Damping capacitors is another tweak that works, I did several before and after comparisons modding different pieces of kit, all improved the sound.
Heat Sinks?
Dont be too fast to dismiss damping them Kev, you obviously dont want to stop them functioning put a small piece on top can alter its resonant frequency, which can made a change to the sound.
Worked to good effect in my Oppo and Audiolab players.
Yes,
Its a bit of a rabbit hole, and sorta easy to dismiss, but vibration is worth making the effort to mitigate.
Just depends how far you want to take it I guess?
In my opinion, its worth doing a deep-dive on this stuff, it really works.
To James’ point about OVERdampening:
Yes, you can do that, but not for the obvious reason?
Once top level vibrations are damped, going further its about changing the resonant frequency (vibration) and that can interact with something else giving a less preferred effect.
Think of applying a damping sheet to the underside of a turntable plinth…. Would change SOMETHING in the sound, right?
Would you prefer it though?
Apply the Tweak, listen and compare, keep if you like it.
Job done. Move on to the next one.
AC POWER
Hardwired 10kVA balanced mains powering entire system
AMPS
Meridian 557 power Amp (Modded) / PS Audio BHK Preamp (Modded)
SPEAKERS
Wharfedale Evo 4.4
DAC
PS Audio Directstream (Modded)
TURNTABLE
Pro-Ject X8 balanced output via XLR / Ortofon Quintet Blue cartridge
PHONOSTAGE
Pro-Ject DS3 B balanced Input (TT and Phonostage powered by Pro-Ject Power box RS2 linear psu)
DIGITAL
OPPO 203 (Modded: Linear PSU, i2s output to Dac) - Roon Endpoint, HDMI input used for all things Streaming/ PS5 /AppleTV ... also good for movies apparently?
MUSIC PLAYBACK
Tweaked AP-Linux based Roon Server into Oppo 203 as Roon endpoint
Ipad Roon Remote.
Apple Music/ YouTube via AppleTV, fed to Dac via Oppo HDMI input/i2s output to Dac.
SPEAKER CABLES
Biwired: Duelund DCA10GA (Bass) Duelund DCA16GA (mid & treble) Duelund 12DCA used as jumpers (On "Blackcat Cable" Chris Sommivigo's advice - yup, even with biwire it sounds better - and it does)
INTERCONNECTS
All Balanced: Ghost+ recording studio XLR cables