So come winter the plan is to open windows and doors fire up the AC and experience sound that literally is to die for. From hypothermia, that is.
Room temperature and audio fidelity.
I'm a 58 yr old audiophile. Like you I have had many experiences trying different tweaks and greater changes. Of of my listening sessions, one thing has been a constant inexplicable phenomenon. That being my system would always sound its audibly best during the fall and winter to early spring. It changed so much so that I would call this the music listening season. This intrigued me for years. Changing out speakers, components, etc had a negligible affect my music room would always sound worse during the summer months. As the temperature would rise the audio fidelity would suffer. My system would be less involving to the point of being somewhat shrill. Every summer I would have the same results. My observation had to reason it was the lower temperature and humidity during the cooler months that made optimal listening. So to prove my hypothesis between temperature and audio fidelity, I bought a portable stand alone AC unit 2 years ago for my music room. Bingo, eureka the music came to life with the shrillness gone! The AC unit would bring the temperature down from 75 to 69 deg. This did come at a cost though, in that it was very noisy and I was forever turning up my music to drown out the drone of the AC unit. Early this summer I had the local AC contractor install 2 large vents behind my stereo rack for a total of 5 vents in my 20x12x8 room. That and redirecting some air flow kept the room temperature down to 68-69 deg with my big Bryston doing some heavy cardio. LOL. With the equipment off the temperature could go as low as 63 deg. It has been over 2 months now and I can confidently say, that with a temperature controlled room my system has never sounded better during the summer. This is one of the best tweaks I have personally found. I searched audiogon and found very little discussion on this. Have you had any experiences with a warm room? PS. The higher summertime humidity did not seem detrimental to the Sonics. Also I have a dedicated line to my stereo so that should rule out the air conditioner.
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