Entreq Tellus grounding

[spiritofmusic]

Barry, yr Athena rack thoughts and considered opinions please
I'm v much sold on my Symposium Acoustics Isis rack, and am soon to do an exhaustive three way trial of two passives and one active platform for my tt
But remain in the dark on the Athena

 

[Barry2013]

Barry, yr Athena rack thoughts and considered opinions please
I'm v much sold on my Symposium Acoustics Isis rack, and am soon to do an exhaustive three way trial of two passives and one active platform for my tt
But remain in the dark on the Athena

Hi Marc.
It's arriving on Friday so will let you know how it goes over he weekend.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Oh, I thought you owned one already?
Good luck

 

[Barry2013]

Oh, I thought you owned one already?
Good luck

I have a single three shelf Athena housing the amp.tuner and Sky HD box which I am very pleased with.
On Friday I will get a four shelf double width rack for the rest of the system - turntable,phono stage.CD player, clock,power conditioner and Entreq Olympus and Silver Tellus.
Once that is up and running I'll be able to give a comprehensive evaluation of the Athena racks and will try to do that over the weekend.

 

[spiritofmusic]

Lots of fun, Barry
Eagerly awaiting yr thoughts
Will get back to you re visit here
In the process of a stylus change I need to get back from Soundsmith
When bedded in I'll get back to you
Maybe June?

 

[Barry2013]

Thanks Marc.
Yes June looks good.
We've had to reschedule the new Athena to next Wednesday so I'm afraid I'll have to keep you waiting a bit longer.

 

[Barry2013]

The new Athena double width four shelf rack arrived an installed last Wednesday, Level 3 base and three level two shelves plus four Apollo earth cables. Quite a big job taking out the old racks and reconnecting everything. Separated all the analogue and digital component ground cables so the analogue grounds are all on the Olympus and the digital on the Silver Tellus. For completeness there is a separate single Athena housing the amp, tuner and Sky HD box with a Poseidon and Silver Tellus.,
After all that disruption the system has taken a few days to recover and for the new rack and earth cables to settle in. At the same time we installed a recently acquired Origin Live Mk 3c Conqueror tone arm to replace the Encounter on my Townshend Rock V so quite a bit to digest.
Notwithstanding Guillaume's commendation I have to say I have been pleasantly surprised and very pleased with the results.In particular a notable improvement in resolution, transparency and instrumental delineation. Better dynamics and no loss of musicality from those improvements. In addition it looks good in a lounge and the components are all much more accessible so win win win.
Probably a bit more yet to come.
Still need to completely dial in the new arm but very happy with the upgrade. Adjusting the tracking force is nothing like as easy as it was with the Encounter and I think increasing the tracking to nearer the 2.2 maximum will improve things.
So yes highly recommended and reasonably affordable for the benefits. View attachment 32063 View attachment 32063

 

[Fiddle Faddle]

Looking good Barry. The rack also does a good job of hiding the very complex myriad of cabling you've got going on behind it! So did I read that right - 4 x Apollo cables are connected to the rack itself?

 

[Barry2013]

Thanks Jonathan.
Yes very pleased with it.
Ground cables - that is a very good question!
I'll do a count later and let you know,but yes four Apollo ground cables for the rack itself,

 

[cyclopse]

Hi Barry,

Looking closely at the components in the rack your Entreq grounding boxes look like they are isolated with feet, not sure if they are Stillpoints. What is the thinking here if the Entreq contains minerals/ crystals? (Not electronics which we know are microphonic).

 

[Barry2013]

Hi Barry,

Looking closely at the components in the rack your Entreq grounding boxes look like they are isolated with feet, not sure if they are Stillpoints. What is the thinking here if the Entreq contains minerals/ crystals? (Not electronics which we know are microphonic).

Hi cyclopse,
My Entreq expert advised me that the ground boxes do benefit from isolation feet so I have followed his advice but economically. The Silver Tellus and the Olympus Tellus in the photo have some old RDC cones under them from my earlier days.
The Poseidon which does the speaker negative terminal grounding and the SIA 025 and can be seen on Bonzo's zero-distortion web site from the Vitus/Dave Berning comparison he did at my place a little while ago also has three RDC cones for support. The second Silver Tellus under it has the smaller HRS footers.
The purpose is to isolate the boxes and drain any resonance from the boxes. I can't claim to have ABed them with and without and really just followed the expert advice.
All the sources, amp and Aspect passive power conditioner have Stillpoint Ultra 5s, SSs and the small Stillpoints. The turntable has the large HRS Nimbus couplers which seem to suit it better than the Stillpoints, The Kipod Signature passive speakers have the Ultra 5s.
So all well damped and with the Entreq grounding a combination of mechanical and electrical support to combat sources of vibration and pollution.
The foregoing combination has undoubtedly made a real improvement to my system's sound quality and the latest Athena rack has improved it still further in the ways described in my earlier post.
Hope that is helpful.
Regards,
Barry

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Hi cyclopse,
My Entreq expert advised me that the ground boxes do benefit from isolation feet so I have followed his advice but economically. The Silver Tellus and the Olympus Tellus in the photo have some old RDC cones under them from my earlier days.
The Poseidon which does the speaker negative terminal grounding and the SIA 025 and can be seen on Bonzo's zero-distortion web site from the Vitus/Dave Berning comparison he did at my place a little while ago also has three RDC cones for support. The second Silver Tellus under it has the smaller HRS footers.
The purpose is to isolate the boxes and drain any resonance from the boxes. I can't claim to have ABed them with and without and really just followed the expert advice.
All the sources, amp and Aspect passive power conditioner have Stillpoint Ultra 5s, SSs and the small Stillpoints. The turntable has the large HRS Nimbus couplers which seem to suit it better than the Stillpoints, The Kipod Signature passive speakers have the Ultra 5s.
So all well damped and with the Entreq grounding a combination of mechanical and electrical support to combat sources of vibration and pollution.
The foregoing combination has undoubtedly made a real improvement to my system's sound quality and the latest Athena rack has improved it still further in the ways described in my earlier post.
Hope that is helpful.
Regards,
Barry

my Entreq Poseidon that I use with my amplifiers really seems to be affected by footers I use. I also have 3 Atlantic Minimus boxes I use with the Poseidon and 6 Everest knobs. the two outside boxes of the Poseidon are hooked up to the negative speaker terminals on my amps. the inside box is hooked up to the plate amps on both my bass towers. the Atlantic Minimus boxes are to enhance the performance of each of the Poseidon boxes.

when I use the 'stock' wood footers sitting on my composite wood over concrete floor, I get a bit of brightness and super focus. I like it in some ways for it's ultra detail but it's not really musical and it's tiring. when I add the Wave Kinetics A10 U8 footers on the Poseidon and Atlantic Minimus boxes I get a more refined balance, the tipped up brightness goes away, and ease is added. much better.

would every system have that same reaction? cannot say. I think finding the balance for each system and personal taste enters in. this stuff is not plug and play.

YMMV

 

[Barry2013]

Thanks Mike.
That is interesting.
Not seen Wave Kinetics over here. What sort of price are A10-U8 footers?

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Thanks Mike.
That is interesting.
Not seen Wave Kinetics over here. What sort of price are A10-U8 footers?

I have -7- sets of -4- A10 U8's I've used for years all over my system. unlike some footer products, I've yet to encounter them changing tonality, although they seem to eliminate any brightness consistently. the only case where they did not work in a positive sense was when I tried them on the Dobbins turntables, which had all been designed around the Stillpoint footers. in that case they had a softening effect. I might use 3, 4, 5 or 6 depending on the weight of the product.

last time I checked they were around $600-$700 for a set of 4. I keep meaning to sell a set or two of mine as i stack gear on top of the Herzan or change things, but the A10 U8's always seem to come in handy to make something sound better. I've also used them with my Herzan's in some cases to good results.

they are the most universally positive all around footer product I have encountered. when I'm testing something they are a good quick improvement over any stock footers.

I even have a set under my upstairs NAS to good effect. I'm sure the 5 hard drives appreciate them.

 

[cuntigh]

I installed 3 Shun Mook UDR under the Olympus Tellus that sits in a wood stand and the effect is far from subtle.
My 2 cents

 

[Barry2013]

Thanks Mike and cuntigh,
This exchange courtesy of cyclopse gets more and more interesting and bonzo will be delighted with your post cuntigh.
My RDC cones are really quite modest in comparison so looks like an upgrade would be beneficial.

 

[caliaripaolo]

The new Athena double width four shelf rack arrived an installed last Wednesday, Level 3 base and three level two shelves plus four Apollo earth cables. ..........

Congratulations !! very nice.
You made a great journey on groundboxes side.
you've still got improvements seen the level achieved? I had Controversial results by adding too many ground connections, I mean, I think I have reached a correct tone balance with the number of current connections. I tried to add a ground connection to the MacMini (through USB cable) but the result achieved was too dark sound.

 

[caliaripaolo]

I also have 3 Atlantic Minimus boxes I use with the Poseidon and 6 Everest knobs. the two outside boxes of the Poseidon are hooked up to the negative speaker terminals on my amps. the inside box is hooked up to the plate amps on both my bass towers. the Atlantic Minimus boxes are to enhance the performance of each of the Poseidon boxes.

Hi Mike,
please, may I know if you connected the 3 Atlantic Minimus boxes using the supplied cables or, if you ever tested to connect the 3 Atlantic Minimus boxes using the second wire of Atlantic Eartha cable.

 

[Barry2013]

Congratulations !! very nice.
You made a great journey on groundboxes side.
you've still got improvements seen the level achieved? I had Controversial results by adding too many ground connections, I mean, I think I have reached a correct tone balance with the number of current connections. I tried to add a ground connection to the MacMini (through USB cable) but the result achieved was too dark sound.

Thanks Paolo
Yes it has been a significant step forward but it took some days for everything to settle in so some patience was required.
I think I am at or close to capacity on the OT and ST in the photo and I agree that overloading them can be a mistake.PCs can be rather demanding too and Macs are one of the noiseiest I am told. Don't have any personal experience as my laptop is a Dell Inspiron 17SE.
The OT mains earth is an Apollo. I think there is more to come if I upgrade that to an Atlantis in the future.
I also found Mike's experience with the Wavekinetics A10-U8 footers very interesting. Currently trying to find out if they are available in the UK or Europe.
Best wishes.
Barry

 

[caliaripaolo]

Thanks Paolo
Yes it has been a significant step forward but it took some days for everything to settle in so some patience was required.
I think I am at or close to capacity on the OT and ST in the photo and I agree that overloading them can be a mistake.PCs can be rather demanding too and Macs are one of the noiseiest I am told. Don't have any personal experience as my laptop is a Dell Inspiron 17SE.
The OT mains earth is an Apollo. I think there is more to come if I upgrade that to an Atlantis in the future.
I also found Mike's experience with the Wavekinetics A10-U8 footers very interesting. Currently trying to find out if they are available in the UK or Europe.
Best wishes.
Barry

Thank you Barry,
I solved the PC noise due to the bad switching Power Supply by modifying the MacMini applying a couple of kits from Uptone (JS-2 external power supply and DC-Conversion / Linear Fan Controller Kit (MMK)).
Concerning the footers for my Poseidons, I use Nordost Sort Kone AC with satisfactory results.
Best wishes,
Paolo