canuckaudiog
On a quest for high fidelity
Hey guys,
Well my stereo has gone through a lot of changes ever since I got into this whole stereo craze/addiction/what have you.
I was going through the pictures on my cameras memory card and noticed I had pictures of each iteration of my set-up, with each change I made to it. I thought I'd share a little story and some pictures of how my stereo has changed and evolved since I began.
It starts off roughly 6 months ago - I decided I wanted to get a better home theatre system, and since learning that HDMI isn't really all that great I figured well why don't I upgrade my receiver for cheap, I bet there's a really nice unit on sale that doesn't have HDMI because everyone thinks you need it. At this time, my set-up consisted of:
Speakers: Polk Audio RTI6 Bookshelves, CSI5 Center, FXI3 Rears, PSW1000 MicroPro Subwoofer
Receiver: Harman Kardon AVR354
Source: PS3
Browsing the local classifieds, I spotted a Pioneer Elite VSX-37TX for $150. It was in mint condition and had the original manual, remote and box. I figured here we go, this is what I want. 10 year old model but was expensive at the time, much more expensive than the current receiver I had. So I contacted the seller, noticed they still had it, and picked it up.
After getting the receiver and putting it into place, disaster struck. I knocked one of my front speakers off of the stands and destroyed the woofer. Ahhh, no! Well, this just means I get to upgrade.
After getting the new receiver and trying out the surround modes and fooling around with it, I started to realize that I didn't care so much for surround sound or movies in general. This lead me to believe that well, maybe I could just sell off my sub, my center and rears and put the money towards a really nice set of towers.
Then something interesting happened. I started talking to my Dad about my newfound stereo addiction and he mentioned to me that he remembers records sounding the best. Knowing that I want to keep upgrading and get better sound, I decided OK my next upgrade is to change the source from my lousy PS3 to something much nicer. I contacted a friend of mine who knew a lot more about old gear than I did. He had a look at the local classifieds for me and spotted a Luxman PD-264 with a new Sumiko Pearl on it, complete with original box, manual, warranty card, stylus guide, everything! I sealed the deal with the seller and picked it up.
So from the original iteration with the surround set-up, the HK A/V receiver and PS3, it now changed to this:
The bug really started to get at me. It had bitten me, but the disease started to spread like wildfire. At this point the Pioneer just wasn't doing it for me, it didn't have enough oomph for those towers and although it sounded nice and clean, it just wasn't what I was looking for.
This time, I decided to get something to go with the record player. An era correct receiver to match the sound and to see what the old stereos were all about. I went for a Sony STR-V5 that I had found locally, and picked it up.
Okay. NOW we're jammin'! This set-up kicks some fidelity butt.
I enjoyed this set-up for a while until my neighbour downstairs came knocking and told me how much my newfound addiction was bleeding through the floor and disturbing his TV watching. Well, this isn't going to work now is it?
I was a little taken aback, realizing the gear I had decided to go for in the situation I was in. I live in an apartment so, yeah, not really ideal.
In a slight of brilliance, I decided I was going to take over the other room. My wife was using it as her reading room, but she hardly ever used it. I knew I would get much more use out of having a dedicated audio room, and plus it would keep my stereo out of the living room where she watches TV all the time. She agreed, and thus begun the next little chapter in my journey for fidelity freedom.
So now that I had a vintage receiver, vintage turntable, I wanted to get some vintage speakers. I was deciding between some Celestion Ditton 442's and IMF TLS 50 II's. This was my very first post on AK at this point - I asked what you guys would recommend, the Celestions or the IMF's. The nod went to the IMF's. OK, road trip it is! This was an 8 hour road trip but I knew it was worth it. $250 for these suckers is a good deal in very good shape. Unfortunately I didn't get to find out the truth about these "modified" IMF's until later on, but I'll get to that. For now, I was very excited to finally get an incredible speaker for a good price and have something sensational.
I picked them up, brought them back home, and hooked 'em up. Quite an improvement over the Celestion DL12's. Here's a shot of them in their new room:
I loved the look of it. Simple, elegant, and I like the TV stand and how everything came together. Oh, you see the Pioneer hooked up to it because at this point the Sony is in the shop. There was something wrong with it. Unfortunately this was before I learned about deoxit.. coulda solved it myself, but oh well. The Pioneer was again lackluster, and I wasn't sure if the Sony would be fixed, so I decided to find something. After reading up on receivers here on AK I decided I wanted a Sansui. As luck would have it, I found two of them:
I found an AU-555A and a G4700. Yeah, now we're talkin'! I got bit by the 'sui bug, and pretty good too. I actually preferred the sound of these units over the STR-V5. Although I loved the size and weight and just overall looks of the Sony, it couldn't match in terms of sonics. Not to mention that AU-555a had no problems driving the IMF's, same with the G4700. At this point the Sony is out of the picture, and now the AU-555A takes over as the main driver.
Oh yeah, I picked up a set of Celestion Ditton 44's. However that is going to be saved for another thread, another story.
So this was my set-up for a couple of weeks. Then, my Sony STR-V5 came back from the shop and is working better than ever. All right, well, I decided that since it has the power I wanted, it was going to be my main unit for a while.
At this point I'm in a bit of a conundrum. I love the heavy sound of the Sony, but prefer the fidelity of the Sansui's. Hmm. I decided to put this on the backburner for a while, and focus on getting an original pair of IMF's instead since I liked the modified ones so much. Having the big Sony meant I could go for bigger speakers that needed the extra juice, so at this point I decided to find myself the IMF TLS 80 II's.
The IMF TLS 80 II's are my favourite score, by far. I put up an ad on Kijiji looking for IMF speakers. A local flipper responded saying he had a pair, but they needed crossover work. He wanted $600 for them, and had the stands. Not too bad actually. Well, it was more than I could afford. I decided okay, I'll go check them out and if I really like them I'll find a way to buy them. So, I went down to his place, and we must have chatted for an hour and a half. At the end of it he offered them to me for $500. Sold. I had never done crossover work before, but being a part of AK means you can do anything. So I sealed the deal, and picked them up about a week later. At the same time I decided to rearrange the room to make it lengthwise instead of widthwise. I knew this would make it sound better, and it did. Here is a shot with the bigger and smaller IMF's:
All right, I know this is long.. but bear with me we're getting to the end.
Anyhow, so the small room is a little crowded with both. I decided after I fix up the big IMF's, the small ones will go into a second stereo for the wife to listen to her records on.
Fast forward a month. I get the capacitor parts in for the big IMF's, get the tools together, ask for some advice on here, and I git 'er done. Now the small IMF's are out of the picture and the big IMF's are here to play. Ahhhh finally. My dream speakers are ready to do my bidding.
At this point I was still in a conundrum about the receiver. I knew I liked the Sansui's more, but needed the power of the Sony. Hmm. Well, I had some money at this point for a new receiver as I had sold all the other gear I didn't need, such as the Pioneer, other speakers, etc. It was time for an upgrade. I put another ad on Canuck Audio Mart stating I want a big fat amplifier/receiver that is superior to my STR-V5, preferrably a Sansui, but I'm open-minded.
A week later, I get an e-mail stating someone had a Sansui G7700 for sale for $275 in mint shape. This seller has an impeccable reputation for shipping and the unit was gorgeous. OK, this is going to be my next upgrade.
Fast forward two weeks. The unit arrives, right before my vacation started. Talk about perfect timing. I unbox it, and throw it in the setup:
All right now THIS is one hell of a stereo. I'm quite proud of it at this point, it sounds beautiful, sweet and smooth, and looks awesome. However, I knew I still wasn't done..
I went through quite a phase at this point, buying and selling lots of gear, adding stuff to my set-up such as a cassette player, and finally I decided to change the audio stand. This brought my latest set-up to this iteration:
In this picture you see the following:
IMF TLS 80 II Speakers
Luxman PD-264 Turntable
Sansui G7700 Receiver
HK CD491 Cassette Player
Philips CD160 CD player
Well my stereo has gone through a lot of changes ever since I got into this whole stereo craze/addiction/what have you.
I was going through the pictures on my cameras memory card and noticed I had pictures of each iteration of my set-up, with each change I made to it. I thought I'd share a little story and some pictures of how my stereo has changed and evolved since I began.
It starts off roughly 6 months ago - I decided I wanted to get a better home theatre system, and since learning that HDMI isn't really all that great I figured well why don't I upgrade my receiver for cheap, I bet there's a really nice unit on sale that doesn't have HDMI because everyone thinks you need it. At this time, my set-up consisted of:
Speakers: Polk Audio RTI6 Bookshelves, CSI5 Center, FXI3 Rears, PSW1000 MicroPro Subwoofer
Receiver: Harman Kardon AVR354
Source: PS3
Browsing the local classifieds, I spotted a Pioneer Elite VSX-37TX for $150. It was in mint condition and had the original manual, remote and box. I figured here we go, this is what I want. 10 year old model but was expensive at the time, much more expensive than the current receiver I had. So I contacted the seller, noticed they still had it, and picked it up.
After getting the receiver and putting it into place, disaster struck. I knocked one of my front speakers off of the stands and destroyed the woofer. Ahhh, no! Well, this just means I get to upgrade.
After getting the new receiver and trying out the surround modes and fooling around with it, I started to realize that I didn't care so much for surround sound or movies in general. This lead me to believe that well, maybe I could just sell off my sub, my center and rears and put the money towards a really nice set of towers.Then something interesting happened. I started talking to my Dad about my newfound stereo addiction and he mentioned to me that he remembers records sounding the best. Knowing that I want to keep upgrading and get better sound, I decided OK my next upgrade is to change the source from my lousy PS3 to something much nicer. I contacted a friend of mine who knew a lot more about old gear than I did. He had a look at the local classifieds for me and spotted a Luxman PD-264 with a new Sumiko Pearl on it, complete with original box, manual, warranty card, stylus guide, everything! I sealed the deal with the seller and picked it up.
So from the original iteration with the surround set-up, the HK A/V receiver and PS3, it now changed to this:
The bug really started to get at me. It had bitten me, but the disease started to spread like wildfire. At this point the Pioneer just wasn't doing it for me, it didn't have enough oomph for those towers and although it sounded nice and clean, it just wasn't what I was looking for.
This time, I decided to get something to go with the record player. An era correct receiver to match the sound and to see what the old stereos were all about. I went for a Sony STR-V5 that I had found locally, and picked it up.
Okay. NOW we're jammin'! This set-up kicks some fidelity butt.
I enjoyed this set-up for a while until my neighbour downstairs came knocking and told me how much my newfound addiction was bleeding through the floor and disturbing his TV watching. Well, this isn't going to work now is it?
I was a little taken aback, realizing the gear I had decided to go for in the situation I was in. I live in an apartment so, yeah, not really ideal.
In a slight of brilliance, I decided I was going to take over the other room. My wife was using it as her reading room, but she hardly ever used it. I knew I would get much more use out of having a dedicated audio room, and plus it would keep my stereo out of the living room where she watches TV all the time. She agreed, and thus begun the next little chapter in my journey for fidelity freedom.
So now that I had a vintage receiver, vintage turntable, I wanted to get some vintage speakers. I was deciding between some Celestion Ditton 442's and IMF TLS 50 II's. This was my very first post on AK at this point - I asked what you guys would recommend, the Celestions or the IMF's. The nod went to the IMF's. OK, road trip it is! This was an 8 hour road trip but I knew it was worth it. $250 for these suckers is a good deal in very good shape. Unfortunately I didn't get to find out the truth about these "modified" IMF's until later on, but I'll get to that. For now, I was very excited to finally get an incredible speaker for a good price and have something sensational.
I picked them up, brought them back home, and hooked 'em up. Quite an improvement over the Celestion DL12's. Here's a shot of them in their new room:
I loved the look of it. Simple, elegant, and I like the TV stand and how everything came together. Oh, you see the Pioneer hooked up to it because at this point the Sony is in the shop. There was something wrong with it. Unfortunately this was before I learned about deoxit.. coulda solved it myself, but oh well. The Pioneer was again lackluster, and I wasn't sure if the Sony would be fixed, so I decided to find something. After reading up on receivers here on AK I decided I wanted a Sansui. As luck would have it, I found two of them:
I found an AU-555A and a G4700. Yeah, now we're talkin'! I got bit by the 'sui bug, and pretty good too. I actually preferred the sound of these units over the STR-V5. Although I loved the size and weight and just overall looks of the Sony, it couldn't match in terms of sonics. Not to mention that AU-555a had no problems driving the IMF's, same with the G4700. At this point the Sony is out of the picture, and now the AU-555A takes over as the main driver.
Oh yeah, I picked up a set of Celestion Ditton 44's. However that is going to be saved for another thread, another story.
So this was my set-up for a couple of weeks. Then, my Sony STR-V5 came back from the shop and is working better than ever. All right, well, I decided that since it has the power I wanted, it was going to be my main unit for a while.
At this point I'm in a bit of a conundrum. I love the heavy sound of the Sony, but prefer the fidelity of the Sansui's. Hmm. I decided to put this on the backburner for a while, and focus on getting an original pair of IMF's instead since I liked the modified ones so much. Having the big Sony meant I could go for bigger speakers that needed the extra juice, so at this point I decided to find myself the IMF TLS 80 II's.
The IMF TLS 80 II's are my favourite score, by far. I put up an ad on Kijiji looking for IMF speakers. A local flipper responded saying he had a pair, but they needed crossover work. He wanted $600 for them, and had the stands. Not too bad actually. Well, it was more than I could afford. I decided okay, I'll go check them out and if I really like them I'll find a way to buy them. So, I went down to his place, and we must have chatted for an hour and a half. At the end of it he offered them to me for $500. Sold. I had never done crossover work before, but being a part of AK means you can do anything.
So I sealed the deal, and picked them up about a week later. At the same time I decided to rearrange the room to make it lengthwise instead of widthwise. I knew this would make it sound better, and it did. Here is a shot with the bigger and smaller IMF's:
All right, I know this is long.. but bear with me we're getting to the end.
Anyhow, so the small room is a little crowded with both. I decided after I fix up the big IMF's, the small ones will go into a second stereo for the wife to listen to her records on.
Fast forward a month. I get the capacitor parts in for the big IMF's, get the tools together, ask for some advice on here, and I git 'er done. Now the small IMF's are out of the picture and the big IMF's are here to play. Ahhhh finally. My dream speakers are ready to do my bidding.
At this point I was still in a conundrum about the receiver. I knew I liked the Sansui's more, but needed the power of the Sony. Hmm. Well, I had some money at this point for a new receiver as I had sold all the other gear I didn't need, such as the Pioneer, other speakers, etc. It was time for an upgrade. I put another ad on Canuck Audio Mart stating I want a big fat amplifier/receiver that is superior to my STR-V5, preferrably a Sansui, but I'm open-minded.
A week later, I get an e-mail stating someone had a Sansui G7700 for sale for $275 in mint shape. This seller has an impeccable reputation for shipping and the unit was gorgeous. OK, this is going to be my next upgrade.
Fast forward two weeks. The unit arrives, right before my vacation started. Talk about perfect timing. I unbox it, and throw it in the setup:
All right now THIS is one hell of a stereo. I'm quite proud of it at this point, it sounds beautiful, sweet and smooth, and looks awesome. However, I knew I still wasn't done..
I went through quite a phase at this point, buying and selling lots of gear, adding stuff to my set-up such as a cassette player, and finally I decided to change the audio stand. This brought my latest set-up to this iteration:
In this picture you see the following:
IMF TLS 80 II Speakers
Luxman PD-264 Turntable
Sansui G7700 Receiver
HK CD491 Cassette Player
Philips CD160 CD player
