question for nautilus 801 owners


The n801 tweeter can be brutaly honest and sound very brite and metalic. I know associated equipment makes a huge difference along with what recordings are being played. my question is to owners who have experienced the changes in their system as they have upgraded equipment... Have you heard the treble go from excessive brightness to a smoother and more relaxed and transparent presentation?

Just want to know if I will eventually get there and that the time and money is not wasted.. I dont have good speaker and interconnect cables from cd and phono but have nice ones from pre to power. Four mono blocks have stock cables and no line conditioning but sources are connected to ps audio p300. All power cords are stock.

Help on this will be greatly appreciated..Joel
cardiomaniac
My guess is ( Just a guess ) that you really need to invest or at least borrow some good quality wires that will allow the 801s to show you there potential. I would start with the cd player first and go from there. Quality speakers as you have do require quality wires etc. This could make a major difference in your brightness level.It may not cure all your problems but should help considerably...Room,speaker placement etc., will aslo contribute...
Three points.

1. I have made a lot of changes in my vinyl playback chain since getting the N801s, and each change has been starkly revealed. The most recent is the Walker Reference Phono Amp, Second Edition, and this has opened up and "naturalized" the treble to a striking degree.

2. Nevertheless, the tweeter has never been as well integrated and artifact-free as the seamless treble/midrange ESL panel balance of my InnerSound Eros. The tweeter sounds cleanest with top quality analog and gets smeared, "dirtier," and less complex with CD redbook.

3. The tweeter is padded down by 5 dB with resistors. It may be possible to work with the distributor to change the tweeter resistors to pad this down a dB or two further. Philip O'Hanlon had the distributor remove/bypass the attenuator resistors from his N801 because he wasn't getting enough treble in his very large listening room. Different strokes...go figure.
Wires are next in line. thanks
Monoblocks are bryston 7bsst(240v)

Great information steve. Actualy I should have said the treble is grainy and metalic. There is too much treble as well but room reflections are generating some this. I'm working on acoustic treatment. I just picked up a Nottingham hyperspace with ps and mounted my old rega rb300 and clearaudio v-wood cartridge. The table has made a dramatic improvement overall except it has revealed the grainy or etched treble even more.

Pre amp is bp26mm/mc. Will try more expensive phono stage much later but would imediately experiment with cables,line conditioners,tone arm, cartridge if one or all of these would make a big improvement.. Joel
Very bright and revealing equipment. Try various cables from local dealer, preferably in copper to soften presentation. How is your room setup?
Unless you are willing to swap out your Bryston amps in favor of something like the Classe Omega (i.e., something smoother), I suggest you try a full rewiring with Cardas Cross interconnects and speaker cables. While it may not be the answer, Cross is made for such cases and is not terribly expensive.