Hiss and Hum in a system newly put together


A friend of mine recently acquired his system with the help of a friend who advised him to get following components:

Audio Analogue CD Maestro
Unison Research Integrated Amp S-6
Sonus Faber Grand Piano Speakers
Silver Audio Hush Wire Interconnects
Straightwire Rhapsody Speaker Cables

The poor guy is having sleepless nights since his system is plagued with hiss and hum. Since he is almost down under in Jakarta Indonesia, I could communicate only with email rather than physically inspect the system. From the explanation that he gave me, I could suggest to him to check his cabling and see if the system is properly grounded, secondly I also suggested to check the valves if they are properly seated and locked.

Is there anything else he should be checking?

I will send the link to this post to him so that he could try and trouble shoot his system with any help from Audiogoners.

Thanks for any help you can provide to someone who has just spent a lot of money and is having trouble from the word go.
quadophile

Showing 3 responses by quadophile

Very good idea, I completely forgot toask him if he had any conditioner installed, if not he should buy one and install it anyway for the sake of protection from surges and spikes in addition to RFI and EMI sheilding.

Thanks
Briweve,

That is good information, very much appreciated. Sometimes we are so oblivious of our surroundings that a simple trick like checking things you mentioned is overlooked.

The checklist is getting bigger and bigger but that is what is required here.
Just received a message from my friend.

Finally the problem was attributed to a defective valve (ECC 82)which was replaced. No hum or hiss being produced from the system anymore.

I appreciate everyones input on this thread and their contributions.

Thank you very much for free remote assistance in solving the problem.