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?
@waytoomuchstuff + 1 “IMHO, we've got push the resolution envelop past the point of "comfort" to learn which exit to get off on. It's all part of the hit-and-miss experimental process. Hopefully, time and money will also cooperative with this objective.” This captures it well for me. How does one know where the line is if you don’t find it and of course that line is ever changing |
@mulveling and @mbmi yup. This is part of the fun of this. I have three systems that I’m always tweaking, because I’m a tweaker. That part of the fun for me and expense too of course. BTW system is feeling just about right tonight with the Cardas cables in (Clear Cygnus). At first I was missing the snap of the Wireworld but the Cardas is having synergy with my McIntosh tube pre and monoblocks and the SF Amati (much more detailed than the Olympicas that it replaced). The system is much more welcoming now than it was. Great responses in this thread—nice to know I’m not alone in my journey.
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@ghdprentice thank you for the thoughtful response. I’ve just ordered The Complete Guide to High End Audio. Great suggestion. Take it slow is a good idea. I have the Amati Traditions— great speakers — and I think are good match with my Mc gear. I like the idea of going to a city to listen to a variety of gear. It’s a journey and that is part of it. Getting to see some live music would be a good baseline for sure because it’s been a long time and honestly I have no idea how it is supposed to sound. |
@jji666 glad you mentioned toe in as this can be a great way to manage overly strident treble. This has definitely been a tool I have used to manage my system’s treble. I’d add managing a big window behind my listening position has been important. I’m working with a studio design engineer and he showed me the treble spike the uncovered windows was creating. When we covered the windows with a pile of pillows the spike disappeared and the SQ was much more measured—working on getting some window treatments that are acceptable to the family. The room definitely is a part of the equation as we tweak our systems to our liking. Lots of hard surfaces are going to increase fatigue but a well treated room presumably can handle more detailed speakers with causing harshness. |
