What was your biggest surprise?

[Tom Bombadil]

I assume nearly everyone participating in this forum has been in search of those magical changes you can make to your system to achieve a bit more audio nirvana. I've been buying and upgrading systems for 41 years. So many upgrades. So many tweaks.

Wondering what has been your biggest surprise, either in how much something changed your system or how little.

For me the biggest surprise was cables. All cables: interconnects, digital, power cords, and speaker cables. In the late 90s I was of the mind that cables made a difference, sometimes a very noticeable difference. I accumulated several different brands over the next few years. Kimber, AudioQuest, MIT, DH Labs, Tara, Blue Jeans, and several more.

I own multiple amps, preamps, DACs, CD players, and speakers. So I would move these cables around, listening for differences.

Eventually I decided to carefully analyze and evaluate all of my equipment, for the purpose of spending my money wisely. So I purchased some switching gear, got some friends and family to pitch in at times to run tests and switch components and cables, and slowly got around to testing a lot of gear. Over a 3 year period.

What I found out was that with few exceptions, I could not discern a difference in cables when evaluating the under blind conditions. That is, when not knowing what it was that I was listening to. This was under fast switch conditions of seconds between switches, minutes between switches, and in days & weeks between switches.

Now under sighted comparisons, I thought I heard significant differences, but they would always disappear under blind comparisons. (The same turned out to be true for multiple other people who participated in comparisons from time to time.)

I could find no synergy between cables and components. Good quality cables were always transparent between all of my gear. Along the way I used equipment from Conrad Johnson, Cary, Von Schweikert, Dynaco, Audio Alchemy, Parasound, Thiel, Audio Research, Rotel, Marantz, B&W, Krell, Theta, Harman Kardon, Bryston, Spica and others.

There were a few times when I was able to consistently ID a cable and in each time it was when I was compariing against a very low quality able. Like a cheap nickle plated A/V cable, a 20AWG speaker cable, a cable with corroded RCA jacks. One time vs a more expensive cable which turned out to have a very high capacitance. Otherwise I was unable to discern any difference between $1000+ audiophile brand cables vs $20 Radio Shack Gold interconnects or zip cord 12AWG speaker cables. Or a $700 power cable vs a $6 Belden power cord.

And no one else who participated with me, most of them in just one comparison each, although a couple of friends did a few with me, ever showed that they could consistently tell a difference either.

This was truly a great surprise to me. After a fairly long period of time, I had to conclude that no cable made a difference in any of my systems, at least as far as I was concerned. And I quit spending money on cables.

 

[chadnliz]

Cables work for me and I believe in their benefits but am cautious about many cables that are b.s. but my recent big surprise is how good the Sonus Faber Venere speaker sounds, especially the tweeter quality.
For a budget speaker it punches above its weight, super good looking to boot.

 

[4Play]

The biggest difference I have noticed in my system has to be the Focal speakers. I paired them with a Jolida tube integrated and a McIntosh solid state integrated, and on both instances I have experienced a holographic 3D texture unlike anything I have experienced before. The frequency response on the 806Vs are high. However, it must be how the cabinets are made on the inside that produces the 3D texture.

The 806Vs are bookshelf, and I can only imagine how good the towers must be.

 

[Gazdatronik]

My big surprise was when I first fed a more powerful amplifier to my efficient speakers. Being what they were, I'd have thought my modestly powered marantz was plenty until I happened upon an Electrovoice 7100 with twice the power. It was only 50 wpc but a huge improvement. So I got an amp later that was twice that, a 100wpc apt holman, and began to really enjoy my jbl l26s.

Now I have dcm timeframe 600s. They sound much better than the L26, but obviously not as efficient. I believe what I don't like about them will be rectified with even more watts of power, which is a shame since I like the apt so much. Maybe I'll just get another apt and monoblock them.

As far as cables go, I've experienced bad cables in the form of the ones that seem to let in a lot of noise and hum, especially if covering more than a 6 foot run in a house with a fluorescent light in it somewhere.

I've had cables that look good but do this. Switching them out fixed that and fixed headaches. I have learned since to just spend the extra couple bucks and have worry free listening.

My test is to plug it up, turn on the kitchen fluorescent light and crank up the volume all the way. If the rig remains silent, you got yourself a damn fine cable.

 

[lizard84]

Mine was how good a $600 pair of Maggie MMG's could sound, I was blown away. We ending up buying a place with a smaller listening room and I let them go and have regretted it ever since. I absolutely love my Salks but I vow I will one day soon have a set of .7's or 1.7's that I can easily move out from the wall when the planar mood strikes me.

 

[tomlinmgt]

Acoustic treatments, distributed bass and line source designs (both monopole and dipole)...those were my game changers, my quantum leaps.

 

[davidro]

Acoustic treatments, distributed bass and line source designs (both monopole and dipole)...those were my game changers, my quantum leaps.

Wonder what it would sound to have say a triplet of the AN 15"s in a line source format...active tri-amping and perhaps OBd. Whatcha think?

Sent from my X10a using Tapatalk 2

 

[tomlinmgt]

^^^

I've seen some discussions about FR drivers in a line source configuration and many suggest the lager the driver the greater the likelihood one could detect comb filtering unless the distance between the speaker and listening spot is a good distance away. Terms like "acoustic centers" and "center to center spacing" were getting thrown around a lot. Lobing, time alignment....all that stuff can get kinda funky with said configuration, evidently.

That having been said, I still intend to try a short line source of three Tang Band W8-1808's since I have six of them sitting around. But I think I might get better results using four of them in an MTM with a BG Neo 3 and take-no-prisoners LF support (the cat's out of the bag...but then again, may not amount to squat).

 

[davidro]

Wish I had a shed!

Sent from my X10a using Tapatalk 2

 

[Tom Bombadil]

Acoustic treatments, distributed bass and line source designs (both monopole and dipole)...those were my game changers, my quantum leaps.

Acoustic treatments are perhaps the most under utilized tool in audio. I've rarely ever seen them in a home.

I once had a room where the room resonance was several dB in the mid-70Hz range. Overwhelming.

 

[Billfort]

I slid into taking the room seriously a long time ago and got more and more serious about it as time went on so I agree it's of utmost importance but I don't remember it as being a surprise at any point.

But hearing that first good SET, hi-efficiency speaker system - game changer, shocking, surprised, paradigm shift - all that stuff.

 

[mhardy6647]

Biggest single surprise -- discovering after decades of denigrating them that I really, really liked the "Altec sound"... the trick, as implied in the post above, is matchin' 'em with the right amplification. In the 1970s, when I originally formed that opinion, the ones I heard were matched with the wrong amplification, big time.

 

[Billfort]

Oh yes - I had Altec 19s...at the same time as I had things like a 'monster' JVC receiver.

'wrong' pretty much nails it.

 

[4-2-7]

A big surprise for me was stepping into very good MC cartridges. After spending tons of money on grear and tables looking for great SQ all the while keeping the same ho hum MM cart I never found it.

When I steped up the game in MC carts a new sound system presented it's self......High End Audio came to life.

 

[4-2-7]

Biggest single surprise -- discovering after decades of denigrating them that I really, really liked the "Altec sound"... the trick, as implied in the post above, is matchin' 'em with the right amplification. In the 1970s, when I originally formed that opinion, the ones I heard were matched with the wrong amplification, big time.

Yep I whole heartedly agree that the power and quality of the power will make a speaker perform far different.

I always over power my speakers now.

This is one reason I never recommend a speaker or knock a speaker to anyone.

The people that do, don't understand how their maching gear might not be the same as another will be doing it.

I have some Sansui Sp-5000 & SP-5500 that I like they both are pretty rare and are 90w & 125w respectivly @ 102db. On this board I will hear many oppinions how bad they are because of this or that or they had some other suies.

However when I use them I'm driving them with two MC275 Mk VI mono blocked @ 180 WPC. I think this ups the game in the SQ and what they are capable of.

 

[tomlinmgt]

I slid into taking the room seriously a long time ago and got more and more serious about it as time went on so I agree it's of utmost importance but I don't remember it as being a surprise at any point.

But hearing that first good SET, hi-efficiency speaker system - game changer, shocking, surprised, paradigm shift - all that stuff.

No doubt, the degree to which acoustic treatments can improve the experience is largely dependent on how good or bad the room's acoustic response is without the treatments. I wonder what your reaction would be if you removed all the treatments in your space, Bill. :scratch2: Too bad your ceiling treatments are practically permanent. When I emptied my space last year to paint the walls I set up the 19's with no treatments.

And you guys sure give me plenty to look forward to re Altec Duplex and SETs. :yes:

 

[johnebravo]

The biggest surprise for me was discovering how important the acoustic properties of the room, and just as much, the positioning of the speakers in the room, are.

Since I was a teenager, I had always believed -- where I originally got the idea, I don't recall -- that speakers should be near a wall, and preferably in a corner, if possible. Moving the speakers out into the room, away from the walls, completely changed how they sounded (in my case, Vandersteen 2ces). Of course, positioning them like this has practical consequences that most people are just not willing to live with -- for one thing, the stereo inevitably ends up dominating the room, making it almost useless for anything else. You almost have to have a dedicated listening room.

A really poor room with characteristics like low ceilings, lots of reflective surfaces like hardwood floors, etc., is going to be challenging to overcome. It's amazing how different the same stereo will sound in different rooms. If you start out with a really poor room, even very good equipment will not sound very good.

 

[TubeHiFiNut]

<snip>

But hearing that first good SET, hi-efficiency speaker system - game changer, shocking, surprised, paradigm shift - all that stuff.

Agreed. The Lowther PM2a/Medallions driven by the Quicksilver 300B amps really raised the bar.

In the same territory are the Quad ESL-57s driven by the Quicksilver EL-34 amps (or Heath UA-2s, or Dyna ST-35).

Which flavor of magic do you prefer?

 

[Billfort]

That was the exact same speaker cabinet/driver combination I first heard SETs on too - an AudioNote 300B amp in my case. Almost had me leaving the big CJ tube amp I had in that shop for repair, behind.

I ultimately found a speaker direction that had a better set of trade offs (for me) but I still remember how floored I was on hearing that 300B the first time.

 

[TubeHiFiNut]

That was the exact same speaker cabinet/driver combination I first heard SETs on too - an AudioNote 300B amp in my case. Almost had me leaving the big CJ tube amp I had in that shop for repair, behind.

I ultimately found a speaker direction that had a better set of trade offs (for me) but I still remember how floored I was on hearing that 300B the first time.

I know how you must have felt. This combination remained in place for several years. I almost sold everything else and settled down.

Almost.....