Albums you use to test your gears?


Which CDs/LPs would you use to test/compare your system components?
I am going to compare the following components.
preamp: Clearaudio Microbasic vs Yaqin MS-12B tube preamp
- Amp: Linn AV5105 power amp with Yaqin MS-12B vs Yaqin MC-10L integrated amp
- Cable: Zu Wax biwire vs Linn K400 biwire vs Canare 4S11 quad vs single wire (old and cheap) stranded XLO cable
- Turntable: Thorens TD145MKii/Grado gold vs Clearaudio Emotion/aurum classics

My other components are Tyler Taylo 7U speakers and NAD C541i CDP.

My experience so far is that Linn AV5105 (even with the cheapest XLO cable) is a clear winner over Yaqin MC-10L (even with upgrade tubes and the most expensive Zu cable). The difference is readily noticeable with whatever kinds of CD/LP I listen to.
Emotion is marginally better than TD145MKii, but not as much as with amps.

However, it is rather subtle to discern the difference for phono preamps and speaker cables.
Maybe the preamps are very similar and my systems overall are not refined enough to show differences.

I wonder it would help further discern the differences if a particular kinds of music (either on CD or LP) are used for comparison testing.

Any input would be appreciated.
128x128ihcho
"use your favorites"

Yes, that is very true. Actually that is what I am doing. I have a decent amount of collections (500 CDs, 500 LPs). I just needed an additional help.

It is both fun and pain on doing this.
Fun part is if I recognize the sonic improvement from upgraded gears. Pain when I don't.
I read from somewhere that one will be blessed if he/she does not recognize differences among different gears because, then she/he does not need to spend $$$$ to search for better sound. Well, I am not the blessed one. ;-)

One thing I recognized over the weekend is that Yaqin does pretty good for full orchestration on LP. Even though it has less power it produces less congested and muddled sound than Linn. For rest of other music -- solo/chamber classical, acoustic jazz, vocal, pop/rock -- Linn is much more lively and dynamic, and of course, much more power. Yaqin has been somewhat flat on CDs for most music I tried, but Linn is miles different on CDs.

For speaker cables, the difference between the cheap single wire XLO cable has done pretty good so far. Zu biwire WAX produces a marginally better sound -- a little bit deeper base and wider sound stage. But, the MSRP of the two cables are over 10 fold (less than $100 vs $1000). I don't think I can justify the price difference.

I ordered a few more CDs and LPs upon your suggestion. I may come back once I find something more worthwhile to write about.

Thanks all.