It will be interesting to hear what others think of the recordings. I suppose it could be a combination of the recordings and the room.
Location: cheltenham
Posts: 747
I'm matt.
It will be interesting to hear what others think of the recordings. I suppose it could be a combination of the recordings and the room.
Just had a listen to the Donald Byrd album. It's a good quality recording with good dynamic range. After the first couple of tunes I couldn't detect any issues at all so I cranked the level right up beyond what I would normally listen at and played the rest of the album like that.
I used an Oppo universal player into a Soncoz SGD1 DAC into a Krell KSA100 Mk2 into JM Lab Electra 926' - volume controlled via the DAC.
But I couldn't hear any issues, it did not sound 'up front'. There was no break up on any instruments at any time.
Have to say I would not expect to hear any break up on a professional recording like this. It's a multitrack, they are not live takes so if there was a problem with overload on one track they'd just re-take, they wouldn't use it. Bear in mind if there was any overload then it would sound even worse on direct playback in the studio than it does playing the finished product at home.
I d be interested if anyone else who has this album or access to it would try and see if they can hear the flute issue.
Anyway - Caveats - The power amp is on the smooth/warm side of neutral, and my room is well damped with some treatment in one corner. There were a couple of occasions with the trumpet where I could imagine that in an underdamped room with a lot of hard surfaces, it might be too much and there'd be some ringing.
Current Lash Up:
TEAC VRDS 701T > Sony TAE1000ESD > Krell KSA50S > JM Labs Focal Electra 926.
I just played it as well, sounding better in my system now, still a few passages with spiky treble though. Since I changed all the valves to Gold Lion and put the speakers right back in the corners, more bass balances out the harsh treble I was getting, although with some music sounding a bit too warm/syrupy, leading to a sound which could be clearer. Overall though with jazz its better. I'll experiment with finer adjustments with speaker positioning and cable. What size is your listening room? I would consider moving flats, but where I live I have a lot of freedom to play music as much as I like at decent volume as I have so few neighbours.
Current system 1210 GR. CDP - Meridian G08. Amp -Sugden A21I - Sig. Wharfedale Lintons.
Location: Plymouth
Posts: 20
I'm Stephen.
I feel I must remind you why you started this thread:-
Valve amps, great with Jazz, shit with everything else
You have acknowledged the issue is your room. I just want to be clear that this whole exercise has been a wast of time. Do you think possibly that you should adjust the title to "room acoustics can really suck"
Sources:
Turntable - Rega P2 (Modified).
Streamer - Cambridge Audio Azur 851N.
Reel to Reel - Akai GX635D.
NAS - Thecus N4200 Pro.
Amplification:
Phono Pre - QUAD Twenty Four P.
Pre Amp - QUAD QC - Twenty Four.
Power Amps - 2 x QUAD 11 Forty mono blocks.
Headphone Amp - QUAD PA - One.
Rack:
Blok Stax 400 and Blok Stax 300
To recap, all valves in S500 now Gold Lion, mains regenerator in the attic, soon to be seen in the classifieds ('makes a huge difference'!). Audionote confirmed the old versions of the AN J I have are fine in corners, so I shoved them reet back in there, along with the spiders, and its great to get them out the way. Sofa - which I've always - silly me - had reet back up against the wall, now out about 2 feet into the room, this was a slight improvement, i could tell the moment I did it, bass less boomy. As usual it will take a few weeks to see whether I really like these changes, as I haven't had my TT set up for a while, don't know how that will sound, most of my rock is vinyl based too, so see how that sounds as opposed to just jazz (90% of my cds). In time I can see myself trying other speakers, and keeping the valves, but who knows.
Current system 1210 GR. CDP - Meridian G08. Amp -Sugden A21I - Sig. Wharfedale Lintons.
Current system 1210 GR. CDP - Meridian G08. Amp -Sugden A21I - Sig. Wharfedale Lintons.
Never mind this bollox, have you fitted that SC35C and NOS stylus yet?
Marco.
Main System
Turntable: Heavily-modified Technics SL-1210MK5G [Mike New bearing/ETP platter/Paul Hynes SR7 PSU & reg mods]. Funk Firm APM Achromat/Nagaoka GL-601 Crystal Record Weight/Isonoe feet & boots/Ortofon RS-212D/Denon DL-103GL in Denon PCL-300 headshell with Funk Firm Houdini/Kondo SL-115 pure-silver cartridge leads.
Paul Hynes MC head amp/SR5 PSU. Also modded Lentek head amp/Denon AU-310 SUT.
Other Cartridges: Nippon Columbia (NOS 1987) Denon DL-103. USA-made Shure SC35C with NOS stylus. Goldring G820 with NOS stylus. Shure M55E with NOS stylus.
CD Player: Audiocom-modified Sony X-777ES/DAS-R1 DAC.
Tape Deck: Tandberg TCD 310, fully restored and recalibrated as new, by RDE, plus upgraded with heads from the TCD-420a. Also with matching TM4 Norway microphones.
Preamps: Heavily-modified Croft Charisma-X. LDR Stereo Coffee. Power Amps: Tube Distinctions Copper Amp fitted with Tungsol KT-150s. Quad 306.
Cables & Sundries: Mark Grant HDX1 interconnects and digital coaxial cable, plus Mark Grant 6mm UP-LCOFC Van Damme speaker cable. MCRU 'Ultimate' mains leads. Lehmann clone headphone amp with vintage Koss PRO-4AAA headphones.
Tube Distinctions digital noise filter. VPI HW16.5 record cleaning machine.
Speakers: Tannoy 15MGs in Lockwood cabinets with modified crossovers. 1967 Celestion Ditton 15.
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