XXHighEnd

G'day Peter, and greeting to all forum members, from OZ :)

Sincerest thanks for the reminder via a PM on TT's forum ... I had been meaning to follow up on your product for some time but it kinda slipped off the radar.

I've got an open mind to most things audio ( and life in general ) and wasn't expecting a great improvement, if any, over my player of several years now, Foobar2K, but boy oh boy .... was I ever wrong on this one !!

Upon firing up XX for the first time and listening to some very familiar tracks, it was if someone had suddenly lifted a blanket from in front of my speakers. The improved dynamics together with the new found clarity of the mids and highs were quite evident  and I settled down last night to many many many hours of discovery. I kept thinking to myself "hey, how good is this, and i've only just started to familiarise myself with the player"

My main speakers are very neutral and revealing ( http://www.users.bigpond.net.au/benny/SGR/SGR_Octagons_Raven_R1_&_SEAS.jpg ) and helps to perhaps explain why it is easy for me to discern the improvements that XX brings to bear over Foobar's way of doing things. For those interested, my audio chain is via an XP OS ( C2D 3GHz proc and 1GB ram ), using an M-Audio Audiophile 24/96 PCI sound card, into a Sony TA-E9000ES procesor via coax link, and from there to a Hafler XL600 amp on to the speakers.

Up to this point I've had no interest in anything Vista has no offer from a HTPC perspective, but upon reading some threads in this forum, I think i'll be splicing in another partition to my HTPC and giving it a whirl to see what further improvements that may bring to XX's ability.

I wish you all the best for the products future Peter, it truly deserves the fresh approach you've created. I'll be doing my bit to spread the word among my aussie mates!

Back to experimentation for me .. I won't be far away :)

Cheers all

Russ

Hi there Russ ... thank you for your nice words. But man, I'm looking now for over 10 minutes at your speakers ... I think they are really gorgeous. I can only imagine beautiful sound coming from them (by the design mostly of course). And if that's a band tweeter I see in d'Appolito there ... go get Vista !

Now, get a listen to your piano lack ! (which is a serious remark with a meaning :)

Regards,
Peter


PS: Hafler ... that's been long since I heard about that ... nice !

Hey Peter :)

There's also my centre speaker to match ;) ( http://www.users.bigpond.net.au/benny/Misc/Centre.jpg ) using the same Seas Excel drivers. Those are 10" bass drivers BTW. The tweeter's are Orca Design's Raven R1 ribbons. I feel very privileged to be living in the same city as the guys who designed and built these for me as I was able to pop over to see them progress from their embryonic state to the works of art they now are.

Yeah .. the Hafler has been in constant use now for 15 years or so and has such a comforting sound, like an old favourite jumper  that has patches in the elbows .. LOL. I suppose one day it might get put to rest, but that day will be when I migrate to fully active speakers I daresay.

Well it's almost 3am over here and time for bed. I've got more playing to do tomorrow as I explore the hidden mysteries of Vista.

Cheers and happy listening :)

Russ

G'day Russ

I recognice well enough your "surprice" by the uniques of the XX. It is no less than a quantum jump into a new space of listening.

Now tell me one thing: Your speakers is not only lovely piano black (like Peters), but likely also are able to expose whatever your need them to.

Can you hear this: Standing waves are not anymore disturbing you? It is a phenomenon recogniced at my place. But yours?

Why I ask, is that I still need some brigs in the wall to comprehend why it is so. Why, how and (a word that doesn't excist yet) is it so?

Read elsewhere my comments on that. I have some bids on it....But you, who has a real speaker that might tell it to your brain processor, can you elaborate.

Gerner  :welcome:

G'day Gerner,

thanks for the welcome :)

I'm not sure whether I can give a definitive answer to the phenomenon of standing waves being reduced per se, but I do perceive better control over the lower registers also with XX. This manifests itself as tighter control of instruments such as bass guitars and the kick and tom drums for example.

I still recognise the underlying unique characteristics of my listening room ( I'm referring to it's room modes and resonance now ), and something has changed to make it 'better/more controlled' in my mind.

Do you have some examples of music that demonstrate more clearly what you are experiencing with regard to these standing waves? It may help me to focus on what you are hearing.

I'll be taking XXHighEnd over to the guys who designed and crafted my speakers early next week for their opinion and objective assessment. I think they will be as excited as I was on first listening to it. I'll be using their recently developed fully active speaker system and I'm sure they will reveal all the new subtleties and more that I've been experiencing with XX :)

Exciting times indeed!

Cheers and happy listening :)

Russ

Hi Russ

If you read this: http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=23.0

then maybe you could elaborate a little. And maybe even in that topic....!

Cheers

Gerner :)

Well I finally got my Vista Ultimate partition sorted out in my dual-booting HTPC today and had a very enjoyable afternoon and evening listening to my system with a newfound clarity that I have never heard before :)

I quickly settled on using #Engine3 with DOUBLE/UPSAMPLE in version 0.9d as the best for me. I am using the motherboards builtin sound device ( ASUS P5B Deluxe ) to feed my Sony processor ( via coaxial SPDIF ) as there are no Vista drivers for my M-Audio Audiophile 2496 card .. grrrr!!

This new engine #3 under Vista has opened up the soundstage even further from my initial XP trial, and yet has even better definition and pinpoint positioning of instruments. The first track I listened to was 'The Race' by Yello ( a track I'm sure a lot are familiar with ), and the sound was uncanily 360 degrees around me. Never heard it like that before. Spooky actually from a 2channel recording!

Lots and lots of favourite tracks followed for several hours, and each one had a level of clarity and dynamics I had not experienced before.

I ran into a couple of bugs during my listening session which I will make note of in days to come if they reoccur, but one that does come to mind is a few occassions where a track started out with a very noticeable buzz superimposed on it. Not a constant buzz per se but more of a distortion of what appeared to be the higher frequencies of the track. I first heard the issue during a solo guitar track and thought it might have been unique to that track. I simply stopped and restarted the track and all was fine with not a hint of the buzz/tizz. It happened again later on with another different piece of music, and again, a stop and restart cured the problem. I'll listen out for any other occurrences of this buzz and make a note of what the system was doing leading up to it, but at this stage my Vista partition only has XXHighEnd and TheaterTek installed and will likely remain that way for some time to come.

Time for some sleep ... there's more listening awaiting tomorrow :)

Cheers for now

Russ

Yello ... well, I kind of promised that (elsewhere) :biglol:

And Russ, the buzz you mention was reported by someone else too : http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=24.0
Maybe it's not exactly the same there (and another PC for sure :)) and the only thing I can say is that I had this once myself. Only once.
Don't start looking for it, but might you find the common denominator ...

Regards,
Peter