How would you spend my money?

[dgale]

How would you spend my next $5K?

Here is my current wishlist and system. I find nothing deficient in my system. However, in my experience the right upgrade or tweak can bring surprising and unexpected improvements.

What would you do?
1. Amp - Upgrade current Transparent Reference PC
2. Upgrade legacy Syn Res Element Copper RCA
3. Upgrade Wireworld Gold and Platinum BNCs to WAVE BNCs (or just one pair?)
4. Tannoy Super tweeters
5. External LPS for M Scaler (DAVE SJ LPSU rocks!)
6. Second sub
7. Decent starter analog rig.

This is my current setup-
Tannoy Kensingtons
Single REL S/812
Pathos InPol Heritage MK2 integrated
Innuos Zenith MK3 - PhNET - PhUSB
CHORD DAVE/HMS with San Jacobs DC4ARC LPSU
Transparent PowerIsolator
OPTO Galvanic isolation
Mostly Transparent cables

 

[ecwl]

2nd sub.

But... do you already have microphones and computer hardware to measure to optimize sub integration with your speakers?
Because if so, you might get more bang for your buck measuring the system, moving your listening position, speakers and maybe putting selective acoustic treatments. $5k of acoustic treatment will probably improve the sound more than a 2nd sub. If you know what you're doing. Obviously, if you buy the wrong acoustic treatment and put them in the wrong spots, the sound would actually be worse. But that would happen too if you don't have the 2nd sub properly integrated.

 

[Kingrex]

I would run dedicated 10 awg circuits to your room. 2 minimum.

 

[thedudeabides]

Highly recommend you determine what deficiencies exist with the current sound of your system and priorize those deficiencies. Once you have, I think you may get more informed suggestions and can address those items in a rational, reasonable way. Otherwise, you could be chasing your tail and depleting your bank. But if ýou want (and can afford) to try different items and see if you like the change, go for it. And I suspect you will be surprised for better or for worse.

 

[Lee]

Second subwoofer.

 

[Kingrex]

In

Highly recommend you determine what deficiencies exist with the current sound of your system and priorize those deficiencies. Once you have, I think you may get more informed suggestions and can address those items in a rational, reasonable way. Otherwise, you could be chasing your tail and depleting your bank. But if ýou want (and can afford) to try different items and see if you like the change, go for it. And I suspect you will be surprised for better or for worse.

Totally agree. But sometimes its hard to know what the bottleneck is. It takes years to have not only the ear, but the experience to figure out what is doing what. I have personally vassillated around the source or amp being more important. At time a change in one or the other may be small or large. With cables I have had a more experienced person making changes and I'm not sure its going the right or wrong way till a few steps in it all clicks and becomes obvious.

Oddly this question harkens to the Ron thread where taking criticism from friends can be problematic. But what happens when someone walks into the OP room and says, "Ths sounds like crap. You need work." Well, then what. Are people insulted. Are there any usefull answers presented. Is the friend as inexperienced and taking shots in the dark spending money in all the wrong places. Its not to hard for audiphile type to be the blind leading the blind.

 

[dgale]

Thanks for the thoughtful feedback. A common suggestion is acoustic treatment which my living room/listening room lacks. Interestingly, I’ve recently been in touch with GIK about their new SlatFusor line which might be a suitable decor compromise.

I would welcome a set of experienced ears to hear my system, but haven’t been able to arrange that yet.

 

[dgale]

Helpful comments, thanks. I could say that the Kensingtons and S/812 don’t fully pressurize my 15’x21’ space, though I’ve made some recent improvement in dialing in the sub.

Interestingly, my small bedroom (10’x12’) NAIM UNITI ATOM/Tannnoy MINI AUTOGRAPH/REL T5X fills the room very nicely with a good visceral feel. Perhaps small room size and near-field listening helps this.

 

[thedudeabides]

If you are satisfied, why fix something that is not broken? I personally don't understand your reasoning but I am on the pragmatic side. And who cares what other people think about your system. They don't have your ears or biases. And sub / speaker integration has a huge impact on dimensionality, tonal saturation and overall impact. Maybe all you will need.

And you can always try another REL, risk free, from Music Direct. That could well be the "silver bullet" you are looking for. Much unanimity of opinion regarding benefits of two subs versus one. If your itching to spend some money, I would start there. If you are not pleasantly "surprised", you can always get your money back. Best of luck.

 

[Kingrex]

For the most part, you have decent gear. I would still say dedicated circuits to the room. Its never wrong and surprisingly beneficial. Especially if your on a general purpose 14 awg wire. I would also look at a switch like an EtherRegen.

 

[bruce36]

Call Stirling Trayle. wwwAudiosystemsoptimized.com

 

[ecwl]

Helpful comments, thanks. I could say that the Kensingtons and S/812 don’t fully pressurize my 15’x21’ space, though I’ve made some recent improvement in dialing in the sub.

Hmmm. That is extremely unusual.
Often the reasons for this are in order because
1) you are sitting at a bass null in the room so no amount of speakers or subwoofers would pressurize your sitting position
2) your subwoofer is sitting at a room null for the frequency that you want to pressurize so it wouldn’t matter how high you crank the REL, it won’t work and adding another REL would only be helpful if the additional unit is not in the room null
3) Your speakers are sitting at a room null for a bass frequency and maybe moving your speakers would help.

In these situations, treating room acoustics would usually worsen the problem because you’ll get more absorption so frequently, you’ll just get lower volume but the bass frequency null remains (because you never moved your listening position or speakers or subwoofers)

Often what you really want is to measure what’s going on at your listening position first using a microphone, RTA software while playing pink noise from your stereo. You can then move the microphone around to see if there are better spots to sit on where the sound is more pressurized. And if that’s truly out of the question, you can leave the mic on and move the subwoofer around to see if you can get a more even bass response to pressurize the room.

of course if you’ve done that and optimized it, posting some of the measurements can help people make suggestions on what room acoustic treatment to use or what additional measurement to make in your room.

alternatively, you could spend your $5k on Sterling Trayle as suggested or Jim Smith as they can explore these options with you. I would agree if you can’t do it yourself, hiring a true high end expert is worth it.

 

[LL21]

A fun thread. If you like not only the technical aspects of your system, but also its balance, then I would suggest making a change to drive technical performance further comes with the risk of having a system that is technically better in one area, but which might throw the balance off slightly. It can be a funny thing...not always, but it can be.

One thing I have found (ask Mike Lavigne and Audiocrack along with many others here), is that Entreq or Tripoint grounding really (for me) have not changed the system but simply made it more (a lot more) of what I already like about it. The density of sound/music increases, the clarity increases (but not etched, just more understandability of words in sung music, chorals, etc), and the overall sound really 'comes to life' in a way that is true to the original balance you create...but again, it is just more.

 

[dgale]

@LL21 If by “balance” you mean whatever synergy creates the basic sound character I enjoy most - then yes, I am curious as to what may enhance rather than change the basic character of my system’s sound. (I recently moved from D’Agostio Progressive integrated/Rockport Atria ii to my current Pathos Heritage MK2 hybrid/Tannoy Kensington set up. This should tell you everything you need to know about my current preferences.)

Question - Thw Pathos is fully balanced Class A. I recently shorted a fuse in it because the floating ground wire from my REL S/812 inadvertent touched the amp’s casing.
Would any of the ground devices you mention not be recommended for fully balanced amps?

 

[Chop]

Add a second sub and listen to everything improve
If you can borrow some, try some Symposium Rollerblocks, starting on your front end. They are now unfashionable because they aren't updated every 5 minutes and the price hasn't quadrupled in the last two years, but after experimentation their improvement is reliable & they made a huge difference in my system.

 

[bonzo75]

How would you spend my next $5K?

Here is my current wishlist and system. I find nothing deficient in my system. However, in my experience the right upgrade or tweak can bring surprising and unexpected improvements.

What would you do?
1. Amp - Upgrade current Transparent Reference PC
2. Upgrade legacy Syn Res Element Copper RCA
3. Upgrade Wireworld Gold and Platinum BNCs to WAVE BNCs (or just one pair?)
4. Tannoy Super tweeters
5. External LPS for M Scaler (DAVE SJ LPSU rocks!)
6. Second sub
7. Decent starter analog rig.

This is my current setup-
Tannoy Kensingtons
Single REL S/812
Pathos InPol Heritage MK2 integrated
Innuos Zenith MK3 - PhNET - PhUSB
CHORD DAVE/HMS with San Jacobs DC4ARC LPSU
Transparent PowerIsolator
OPTO Galvanic isolation
Mostly Transparent cables

7. decent starter analog rig.

additional tip. sell off the Kensington and get a 12 inch HPD 315a or 15 inch Gold tannoy with modified cross over, you might get back more money. And better sound. Don’t go for the sub

 

[Rexp]

Yes 7 is the answer, particularly if you like Jazz.

 

[Mark212121]

Hello dgale. Unless you have some records that you can't listen to, I would not consider starting with vinyl now. You have a very good digital front end that, in my opinion, would be much better than a budget record player. Then you have to start buyiing records, which, if you buy new, are not cheap, and there is quite a limited choice. Then you will probably need a specialist record cleaner...and so on...

I think you could try and get a home demo of a couple of amplifiers to see how they compare with yours. You could also make a list of a few different speakers and visit a dealer(s) to see if they would give you the improvement you seek. I don't use a sub-woofer, so I can't advise you on that.

Good luck in your quest for a more enjoyable sound.

 

[Sablon Audio]

A quick and cheap upgrade, if you haven't already done so, would be to fit better tubes in your Pathos amp.

 

[Sampajanna]

I had Mscaler and Dave both with SJ Power supply, before moving to Lampi Pacific and then Horizon. I would get that second power supply. And the Wavestorm interconnects between the mscaler and Dave if you dont have them already and grounding for all 4 units.