My New System

Run your ARC now, It only takes a few minutes, and I think you might be surprised what it does without the room treatments. 

Congratulations! I is great when the results of a huge amount of research and investment works out.

What a great post. So nice to hear when someone worked at something and it came out successful.

Good positive review/experience.  Makes my day when others are as happy as I am with their systems

I am curious as to what types of music you are enjoying on this system.

@cueball9 

Congratulations!  🎈🎉🍾 

I’m maybe there.  While I am mostly happy with my system,  the lack of local hifi shops and the abundance of new and improved products sometimes nags at me. For now, I have my forever sources, amps and speakers, but I would love to hear some other preamps and DAC’s in my system. I could live with the preamp I have, but something keeps me wanting to hear different DAC’s.

 I’m close and I’ll let you know when I’m there.

Congrats, hope you enjoy your new system!

Congratulations, what a beautiful and thoughtful system you put together.  I hope you have many years of musical pleasure.

Congratulations.. now time to enjoy it. as others have said, run the ARC before you settle down. 

Congrats on the new system. Enjoy it while you can. 

Congratulations!  Thanks for sharing your musical journey and enjoy your music. 

@cueball9 Where are you looking for curtains? I'm looking for heavy, thick, black curtains for looks and sound absorbing, no windows to cover in the room. FWIW - I used Acoustimac for panels are they look great, excellent shipping. 

Thanks to everyone for the kind words.  I have been listening to the system fairly loud when the wife is not home.  It’s everything you’d expect but don’t always get,

My Amazon Music playlists are mostly Classic Rock.  There’s also some Jazz and Opera in there.  My wife and I love Andre Bocelli. I love the CD "Viaggio Italiano". My favorite track is "Puccini: Turandot, Act III; Nessun Dorma". You owe it to yourself to hear what a human being is capable of if you have a good system.  Bocelli is ...I don’t know.  He’s next level.  We also like Dave Brubeck, Vince Giardi Trio (Charlie Brown Christmas in HD) and Grover Washington Jr for example.

The R11’s really bring the music to life.  Amazon offers some tracks in Ultra HD and these are what you pay for to get the KEF R11’s.  I know it’s cliche but having had Klipsch Heresy’s and Wharfdale EVO’s I have to say, these speakers are amazing.  Sometimes the clarity is startling and the bass is the best I’ve ever heard from a tower.  Man...I sound like a commercial for KEF haha!

The curtains were installed.  They look fantastic.  They better for $18,000.  Unless you live near Eastern Idaho, you cannot get these.  High Country Creations is a small family owned business that specializes in custom drapery installations.  After paying the 50% deposit, I had to wait 5 months until my turn came up.  

The curtains themselves are a heavy weave fabric with a black-out backing.  These are not the cheap ones I got on Amazon.  These really do block the outside light.  With the living room and dining room, I have all of the glass on that side of the room covered.  I’m not a sound engineer but I’m fairly certain that this is an improvement. 

I still need to re-hang the acoustic panels we got from Audimute. (Waiting for final speaker/sub placement.)  fyi: we got the ones that can be painted to match using a Sherwin-Williams paint-code.  Since our painter used SW paint, we got the matching color and I must say, they really do blend in.  Plus the wife likes them so....

The wife is out-of-town so it’s going to be a fun week!  Today I’m gonna break-out my favorite show-off-the-system-movie (minus the surround stuff) "Master and Commander". I love the opening sequence in this movie for two things.  First, the ringing of the bell.  This an awesome test for your tweets.  Second, the ensuing ship-to-ship battle.  I’m going to let SVS loose to play the thunder of the cannon battle. 

Again, thanks to everyone who took the time to send a comment.  My intent was not to brag but to inform.  I spent months trying to decide what to buy.  In the end, I got everything I’d hoped for and just wanted to share so that anyone else in the market for a new system can benefit from my expeience.