Hello from North Yorkshire

[This boy can wait]

Hello everyone,

I'm Stef, originally from London but now living in North Yorkshire and I have been dabbling in HiFi since I bought some B&W DM600s and a NAD amp from Pirates Hifi in Leicester in 1993. After moving to Liverpool I fell into the clutches of Doug Brady Hifi in Warrington, picking up the Pink Triangle LPT GTI that I still have today and an Exposure Amp.

I then somehow ended up in the living room of a chap called David Speirs who got me hooked on a Sugden A21a, which ended up driving some Proac Studio 100s for years.

Fast forward a bit via experimenting with A21a bi-amping, I chopped everything in for a Sugden A21a Series II, CD21 and a Pair of Proac D15s from Audio Republic in Leeds. I still have the A21aII and the Proacs but everything got packed away for the last 10 years as we had a family and I got pushed out of the last remaining free bedroom. We've now moved and the hifi is set up again and I'm loving it. Despite everything sounding wonderful it was about 3 days before I started wondering what I could change, which is how I've come back to hifi forums. I've been on Hifi Wigwam since 2008 and have just found AoS.

My digital listening is now a laptop feeding into an Audio GD NFB-2 DAC via an Art Legato USB>SPDIF converter, both swapped/bought from a very nice man called Andy from Heckmondwike and I still haven't got the turntable set up yet.

And that's how I came to be here. It looks like a very nice community - hello :)

[southall-1998_mk2]

Howdy! Welcome to AOS.

Have fun.

S.

[Light Dependant Resistor]

Hi Stef
Welcome to AOS, that's a nice system you have, with a nice combination of Sugden amps. In your shoes i would choose a piece of piano music
and see how your system as it is, reproduces all the complexities piano can provide. Basing future changes on that same piece, will give you a good reference
of where you are heading.

Interconnects and new speaker cable are modest outlay, and can yield great results.

Cheers / Chris

[This boy can wait]

Thanks Shane and Chris.

I'm going to start a digital interconnect from my USB>SPDIF converter to my DAC as I didn't even know that this was different from the RCA interconnects I had lying around. The Legato has a BNC output so this is a good opportunity to try a new cable.

One thing, it's nice to be able to talk about cables sounding different. When I was frequenting forums >12 years ago, that was essentially impossible without things turning sour very quickly!

[Light Dependant Resistor]

Hi Stef
Yes AOS is quite unlike other forums, and your opinions are respected - Marco's post 5 here https://theartofsound.net/forum/showthread.php?17-The-basics-of-Ethos&p=857999#post857999
sums it up, so well.


" I'm adding this to our Ethos as I feel that it sums up how we on AOS view the judgement of hi-fi equipment and its associated ancillaries, in reference to the oft raised measurements v. 'using one's ears' debate...

We would gladly use science automatically as the benchmark to judge all things hi-fi, if we felt that it provided all the answers necessary. It would certainly be much easier having an 'undisputable reference' as one's basis for judgement. But it's the grey areas that bother us.

Quite clearly, science can't currently provide all the answers in audio, certainly as far as measuring how equipment and its associated ancillaries treats music signals, and ascertaining how humans process recorded musical information, via our ears and brain. Therefore grey areas exist because we are not robots, and so when listening to music, our brains aren't programmed to respond in a specific way to known audio measurement parameters... The fact is, we do not listen to music in the same way as scientific apparatus measures sound waves.

If such apparatus could measure how we as humans listen to and appreciate music, then measurements would be truly meaningful and embraced wholeheartedly by music enthusiasts and audiophiles alike. That is why audio/music enthusiasts, like those on AOS, will always trust their ears more than any scientific tests or measurements, because what can currently be measured scientifically just doesn't tell the whole story.

Until the day comes when tests and measurements unequivocally provide all the answers, we will happily continue using our discerning ears which for us are infinitely more accurate and reliable in ascertaining what really matters in hi-fi (and subsequently in our enjoyment of music), especially in those all-important grey areas... It's often the small details or 'grey areas' that make the most significant difference, and thus are ultimately of most significance!

Marco. "

[Scorps]

Hi Stef
Welcome to the forums :)
Regards
Pete

[walpurgis]

Hello Steph. Welcome to AOS.

Never seen anybody bi-amp with A21a amps, interesting idea.

Join in the chat and get to know everybody.


Enjoy the forum,
Geoff.

[enrae8]

Hello Stef
Welcome - AOS seems to be very relaxed compared to other forums - you can just dip in and out whenever you feel like it - no hassle:)
Cheers
Neil

[This boy can wait]

Thanks Geoff.

The Sugden bi-amping was a relatively short term experiment. I loved my A21a series I and just wanted more, so I bought an A21p and tried using them together but the result did not match my probably unrealistic expectations. So I traded both in for an A21a Series II, which I like very much.

All best, Stef

[Pigmy Pony]

Hello Stef
Welcome - AOS seems to be very relaxed compared to other forums - you can just dip in and out whenever you feel like it - no hassle:)
Cheers
Neil

Hey Neil, where the bloody hell have you been, I don't know, coming and going, it's not a bloody hotel you know...:D Welcome to AoS Stef :)

[enrae8]

Hey Neil, where the bloody hell have you been, I don't know, coming and going, it's not a bloody hotel you know...:D Welcome to AoS Stef :)
Yeah - Had a bit of a shock passing in the family

[Pigmy Pony]

Oh man, sorry to hear that, it's always a shock, even when it's sort of expected. Ex wife's mother's in hospital with the covid, news is she's improving.

[Barry]

Welcome to AoS Stef.

Nice introduction. What are your tastes in music?

Enjoy the Forum
Barry