Gromit's music centre...

[Gromit]

What cables are you using with your NVA amps Richard?

I keep looking at NVA equipment on eBay but I'm constantly put off by potential problems of cabling and using a non-passive pre-amp. It says that any cable over 200 picofarads per metre is not advised but I haven't a clue where to find that kind of info about my cables.

My pre now (which is my DAC) has 5v variable output so is very far from a being a passive input in terms of voltage.

Hi Rob - I'm using NVA LS5 speaker cable (bi-wire config) and for the pre-power & CD-pre I've some NVA Super Soundpipes. Normal Soundpipe for the Slee phonesa amp.

I've a 6m set of LS1 speaker cable that may be coming up for sale soon (if you or anyone else might be interested).

Richard'll be able to give you the low-down on cable/passive/active compatability though - it all goes way above my head!

[Gromit]

Update...



Been having a dabble with some of Salisbury's finest (NAC72/NAP180; Hi-Cap's arriving on monday). There are some Avondale 821 boards to try aswell, loaned by a very helpful member of one of the other forums.

The NVA rig is sat in the other room keeping warm and cosy on some 240v/ac but will plug it into the system later this week to see how the two set-ups compare. Should be fun!

[Gromit]

Been having a spring clean and move around. I got my old Audiotech table out of the loft and put it under the NAS. It's made a major improvement, tightening things up noticably. Losing the spikes off the top of it and using strips of Dynamat to stop the metal tubes ringing has helped.

I had wondered, from previous fiddling, that the Spacedeck doesn't like spiked supports as it causes resonances to be set up. Seems that may have been right as it's a much more free-flowing but dynamic presenation now.

[Filterlab]

Nice one, I love tweaks like that. I'm going to sort out some kind of isolation for my front channels on the 5.1 system, they're Polks and for some reason have no spikes (?) which makes them a bit 'fat' in the bass.

Simple stuff always seems to work wonders.

[Gromit]

Simple stuff always seems to work wonders.

Indeed it does Rob.

I'm quite pleasantly surprised, mostly regarding the improvement in dynamics. Whereas before the NAS whilst all very sweet and 'pleasant' (yuk) sounding, it now has its teeth back. Most notably, bass is improved and now has much more weight and detachment from the overall sonic picture. For want of a better description there's less 'hash' - less 'noise' going on behind what really matters.

It's a win-win result...just the sort I like.

[WikiBoy]

Indeed it does Rob.

I'm quite pleasantly surprised, mostly regarding the improvement in dynamics. Whereas before the NAS whilst all very sweet and 'pleasant' (yuk) sounding, it now has its teeth back. Most notably, bass is improved and now has much more weight and detachment from the overall sonic picture. For want of a better description there's less 'hash' - less 'noise' going on behind what really matters.

It's a win-win result...just the sort I like.

If you want a tech-ie explanation it is all down to coupling or uncoupling and the degree to which it is applied. It is fitting mechanical filters or removing them, the physical equivalent of LCR.

If everything is right then in order to maintain that full transmission with a mechanically resonant object (i.e. something that is using motion to derive electrical current, turntable / or something that is using electrical current to derive motion, loudspeaker) you must couple as rigidly as possible. BUT you may not want everything that object is giving you as it will have an inherent timbre, or peaks at resonent frequencies. That is why sometimes mechanical capacitors are necessary, simplest being bluetac or half squash ball etc.

Nothing is ever perfect in the world of audio, everything is a compromise.

With relatively low weight sprung turntables like Linn normally decoupling is important (hence the springs) and then rigid coupling from that point back to mechanical earth. With relatively light unsprung turntables like Rega then more often than not some form of decoupling becomes necessary. With heavy unsprung turntables like your NAS it is using mass to absorb resonance (turn it to lower frequency) but it is still important to have a rigid mechanical earth, even your current stand can be improved on in this respect. The four legs are creating mechanical earth loops. Get a single pillar rigid spiked speaker stand and mount the turntable on that. Spike both floor and turntable. This will be like having a new turntable.

[Marco]

Richard,

I understand where you're coming from, but what speaker stands do you know that have a top plate big enough to support a turntable?

Apart from that, excellent post!

I particularly agree with this:

Nothing is ever perfect in the world of audio, everything is a compromise.

Amen to that!

Marco.

[WikiBoy]

Richard,

I understand where you're coming from, but what speaker stands do you know that have a top plate big enough to support a turntable?

Apart from that, excellent post!

I particularly agree with this:



Amen to that!

Marco.

If you are spiking to the base of the NAS then size doesn't matter. In fact within reason (stability) the smaller the better to cut down on the length of duplicating mechanical earth paths. Perfect would be single spike but it obviously would be unstable, minimum is three.

[Gromit]

Thanks for the info Richard - I think I just about understood it.

I'm on my tod this weekend (no little'un running around to knock things over) so may try one of the speakers stands under the NAS, would be interesting to hear what it does. I've still got my old Kan II stands to use as spares for the Royds.

Will report back.

[Filterlab]

Good info Richard, lately I've found that 'as rigid as possible' has been the most beneficial support to my ears. It just seems to 'shape' the sound of the system to my tastes. It seems odd to me that it works given that my system has no moving components nowadays, but still it works and that's good enough for me.

I have an old box absolutely full of halved squash balls, sorbothane thingies, spikes and threads and bits of glass and all sorts of paraphenalia that I use for experimentation, I love the playing about bit.