Ron’s New System

[Ron Resnick]

I had assumed you had just hooked up the new cables on the floor for easy back and forth testing between the two. I had not realized that you snaked the new ones through the conduit before listening.

Now that is a reasonable assumption!

I got tired of piles of 47 foot cables on the floor.

 

[Ron Resnick]

By "right" amp, I mean you were contemplating amps to solve your issues with upper bass lower mid energy and midrange warmth. It was presented and discussed as a trade off. Now, you seem to indicate that it was not amps at all, but rather cable and tubes

As we all know this hobby is a non-linear process. The fact that I often post my thoughts virtually stream-of-consciousness in real time definitely makes things confusing for readers. I'm focusing on one issue, and I post about it. Later I'm focusing on a different issue and I post about it. But I don't necessarily talk about how they relate.

There is no doubt -- to me, anyway -- the Jadis provided welcome weightiness in the upper bass to lower midrange. I thought-- I assumed -- I needed to keep pushing on that lever.

I don't feel that way anymore. When the Grado Epoch 3, with its lower sonic "center of gravity" than the ZYX, goes on the 5T, I may feel I overshot the mark and maybe I will want to remove some acoustic absorption panels.

Maybe switching to EL34s would smooth things out too much.

I wonder if Al would recognize the sound of the system now?

 

[Ron Resnick]

This is why I asked about the large scale symphonic music at loud levels. If your friends no longer hear compression or clipping or restriction with that demo, then, it would support your claim that it is tubes and cables, not amps that were the issue/trade off.

I don't think the dynamic compression issue raised by Don and Phil has anything to do with the tubes and cables.

I appreciate that you were very happy before. Now you are more happy, and if you can gild the lily some, you will be even more happy. It is a progression and understandable.

Thank you very much! This is how I think of the process.

Unless a consensus of visitors alerts me to an issue I am not presently hearing I am done for now.

 

[PeterA]

Now that is a reasonable assumption!

I got tired of piles of 47 foot cables on the floor.

Some readers more rigorous and skeptical than I might assume that making the effort of snaking the cable through the conduit before listening tests indicates a prior bias in favor of the more expensive audiophile cable. Not I, and I am just pulling your leg. I don't know what Micro might think.

 

[Ron Resnick]

I find the comparison between this from 13 hours ago very interesting to the one from 8 days ago and from one month ago. There is definitely a smoothing over of everything in the latest version with tube and cable change. Yes, less sibilance too. What cartridge and tonearm are you using for this latest video?

ZYX UNIverse Premium on Reed 5T.

Feel free to refuse, but if you do want to make the effort, I would like to hear some larger scale, non pop, less process music, like acoustic jazz or larger scale classical, preferably of the same music as previous videos.

I am happy to do that sometime.

On the other hand, it sounds like you have arrived where you want to be

I think so, at least for now. Will I come to feel that the elimination of the excessive sibilance has concomitantly smoothed things over unnaturally?

The last thing I listened to last night was "Eleanor Rigby," and I liked it the most I've ever heard it here.

and are no longer soliciting opinions

I always like to read peoples' opinions! I always consider it "food for thought."

Congratulations on your progress.

Thank you!

I apologize if I am sounding too much like Bonzo.

I did not think you were.

 

[Ron Resnick]

Some readers more rigorous and skeptical than I might assume that making the effort of snaking the cable through the conduit before listening tests indicates a prior bias in favor of the more expensive audiophile cable. Not I, and I am just pulling your leg. I don't know what Micro might think.

That would be a fair allegation of potential bias. But if I can hear the reduction in exaggerated sibilance and change in tonal balance, I think any audiophile would be able to hear it.

I have to be in just the right frame of mind with the right amount of patience to perform a procedure like the cable snaking. I had a window of time yesterday to do it.

I'm not a cable denier; I'm not a cable skeptic. As I've written in detail elsewhere I just think it's very difficult to predict in advance which cable a particular audiophile is going to prefer between any two particular components in his/her own particular system.

When the owner of a cable company says on a public video that she personally prefers, in her own personal system, one of her products which costs I think 1/4 of the cost of her top-of-the-line product I think it's a preference worth listening to. I am still using Cardas Clear Beyond interconnect everywhere else.

Through a lot of Internet research I don't think I have ever seen a comment, ever, anywhere, that a Cardas cable contributed to unnatural brightness on a system. So for these admittedly non-experience-based reasons -- and the fact that I could custom-order it without rhodium -- I thought the Clear Reflection was worth try.

 

[morricab]

That's a fun idea, but snaking the cables through the in-wall conduits is not fun, and I really wanted to try to make some progress and clean the place up. So I probably won't be doing that interesting experiment anytime soon -- unless there's a strong consensus that I'm wrong about the cables.

Can’t you just move the preamp and DAC temporarily into the main room to get the answer?

 

[morricab]

As you knew better than I did the RD75 is not a pure ribbon.

It behaves like one electrically…it is still essentially a flat foil.

 

[morricab]

OK, from the 30 pages of amp discussion, I now have the impression from these recent posts that you have arrived where you want to be and that you hold the new cables and tubes responsible for your satisfaction. Your enthusiasm for the new sound is evident.

By "right" amp, I mean you were contemplating amps to solve your issues with upper bass lower mid energy and midrange warmth. It was presented and discussed as a trade off. Now, you seem to indicate that it was not amps at all, but rather cable and tubes and now those give you want you wanted. I don't recall prior complaints about sibilance.

This is why I asked about the large scale symphonic music at loud levels. If your friends no longer hear compression or clipping or restriction with that demo, then, it would support your claim that it is tubes and cables, not amps that were the issue/trade off.

I appreciate that you were very happy before. Now you are more happy, and if you can gild the lily some, you will be even more happy. It is a progression and understandable.

It kind of begs the question…Did Ron hear what his friends claimed to hear? If not, then unless someone tells him he wouldn’t know if the “problem “ went away…

 

[Ron Resnick]

Can’t you just move the preamp and DAC temporarily into the main room to get the answer?

It would be probative, but I don't know if it would give the answer.

 

[Ron Resnick]

What I am hearing now sounds like less like an electronic recording, and more like a person in the room. When the electronic recording process adds sibilance, do we want to keep that sibilance through our systems?

The answer depends entirely on one's high-end audio objective: "reproduce exactly what is on the tape, vinyl or digital source being played," versus "re-create the sound of an original musical event."

My objective is the latter. I'm trying to re-create an audience member's experience, not the microphone's experience.

 

[PeterA]

What I am hearing now sounds like less like an electronic recording, and more like a person in the room. When the electronic recording process adds sibilance, do we want to keep that sibilance through our systems?

The answer depends entirely on one's high-end audio objective: "reproduce exactly what is on the tape, vinyl or digital source being played," versus "re-create the sound of an original musical event."

My objective is the latter. I'm trying to re-create an audience member's experience, not the microphone's experience.

In my opinion, passing judgment on the amount of sibilance on one recording is not a rigorous enough investigation. Vocals to have sibilance in real life. It’s a matter of degree. Just ask someone to repeat this sentence to you aloud.

To understand what the cables are doing, I would listen to a whole range of recordings or a few that I know very well to be natural sounding based on hearing them in a variety of systems.

 

[morricab]

What I am hearing now sounds like less like an electronic recording, and more like a person in the room. When the electronic recording process adds sibilance, do we want to keep that sibilance through our systems?

The answer depends entirely on one's high-end audio objective: "reproduce exactly what is on the tape, vinyl or digital source being played," versus "re-create the sound of an original musical event."

My objective is the latter. I'm trying to re-create an audience member's experience, not the microphone's experience.

Ok, sounds like you’re done! Enjoy

 

[Ron Resnick]

Ok, sounds like you’re done! Enjoy

Definitely done for now on the major pieces.

Thank you!

 

[Al M.]

Putting it differently, can't I just be happy with the sound now?

No.

Unless you switch to SETs and horns, some will always pester you.



Nah, of course you can be happy with your sound!!

 

[PeterA]

Putting it differently, can't I just be happy with the sound now?

Of course you can. Enjoy!

 

[Ron Resnick]

Vocals to have sibilance in real life.

Definitely.

When you listen to a record, and the record is a recording of somebody singing into a microphone, and the electronic recording process records sibilance which is exaggerated compared to what you would have heard if you had been listening to that person live and unamplified in person, what do you want your audio system to do with that exaggerated sibilance?

 

[bonzo75]

What I am hearing now sounds like less like an electronic recording, and more like a person in the room. When the electronic recording process adds sibilance, do we want to keep that sibilance through our systems?

The answer depends entirely on one's high-end audio objective: "reproduce exactly what is on the tape, vinyl or digital source being played," versus "re-create the sound of an original musical event."

My objective is the latter. I'm trying to re-create an audience member's experience, not the microphone's experience.

if recording is adding sibilance, yes I won’t want to take it off as I cannot adjust a system to change the frequency response for each recording without using EQ. If it bothers me so much. I will just choose a recording without sibilance.

were all vocals in your system playing with sibilance?

btw, I have no idea if fields of gold has sibilance or not. I assume it doesn’t

 

[Ron Resnick]

btw, I have no idea if fields of gold has sibilance or not. I assume it doesn’t

To my ears "Fields of Gold" does not have sibilance.

 

[Ron Resnick]

if recording is adding sibilance, yes I won’t want to take it off as I cannot adjust a system to change the frequency response for each recording without using EQ. If it bothers me so much. I will just choose a recording without sibilance.

What if adding sibilance to the recording is endemic to most recording systems?