My Constant State of Change System...

[Wakefield Turntables]

Charles, please keep posting! It's nice to see how your system has grown and changed over the years.

[cube-tube]

Charles, please keep posting! It's nice to see how your system has grown and changed over the years.

Thank you sir. It certainly has progressed quite a bit over the years.

[cube-tube]

So I was just playing this album Saturday afternoon. It's not the best recording of this piece, but it's not bad either. (BTW, I played this piece back when I was in orchestra, 1st chair bass, and loved it).

Anyway, so I was playing this piece this past Saturday afternoon through my Quad Artera Pre preamp, and was really cranking it by the 4th track.

Track 4: Maestoso - Allegro

Bass from the pipe organ rumbling at full tutti, orchestra at full tilt, brass, winds and percussions blasting, and I was happy and the system was sounding pretty darn good! I had a big ol' smile on my chops!

Well... I just did it again today, literally moments ago, only this time with the Pass XP-20 in the chain. This is the first time I really opened up the taps on the XP-20, all the way up to "68" on the volume!

Let me tell you, it was a totally different experience! A whole lot more visceral, a lot more tactile, a sense of a much larger venue, more air and space and dimension between the instruments. There's more texture and inner detail throughout. Stage width and depth are greater.

And this is with the XP-20 being on for roughly 30 hours straight so far. Anther 20 to 30 hours might improve things a little more. Who knows. It was packed up for around 3 to 4 weeks, so it may have some "waking up" to do again.

Not to sidetrack because this post is about the improvements the Pass XP-20 brings to my system, but I have to say again how impressed I am with this old Emotiva XPA-2 Gen 2 amp of mine as well. This is three different times now that I have hear this amp scale up with the upgrades I have made upstream.

There's a lot better amps out there, I know. But for what it is and what it's capable of doing is pretty darn amazing. This is a good thing. This will allow me to be happy to hold onto this amp for a while longer and save up at my leisure for an amp or amps that will truly take the system up a few more notches.

More to come, I'm sure. :grin:

[cube-tube]

Here's some updated pics of my system. Within the past month, I have upgraded my Hisense 65" LED TV to a Samsung 75" QN85B Neo QLED TV, upgraded the Cambridge Audio CXN V2 to an Auralic Altair G1, and lastly just last weekend, upgraded the Quad Artera preamp to a Pass Labs XP-20.



All three are vast improvements over the units they replaced, most importantly the Auralic and Pass. Wow!

[Wakefield Turntables]

Nice crib!

[cube-tube]

Thanks!

One of the mains reasons I wanted to get the Pass XP-20... It has an honest "Tape Loop"! I just got the analog side of the system connected to it.

[Lawrence001]

What is this heresy??

[cube-tube]

Just like now with the new preamp, it's not in the signal chain. It's just there for show, not for go... If you catch my drift.

[Lawrence001]

Phew you had me worried for a minute [emoji23]

But I like the spectrum analyser if that's connected [emoji16]

And seriously, a bit of EQ can be better than living with room issues.

[cube-tube]

Phew you had me worried for a minute [emoji23]

But I like the spectrum analyser if that's connected [emoji16]

And seriously, a bit of EQ can be better than living with room issues.

It's a good reminder of my father since it was his, along with the Technics turntable and Nakamichi deck. Takes me back to when I was a kid. Good memories.