I normally don't contribute much to these types of discussions, but I felt my personal experience warranted some comment. After seeing the GC devices advertised in several magazines and catalogs, I became curious. I found the review for these in The Stereotimes and then this discussion. I decided, from the comments above, that testing this "tweak" as too simple to pass up. I took a short piece of my existing speaker cable, Kimber 8TC, and stripped it into 2 loops approximately 8-10" long. I installed them on my speakers and then ran some errands. When I returned, I was surprised to find music pouring out all over the room. The music had a greater ease and flow to it with improvements in both separation and soundstage. I have never had this experience with any other "normal" tweak and am most impressed. I don't know if this works with all systems or just some but it is certainly worth the effort to try. My electronics are Audio Research and my speakers are Dynaudio for those who might be interested. Many thanks to the developer and those of you who contributed to this thread! |
Gswaul,
Thanks for your comments. The wire loops are a surprising change, as silly seeming as the idea is. Even more surprising is what the full Ground Control device brings to a system.. My recommendation, of course, is that you should buy a set!!!! :=)
You still have tonal vividness an even more clearly locked in dimensionality, a bit faster response and a general sweetness to the sounds still to be obtained from the standard commercial GC's.
As Jejaudio points out, better materials are important and the Reference GC is noticeably more capable than the standard units. And then there are still the amplifier, preamplifier and source GC's to explore.
Bud |
Just to increase the Agony of those still on the fence over these small Ground Control items, here is a new review.
http://www.stereotimes.com
Bud |
Wow! I took a 20" piece of Monster speaker cable, split it, looped it, twisted the bare ends and attached one each to my Def Tech STS speakers and zowie. After two days of listening to familiar CD's I can say vocals are more real, cymbals really shimer, guitar, drum, sax, you name it and all has more presence. This is the best tweak yet to my humble system. |
Bud since I did have limited success with my DIY GC, before I go and get the REF version, I would like to know if you have any comments about using your devices on speakers(Ref 3A GrandVeena)that already have bybee devices inside.
Would there be any kind of cancelling effect?
Could this be why I didn't experience the night and day differences that others are experiencing?
I know that using the Walker devices Utra links, did interact with the Zoebel network(bybees)inside my speakers and this cancelled out any improvements.
Thanks. |
I cannot answer your question Lacee. I have zero experience with the Bybee devices. I think they, along with the Walker devices, are used to strip RF signals and their down sampled resonances from speaker cables, but that is the extent of my, most likely misunderstood, knowledge.
I think I would recommend getting a pair of the standard GC's and trying them, first on the speakers and then on the amplifier ground connections. I use the standard GC on my amplifiers, a reference there just does not provide the balance between resolution of sound source retained information, versus resolution of sound stage information. This allows me to use the reference GC on the speakers to retain that source specific information there, without compromising the sound stage.
Since you have had some success with a DIY variation I suspect the standard GC will work well for you. If I were you, I think I would experiment a little further with the DIY devices, before spending any real money. Try both longer and shorter loops of the original materials and then deliberately change the type of plastic on the wire jacket. Lamp cord is PVC, Monster Cable is often polyurethane and some other cables utilize polypropylene, Teflon and pure (smelly) raw vinyl. You can also take some bare stranded wire and put it into a polyolefin shrink tube. The reason to bother is to find out how your system responds to the various dielectric constants of these materials.
If the best sound comes from the shrink tube covered cable, then you will probably want at least one set of Reference GC's in the amplifier / speaker circuit. If the PVC sounds best then don't bother with Reference speaker or amplifier GC's. Instead use the reference RCA on your preamp and standard lugged GC's on your speakers.
This is a pretty rough guide and you can expect that even the standard GC is going to outperform an ad hoc experiment, but at least you will not just be guessing about the direction to take.
If you do further experiments do report back please, your information will be welcome.
Bud |
Pixelphoto,
My system is pretty humble also, so don't feel bad about yourself! I have a friend in the hill country in Texas with a massively expensive McIntosh / B&W 802 system. Before GC application I wasn't overly impressed with anything but the sheer scale of the reproduction, compared to my system. After Standard GC's were applied, her system was the equal of mine in all categories and firmly trounced it in scale. But who cares? I still have torrents of music to listen to at home and so does she.
Do experiment a bit further with what I mentioned to Lacee above and then treat yourself and get a pair of the real thing. I doubt you will be sorry you did and you will have a reason to experiment further, in other locations in your system. Everywhere there is a commercially viable piece of electronics gear, there is a potential for improvement in your overall system's musical values by correcting the ground side information retention.
Thanks for your comments by the way, it is good to hear that more and more folks are digging into this relatively unexplored area and coming up with gold. You might want to explore EnABL speaker processes at some point..... and yes, it will work on your system and yes, you can learn how to do it successfully. Anyone with fingers attached to hands and stereoscopic vision can do so.
Bud |
Thank you Bud and to all the other great people on this site.
Marvin |
Well I just posted my Review of the Ground Controls in the standard and the Reference versions in spades and RCA. |
Bud, I think it was stated before, but I don't understand why. I have a fully balanced amp (Wyred 4 Sound) that I run in full balanced from source through preamp to amp. Why will the GCs' do nothing in my case? |
Koestner, I run my system balanced from CD Player, Preamp, Amp and the Ground Controls work fantastic! |
Ozzy, where do you place them as both leads are hot, only 180 degrees out of phase from each other?
John |
Koestner,
I have just been reporting what users have forwarded to me. The one user, with a fully differential system, reported no change at all, neither better or worse. A balanced system is not always fully differential, there can be a ground reference in the system and that is all that is known to be needed for GC's to perform. Obviously, Ozzie is having great success with his balanced system.
To date we have seen two GC's up for sale and none have been returned to us as unusable, other than the fully differential system rejection.
The RCA's do seem to take longer to charge than the spade lug items. I ascribe this to signal level and relative current levels involved, with the RCA's not normally seeing more than 3 or 4 volts peak and only ten's of ma in current.
I have noticed that the louder you play the system, over what you will normally listen to, the quicker the spade lug versions charge. This does not seem to be true with the RCA's though, or at least not in my experience. Again, I think it is related to the signal levels involved as
I would suggest that you try out a pair of standard lugged GC's. If they don't work out for you, return them and please report back in either case. The more different styles of systems that use them, the more data points we have and all information is good information.
Bud |
Koestner, My equipment has both balanced and single ended input/output. The RCA Ground Controls are used on the RCA's. |
Just an update on my DIY Ground Control spades. I have replaced the solid silver DIY Ground Controls spades on both of my speakers with a pair of DIY Ground Control spades made with JPS Power AC In-Wall cables. This is a 10 awg cable used in home wiring to your electrical service panel. It is $18-$20 dollars a foot. I cut a 5" piece, stripped about 1" off both ends. Then twisted the stripped ends together. Then I put the two twisted ends into a Pure copper spade lug (no plating). There was a greater since of spaciousness with the music, but everything was more infocus. But what stood out to me was the noise floor was much lower now with all kinds of musical cues coming out in songs that I knew. Yes I heard them before with the Silver DIY Ground Controls. But now there is a more shimmer in brushes, male and female voice have more throatiness. All this with no edge or harshness, just a flowing ease with full dynamics. I still have the Silver-Palladium mix DIY Ground Controls on my poweramp. I have another set of DIY JPS AC In-Wall Ground Control that I will put on my amp in place of the DIY Silver-Palladium mix Ground Controls. But for now just by replacing the DIY Silver Ground Control spades on my speakers with the DIY JPS AC In-Wall Ground Control spades. There is a very very noticable step up in musical flow and sound across the board. So do better ingredients make a better Ground Wire, once again the answer is yes. |
How did you fix the various combination's together. I have found it unusually important to have similar metals, even if there is a tin/lead solder in the connection. The best so far had been all copper with a tin coating and no lead anywhere. |
Hi, Bud. I have the DIY JPS AC In wall cable on both the negative post of both my speakers (spade connections). I also have the DIY JPS AC In wall cable on the negative post of the right and left channel of my power amp( spades). Now back to the speakers, I also have added the Silver-Palladium DIY Ground Control to both speakers negative post using a banana plug. Combining both the JPS wire with the Silver-Palladium wire give me the best of both cables. The JPS wire brings out background sounds betters. Brushes have more shimmer, and the sound stage is wider. The Silver-Palladium is very good with the mid range and has a very solid bottom end. So the sound stage is wider but still in focus. PRAT is very good. The DIY solid silver wire is not as good with the DIY JPS wire. I have even tried PCOCC copper and it seemed a little slow sounding at first listen, maybe needed more time to burn in. TEASER ALERT: I have been working (USING) on a DIY Control wire that can be used on the POSITIVE POSTS of your speakers and power amps. I guess I should have taken the RED pill instead of the BLUE one. (THE Matrix). |
