barrysandy
Responses from barrysandy
| Fozgometer/Adjust + Exchange This sounds a little strange to me if you can adjust the gain on your phono preamp. What do you see on the screen when you play the test record? Do you mean the output of the cartridge/phono section is too high and there’s clipping/overloading the... | |
| Audio Research Factory Tour It's interesting to me what people expect in a 20 minute video. If you know the company's history and have owned and listened to many of their classic designs the video is a nice supplement to all that. I don't need to hear a soliloquy on circuit ... | |
| Is Jim Smith's Book"Get Better Sound"Best Book ? One of the best audio reference books ever with a lifetime of ideas to improve your system and setup. Almost everything will sound familiar until you pay attention to the details and realize how many hidden gems there are. There were at least 3 id... | |
| Tri-Planar & Customer Service Excellence lewm: As to upgrading the arm to a VII from the IV, this was done back in 2009 so there are likely new offerings. Tri rebuilt the arm with new tighter-tolerance bearings, changed the wiring harness to Discovery cable if I recollect, and added the ... | |
| Tri-Planar & Customer Service Excellence Some years ago Tri Mai upgraded my IV to a VII for a very fair price with quick turnaround too. Oh, if you can find someone with a cable cooker you can burn in the tonearm wires much faster. The signal level is so low otherwise they never get comp... | |
| Best Jazz pianist Maybe not the best, but a huge influence and way up there -- big Earl Hines and Eubie Blake fan. | |
| Capitol Audio Fest This is a show that has gotten better and better over the past 3 years I've attended and is well worth the trip. The overall sound quality of the systems/rooms has improved every year. The big VAC / Von Schweikert room was truly amazing if you he... | |
| What are your favorite upright 4-5 shelve audio rack recommendations? Steve Blinn, who advertises here, makes really nice ones. If you were on a tight budget you might consider Sanus. | |
| Dirac vs dspeaker room correction Have been using Dspeaker Dual Core Antimode 2.0 since 2012. Very easy to use for basic room correction and it has lots of additional functionality besides. Terrific customer support if you have a software issue like when doing uploads of new ver... | |
| What's been your turntable ownership over the years? Dual 1209Harmon Kardon Rabco ST-8 (tangential arm)Denon DP-3000 direct driveVPI HW-19 MK III (later with Applied Fidelity sapphire & ceramic bearing)TW-Acustic Raven Anniversary w/ BN upgrades (copper platter, 3 motor unit, mat, & feet) | |
| Alternative mat for SME turntable Funny you should ask about this. There’s a TT mat shootout on part-time audiophile that might be of interest. I think it’s generally hard to predict what any mat will sound like for various TTs.https://parttimeaudiophile.com/2017/02/15/five-turnta... | |
| Counterpoint NP-220 died: I've owned and upgraded variants of these for 17 years. NP220s can be very nice sounding amps depending on the level of upgrades so you may be disappointed with something else. Haven't heard the BHK amp, but it's worth checking out if you decided ... | |
| Best Capacitors for Crossovers I like the Duelund Cast caps for speaker crossovers and use them on the tweeter / midrange panels of my Magnepan 3.6s. They sound amazingly clear and natural. They're almost as good as a Pass Labs 3 way active crossover used on the bass panels and... | |
| Top resistors I’m sure everyone would agree that assessing sonic characteristics of parts in a complex audio system is extremely challenging due to component interactions, but here’s my experience. Shinkohs and Riken Ohms are nice, but just too colored, in a ni... | |
| Who do you like for equipment mods? Not sure why I didn't mention it above, but Bill Thalmann at Music Technology in Springfield, VA outside of DC does terrific work. He worked for Conrad Johnson and has been doing repairs and mods for a very long time (and to prove it - he is alway... |