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Warm vs Revealing—the struggle for balance

For me my upgrade path has been finding balance between warmth and dynamics/detail.

It’s looks something like this: find satisfaction (Raven Nighthawk + Tekton), get upgrade bug seeking more dynamics, get more revealing gear (Ma 352), feel fatigued, buy new tubes (Telefunken) and speakers (SF Olympica); want more dynamics (Mc 601 + c50), I immediately get tube pre because of fatigue (c2300), still too sharp (new tubes and DAC); excellent balance, but of course sell speakers, new speakers too revealing, buy Cardas cables to replace Wireworld (ahh just right for now, but may be a little more revealing might be nice).

And oh yeah, working on fixing the damn room problems!

Chasing the unicorn. 

Anyone else doing this back and forth?

w123ale

Showing 3 responses by carlsbad2

carlsbad2's avatar
carlsbad2
1,384 posts
 

I went through lots of amps and DACs and occasionally had problems with harshness (as you call it, lack of warmth). 

Once I siginificantly upgraded my DAC (Chord DAVE) and moved to low power SETs (and I've had several different ones), I've never experieneced harshness or fatigue as I continue to upgrade my system.

I don't think there is such thing as speakers that are "too revealing".  Speakers can be harsh but that is just poor implementation (by the manufacturer).  

Jerry

 

carlsbad2's avatar
carlsbad2
1,384 posts
 

I just don't agree that you can have too much resolution.  What causes harshness isn't too much detail.

carlsbad2's avatar
carlsbad2
1,384 posts
 

after reading this I've concluded that my daughter's amazon alexa is a Monet.

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