Getting the listening room

[neevo]

... finished.

I'm in the middle of getting my listening room complete before I run out of money and/or the wife stops the spending spree. Luckily she wants the room looking nice and I'm up for the same with great sound too.

The turntable IKEA table is being replaced with a custom side table courtesy of a cabinet maker we found on eBay. It's a custom dimensioned version of this with 2 shelves for my amp and tube preamp:

http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/...-E401-4D86-9F7E-90521E44D6CB_zpsbaq50s8q.jpeg

The wife has also approved some KEF LS50's (although I'm having some drama getting them at the moment with the store that has my money), which highlighted a need for some bass as the LS50's aren't exactly dropping low
Hz. So I found a refurbished Wharfedale Powercube SP-C10, which arrived today.

Plugging it in to my B speaker outputs via high level on my Kenwood KA-7100 and after some playing I've got it dialled in. Surprisingly enough it sounds the best tucked right into the corner with some volume and crossover fiddling and the impact it's made to the soundstage on my trashed AR28BX's is nothing short of astonishing.

Also it's bizarre that not only is the sound more rounded and complete, but it's made the imaging better too despite the fact I'm sat off centre to the speakers too. Very pleased.

Can't wait to finally get the LS50's in there too!

 

[neevo]

Now I have a strange thing happening with the B speaker outputs on my amp. With speakers on A only, I'm getting a hum coming through the sub that is constant volume (not affected by the volume on the amp).

When I click the amp to B only or A+B the hum goes away.

Anyone with some thoughts on what's going on?

 

[mgosdin]

I get the same behavior with my Pioneer sub. So far as I can tell the B speaker outputs don't fully "disconnect" when they are turned off and a low level signal ( hum ) passes to the sub. I have to turn the Pioneer off to stop it.

Mark Gosdin

 

[neevo]

That's good to know. Maybe nothing to worry about then. Not like I'm not going to use the sub anyway.

 

[neevo]

Its funny listening to records again with the new setup. I've managed to put the AR's in a better position for imaging which gives the top end a much more open feel and the introduction of the sub means you can hear parts of the mix you couldn't before (for the better). Also not sure if the efficiency of the amp has gone down slightly or if the overall sound is more pleasant, but I'm finding myself with the volume up a lot more than before.