jafox
Responses from jafox
| Audio Research amps - balanced & non Sorry Eldartford, it's not ignorance, but rather observations with my system. I have played the game with trying to use transformers to achieve balanced signals out of DACs. And the result was a loss of low-level detail and truncation of harmonic ... | |
| $20 XLR cables that sound good How do you know for sure that $100 or $1000 or $10,000 is enough to spend on IC's.Is this not true for every link in the system? The progress that many people here continue to make is to add another level of refinement to their system with each ch... | |
| $20 XLR cables that sound good As Atmasphere has cited, the balanced configuration is insensitive to the kinds of wire characteristics which lead some audiophiles to pay mega-bucks for interconnects.I have great respect for Ralph and his products. And his amps easily have the a... | |
| Moving Up the ARC Chain: Some Observations Great write up. I went through similar changes with ARC gear in the 80s and 90s. My observation was that ARC was never consistent with a "house" sound. The next generation was often not a refinement of the last but rather a completely different sh... | |
| Audio Research amps - balanced & non With a single ended input through an XLR adaptor the VT -130 SE will produce less than half the power output that it will produce with a true balanced input signal ...Really? That seems kinda odd. What does power out put have to do with it? The in... | |
| Audio Research amps - balanced & non By adding all this junk to the signal path, you significantly defeat the major strengths of the SP-10 and the VT-130.....and this is portrayal of space. These both were at the top of their class in this key area. Keep things simple and you will be... | |
| DAC with the best midrange ever..... Lots of good comments here. From the Krell products I have heard, the sound has always been rather sterile, dimensionally flat, but very resolving. I can say the same about Ayre, Spectral, Levinson(Madrigal), Klyne, etc.I have heard some of Rapoge... | |
| DAC with the best midrange ever..... The Manley Reference DAC from the mid-late 1990s. Check it out here. I have had one for several years and would not let it go because it does the middle 6 or so octaves like nothing else. And with the help of Steve Huntley at GNSC to update power ... | |
| What do you see as the downside of tubes? buy an amp that's fused so you don't have to send the unit out for repairs (or learn to solder) anytime you short a tubeThere is no guarantee that a fuse will go before a tube blows a resistor or fries a circuit-board trace. The ARC VT130 that I o... | |
| Hi End Pre-Amp shoot out in central jersey? I think Mechans is referring to a phono stage?NOT! Very very few phono stages, new or old, go much beyond 60db. And nearly all that have this much gain achieve it with a step-up transformer which takes a typical MM stage of 35-40db up another 20 t... | |
| Saw Heart last night I saw Heart at a small venue at a casino a few weeks ago and it was not as loud as described at all. But like any rock concert, ear protection is always advised. And yes, Ann and Nancy were both outstanding. So very cool! | |
| Hi End Pre-Amp shoot out in central jersey? I assume you mean line stages here? Or did you also compare the phono stages?Can you share the differences, pros/cons of the Dart vs. the MA1 in your system? It's good to get a feel of these parameters to know how subsequent line stages compare to... | |
| What do you see as the downside of tubes? Ah nuts, had I only tried putting a Mack truck on my old PS Audio amp before I got into tube amps, I would have saved a lot of pain and suffering from the hassle of tube amps. | |
| What to listen for when setting VTF? The responses above reflect VTA (angle) changes but Gbb is asking about VTF (force) changes. | |
| What do you see as the downside of tubes? This is usually only an issue though in the summer months, as in the winter you will actually appreciate the (rather costly) space heaters!Oh so true with a pair of CAT JL-3's here in Minnesota. |