Mighty Favog

Dean, Do cables sound the same. Definitely not. I started out with 14ga. lampcord wire (ala-Woods Wire) then went to Original Monster 12ga. and now the MITerminator 2's. It is very true that the MIT's do reach a louder volume earlier in the volume control's travel, shame I didn't have the wherewithall to do a before and after measurement with the 830z. High frequencies no longer sound like a fuzzy hiss but now a sharp and pure "ding" from cymbals and the occasional percussion triangle. Midrange has a very natural, uninhibited flow for voices now. Most singers in the past sounded, well, rather "nasel"y. Akin to Fran Drescher(?) of "The Nanny". Bass has reached such low frequecies to make it seem like a note can only be felt and not heard. The biggest and most appriciated improvement is the amount of bass at low volumes. Something I've longed for without getting up from the big comfy chair and kicking up the loudness control a notch or two. I did have to trade the large spade clips for the small ones though. I thought the large ones would give me more contact area to the binding post. But these things were so close to each other I folded some pieces of news paper tightly and stuck it between the spades to prevent them from grounding to each other. One DVD I was really looking forward to was "The Dance" from Fleetwood Mac. I think this was recording engineer's greatest opportunity to make something wonderful and they/he/she went down in ball of flames. Mic Fleetwood's floor basses were very single note sounding and drowning out of John McVie's guitar. Lindsey Buckingham's playing wasn't defined enough either. Oh well, maybe their engineers are getting old too. I also noticed some high frequency drop outs on a few occasions with some older cd's. I guess thats from the now much higher level of sensativity of the system. Would I spend this kind of money again for these cables? If I knew what to look for then as I do now I would have done it long ago. About 67 hours total playing time and counting!! ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Monster Power HTS-5000 MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Vibrapods Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard! This message has been edited by tblasing on 12-15-2001 at 11:36 PM

rowoo- Thanks. I haven't had time to give them (it) a good listening to but I do agree that it does make a certain amount of sense. This preamp has a 20w inboard amp for multi-room applications and their may be some incoming leakage there too. I guess I really do need another set, just have about 6 or 8 left over. If money and improvements are plentiful enough I may even get some caps for all the XLR inputs/outputs that aren't being used. Boy, if this preamp had XLR connections I'd sure as heck be using those for sure! It's the only major piece in the system that doesn't have 'em. See ya! And long may your MMF-5 spin. ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Monster Power HTS-5000 MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Vibrapods Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard!

Hey guys! Does anyone have 2 extra Cardas RFI caps for blocking off unused RCA jacks on equipment (preamp, tape deck etc.)? I just got some from Audio Advisor and I really can't see ordering another twelve of them. I'll gladly pay the $3 each they sell for (+ shipping). Thanks!! ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Monster Power HTS-5000 MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Vibrapods Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard!

I'm right behind ya Justin. Last night I just bought both "Day Without Rain" and "Paint the Sky With Stars" cd's then went home and had an Enya fest while reading the newest Stereophile. This message has been edited by tblasing on 12-14-2001 at 04:21 PM

Thanks guys.

Which Enya album is the sound track from?

Last I heard from BobG was that they were getting damaged in shippment. This could also be from the lack of enough internal cabinet reinforcements to keep the cabs from flexing or emminting a bit of resonance. I know when I got my 20's I had to put a small piece of thick felt between the mid-range magnet and the shelf it sits on to keep it from rattle-ing; meaning it didn't sit very tightly against the shelf to begin with. Also, one of the mid-ranges had to be dissasembled from its horn and reattached do to the driver. It appeared that it was cross-threaded but BobG assures me that it was dropped on its side or back in shipment. Who knows... ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Monster Power HTS-5000 MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Vibrapods Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard! This message has been edited by tblasing on 12-11-2001 at 02:38 PM

You might want to check out Raxxess or BGW for a few models of fans. Good luck, ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Monster Power HTS-5000 MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables (and I do mean CABLES) Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Vibrapods Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard!

Shan, Congradulations on the work. You can now (if you wish) make the addendum to your equipment list as Quartets (Cornell Hotwired). Jim would be proud I'm sure. Funny you mentioned MIT. I just bought a pair of MITerminator 2 Bi-Wire speaker cables from Audio Advisor. Great deal at half off MSRP. They're past the 48 hour break in period but still counting the hours for the remaining 25%. Man I can't wait till we get rid of that party-pit couch that's blocking most of the left channel! ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Monster Power HTS-5000 MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables (and I do mean CABLES) Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Vibrapods Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard! This message has been edited by tblasing on 12-11-2001 at 04:40 PM

I don't mean to be a stick in the mud but wouldn't running four speakers rather than two lower the volume level in which the amp(s) would start to clip? ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Monster Power HTS-5000 MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables (and I do mean CABLES) Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Vibrapods Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard!

quote: Originally posted by William F. Gil McDermott: Boy, I don't know how my name got brought up in this context. Except that I'm long winded. I didn't mean to imply your long winded. Really. Just thorough that's all.

quote: Originally posted by deang: tblasing - Is that what you do when you have a quesiton - Run down to your local Hi-Fi store? It was an honest suggestion and not a slam so for now I'll let that one slide. This message has been edited by tblasing on 12-01-2001 at 07:31 PM

EE- I'm using a Rotel RB-1080 (200wpc and only two-channel) for a pair of 20's and it has yet to run out of gas on me. It's a very fast (slew rate) and musical amp for the money. I think I paid $900(US) for it at a high dollar store. Here, they call that kind of store an "Audio Salon". I did put a meter on the amp one time to see what it was putting out at a given volume. At my absolute limit of safe listening the amp was putting out no more than 2.73 AC/volts. And it was plenty loud! The 200wpc is a good rage for this line of speakers. Not that your 30's will ever see all 120-125wpc (or 200wpc for that matter) it's not a bad idea to have that much in reserve. As far as weight is concerned. The RB-1080 is only about (I think) 38 pounds or so. An amp from McIntosh with 200wpc can easily weigh twice that. There is a question of heat though. Rotel suggests at least 5 inches of open space above the amp if it's put in a closed cabinet. My cabinet is well ventilated from a mesh door, sides and an open back so it's clearance is about 3 1/2 inches. If you have an open rack type storage unit you could get away with probably 3 inches. Good luck!! ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Monster Power HTS-5000 MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables (and I do mean CABLES) Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard! This message has been edited by tblasing on 12-01-2001 at 07:21 PM

Ross- The Mac C33 is quite old (about 20 years) so it's strickly two channel. It does, however, have three sets of outputs to more than one amp. I suppose the most one could use with this is six mono-block amps. Here's the specs on it: http://www.sundial.net/~rogerr/preamps.htm#c33 I still can't believe my ears when this thing is playing. Being this old but sounding this good. I got it in mint shape from Audio Classics in New York. The salesman I deal with is Fank Gow, son of the famous Gordon Gow, who designed a lot of the McIntosh amps for years. Bet they had some neat stuff hangin' around THEIR house! Thanks guys for the praise, I'm still blushing.

Matt- Do a search on this BB for "Bi-Wire" or "Bi-Amp". There is pretty much discussion on the two topics. For starters, anyway, it's not the same thing exactly. The explainations can be quite lengthy. William 'Gil' McDermott (on this BB) usually has some comprehensive rundowns of the possibilities with either. ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Monster Power HTS-5000 MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables (and I do mean CABLES) Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard!

Ahhh..the old days.. When I was in retail at a locally respected store that sold audio/video equipment it was a very backwards expierience. We sold one of the first Sony Beta-HiFi units available to the public (the SL-7200) for about $1,000. Neadless to say that the year and a half I was there we only sold two and one of those was bought by an employee. Managment decided to drop the upper line units for the more 'popularly priced' lines. This infuriated the customers, but the profit margin was huge. They said they felt like they were shopping at K-Mart, etc. About three years later I was running the Firearms Debt. in Sporting Goods in the same store. Same thing happened. Everyone wanted to us to carry and stock everything that Colt made (Pythons, Government Models, AR-15 A2, etc.). The only thing that happened there was someone's son who just got out of Boot Camp wanting to show Mommy and Daddy that they can field strip an AR (believe me, it ain't tough). Eventually the same thing happened there as well, "customers" were only interested in when it was going on sale. Not "If" or "How much does it go on sale for?" but "WHEN will it go on sale?!" About a year of that went on before the expensive units were also dropped in favor of lines such as (choke) Rossi, Taurus and Norinco. I was embarased to sell that crap. In closing, people want to FEEL like more posh consumers by shopping in a store that has nice stuff but when it comes to actually buying the upper lines...most of them put their wallets in a vise. ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Monster Power HTS-5000 Power Conditioner/Surge Protector MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables (and I do mean CABLES) Vibrapods Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard! This message has been edited by tblasing on 12-03-2001 at 02:00 PM

I would think that just running it without rest of the system being on would be fine, unless, for some odd reason, the new player needs some sort of feedback from the pre-amp, receiver, etc. Can't think of any though. ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Monster Power HTS-5000 Power Conditioner/Surge Protector MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables (and I do mean CABLES) Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard!

Hey deang- Maybe you could ask the guys over at Carlin on East Dorothy...

Jim, Thanks for the envy. The 841 having DVD was actually an add on to what I originally wanted, a darn nice CD player. Sorry to say the room that the system is in (and the only one in our house that can hold it..) gets the furniture rearranged every six months. Yea, the girlfriend's idea of change. The hot-wire is working out great!! No ill-effects no unexpected problems..nothin'! I did add something to it though. One day at work I was poking around Audio Advisor's website and found some MIT speaker cables. Looked at it again....Holy Cow!! Half off MSRP! This stuff's not even in there catalog. Now....as of this past Wednesday, sits on the floor a pair of MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire 12' cables. Was kinda hard trying to hide those passive network boxes behind the 20's and not let the girfriend notice . Is there a difference? Oh, yea. To say the least. I'm not sure if it's because of the (now) bi-wired setup or just better cable but it is definitley louder at all frequencies. Even MIT is going with the 'Cable break-in' theory. They say it takes 48 hours to break them in to 75% peak condition and two weeks for the other 25%. I guess thats with constant playing. I thought about getting a burn-in cd but I could just see my cat with a packed & folded hankerchief tied on to a stick walking out the door when I get home saying "I'm outta here pr*ck". So I decided to just watch broadcast TV through the system for a while. A small let down, I picked up Fleetwood Mac's 'The Dance' DVD. I dunno who did the audio mixing for that but there was so much drop out from John McVie's bass and no high end from Lindsey Buckingham's guitar that I almost too it back. I do have a reference for this concert though.....I WAS THERE!! Well...when they came to Cincinnati anyway.... ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Monster Power HTS-5000 Power Conditioner/Surge Protector MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables (and I do mean CABLES) Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard! This message has been edited by tblasing on 12-01-2001 at 04:56 PM

O.k. Here's the situation. I am running a strictly two-channel set up with absolutely no plans for X.1 HT. As you can see below I now have a McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD unit. This thing can play DVD-Audio disks and most of them I see (at Best Buy anyway) are in 5.1. My question is, are the differences between DVD-Audio and other cd's (engineering being equal) is the three additional tracks encoded on the disk? Thusly, would it be a waste of money on a two channel system? Or!! Is there really a sonic improvement in DVD-A? ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Monster Power HTS-5000 Power Conditioner/Surge Protector MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Speaker cables (and I do mean CABLES) Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard!

quote: Originally posted by edster00: We made it through one Clinton administration...the ***t is really going to hit the fan if the Hildebeast Hillary ever manages to get elected president (it is only a matter of time until she runs). I thought she was already president once. LOL

In Yoda voice--"Hillary...Mousseline, Hillary...Mousseline. Must later understand." ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Monster Power HTS-5000 Power Conditioner/Surge Protector MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard!

And to think all they needed was one little bitty amp and the firefighters could have listened to their screams to be rescued. ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Monster Power HTS-5000 Power Conditioner/Surge Protector MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard!

Wasn't that picture on here about six months ago? ------------------ Tom KLF-20 Mahogany (Cornell Hotwired) McIntosh C33 Preamp McIntosh MVP-841 CD/DVD Rotel RB-1080 Amp Yamaha PF-800 Turntable/ Sure V15 Type V Cartridge Ortofon VMS-30 mkII Cartridge Stanton 999SS Cartridge Yamaha K-1020 Cassette dbx 1231 EQ H.H. Scott 830z Analyzer Monster Interlink 400mk II Monster Interlink 300mk II Monster Video 2 (DVD to TV) Studio Tech U-48RW Cabinet Monster Power HTS-5000 Power Conditioner/Surge Protector MIT Terminator 2 Bi-Wire Enough empty boxes for a fire hazard!

The "Motor-Voter Law"!! Now there's a reason to support Clinton. LOL