Hi Anthony, no... no changes planned whatsoever.

I've totally fallen in love with the SET sound, top to bottom, and going fully active would mean 3-4 SET monos on each channel. I'm simply not going to do this. And I'm not in the least bit interested in any other type of amplification now, so no mixing class-D (or whatever) for the bass, and SETs above. For me, it's got to be SET all the way.

I now hear a 'glare' / a 'sheen' that all the PP amps I have here seem to add to the sound. It sounds really impressive for a few minutes, and then fatiguing. The sound is too 'tight', too controlled almost. Actually, I'd say that the only PP amps I've ever heard that don't have this were the Sauermann monos I owned. I don't regret selling them though, because as good as they were, I still prefer the sound of my current (cheaper) SETs.

I reckon I'm getting a good response down beyond 40Hz (with a big dip at 50Hz still). That's good enough for me.

Mani.

Thanks Peter.


Over the two and half years I had the Orelos here, I tried a lot of different things, including different positions. I actually had them 1m from the rear wall in the beginning, and only moved them closer over time. Going from 1m to nearer the rear wall really didn't seem to change much here. Filling the wings with 240kg of sand didn't help the sound (nor my back!). The only thing that 'worked' was using severe DSP, but that turned out to be too much of a 'sledge hammer' approach and introduced other issues that I discovered later.

In any event, the ultimate test is using your own ears. And my ears are clearly telling me that whatever the issue was with the Orelos in my room, I don't have it with the Animas. To my ears, the bass sounds as clean as it did with the Orelos... just way more of it! What's not to like?

Edit: I want to make it absolutely clear that I'm talking about the performance of the Orelos in my specific room, with a 4m ceiling.

Mani.

Hi Ramesh, there's no question in my mind that the Animas are better suited to my reasonably small listening room (~6x5x4m) than the Orelos. The Animas respond well to being placed pretty close to the corners, and I think this is where they differ mainly - I am now convinced that the Orelos need a couple of meters of breathing space behind them to perform well in the LF. Paul has a lot of breathing space behind his Orelinos, and they sound superb.

Certainly, I have absolutely no issues with bass in my room with the Animas. I'm getting a beautifully balanced sound, which I never achieved with the Orelos without some serious DSP in the LF, which brought along a whole new host of problems, as I discovered over time.

If I were typing this a few hours ago, I would have said that the Animas are way more laid back and less dynamic than the Orelos. But I've just connected my BD-Design mono amps to the Animas to give the speakers a bit of a continuous thrashing (get them loosened up a bit) and I'm hearing quite a few similarities now. I still doubt that any amp on the planet would get as much drive out of the Animas as you can get with the Orelos with their built-in amps.

If you can get a sound even half-way approaching that of Paul's set up, you'll be in for a real treat. If I could have gotten the Orelos to work in my room, I absolutely would have kept them. But I have to say, I am really enjoying the SET sound with the Animas. I just know this SET/speaker set up is the end game for me.

HTH.

Mani.

Yeah, and to my ears, they sound as good as they look. They certainly seem to match the room (sonically and aesthetically) better than any other speakers I've ever had in it.

And now to that NOS1 upgrade we've all been hearing about... 

Mani.

Done!

Mani.

This is what I would refer to as 'post-rational' thinking:

- 'Pre-rational' - let's start dancing and hope the Gods hear us and send us rain
- 'Rational' - it's all about complex weather systems, none of which give a damn about us humans
- 'Post-rational' - it's strange, but when I start living a 'congruent' life, the universe almost seems to start coalescing around me to help me - maybe there's more to this whole endeavour than we currently understand?

My belief is that progress in hifi will now only be made by post-rational thinking - electronic measurements up to a point, but the human ear/brain beyond that. I mean, how much lower do we need to go with THD+N than we can currently achieve? To my ears, zero feedback amps with relatively high THD+N simply sound better (more musical, more interesting) to my ears than amps with massive amounts of feedback and THD+N that is almost immeasurable.

Mani.

All I know is that USB is the weirdest interface on the planet!

(Oh, and I also know that I'd like both my 'sheep' upgraded with the Phisolator/B'ASS, of course!)

Mani.

PS. This upgrade comes at a really good time for me. I have to say that I haven't listened to either of my 'sheep' for weeks now. I've been very much enjoying listening to the AR-T Legato USB-to-spdif converter feeding my TDA1541A S2 DAC (modified to run in NOS mode with a Crystek femto clock). There's a 'musicality' with this setup that is so addictive.

Following on from the 'Testing a few digital cables' thread (http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=3723.105), I've been thinking about something...

If I set up my Tascam recorder to capture the output of my USB-to-spdif converter digitally, will different SFS and Q settings in XX sound different on the digital captures?

For example, let's assume I set vol = 0, and no upsampling/filtering, ensuring a bit-perfect output from XX. Now, let's say I take two different captures:
1. with SFS=1
2. with SFS=120 (all other settings remaining identical)

Through a DAC, even though the output from XX will be bit-perfect in both cases, these two SFS settings will definitely sound different - we all know that, right?. However, captured digitally these outputs should be identical - the SFS and Q settings have no bearing whatsoever.

Why? Well because the only mechanism that could possibly cause them to sound different (implying playback through a DAC) is noise-induced jitter. There can simply be no other mechanism at play. And this mechanism is only at play at the point of conversion to analogue. When the output of the USB-to-spdif converter is fed to the Tascam's digital input, there is no conversion to analogue, so both captures should be identical, irrespective of XX's SFS and Q settings.

This then implies that XX is just like any other bit-perfect player in the digital domain. Perhaps this is why some people believe that 'bits are bits'. But what they totally fail to understand is that the different noise signatures from different players will cause different noise-induced jitter in the DAC, which in turn will affect the sound that the DAC produces.

Any thoughts?

Mani.

Peter, I've moved all my recording equipment back into the basement and won't be able to do anything now until the end of next week at the earliest.

However, I've just taken a quick listen and it's interesting...

Peak Extend OFF:
0dB - thick, full sound
-1.5dB (onwards) - much more sparkle and life, but maybe too thin for some material

Peak Extend ON:
0dB - thick, full sound
-1.5dB (onwards) - thick, full sound (exactly the same as 0dB, but slightly quieter, obviously)

I think your thoughts about PeakExtend playing a part might be right.

Mani.

Hi Alain, thanks for sharing.


I just want to make it really clear that what I'm hearing is not a gradual build up to a fuller sound as 0dB is approached. It's a definite ON/OFF. At -1.5dB, to my ears the sound is pretty much the same as at -9dB, or -15dB, provided there is no clipping in the material. But at 0dB, it fundamentally changes.

Anyone should be able to hear this with the files I've linked to. Play the 0dB file 1.5dB lower than the -1.5dB file. The level you play back on doesn't matter, as long as it's not -1.5dB and 0dB. For example, playing back at -19.5dB and -18dB are fine. If you're hearing what I'm hearing, there will be a quite big difference in the way they sound, at yet the signal level reaching the DAC will be identical.

Mani.

OK, I'll just assume that no-one else is hearing what I'm hearing...

Mani.

With the AR-T I had the upsampling slider set to '1', 'Is NOS1' = inactive, and no filtering (both Custom and AP off).

What's interesting for me is whether 0dB actually sounds better/more accurate than any >0dB attenuation. Your large SFS and other Q settings seem to work well for >0dB attenuation, but not for 0dB - they make it sound too 'thick'.

Mani.

I'm hearing the effect on these digital recordings too. So, it has nothing to do with being in the DAC's sweet spot.

Mani.

I thought it might be useful to redo the files with an all-digital recording chain: Mach II -> AR-T Legato USB-to-spdif -> Tascam spdif input

Here they are...

1. Drum kit (XX at 0dB):

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B0PU5LO5jVjfWnF3QkFWRVpkd3M

2. Drum kit (XX at -1.5dB):

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B0PU5LO5jVjfLUw3VEhGUTc1enM

(On this track, you may notice that the L/R channels are reversed for the first second or so - you're not going mad, it's just a bug in the Tascam's 'auto record start' function.)

3. -14dB 1kHz sine wave (XX at 0dB):

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B0PU5LO5jVjfVUt6NE4xZ0t5N2c

4. -14kHz sine wave (XX at -1.5dB)

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B0PU5LO5jVjfaFljcGJCRTBfdUk

(Again, I'm using 'my own' sine wave for the last two.)

Mani.

No problem Peter, I'll redo it, but it'll have to wait until this evening because I need to sort some extra balanced ICs out from the preamp to the ADC.

Mani.