Zu loudspeakers

caesar

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May 30, 2010
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Once you start fussing, you will understand. I did a 10 year bid with digital and
have most of my favorite music on CD. Good Vinyl is just more engaging.
Here is the perfect room for X-tremes, curtesy MBL. Yes i will build the room
first;)
View attachment 49503
Thank you for the diagram!

As far as analog, I have small children. And they are getting into everything. One of my kids got into my wife's makeup cabinet and she made a huge mess out of expensive makeup. And my son will be an engineer, no doubt. I can only imagine what he can do to an expensive cartridge when he starts disassembling the setup...

And furthermore, the ripped vinyl is professionally done. It's much more quiet than most vinyl I have heard, as those original records have been touched by man only 2-4 times, only to rip... And there are no stylus microphonics,.... So it's great.
 
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Lagonda

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Thank you for the diagram!

As far as analog, I have small children. And they are getting into everything. One of my kids got into my wife's makeup cabinet and she made a huge mess out of expensive makeup. And my son will be an engineer, no doubt. I can only imagine what he can do to an expensive cartridge when he starts disassembling the setup...

And furthermore, the ripped vinyl is professionally done. It's much more quiet than most vinyl I have heard, as those original records have been touched by man only 2-4 times, only to rip... And there are no stylus microphonics,.... So it's great.
Children can be trained. The real problem is a passive aggressive wife
with a dusting fetisch. I lost two great cartridges to two different spouses :rolleyes:
 

spiritofmusic

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Hmm, I'm not sure why that last post was "liked" by 3 members. Destroying a cart is not likeable in any way.

Maybe this was a feminist act to oblige men to do more cleaning.
 

Lagonda

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Hmm, I'm not sure why that last post was "liked" by 3 members. Destroying a cart is not likeable in any way.

Maybe this was a feminist act to oblige men to do more cleaning.
Or pretending to accept our weird hobby and all the time it consumes, but hating
it. Cleaning accidents are only accidents ;)
I lost my second cartridge after having specified (after loosing one cartridge)
never clean close to the TT. I had the system set up in the living room, with only
phono preamp and TT placed in an adjourning unused guest room , two holes
drilled in the wall for IC cables. Perfect separation ? Not ! She went into
a closed room and lifted up the 20 pound Nakamichi TT so she could
dust under it , accident ? I gave up on TT’s for 10 years after that.
 
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spiritofmusic

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Ooh!
Is there a click for "deeply, deeply disliked" I can hit?
 
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caesar

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Or pretending to accept our weird hobby and all the time it consumes, but hating
it. Cleaning accidents are only accidents ;)
I lost my second cartridge after having specified (after loosing one cartridge)
never clean close to the TT. I had the system set up in the living room, with only
phono preamp and TT placed in an adjourning unused guest room , two holes
drilled in the wall for IC cables. Perfect separation ? Not ! She went into
a closed room and lifted up the 20 pound Nakamichi TT so she could
dust under it , accident ? I gave up on TT’s for 10 years after that.

It hurts reading this. We have had the same cleaning lady for about 10 years now. I instruct her every time not to touch my stuff. I even put tape on the floor to indicate where she cannot cross to get close to equipment. Even my kids follow this, most of the time.

Yet last time she cleaned, she left the microfiber dusting cloth on top of the speaker! She may have been yapping to my wife and got distracted, or something, and left it. I am pretty much a laissez faire, live and let live type of a guy, but next time I see her, I may choke her. :)
 
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bonzo75

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spiritofmusic

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Ked, at least you'll never have this problem since that tt at home isn't happening.
 
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XV-1

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these stories are probably why Tang has his system @ the office ;)
 
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spiritofmusic

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I thought Tang's office cleaner also destroyed his stylus?
 
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bonzo75

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XV-1

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bonzo75

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I thought it was you Ked :p

I am his cleaner. I clean up the noise so he can buy the right stuff. He is messy in that regard though
 
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SETDrugs

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The Zu brand is about having fun, enjoying the music, and living a better life! Audiophilia, itself, and its paranoia about missing a new piece of analytical detail, is the villain because it takes one away from joy of music to chasing gear that provides that detail. Some guys may spend 20 plus years wandering in the wilderness of audiophilia, reading from despicable Audio journalists about what is “best” because some scumbag reviewer heard some new noises in his recording, and finally discover Zu.


And when they do, they enjoy the full emotion of music with a scrunched face, squeezed- shut eyes, craned-back neck, curved and stretched-out back, curled toes, a smile or grimace based on the song. It’s the full emotional transport to the heartbreaking pain or ecstasy, reaching to the depth of the artist’s soul and deliver it to the listener. From their heads to their heart to their hands. Soul to soul connection. It’s why music exists. And there’s nothing like Zu to deliver that.

Caesar,

Perfectly stated. I could not agree with you more about Zu and this hobby in general.
Just curious for myself and I'm sure others here, can you describe a little about your system. What Zu speaker are you running? What about the amp and preamp? Analog or digital front end? Thanks
 

caesar

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Caesar,

Perfectly stated. I could not agree with you more about Zu and this hobby in general.
Just curious for myself and I'm sure others here, can you describe a little about your system. What Zu speaker are you running? What about the amp and preamp? Analog or digital front end? Thanks

Hi,
Thanks!

To answer your question, Zu is not my audiophile system, and not my only system, so I am not going "all out". The goal is simply to enjoy pop, rock, soul, and blues. The system consists of Druid 5s, Audion Silver Night amp (integrated), and a Chord Dac. I'm not using a preamp; the ones I've heard make things worse, and I'm not interested in incurring search costs at this time to find one that works.

The system sounds amazing with great recordings and digitized vinyl, and also sounds great with Tidal. The system puts me in a state of flow, where I'm just listening to music and nothing else matters.

Cheers!
 

SETDrugs

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Caesar,

My system has settled with Zu Soul Supreme, Thomas Mayer 45/2a3 power amp and Mayer 10Y preamp. My source is Euphony PTS server and my dac is the Yggydrasil A2. I'm streaming Qobuz via Roon ; it sounds like a dream. I can't agree with you more on most of the preamps out there until the Thomas Mayer 10y arrived. The Mayer amplification chain has totally transformed my system, particularly the preamp. NO more changes, this is a lifetime investment. Unless Sean comes out with a significantly better update to the Supremes at a reasonable cost, this is it.

Together with the amazing Soul Supreme, I've never enjoyed music and even movies like this before. Tone, emotion, musicality, transparency, and just an organic effortless nature to the sound that makes listening such a pleasure that once I get started its extremely difficult to stop. Its like I'm in a deep trance with the music. Very therapeutic as well to unwind after hard days work. Thats how addicting the sound can be so I know exactly what you've been trying to say in your last few posts.

Cheers!
 

spiritofmusic

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Kevin, there's a guy on AGon who's sold his Soul Supremes to go w the new Druid VIs, and is loving what he's hearing.

In my case, the Zu sound was so compelling in 2008 that at the demo I wrote the cheque there and then for the Definitions 2. I struggled a lot w poor room acoustics and dialing in, even w the impvts wrought going to the 4s.

In the new room here, my 4s came alive fully on digital, but I still struggled w my analog thru them.

Now this has been sorted, I'm getting a totally compelling sound on both lp and cd (streaming next year hopefully).

The Zus are now fully doing the microdynamic, reflective, illuminating thing, not just the big microdynamic thing that I could only nail a few years ago.
 

the sound of Tao

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Hi,
Thanks!

To answer your question, Zu is not my audiophile system, and not my only system, so I am not going "all out". The goal is simply to enjoy pop, rock, soul, and blues. The system consists of Druid 5s, Audion Silver Night amp (integrated), and a Chord Dac. I'm not using a preamp; the ones I've heard make things worse, and I'm not interested in incurring search costs at this time to find one that works.

The system sounds amazing with great recordings and digitized vinyl, and also sounds great with Tidal. The system puts me in a state of flow, where I'm just listening to music and nothing else matters.

Cheers!
Hi Caesar, which preamps have you heard and how did they make things worse?
 

spiritofmusic

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Jun 13, 2013
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"State of flow"
Caesar, very nice, and appropriate turn of phrase.
For me, the sound I aspired to in the early days (Linn/Naim active 6 pack/Isobarik or DBL, Krell/Wilson Watt Puppy, MF Kilowatt/ML Prodigy) was turned on it's head when I discovered tubes, SETs in particular. The promise of Zus to be truly SS/SET agnostic meant that medium power tubes in the vast space I lived in before came into focus as properly practical.

And now I've gone fully down this rabbit hole, and could not contemplate going to any other type of setup.

This flexibility of Zu, truly SET friendly in the most challenging of rooms, is what is of particular critical importance to me.
 

the sound of Tao

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A mate of mine was selling Zu’s a few years back and coincidentally (like Caesar’s) paired usually with audion amps... heard many in the range including with the silver nights and the kt150s.

Can’t imagine that speaker amp pairing not benefiting from the musical and structural gain of a very good preamp. This isn’t an audiophile assertion but rather purely a music loving one. Without good musical organisation and gain structure they could almost tend towards being a bit more overbearing and wayward rather than sensitively nuanced and musical. Not quite just right, more random and assertive but strangely musically not right. For the same reason I’m not a real fan of naim. Each to their own, but I feel a middle path approach is better, for high sensitivity however I figure just go horn or go home... they might be genre restrictive but if you love music they are the best... errr flame suit on... ps purely subjective call.
 
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