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How to take the first step towards the next level of sound reproduction?

Zingem

Zingem

Active Member
Hello to all you fellow Audio Buddies.
Just popping up a question purely out of curiosity. I'm not suffering from a bout of Audiofila Nervosa or anything (well not more than usual anyway)...
No i'm perfectly happy as things are. And neither did i won the lottery.

But just for the sake of reasoning, suppose one has found the right level of synergy within an audio system. Everything is on a same level working together nicely.
So within your room -with its given dimensions- the different components work together, after much tinkering and listening you succeeded in combining and setting up a system without obvious flaws.
Front end -say turntable and CD player/streamer- are on par with the quality of the amplifier(s) and the loudspeakers, and work together towards a certain optimal result. For a time you sit back and enjoy.

But (purely hypothetically thinking) suppose you wanted to step up to the next level (say from C to B, or from B to B+ or something) and would love to improve your sound reproduction yet again. Where would one start?
Which different component would improve your system the most? What would be the best middle to long term investment as a starting point?
Would you be looking at the front end (different cart, turntable, etc, or even completely different medium)? At the amplifiers, the speakers?
Would it have to be the interconnects after all? Or would one take a closer look at room acoustic improvements?

Did you have any experience with this situation, or given it much thought? I'd be interested in you opinion.
I've no idea wether this topic has been dealt with in the past. Sorry if that's the case, just a link would probably do fine.

Grtz
J-S
 
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If you already have a decent, well matched system that's working well together, and have addressed the "first reflection points" in the room, but still have the upgrade itch, I would start with the cartridge and/or the phono preamp in a vinyl system, or the preamp in a digital system. This is assuming that your current speakers are fairly resolving.
 
Personally, I'd work from the speakers back to the sound gen.

The listening room is often the most difficult to work with, as often space is limited.

Budget is also another factor wherein you have to take two people into consideration and work within your priorities.

If you scan with "search" the different forums, you will find this illusive "missing link" bothers some, while others are more content just to sit back and enjoy what they have in the way of gear.

Like all aspects of life...it is a matter of degrees.

Q
 
Like other said, Room Treatment in a great place to start. I can't really treat my main living room much, and that is where my main system is.

But, my most recent and surprising sound upgrade came from was by replacing all the stock 16g and 18g Power cords with aftermarket 12g and 14g cords.

Might not work for everyone depending on gear and electrical conditions but for me it was one of the best $450 I have spent in this hobby.
 
Thanks for the responses so far.
So do I understand that to get everything to perfection room treatment and maybe power cords are the way to go. If one would restart a whole new cycle of improvement speakers are the starting point? That would be according to my own intuition.

As stated above I'm happy with my rig. I think i invested wisely over the years, often choosing affordable vintage stuff, sometimes selling something with a profit due to rising prices in order to buy something new to complement the system, taking my time to find the right component for my system. Like so many of you guys do i'm sure.

What triggered this question was a visit to someone who really has invested in a megabuck rig.
McIntosh preamp into a big Parasound poweramp, etc. Tall speakers. Great system only slightly limited by maybe a difficult match between pre and poweramp, as he suspected himself - and he may have been right.
And very probably even more by the not so great room Acoustics and dimensions
I drooled over his Acoustic Solid Turntable, which sounded just great. Have taken interest in that brand for years but never got the chance to listen to one, it was a revelation.
That triggered something, and i soon found myself looking up current prices for these 'tables and calculating selling prices for some of my stuff.
Now i have been cured of my audiophilia for years since i stopped buying stereophile. Nothing against the mag but they made me want to get stuff that i didn't need, and made me listen to shortcomings, instead of taking interest in the music itself.

That rig and that turntable got to my head for a few days like in old times. So i asked myself the above questions. Am i happy with my system? I am. It's far from perfect. It doesn't stink either.
What would i change if i had the opportunity? Conclusion is a bit of room treatment and probably a better power cable for my amp. I see this reflected in your answers.
But it's not wrong to phantasize about starting a setup from scratch when winning the lottery, is it? Is it?? Or opening new dimensions. So that triggered the chain of thougths.

Thinking of that Acoustic Solid, i should play the lottery maybe just this weekend...
 
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Not having any reference to what your current gear and room is, it is very hard to say one thing or another. I just wanted to relay my latest Ah Ha moment, but not all gear and rooms will provide the same improvements. Speakers are usually most peoples starting point after other issues are eliminated.
 
Hyfi said:
Not having any reference to what your current gear and room is, it is very hard to say one thing or another. I just wanted to relay my latest Ah Ha moment, but not all gear and rooms will provide the same improvements. Speakers are usually most peoples starting point after other issues are eliminated.
Click to expand...
Wise words.
It's more about the basic idea than about my actual system. BtW to give an idea my main rig consists of full range home made speakers like part of in signature picture on the left, currently driven by a hybrid Magnat Rv.3 integrated. Front end consists of a Thorens td520 and Ortofon HMC30 ( nice cart!), complimented by either a Dual 701 or a 1219 ( they take it in turns every 2 months or so) with a Shure V15IV HE. Older Technics and Marantz CD player, a Dual tuner (mostly use my Tandberg receiver for tuning in anyway). Cassedecks are Tandberg and Akai and there is the old R2R ReVox b77.
Cables is a bit of mishmash, and i use a van den Hul filter for the power cables.

Have had other gear, but sold most of it and bought the new Ortofon and Magnat. Oh cans are Sennheisers HD650. Use them a lot as well.
Only obvious flaw is this. The speakers are great, resolving, three dimensional sound, etc. But they were developed originaly (by my daddy) for a larger room than the one they now occupy. I make the most of positioning to get a nice soundstage and compensate the loss of momentum in the low freqencies with a sub.
 
Zingem said:
But it's not wrong to fantasize about starting a setup from scratch when winning the lottery, is it? Is it??
Click to expand...
No there's nothing wrong with that at all...
But that said one has to try and remain rooted in the real world and accept that they may never actually be able to attain that sorta fantasy.
Same deal with checking out other "high end" big $$$$ systems,It's fine to do it,but it should'nt drive one into an instant inferiority complex.

Me,I'm a speakers & preamp sorta guy.
So those are almost always the two components I'll be swapping around at any given time chasing SQ gains.
But I rarely ever use the outside world as the measure of how I feel about any of my own systems.
There's just no practical way I can do the "keeping up w/the Joneses" thing...

So I dont sweat those sorta things even the slightest bit.
But I dont live under a rock either,LOL.

FWIW

Bret P.
 
Good idea, Tubed!
Bret, i take your point, and it's a sound advice. But i've heard other systems from time to time, some even better to my ears. And there is no envy or that sort of thing playing a part.
 
Good sensible original post. Personally I either build or modify a lot of my equipment. I like to take something which is essential good in terms of design and then try to improve it. My main system is fully active, so changing speakers for comparison is difficult as mine have no crossovers. I designed and built the latest set about 2 years ago. The bass units have 8" Peerless drivers mounted in transmission line cabinets with 6" mid ranges and tweeters in a separate vented (pressure vented, not ported) enclosure. They each stand about 44" tall. Months of design work and calculations went into these, followed by listening tests, by myself and others, followed by modifications (circular process). They are fed by a highly modified Rotel RB976 Mk2 6 channel power amp with modified Behringer 3 way mono crossovers. A modified NAD pre amp precedes this lot. I mostly listen to CD and vinyl and the TV sound is fed in as well.

Can I fault it - of course I can. But I study and analyse individual components carefully and than make small (reversible) modifications. Some mods make a greater difference than others do. Whether a difference is a step in the right (or wrong) direction takes time to analyse, so I do this slowly after researching what I am changing. I appreciate that what I do is at far greater depth and complexity than just changing an interconnect, or amplifier, but the process is still the same. Research it. Change it and have a good listen. If you like it you keep it, if you don't you change it back and have another think.

Obviously the move from passive speakers to a fully active system was a huge step and I have no plans to reverse this in the future as I think it was a good move. The only downside to it is that you really need an audio analysis system to get the best out of it and you really need to know what you are doing to set it up. Even wiring it up wrong can easily blow speakers. On the plus side, everything is so adjustable, e.g. if I want to change the bass/mid crossover point, I can do this is in a few seconds. If I think I have a midrange issue, I can switch off the bass and treble completely and have a good listen to the midrange alone.

This has become a very revealing system. Sometimes I'm happy with it and sometimes I'm not. It is definitely capable of showing up differences in music studio production quality and sound balance. I have a dynamic spectrum analyser hanging off the back of the system, and if I think that the bass is lacking in a piece of music for example, this does at least allow me to see what level those frequencies are actually at in the first place. I stops me from jumping to conclusions so if I want to adjust things to improve the sound (to my ears), at least I know what I have changed and I can move it back afterwards.

When do you get to the point where you feel you cannot improve it any further? Who knows? Is that the point where you take a long look at your finances, bite the bullet and start again?

One thing I have found is that in the early days it was quite easy to hear big improvements by making changes. These days I am finding that the improvement steps are getting smaller. It seems that the closer you get to your audio nirvana, the harder (and more expensive) it is to actually reach it.
Does the law of diminishing returns kick in to a point where you say to yourself "This is the point where I stop"?

Before you question me on this - I don't know either!
 
One mans C is another mans A. So you are going to have to saddle up and visit any place where you can listening to music. Be it a diminishing number of hifi stores, Audio clubs, friends homes, etc etc. I guess you could join chat rooms in your local area, too.

If you are fortunate to be able to travel take at least one opportunity per trip and go kick some tires. There is nothing like auditioning a sound system, and take your own selections of music. attend live concerts, recitals, music programs, musicals,. Educate your ears.

When I was in college I would attend or be part of at least 4 events a week. Now that I am by myself after 40years it wouldn't hurt to get out again. Having two universities really helps. I like venues and groups that don't use PA systems. Big Choirs, Orchestras, Wind Symphonies, Organ recitals, solo and ensemble contests. But smaller more intimate, Jazz quartets. Piano recitals, occasional augmented String quartets can briefly be enjoyable. Operas and I are on a stand back approach. Though I love Gilbert and Sullivan and an Occasional Verde piece. Though I love Wagner instrumentals, the Operas so carry on and on and on. I have a real love of Brass. Grimethorpe and Mills Black Dyke come to mind. Dallas Wind is OK, but they Navy and the Prssident's Own Marine band are my first choice. I got to hear the Philadelphia Symphony a few times with Ormandy conducting. They really set the standard for string sound way back then, I used to attend SF orchestra concerts as my music professors and english teacher were first chair players, Violin, Oboe, Flute, and Trombone. I also loved going to SF Ballet performances. I am hooked on Tchaikovsky and Don Quixote. recordings, DVD, of Ballet are much more realistic musically as the producers are more apt to be more worried about camera angles than they are the music and tend to leave the sound mix alone. Where strictly classical recordings of music can be overly engineered. The way Russian conductors control their musicians accelerating and coming almost to a halt with precisions as the dancers and ballerinas solo is mind boggling. They can go from less than 30 beats a minute to over 180 and back again faster than a 427 Cobra can go from O to 100 mph and back again. The idea of having that much control over 60+ musicians is mind boggling. Musicians are individually a pretty independent breed with their own ideas about everything. Big orchestras with a ingrained long history can be a real challenge if you want to re-event or make minor changes some times in an often played piece. Ballet pit orchestras are much more flexible once its understood who is in charge and its not the conductor, but the soloists on stage. Opera Prima Donnas are always a challenge, but so are the other lead singers.

I know I go on, but the idea is get out there and broaden your horizon and tune up your ears. Then you will know that special sound when you hear it. And you don't have to spend big money/ Remember its about the performance, not the decimal places of distortion.
 
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