eldartford

Responses from eldartford

Aragon 4004 mk2 vs Adcom 555 mk2
Kool39...My observation about "way more musical" was general in nature, interpreting Johngalt47's observation.With regard to the particular Aragon amp: no I do not have experience with it. From what I see and read it appears to be similar in conce... 
Questions about Toslink's
I consulted with our fiber optics guy, and as I suspected there are "switches": in fact there are multiplexers. The switch is implemented with a solid state variable opacity material, and is controlled by 0/+5 vdc. Just a guess but the cost would ... 
Aragon 4004 mk2 vs Adcom 555 mk2
"Way more musical" is a nice way of saying it has more harmonic distortion. Ok if that's what you like. 
Best center speakers for dialogue clarity?
Dialog clarity is best with a speaker that has quite restricted frequency response, and therefore is lousy for music. For music you should have a center speaker that matches the Left and Right speakers, and use of a dialog speaker, alas too common... 
Quality of 70s Quad Pressings?
For SQ recordings you really need a decoder, but, if you have a couple of extra speakers, hook them up in series with each other, and "bridged" across the Hot terminals of your stereo amp and put them in the back of the room. You will recover some... 
Rate these on order of importance:
Unsound...No they don't. 
Stereophile confirms new gear is getting worse....
We audiophiles regard specs as being (or should be) related to sonic characteristics. But this is not the primary purpose of specs.A product is tested and the test results are compared with specs so as to verify that the particular unit does not h... 
Stereophile confirms new gear is getting worse....
IMHO, anyone who pays $18,000 for an audio amplifier deserves what he gets. This is not rocket science. 
Rate these on order of importance:
I think that the order of importance changes as you go up the price scale. For a system below $1200, the speakers will be the limiting factor. (Disc player, $250, Amp,$400 Magnepan MMG, $550). Going up in cost, I would still put money into better ... 
Warrenty and lifespan of cd players
The mechanical aspects of playing a CD, including dynamic adjustment of LED focus are quite remarkable, and I find it hard to understand how they can make it work so well when brand new. It is a characteristic of mechanical devices that they wear ... 
Cross over frequency ???
Sean..."Versatility"? My Rotel 1066 is so damn versatile that half the time I can't figure out what it is up to. And the manual isn't much help. I do hear a lot of complaints about "bass handling", so perhaps the solution is what I have done...set... 
Organ CDs with really deep bass
When I do want to shake my house I use Telarc SACD 60579 "The Sound of Glory" Morman Tabernacle Chior. This is not exclusively organ music, but they do have one monster organ there in Salt Lake City, and most of the stops were pulled out on some o... 
Help with increasing gain on pre amp or options?
The gain of either the preamp or the power amp could be easily increased slightly by trivial circuit changes. Why not consult with the manufacturers? 
Why are some cables 'directional'?
With AC electricity, like music, electrons don't "travel" anywhere, but just jump back and forth in one place. Take it from me. Some of my best friends are electrons. 
attenuating maggie 3.6's
As an experiment with low cost biwire, I replaced the one ohm resistor that I had been using with a small size wire run for the tweeter, calculated (and measured) to give me the one ohm that I like. I think the results are very good, and I don't k...