Znak_m here is the quick cure (your MFA's are good amps)
I know Scott Frankland - he does good work.
1) Take the Hydra OFF of the amps.
2) Use any PC you have two of on the amps (hopefully you can use the BMI's). If you have been using Shunyata's on the Amps, use stock PC's.
Plug direct to wall if possible.
3) Plug the Metronomes into the Hydra.
3a) Try the various PC's you have left over on the digital gear swap the Mamba & Top Gun between the DAC and Transport
4) report back to us to let us know about the changes you hear.
Also.. what EAD front end were you using? The EAD T-7000 perhaps??? |
Znak_m, I have to believe the EAD T-7000 Transport will kill the Metronome. Sorry to say but its true. The EAD beat out many transports under 10K in my own system. :( Plug it into the metronome DAC and get ready for something special!
Also, I have to repeat, the Hydra should ONLY be used on your digital gear. Its not a good thing for amps/preamps.
Don't worry about the 30' run of cable. That is the least of your issues. The Revels are great speakers but are to some extent "impersonal" and less "involving" than other speakers you've lived with making synergy a more delicate path to tread...that said, the Revels will play exactly what you send them so... this becomes simply a case of matching the right cables & conditioners with the right components.
And if you can stomach it, use the EAD. Its outstanding! IF you don't want to use it, please....sell it to me. |
Znak_m, the EAD is good isn't it? It's mysterious how other MUCH more expensive transports can be completely blown away by this thing. When it comes to digital, I've had them all and the EAD transport (T-7000) absolutely smoked everything else - even when using lesser DACs.
Now.. the Audiomeca DAC (I suppose you mean the Enkianthus) is amazing. Talk about involving! Its very relaxed sounding and very emotional. Its not a "get up and dance" type of sound but it is certainly magical. That DAC (or an Audio Note) combined with the EAD would be MY choice for the top player right now. Better than AudioAero, Accuphase, EMC-1, etc. and much less expensive. The soundstage from that EAD goes through the walls!
Cables will be your next step after your source is nailed down. |
Kana, The EAD T7000 is old and flakey making it a hassle to use. The drawer on most T7000's closes before you can get the cd in the tray. So.... when using you have to hold the drawer with your left hand (as it pulls against you) and drop the CD with your right. While this problem is common, it cannot be fixed as EAD is not much of a company anymore and philips does not make the same mechanisim any longer.
This is why I recommend folks try the Theta Data (not the BASIC) because it is in essence the same as the T7000 and is still supported by Theta.
I haven't been able to find a good used Theta or an EAD and that's why I don't use it. |
BbTuna - the EAD is hard to find. As I stated in the post above, I cannot find one myself. I think the reason why the EAD T7000 is so good is that it was completely overbuilt since it was a first generation Laser Disk Player. Newer models are crap by comparison and have none of the sonic virtues of the old T7000. EAD will try to convince you otherwise but they are flat out lieing.
Given the EAD-T7000's performance (when it works) is so far superior to other more expensive transports, I'd have to say it would fit most anyones listening preference when paired with the right DAC.
As for Audiomeca/Audio Note, I like 'em both but my taste is pretty expensive on the AudioNote side. Every step up the ladder gives you a tremendous increase in performance. The 3.1x Audio Note is what *I'd* shoot for as a starter but the 2's and 1's are not bad.
The Enkianthus by Audiomeca is outstanding as well but isn't everyones cup-of tea. Its a very, relaxed sound with less dynamics than say an Electrocompaniet or Audio Aero based machine. The Audiomeca astonishes you with seduction while the others seem to get similar results with a slap in the face (EC). Perhaps I am being a little too harsh saying the EC is a slap in the face but I wanted to paint the contrast between the two DAC's.
Even with a Krell HTS (home theater processor) used as a DAC, the EAD sounds at par with ANY one box player.
As for speakers, a close friend of mine is a Dynaudio Maniac. He has owned all the Confidence series speakers (earlier C3 and C5's) but has upgraded to the Consequence. This is truly an amazing speaker and I am sure (having not listened to the C2 or C4's yet) that they try very hard to reproduce what the Consequence does. In the grand scale of things, if you can afford big amps to power the Dyn's, it would be a revelation for you to bypass the newer C2's and C4's and jump back in time to a pair of Consequence - which was the Dynaudio flagship prior to the 90K Evidence. |
Hi Rx6man - thank you very much I appreciate the kind words. Digital IS a big issue and right now I am personally going through sort of a revelation. I'll tell you about it but first I have to explain where I am coming from - as well as where I've been lately.
Pardon me while I ramble...
About 9 months ago, after trying almost every CD player I could get my hands on, I completely left digital in the dust (sold all digital gear) after I got my first analog rig - a simple Linn LP12.
Needless to say, the Linn gave me everything I hoped I would get from my digital devices & it took only seconds to realize that my perception of what "analog like" meant was way off base. Warmth is often considered to be a trait that makes a digital device seem "analog-like" but this is not necessarily true. A Shelter 901 on the Linn LP12 with a good clean recording will sound more high rez than either of the new High Resolution formats. Lets just say that after hearing the Linn in my system, it became immediately evident that digital devices were missing so much more than just "warmth". Analog has a certain completeness to it whereas everything is there... the entire venue... and CD seems to loose that information.
In retrospect, my earlier problems with digital were primarily a result of my comparing digital devices to digital devices. It became like Baskin Robbins, 31 flavors of digital... which one do I like today? Each have merit but.. none truly matched analog in any way whatsoever.
Then, I stumbled across the Meitner BiDat which is a cheap old DAC designed by Ed Meitner who is responsible for much of the technology behind SACD. BiDats have been around for a while and there are many iterations of the units since they have been modified since their inception. Today, these units are being supported and modified by John Wright. John's latest mods offer a complete transformation of the Bidat. John has taken the good, bad and the ugly mods of the past and refined these to produce a set of modifications which make the BiDat a world class DAC. John even incorporated some crazy, witch doctor type tweaks like black fingernail polish painted on some of the chips. Whatever works I guess.
The Bidat give you a sense of completeness and I do not know how or why, it just does. This is not something I can say for any other CD player I've ever tried. The BiDat doesn't have a flavor per se' it just plays music and to someone with ears that are used to the latest whiz-bang sonic signature, that lack of flavor in the BiDat may send you walking the other way. But.. for good listeners who are familiar with what I mean when I say COMPLETENESS and NATURAL SOUNDING, the BiDat is the answer.
Well that's where I am now. I have a simple BiDat which has been modified by John Wright. I am still tweaking with cables and trying to find a great reliable transport. An EAD T7000 I purchased recently arrived DOA from Canada so.. I'm still hunting for a good transport. Right now I am using a Sony S7000 DVD player and it seems to be an "okay" transport.. but I need better.
That said, the BiDat is SO close to vinyl it has turned my listening preference back to CD.
I've compared the BiDat to Linn, Oracle and SME20 turntables and the BiDat (strangely) competes with them all such that it becomes more a matter of vanity if I or my friends even keep our turntables.
The one weak spot of the BiDat seems to be with LARGE scale music - Mahler, for instance. The BiDat does not capture the scale at all it shrinks the venue and seems to compress that which should be enormous into a very tight and well defined, and not too dynamic space.
My potential solution for this is to run an SACD player as a transport (SA-14 Marantz) with the digital out going to the BiDat and Analog out going to the preamp. In my experience SACD seems to capture that largeness of scale, dynamic slam and impact better than CD and it certainly quieter than vinyl.
So perhaps the solution is - SACD transport + Sweet DAC. |
Twl, The interesting thing is that I have been listening to an SME20 lately which is needless to say, "higher up the scale". The SME is very precise & solid sounding and makes the Linn sound unrefined and almost as if its bouncing out of control... yet there are certain qualities about the Linn that are more fun and to some extent more natural with certain types of music. This is not to discount the SME in any way other than to say that it itself is so controled that its difficult for me to suggest that it is natural - nothing in this world (especially live music) is as precise and controled or utterly "ordinary sounding" as the SME20. Yet I believe from an audiophile perspective, somehow the SME20 is better by leaps and bounds than the Linn. Weird.
So needless to say, I am well aware that there are better tables than the Linn and I think my point was that a simple Linn/Shelter 901 was better in all regards than any other digital player. That is why I sold all my digital and went 100% analog - just like you.
You are correct, I am a platter, bearing and motor kit away from a Teres and I am considering doing that. I've even started a new (improved) design over my first Teres.
So I do plan to keep analog because regardless of the table, it *IS* better than digital but the margin of improvement has been cut massively by the modified BiDat.
I do realize that a better table could potentially widen that gap between the BiDat and analog -- but I am having a tough time attaching a dollar figure to that improvement. I would have to go above and beyond the SME20 to look for these gains. And at that point >$10K I begin to ask myself whether or not playing records is worth it. Even at <$10K, I wonder if the differences are worth it. Right now, if I could attach a dollar value to the differences I hear between the BiDat and the Linn or BiDat and SME, I would pay maybe $1000 - $2000 to get that improvement in a system but the gains are not significant enough to justify much more. |
Tom, Not sure if I agree wholeheartedly with the SME reputation you speak of. I usually associate the term analytical to mean excessive detail and I don't think that's the case with the SME20.
I wouldn't call the SME "overly dry" either. So, what do you mean by "overly dry"?? The SME20 has NO grain. Do you perhaps mean dry in the context that it's bass is lean or overdampened? Or do you mean it has a short reverberation time? In any case, the SME20 doesn't seem to exhibit any of those reputed qualities - except perhaps for the bass being ever-so-slightly lean but not enough to consider the table dry.
Like I said earlier, the SME20 is neutral. The table plays the facts accurately and with precision (that does not mean analytical) - nothing seems to be accentuated at all. The table exhibits a neutral tone, or an absence of added color.
That said, I would agree there are more "musical" toe-tapping - lets get up and boogie - type tables around and I think the Linn is a pretty good representation of that type of table.
Perhaps that Teres project of mine will introduce me to a new flavor - that of a completely unsuspended, high mass table. Interesting. Perhaps musical and refined? Hmmm...
Remember, you've got a guy here who "used" to be a digital maniac and gave it all up as soon as he heard analog. After that moment, I couldn't bare to listen to any CDs whatsoever, sold my digital & I became an analog fanatic.
So... I'm sorry for mentioning that digital BiDat thingy - I certainly don't want to scare any of the other analog fanatics on Audiogon. :) |
Hi Tom, I've listened to numerous tables at local dealers and have always been disappointed -- mostly because of the dealers poor room/system, etc. So I never comment on those experiences publicly.
I have only had the SME20, Linn, Oracle at my personal disposal which is why I only comment on those tables.
I've often considered borrowing tables from the dealer but.. as much of an analog fanatic as I am, I still do not feel confident with all the set-up required for various table/arm/cartridge combos.
I guess I'll have to take your advice, bite the bullet and get a Teres or finish my at least one of my projects. It will be very interesting to hear what it does that the Linn / SME doesn't do -- or does too much of.
To simplify what I said about the BiDat, it has opened a door where now, I can honestly say there are many recordings which will sound better on digital vs. analog whreas prior to the Bidat, I felt that nothing sounded better in digital - except certain classical pieces.
Regardless of which table I end up with, having digital which performs somewhere in-between the SME and the Linn(its like the SME with life, and the Linn with precision) is truly remarkable for a $600 device. |
yes sir... I hear it! :) and it sounds better than it did 6 months ago. I'm getting there... Don't worry... |
