The Ultra-Fi thread

[Nielsio]

A purely ported sub-100hz bass seems lol btw. That's gonna sound entirely muddy and slow.

No, I think these guys are more in it for the bling than real audio quality.

[Nielsio]

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No, I think these guys are more in it for the bling than real audio quality.

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But if you feel otherwise, please share.

[PITTM]

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Nielsio - I'm curious why you don't have a direct IS2 USB dac instead of the Spdif connection.

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My DAC has limited functionality when used with USB as opposed to spdif I was told. I never have a/b'd though.

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I'm convinced a good lossless, PC audio based system is the way of the future. No more spinning discs.


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except the hard drive [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

[suzzer99]

OP and several others in this thread, I used to work for a high-end audio store. You are what the salesman would have called "bread-and-butter". You would have been mentioned at Thanksgiving when it was time to say what you were thankful for.

That said, things have come a long freaking way in 10 years. I started to become a tiny bit of an car-audiophile, so I get the concept. But I just feel like you're always chasing the buzz of that first upgrade to a high-class system, when all your music sounds new again. It seems like every upgrade after that is diminishing returns.

But I dunno, I'm not sure I've heard a system as well laid out as the one you describe. Do you still feel like all your music is new when you make some big coherence breakthrough or something?

[cwsiggy]

all,

Red Wine Audio has some of the coolest products (battery powered integrated and mono amps and modded battery powered Olive music servers. Vinni Rossi also has an all battery powered USB DAC/ Pre amp in the works - called Isabella - from his website....

"The Isabella will be an SLA battery powered tubed preamp, with built-in NOS dac (non-oversampling...not to be confused with "new old stock" in this context Mr. Green) . Details are still being worked out and please keep in mind that nothing is set in stone at this point, but here are some of the features:

-- Tubed-preamp stage using two 6922 (6DJ8/ECC88) tubes...one per channel. Other tubes in this family can be used, such as the 7308, 6H23 (russian), 6N11 (chinese)

-- The Isabella will be completely off-the-grid running on SLA battery power, and will feature the new SMART module as described here:
http://www.audiocircle.com/circles/i...?topic=44739.0
It will also feature the same new style 24V SLA battery charger as the Siganture 30.2 and 70.2 (with 4x faster charging speed and beefy XLR plug), and touch-sensing power switch built into the front panel.

-- The gain will probably in the neighborhood of 12dB

-- There will be a built-in non-oversampling dac that is going to change your opinion of "digital music" in that it is not going to sound anything like digital. With a USB input (direct to I2S), using a computer as your source is going to blow your mind. Singing Happily For those who prefer to use a CD player, DVD player, SB2, SB3, Olive Music Server (hopefully modded on SLA ), or any other source that outputs SPDIF, the Isabella's internal dac will also accept coax or optical spdif inputs."

www.redwineaudio.com


Suzzer99 - You are of course correct about diminishing returns - lets face it - the main difference in a 20k speaker and a good 5k one is mostly bass. I think you probably don't need to spend much more than say 6k total. Anything more is serious diminishing returns, but for a Goldman Sachs subprime shortseller, why not...

These new digital products are very exciting in that for relatively low money - one gets the best of both worlds; world beating sound that competes with expensive transports and cd palyers and the advantages of digital playback such as unlimited access to entire library on the fly.
I will never, ever, ever, ever purchase a cd player again.
Most people have of couese already figured this out, but for the wrong reasons (mp3)


I need more $ [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]

[Nielsio]

[ QUOTE ]
OP and several others in this thread, I used to work for a high-end audio store. You are what the salesman would have called "bread-and-butter". You would have been mentioned at Thanksgiving when it was time to say what you were thankful for.

That said, things have come a long freaking way in 10 years. I started to become a tiny bit of an car-audiophile, so I get the concept. But I just feel like you're always chasing the buzz of that first upgrade to a high-class system, when all your music sounds new again. It seems like every upgrade after that is diminishing returns.

But I dunno, I'm not sure I've heard a system as well laid out as the one you describe. Do you still feel like all your music is new when you make some big coherence breakthrough or something?

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The problem you describe is what happens when you don't think about and experiment with system design; if your system doesn't improve on a conceptual level, then you're never going to be really happy with the results.

This is actually one of the things that the hifi market taylors to: the designs stay the same fundamentally and people are stuck upgrading forever in miniscule ways.

[Nielsio]

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Suzzer99 - You are of course correct about diminishing returns - lets face it - the main difference in a 20k speaker and a good 5k one is mostly bass.

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wat?


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I think you probably don't need to spend much more than say 6k total.

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wat?

[jeffnc]

As you get into hi-fi, you realize what really is important and what isn't. Some spend unreal sums on "extreme point of diminishing returns" or even pure snake oil, such as $3,000 power cords, Shakti stones, green magic markers for CD edges, and such. But then they set up their $50,000 system in some crappy audio space and with components that don't complement each other.

The attributes of the room your stereo goes in is huge. And it might not cost anything at all. Simply by moving your stereo from one room to another could result in huge improvements. Most people don't realize that you don't listen to your stereo, you listen to sound waves. And the physical properties of the room your stereo is in has a huge effect on the sound waves that reach your ears.

Another example would be turntable setup. You can buy a $2,000 cartridge, but if the thing isn't aligned and installed optimally, the sound might suck. Again, that is free. You could very easily get better sound from a $200 cartridge than a $3,000 one, and never have a clue why.

When people start thinking in terms of physics rather than magic, they'll do better.

Personally, I'm convinced that satellite/sub combos have a better chance at providing the best bass response. You open up new problems like introduction of new crossovers, cables and amps. But being able to have flexibility in the location and settings for just the deep woofer is a big advantage for most setups.

Another problem some people have is only understanding part of the picture. Different technologies usually have different strengths and weaknesses. If you simply buy a particular component because "it's the best", it might be the exact opposite of what your system really needs. Also, just because some audio magazine or some audio snob says such-and-such is very important, it might not be important to you. You have to listen to music and decide what's really important to you. You don't want a tube amp if the strengths and weaknesses don't fit your personal preferences.

Having said that, the customer (you, in this case) is not always right. That is, just because you think you like your sound a certain way, you might think that out of ignorance. If you don't like much low bass response, then it's not worth paying for it. However if you think you don't like low bass response as a knee-jerk reaction to the goofball with the jacked up car playing rap music way too loud at your local stoplight, then you are doing yourself a disservice by not going out to a quality hi-fi store and listening to what true lifelike low bass extension really is.

You might find that midrange timbre and lack of treble grain is so important to you that you can live without deep bass if that's what you have to give up. Then you might live with a very low power tube amp. On the other hand the reverse might be true. If you find the bottom octave of music is important to giving you a lifelike presentation (or even an artificial presentation that you simply enjoy more), then you might go with some different setup.

[Nielsio]

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all,

Red Wine Audio has some of the coolest ..

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Hadn't heard of that one before. Yeah, their products seem hot. Same type of stuff as BD Design has in terms of electronics, today. It's all pretty similar to the stuff I already have, but if you're new to this you now have a bunch of competing options for a reasonable price.

[Nielsio]

Nice post jeff.