Charles' Little 2-ch Hi-Fi System...

[Empirical Audio]

Beautiful little system.

Are you using the turntable or the Oppo to spin disks?

If it's the Oppo, I have one just like it.. Something to think about:

https://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=154408.0

I also abandoned Jriver19. I use an Interchange Ethernet renderer with Linn Kinsky and Minimserver now. Never go back to vinyl:

https://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=155232.0

Steve N.
Empirical Audio

 

[Folsom]

Why did you omit the resistors? I can only imagine it mostly screwed up the FR.

 

[Chops]

Why did you omit the resistors? I can only imagine it mostly screwed up the FR.

Wrong.

The resistors were only there for the attenuation circuit. When the factory switch was set to 0 dB, all resistors were bypassed.

 

[Chops]

Here's a new update on my system...

It has moved back to the apartment, has been reduced in size and quantity of parts, and has regained a pair of Sonus Faber Venere 1.5' again. This time, they are here to stay! The JL e110 subs are crossed around 60 Hz and running in stereo while the Venere 1.5's are running fullrange and being powered by two NuPrime STA 9 amps which are bridged mono at 290 watts each. These amps are getting a balanced signal from the Parasound Halo P5 preamp.

Amazing sound, blackest blacks, and just dead silent.

 

[Chops]

Wow, a whole lot of nothing going on in this thread... Anyway, trying out a mint pair of Monitor Audio Silver 3i's.

 

[Chops]

I'll start off this post by quoting from Pink Floyd's The Wall... "Is there anybody out there?"...


So, I have been listening to these 18+ year old Monitor Audio Silver 3i monitors for the past few days, and I really like what I'm hearing. With a little placement tweaking, I'm getting pretty decent imaging and soundstaging. These C-CAM tweeters deliver just as much air and spaciousness as the Sonus faber Venere 1.5's, but they do it with a lot more refinement and cleanliness. Not necessarily warmer, just richer.

Today, along with doing a bit more position tweaking, I also decided to remove the cheap homemade 16awg Monster Cable speaker wire jumpers. In doing so, I had to swap out my AudioQuest 72 volt DBS CV-8 speaker cables for my Wireworld Aurora 7 bi-wire speaker cables.

This did a couple things for me...
1) It better translates that warmish "tube sound" of my NuPrime STA 9 amps to those wonderful gold C-CAM tweeters, now giving them just a touch of warmth, yet still remaining airy, extended and refined.

2) With the bi-wire cables, I now have quality cable feeding the mid-bass driver as well instead of that cheap little wire. This produces a fuller, more open, more natural upper bass and midrange that really gels with the tweeters and give real "body" to both male and female vocals. Cello's and viola's have more of that woody sound to them. Piano has more heft and texture to it.

I am utterly shocked at the amount of performance I'm getting from these little monitors. They even do a much better job of blending with the dual JL Audio subs. With acoustic recordings, electronic recordings and speech alone, the blend of the monitors and subs is pretty much perfect.

 

[Chops]

Not that it matters a whole heck of a lot, but in the post above, the Wireworld speaker cables are Oasis 7's, not Aurora 7's. The Aurora's are my power cables. LOL

Anyway, just a recent pic from today. I now have to ordered yet another IsoAcoustics subwoofer stand. Even though they are the same exact model/part number, apparently they decided to redesign the stand, so the new one is a more open design and shorter, and I prefer symmetry. Looking at the system, it's somewhat annoying to see one sub higher than the other.

With that being said, there is a great improvement in sound with these JL subs placed on these stands. The presentation is larger and cleaner, there better decay on how each note is resolved. There's sense of actual space around instruments and the room. Integration with the mains are even better. Very pleasing performance from such a small un-expecting tweak.

 

[Chops]

Still sitting here having a conversation with myself apparently...

Anyway, I moved the Sonus faber Venere 1.5's back into the main system, this time with different speaker cables. This made all the difference in the world for these speakers, and now they sound great!

 

[DaveyF]

Nice looking system. With Sonus Faber speakers I have found that cabling makes a very big difference. IME, SF’s react well to a very fast cable, which is why I utilize the Nordost line. Excellent resolution and high frequency extension.
Also, have you thought about some rooom acoustic treatments? You have the Xmas tree, but I think there are others out there that are better...

 

[Chops]

Nice looking system. With Sonus Faber speakers I have found that cabling makes a very big difference. IME, SF’s react well to a very fast cable, which is why I utilize the Nordost line. Excellent resolution and high frequency extension.
Also, have you thought about some rooom acoustic treatments? You have the Xmas tree, but I think there are others out there that are better...

Thanks.

From what I understand, the Venere series is a bit more "lively" on the top end than traditional Sonus faber speakers of yesteryear. What I was getting with these Venere 1.5's when I first installed them in the current system was just the tiniest bit of grain in the upper treble. It wasn't terrible, but it was noticeable, which in turn was making it a bit annoying. At the time, I was running the Audioquest CV-8 72v DBS cables. Going with the Nordost cables may end up with similar results as the CV-8's.

When I got the Monitor Audio's and moved the Sonus faber's into the bedroom system, the Monitor Audio's didn't have that grain at all. In fact, they were silky smooth. And they got even better when I finally dug out my old Wireworld Oasis 7 bi-wire cables, making the mids and lower mids even fuller and natural and adding just a touch more of smoothness on the very top treble.

The Sonus faber's were connected in the bedroom system with Chinese made Choseal speaker cables, which proved to be a very good combination. The treble was nice and silky smooth again like I remembered from a couple of years back when I had the Venere 1.5's the first time around. So I decided to try them back out in the main system with those Choseal cables, and that did the trick.

Tonight, I think I might try comparing those Choseal cables against the Wireworld cables and see how that works in the main system. With the Monitor Audio's, there was a big improvement in the midrange and mid-bass removing the jumpers and installing the Wireworld bi-wire cables. Maybe the same will hold true removing the jumpers on the Sonus' and using the Wireworld's.

 

[DaveyF]

Thanks.

From what I understand, the Venere series is a bit more "lively" on the top end than traditional Sonus faber speakers of yesteryear. What I was getting with these Venere 1.5's when I first installed them in the current system was just the tiniest bit of grain in the upper treble. It wasn't terrible, but it was noticeable, which in turn was making it a bit annoying. At the time, I was running the Audioquest CV-8 72v DBS cables. Going with the Nordost cables may end up with similar results as the CV-8's.

When I got the Monitor Audio's and moved the Sonus faber's into the bedroom system, the Monitor Audio's didn't have that grain at all. In fact, they were silky smooth. And they got even better when I finally dug out my old Wireworld Oasis 7 bi-wire cables, making the mids and lower mids even fuller and natural and adding just a touch more of smoothness on the very top treble.

The Sonus faber's were connected in the bedroom system with Chinese made Choseal speaker cables, which proved to be a very good combination. The treble was nice and silky smooth again like I remembered from a couple of years back when I had the Venere 1.5's the first time around. So I decided to try them back out in the main system with those Choseal cables, and that did the trick.

Tonight, I think I might try comparing those Choseal cables against the Wireworld cables and see how that works in the main system. With the Monitor Audio's, there was a big improvement in the midrange and mid-bass removing the jumpers and installing the Wireworld bi-wire cables. Maybe the same will hold true removing the jumpers on the Sonus' and using the Wireworld's.

Actually, I think the current crop of SF's are somewhat less able in the very top frequencies than those that utilized the Dynaudio Esotar tweeter and its derivatives. If you heard grain in the upper treble, that would indicate..to me, that your up front gear is part of the issue, and not so much the speakers. Equalizing the sound with less resolving cable is not the way to go IME. Better to address the problem at the source.YMMV.

 

[Chops]

Well never had any treble issues before with this gear and other speakers. Though I never used those AQ CV-8 speaker cables on anything other than those old Genesis speakers, which I recall being a bit brighter than normal when using other cables. And I have read several times that the CV-8's can be a bit tipped up in the treble.

I bet if I install the Wireworld bi-wire cables, they'll sound just fine as well, if not better than the Choseal cables.

As for the gear upstream, the Parasound Halo P5 is known for staying out of the way of the music. The NuPrime amps are known for having a rather smooth top end (tube-like as they say), though they don't sound anything like any tube amp I've owned or heard. They're still great sounding little amps though.

With that being said, I have been pondering the idea of possibly upgrading the P5. The Schiit Freya seems pretty interesting. Also seriously looking at the Hegel P20 and/or PS Audio Stellar Gain Cell preamp.

 

[Al M.]

Actually, I think the current crop of SF's are somewhat less able in the very top frequencies than those that utilized the Dynaudio Esotar tweeter and its derivatives. If you heard grain in the upper treble, that would indicate..to me, that your up front gear is part of the issue, and not so much the speakers.

Quite possibly. However, when I heard some grain in certain recordings, I thought it was my DAC. Turned out, when I switched to my current Sound Anchors Signature stands, which silence resonances much better, the grain was gone. It had not been the Yggrasil DAC, but a problem at the speaker level.

Equalizing the sound with less resolving cable is not the way to go IME.

Totally agree.

 

[Chops]

I went ahead and swapped out the "less resolving" Choseal cables for the Wireworld Oasis 7 bi-wire cables. Just as I had hoped, midrange and mid-bass got a touch fuller and connected. Even better than that, the midrange and mid-bass is cleaner and clearer sounding with better definition, just as it did with the Monitor Audio's. Treble is still silky smooth, but with just a touch more air. This is also a trait I noticed when connected to the Monitor Audio's. The treble remained smooth and refined, yet there was a little bit more air added without getting bright or grainy.

Currently, I'm running a pair of Audioquest 32v DBS Jaguar cables from my Bluesound to the P5, and a pair of Pangea Audio True Balanced XLR's from the P5 to the amps. Maybe I'll swap those out as well for my Wireworld Oasis 7 interconnects and XLR's and see what differences those make. It can't hurt, right?

 

[Chops]

It's been about three hours since I swapped out the Pangea and Audioquest cables (one at a time, about an hour between each). I first replaced the AQ interconnects going from the Bluesound to the P5 with the WW Oasis 7 IC's and listened for an hour or so. Afterwards, I swapped out the Pangea XLR's for the WW Oasis 7 XLR's from the P5 to the amps and have been listening since.

First the IC's between source and preamp... Immediately noticed a bit more sound stage depth and height, and clearer inner detail. Percussion instruments such as the timpani has more of that tactile sound to it, even at lower volume levels. You can clearly hear more of the resonance and decay within the kettle and the skin. I suppose this would fall in the lines of more dynamics and resolution.

Now with the XLR's between preamp and amps... Even more dynamic and resolution. I can hear better detail in the underlying sounds of the recordings. Details that are easily lost (which they were in my system up until a couple hours ago). Sound stage depth is increased a bit more as is stage width. Stage height didn't seem to change at all this time. The overall sound has more "flow" to it I guess you could say. More effortless I suppose. It's hard to explain, but there's a sense of ease to the overall sound. Kind of like the effects of slightly larger, more efficient speakers.

I'm glad I decided to do these cable swaps. They've really brought the system up a couple notches and have really brought these Sonus faber Venere 1.5's to life.

Just for reference, this is the album I've been using tonight to conduct these "tests", streamed from Tidal. One that I've listened to quite a few times over the past few months. It's not the absolute best in recording quality, but it one that I've come to know the sound of quite well recently. The one who claimed to have murdered Mozart... But actually did not.

 

[Chops]

Installed my Ortofon 2M Bronze which maybe has about 30 hours on it if that.

 

[Chops]

Put the Oppo 105D back in the system, maybe temporary, maybe permanently. Helping out one of my musician friends as he's doing a "remaster" of one of his old albums and we're using my system to "proof" his work before sending it off to print, both on CD and vinyl. This may end up being a one time thing for me, or it could possibly be an on-going thing. I won't mention his name right now, but I will say that he was the music director, guitarist, wrote for, recorded and toured with Carole Fredericks, a.k.a. - Taj Mahal's sister.

 

[Chops]

 

[Al M.]

Looks beautiful!

 

[Chops]

Looks beautiful!

Thank you. It doesn't sound half bad either.

Nearly two months of continually tweaking speaker placement, subwoofer crossover point, output level and phasing has really paid off.