the FOMO disease and I do hear differences between my h'phones and my amps and my DACs.. I have kept whatever cords were shipped with the phones but I resigned myself to acquire a few more rugged USB cables .. Do I hear a difference between these and run-of-the-mill USB cables? ... I haven’t bothered but my phone charges faster when connected with the rugged USB cables ...
I Would have loved the one appliance approach of the Devialet but progress in DAC is too lighting fast IMO to lock myself to one DAC ... I could be proven wrong but ... so I got an amp.
I have some leaning mainly the Merging Pro Hapi which is the exact same interface as the Horus or the Hapi at half the price of the NADAC... a no-brainer in my book... Cables... I will choose some well-made cable and be done .. I will not eternalize on these...
Then comes speaker and this is the subject of his thread a little bit …I will use the Geddes or Harman multisubs approach configuration (very similar) .. So ultimate intrinsic bass capabilities is not an issue, I would have preferred an essentially full range speaker because the better scale well. Small speakers in my book remains small even when helped with a sub below … When proven wrong I will bow to the evidence for now I maintain this POV.
I am a planar fan. I have come to see Dynamic speakers have advanced to the point of supplanting planars in term of SQ .. to a point and this should not be constructed dismissal of planars ... I still love them and in term of bang for the bucks ? Nothing compares and even if you remove this factor some planar do things most speakers can’t ..
But I have heard horns and those are seductive and there are the new dynamic speakers .. Things like the beguiling Magico and the Rockport … Notice that all these are usual audiophile fares… I have not yet gone out of the beaten path. … ? The point I am trying to make is that there are too many choices and little immediate information about what is out there. We may have developed a paralysis. On one side there are the audiophile-approved stuff.. Wilson , Magico, ARC, CJ, Krell , etc and on the other side Pro Stuff… Other brands whatever that mean, etc … How would someone decide between those… The mind may decide before audition as many would not want to think that a Crown would for example beat a Lamm or a Burmester .. Ohhh! The horror of thinking about these but here we are. Has anyone compared say Lab Grupen with Krell or Lamm on a Wilson? We also tend to go for what I would call conventional pairing ARC/Wilson, .. Rare are Krell and Maggies or Quad. One of the best Maggie system I have heard was with a Krell KSA-200 on Mg 1,6 or 3.6 IIRC … Or Krell and Quad.. Someone in NYC had the Krell KSA-50 driving a pair of Quad Crosby … Heaven but you rarely if ever see those.. It is implied too quickly without audition that the Pro (or not well known brand with audiophile desires) stuff is not up to the task.. Recently I re-visited the Beolab 5 and people, it sounds good… Not mid-fi good.. Simply good, touching most of the audiophile points.. of accurate rendition of voices, clear deep bass, good imaging , stupendous dynamic and wide-sweet spot and it is not a speaker but a system it has everything: Speakers, Amps, DAC, subs and DRC (to a certain extent), and there is JBL 4367 at $15K for example t seems to perform extremely on objective parameters such as Dynamic Linearity and flatness/smoothness of FR that sans DSP/DRC while sounding good in the process, so good they replace the fabled Giya G3 in one audiophile setup… And there are the virtually unknown speakers we don’t care enough about to discuss and that without hearing just one note form those. I think many who have heard these or similar design are hesitant to come forward and share their impression because those items (mainly speakers for the purpose of this discussion) are not peer-approved. So they are avoided and the discussion centers on what is approved by the community of audiophiles… What do you think? How do we go out of the beaten path? isn’t that how the High End took birth? Opinions as usual are welcome.