Since the change of speaker cable sorted out the overall tonal balance of the system I am now much happier with it. So I decided to try my benchmark recording to see where I am at with it. At the NEBO before last we had a listen to Gordon's (Halfway Tree) 3 way digital active system with open baffles, dipole bass and a Benchmark DAC for each channel. This was a landmark for me in terms of fidelity and holographic imaging and has remained a marker for me to aim at. This was the recording that so impressed:
http://i903.photobucket.com/albums/a...eff%20beck.jpg
My copy arrived yesterday so I stuck it on eager to see how close I have got to the reference.
And the answer is... not very close. It does sound good, impressive even, but it is still short in terms of clarity, and as for the holographic imaging, where you can 'see' the venue and the performers, forget about it. Not there at all. I mean obviously there is a stereo soundstage, but it is not even close to holographic. Damn. Back to the drawing board.
The soundstage thing I could dismiss as the room and the placement. Room treatment and messing with speaker positioning might help here. Marco suggested having the speakers further apart with a bit more toe-in, might look at doing that. The clarity thing, that is where I think I might be up against a brick wall. I'm suspecting that getting rid of the passive crossover and having the amps directly connected to the drivers might be the key there, as I can't see how my current amplification combo could be realistically improved on otherwise.
I suppose I could just be happy with what I have, it is exceeding my expectations and is highly enjoyable, but where's the fun in that? Itches to scratch, what can you do?
