Justin & Jerry's Hifi Blog

[diceman]

Oh bugger.
If you can't get it to work maybe Justin can send one of his spares, assuming he hasn't taken a hammer to them yet!

I'm sure it can be tweaked back to shape OK. I've got a spare valve base somewhere i'll use to check it before fitting to the amp.

[User211]

IMHO going active is the next stage. I appreciate the buggeration in finding 4 bloody good matching monoblock amps but having heard how good a najda active dsp sounds it's where I'd be heading.

TBH I have thought about it quite a bit.

[Ali Tait]

IMHO going active is the next stage. I appreciate the buggeration in finding 4 bloody good matching monoblock amps but having heard how good a najda active dsp sounds it's where I'd be heading.

I use a miniDSP 4x10HD to very good effect to my lugs. I don't think it's strictly necessary to use matching amps, I use a variety and match gain with the DSP..

[User211]

MiniDSP 2x4 HD might be fun to play with. Might order one. Never know til you try. Not too pricey and I have 4 monos in the room anyway.

The passive crossover should be bloody hard to beat though is my hope when the foo is in. Just waiting for the custom made Jantzen inductors, more Pass resistors and Alumen caps to turn up.

[User211]

And low and behold...

[Macca]

Is this the foo then? I have no idea what I am looking at. Components recovered after the Roswell saucer crash?

[diceman]

MiniDSP 2x4 HD might be fun to play with. Might order one. Never know til you try. Not too pricey and I have 4 monos in the room anyway.

The passive crossover should be bloody hard to beat though is my hope when the foo is in. Just waiting for the custom made Jantzen inductors, more Pass resistors and Alumen caps to turn up.

Iv not heard a minidsp. It I did have the chance to listen to speedy Steves horns in his house before he moved. The integration and even frequency response was astounding, it was easily a couple of leagues above his show performances. Once you have full control of time alignment, crossover freq and shape as well as allowing some minor room correction (only knock out the big peaks imho) it just sounds right, slight warmth/valvey-ness can be added if you so desire at the change of a setting.

My own budget play with a Behringer and 3 x a500s beat hundreds of hours of passive crossover design within 1 hour! It's the way I will be going but does limit box swapping a lot as the pre and dac are all in the najda and amp swapping becomes a difficult process with2/3 matching amps. Whilst I have used different amps I never found they totally integrated if the crossover was in the mid-range, it may be easier with the 500hz? Of the apogees. I've not tried yet.

[User211]

Yo Macca yes that is the foo.

Diceman - what I really don't like about the MiniDSP is the A/D and D/A process between the pre an power amps to enable the fucking around. And the dissimilar power amps I'd have to use. Time alignment is not an issue with a Duetta as it is excellent anyway. I do use digital processing in the form of rapidly on-the-fly GUI driven PEQ. In fact I'm cutting the 8-9K region now as I listen by a couple of DB. But it is all done without the A/D D/A intervention i.e. before the digital input hits the DAC. Good I think.

Those Jantzen inductors use lovely looking copper with silver plated tags. Much better looking than the Monocor ones I am using now. They are also massively larger and heavier than the Monocor for the same inductance (can that really be a good thing?). I've got some pretty huge Mundorfs in the crossovers too but by looks alone the Jantzens look better. Danish quality I guess.

Will wire the foo up tomoz. I will say though the Monocor stuff is brilliant for the money. Such cheapness actually sounds great right now as I am listening on some of the best speakers I have ever heard LOL.That said I did swap in a couple of original Apogee Ohmites recently to replace a couple of Monocor resistors and they are better. Still they are cheap too.

Curious as to what will happen with the foo.

Sorry Jezzer but sure you won't mind too much.

That said I completely agree the flexibility to mess around with an active solution is unparalled JP.

And a word to Ali - still have really fond memories of your OBs. Outstanding for the cost. Were you using the MiniDSP then?

[User211]

New crossover is lush, sweet, spacious, detailed and very listenable in the mids and highs, which is where the mods were.

Breathed a sigh of relief it doesn't suck and there's no "wait for the caps to break in after 400 hours they'll be OK" BS to live with.

Credit where credit is due to Humble Homemade Hi-Fi for the Jantzen Alumen Z-Cap recommendation cos they obviously are really seriously good. As are the Path's and Jantzen coils. It all works really well together.

It's Monacor nor Monocor BTW soz about that. Good cheap stuff but not in this league. Very useful for working out if the balance is correct when prototyping.

Normal service now resumes on Jerry's thread

[jandl100]