I really wouldn’t want any audiophile to go through what I have in the last 3-4 weeks.
I put my system away for 12 months as we renovate the chapel and carve out the audio room.
Install everything minus tt, and cd replay just sounds great on Day One and continues to entertain.
Tentative analog reinstall 9 months ago leading to me tripping my Soundsmith, and having to wait several months for repair.
I ask Soundsmith to go for top factory level spec.
As it returns, I delay reinstall while I commission some mods to my analog, incl new bespoke psus to tt motor and Straingauge energiser, top quality pwr cords and fuses to these psus, new tubes to preamp, and also brand new arm mount, balanced transformer to air arm pump, new nylon unipivot points to arm replacing metal, new RCA plugs to tonearm wire, Rollerblocks under main system balanced transformer.
Finally, FINALLY it all comes together one week before Christmas.
Or so I thought. What I got was pieces of the puzzle, but missing one, and this one critical to the whole picture.
So while bass is off the page scary good, mids really exemplary, imaging, depth and air better than anything I had back in London, my treble has gone MIA.
Ride cymbal patterns, percussion lines, generally snap and energy felt veiled and muted.
And to diagnose what might be letting the side down with SO many changes at once left me with a real headache
3 weeks in and I wasn’t really solving my issue until I realised two things
1- I hadn’t checked speed correctly (bad admission for a vinyl guy), getting a new SpeedStrobe on the job showed I was MUCH too fast. Sorted in 5s.
Now that treble is starting to blossom.
2- and with the help of my installer, we decided on getting some serious burn in done, so I’m spending long hours getting signal thru the stylus, energiser and psus (muted, so I can read in peace, testing the sound at the end of each day playing an lp at volume), and furiously playing around with spkrs toe in, seating distance, subs settings, acoustic panels in and out of the room.
—
I have to tell you all, for those first 3 weeks, I was in a bad bad place, two decades upgrading audio, spending a small fortune on gear, collecting 2000 lps. And for what? For THIS sound.
But Ron Resnick, Barry Blue58, Audiophile Bill, and Barry2013 all told me to chill out, work on the details, and things would start to come together.
And today, the first fruits of that coming together became apparent, the bass and mids better than ever, and return to the fold of those treble frequencies.
I’m not done by a long shot, but another 100 hours burn in, and more finagling, and I think I’ll be even happier.
I’ve also really realised my new room is truly different to the last, and this is definitely influencing a smoother, sweeter top end, and I need to readjust.
—
Moral of this story? Don’t be an idiot like me and load a dozen plus upgrades into yr analog in one go without realising you’ll lose your tiny mind in the process!
PS thanks to the aforementioned guys for helping me keep my sanity.
I put my system away for 12 months as we renovate the chapel and carve out the audio room.
Install everything minus tt, and cd replay just sounds great on Day One and continues to entertain.
Tentative analog reinstall 9 months ago leading to me tripping my Soundsmith, and having to wait several months for repair.
I ask Soundsmith to go for top factory level spec.
As it returns, I delay reinstall while I commission some mods to my analog, incl new bespoke psus to tt motor and Straingauge energiser, top quality pwr cords and fuses to these psus, new tubes to preamp, and also brand new arm mount, balanced transformer to air arm pump, new nylon unipivot points to arm replacing metal, new RCA plugs to tonearm wire, Rollerblocks under main system balanced transformer.
Finally, FINALLY it all comes together one week before Christmas.
Or so I thought. What I got was pieces of the puzzle, but missing one, and this one critical to the whole picture.
So while bass is off the page scary good, mids really exemplary, imaging, depth and air better than anything I had back in London, my treble has gone MIA.
Ride cymbal patterns, percussion lines, generally snap and energy felt veiled and muted.
And to diagnose what might be letting the side down with SO many changes at once left me with a real headache
3 weeks in and I wasn’t really solving my issue until I realised two things
1- I hadn’t checked speed correctly (bad admission for a vinyl guy), getting a new SpeedStrobe on the job showed I was MUCH too fast. Sorted in 5s.
Now that treble is starting to blossom.
2- and with the help of my installer, we decided on getting some serious burn in done, so I’m spending long hours getting signal thru the stylus, energiser and psus (muted, so I can read in peace, testing the sound at the end of each day playing an lp at volume), and furiously playing around with spkrs toe in, seating distance, subs settings, acoustic panels in and out of the room.
—
I have to tell you all, for those first 3 weeks, I was in a bad bad place, two decades upgrading audio, spending a small fortune on gear, collecting 2000 lps. And for what? For THIS sound.
But Ron Resnick, Barry Blue58, Audiophile Bill, and Barry2013 all told me to chill out, work on the details, and things would start to come together.
And today, the first fruits of that coming together became apparent, the bass and mids better than ever, and return to the fold of those treble frequencies.
I’m not done by a long shot, but another 100 hours burn in, and more finagling, and I think I’ll be even happier.
I’ve also really realised my new room is truly different to the last, and this is definitely influencing a smoother, sweeter top end, and I need to readjust.
—
Moral of this story? Don’t be an idiot like me and load a dozen plus upgrades into yr analog in one go without realising you’ll lose your tiny mind in the process!
PS thanks to the aforementioned guys for helping me keep my sanity.