Greetings Crazy4,
First, GREAT Topic! :-)
Feels like a great day to unburden my conscience. Oh, but wait, you are wanting to hear JUST about the audio gear. No matter, I have plenty of goofs there too.
Fair disclosure = we are a dealer of many brands.
I hope you all get some good laughs because when I foul up it tends to be a magnitude of 5 times the average because I tend to order inventory of this stuff not just one piece.
Shall we start with tweaks:
Aurios, all sizes - not a bad little product but the surface one puts them on MUST be perfectly level or the piece will slide to the lowest corner every time. And with our luck nothing is ever level, or stays level, in our world.
FIM gold cables - these are a real hoot! So G*& D@#$ stiff every woman in the world is envious! By the time you go four rounds of wrestling with them you might be able to finally plug them in. Aha, but this certainly doesn't guaranty they will stay in!! Sneaky little devils, especially the power cords. They tend to jiggle their way out just enough to start shorting out the power connection on the component sending arking spikes of current through ones components as they work their way loose. They actually lit a solid state preamp on fire right in front of my eyes. I mean over the years I have seen many a tube piece go up in smoke but solid state with flames?
FIM cables round 2 - you want to talk about stiff, eh? Every piece of gear you own better be at least 50 pounds!! Because if it ain't it's going to be floating above the shelf it's supposed to be on!! Who needs isolation stuff when I can have power cords that lift the whole piece right off the shelf? Anyway, I had $25,000 dealer cost (50K retail) of inventory - talk about sweating bullets!!! Thank God for the audio press raving about this stuff as I was lucky to unload them and save my tail. And quality wise they are a credible sounding stuff we just went through an extensive disclaimer with every potential buyer of these to make sure they unerstood the risks.
Ensemble - Swiss right? Means great quality and great engineering right? Picked up a load of the Ensemble power stuff, those little boxes with one plug on them. This was really great! We plugged them into the FIM power cords and WA-LAH! little boxes floating in the air all over the place - what a sight! Then as we tried to pin them down, the little boxes the single plug plate they have on them began popping out all over the place, that's right the entire piece, still plugged onto the power cord mind you. Now I have floating little boxes dangling from two small connecting wires hanging out. Wow, this was a total loss, can't remember how many I had to deal with, but I wouldn't sell these to anyone regardless of the audiophile press.
I suppose I could go on for days, but enjoy the above and thanks for letting me unburden my conscience a little this morning.
In answer to your base question, I still have never really gotten to a solid equilibrium point with a system to where I had it setup the way I am satisfied enough to experience regret when taking a piece out. But hope springs eternal in our quest!! :-)
Best Wishes to All in our Adventures, Paul
