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trivema

Responses from trivema

McIntosh is now inside a Jeep luxury car.
I love my Jeep Grand Cherokee ecodeisel!! 30 mpg rock snow mud buttons, 5 inches air suspension lift so i can pull all those luxury suv out when stuck! Tru story.   
Tidal or Qobuz
I find Qobuz much better SQ on my reference system, very highly resolving with lots of digital bells and whistles, e.g., network switches, fanless silent mini with optimized settings, LPS, great DAC, balanced cables, big tube amp with lots of head... 
What is your most fond musical memory.
Having Doc Watson perform with his nephew at my father’s farmhouse in Western North Carolina in the early 90’s at Christmas time.  Doc is a legend in our part of the world and was a pure musician.    
Focal Aria 948
I have pair of Aria 926 and pair of Klipsch Forte IIIs in the same system. Proper positioning in room relative to sitting area is critical, both width and distance from wall as well as toe in for both.  The Aria’s are way more finicky with positio... 
dac and streamer or seperates
Separates for sure. Magic is in the DAC+.  At some personal risk for blasphemy, look at the WiiM Pro streamer @ $150 and a separate linear power supply.  If you believe in measurements, and in this case I do, check out VintageFlanker’s review on a... 
Dennis Had FIRE 300 B tube SET
I have a KT88 Fire Bottle, awesome little amp.  No preamp into Klipsch Forte’s @99 dB sensitive.  Superb soundstage and imagery.  Dead silent when no signal, you’re going to love the 300b with good speaker match.   
New Product RE: Denafrips 12th Anniversary Edition Digital-to-Digital Converter (DDC)
I have pre 12th IRIS taking signal from mac mini to Pontus II and Toppong D90LE depending on mood, music and speaker set driving.  The Iris made a noticeable improvement in detail, soundstage and blackness between passages.  I thought it was worth... 
Soundstage Heresy IV and Forte IV
Proper listening triangle and correct toe-in Forte’s have massive soundstage in my main rig. 20 watt SET 300b driving 845 output tubes, volume pot never past 10 o’clock.  Does it sound live? Close!   
Are higher end preamps worth the investment when you are only streaming Tidal & Spotify ?
Qobuz definitely best SQ streaming service v Amazon HD, Spotify, Pandora, Haven’t tried Tidal.     Looked up the Modwright 150, it’s a beast!  If you can, audition a few high end tube preamps, e.g., Audio Research, McIntosh, then you’ll know and ... 
KT-77 vs. KT-66
Concur with wolf_garcia the GL KT77 is a fantastic output tube in a Had Inspire, detail, warmth, linear up and down the frequency range with excellent harmonics (my way of saying sounds great!).     toddnig comments are helpful identifying KT88/6... 
KT-77 vs. KT-66
KT66 will definitely sound different than KT88.  KT88 is Europe’s answer to 6550.  My Inspire will run both.  I love the St Petersburg Svetlana 6550 in my Inspire, also have GL KT88 which is slightly different than the 6550, hard to put my finger ... 
KT-77 vs. KT-66
All things being equal, KT66=6L6 w kinkless filament.  KT77=EL34 kinkless filament.  That being said, I prefer the Gold Lion KT77 over my Tesla, Svetlana, RFT, VEB and Psvane (the worst) EL34s.  KT77 has more of everything of the EL34 sonic signat... 
As A Youngster, What Unit Puqued Your Interest In All This?
My dad’s HH Scott 222C, a Garrad turntable playing mom’s favorite Tom Jones album through a pair of 15 inch single driver Altec’s mounted in furniture grade cabinets.  Didn’t drive my Led Zeppelin or Black Sabbath albums very well, so I went NAD s... 
Pro/Studio Subwoofers
Check out Sweetwater’s pro sub selection.  From $400 8 inch JBL to $5K 15 inch Genelec!  Must have dual balanced inputs for most all except Focal which offers a 2.1 LFE bypass input. They have great sales support as well.  i think key is proper s... 
First Tube amp suggestions
Look for a used Dennis Had Inspire KT88 Firebottle on audiomart sites.  He hasn’t built many, but for $2k you get the performance of a $10k SET amp.  He built me one last summer, it blows away my Willsenton R800i and Oldchen EL34 for texture,  ton...