Bubo

Attended the show Friday for 8 hours. These are really just my impressions since a show like this is anything but a controlled environment. Friday, the first day the show was well attended, but still plenty of seating in the rooms on the second to fourth floors where there were lots and lots of vendors most sharing room, ex an amp company with a speaker company with a cable company etc. We started in the basement and worked our way up, so only saw half of the ground floor and half of one of the upper floors * We moved at a pretty good pace and were only able to see or hear about 40% or less of the rooms. * We did not see any radical new technology that is going to change everything like the intro of the CD. * The DAC makers are coming to terms with the fact that they are making a data-com device and a decoder so the implementations are now at least aware of what the questions are. Some of the more expensive ones were sporting larger LCD displays. I like knobs, dials, lights, meters, bouncing bar graphs etc........so if they just added large knobs on the units they would really have something. Lampizator from Poland was there with his tube DAC. * Analog is definitely hot, lots of vinyl, in addition there was one re-builder demoing his rebuilt TASCAM aka Teak Industrial reel to reel decks that sounded pretty darn good. He states that there are now 7 companies selling new tape (France) copied from analog masters ( probably copied digitally at really high sampling and bit depth to what ever they store the masters on) . The Tascams mfg til 2002 look and sound great. Plus lights, meters, knobs, switches and reels spinning.........United Home Audio Wash DC area is the tape deck guy. If you have a spare $7K laying around for his basic unit it may be worth pulling the trigger, I think he has something. * EMO aka Emotiva had a large trade show like space with nice displays and layout, from a trade show perspective the best that I saw. They were demoing their new surround Processor with some recent movie clips in a mini theater I think using their powered line of monitors (Adam look alikes) that lack the punch for a theater....... Their new surround processor, from a glance, has a pretty good layout and is assembled in the US in Nashville. They are marking it as upgradable, a lot of the new stuff the boards.... loads of SMT ASICs and Processors, they probably have to be field swappable..... the connectors and ribbon cables are a good idea in this respect. * Tons of tube gear, again given the controlled and totally uncontrolled nature of the show it's hard to say how anything sounds exactly unless there is obviously something wrong. All of the tube topologies were there, so if you have your fav tube amp design, there were plenty of choices. If you were really interested in dropping some coin, bring you content and make an appointment with someone who knows they are there to sell gear and return either before or after the show starts. * Can you drop $250,000 on Bauhaus Design sterile looking system with almost no: lights, knobs, dials, buttons, bar graphs, or meters that may or may not sound better than a $20K system........almost certainly. * Either because of hearing loss or Psycho Acoustics, a lot of the demos were too loud. The reel to reel guy got it right as did a few others. * Classic Audio Loudspeakers Brighton MI., had nice large JBL Harstfiled reproductions with his field coil speakers plus his own 4 way all wood speakers on demo with lots of tube stuff and outboard power supplies. My bias is towards big speakers, classic proven design even better. His stuff at 2 watts will take your head off. Also very accommodating if you have your own music, my impression is this guy sells lots of gear, deservedly so. This was one of the larger shared spaces in the basement. Very open........... very accommodating. This guy and his co exhibitors are Pros and business people. * Legacy out of Springfiled IL had a large room on the Ground Floor, their large towers that they had going are definitely a winner, if I understood correctly the speakers are matched with an EQ and an amp package that is approx $40K. If you had the coin you would be very happy. * Volti of Maine, soon to be Volti of Nashville area also on the ground floor had their large speakers at approx $20K a pair running, another definitely horn-loaded-winner, not short on wooden looks either. I'm guessing they will take your head off at 2W. * The Ear Gear room ground floor worth a visit, the Orthodynamics are red hot apparently, the guy that mods the Japanese Orthos has his own all new product at $1500 that compared to everything else in the space may be the winner for sound and weight. The Shciit TOTL sp and Woo amps he was demoing with were both very impressive, if I had to take one it would be the Woo. Worth a listen. My two cents: If I were writing the checks..... I would probably take home the Volti's ( perhaps a reinforcement of my decision to buy La Scalas 35 years ago) I thought they sounded very very smooth and clean good relative price performance. In the amps dept, now that I've heard the venerable Mac MC 30s, something less than 50W for simplicity, not sure I could name a new vendor without lots more listens. Any good turntable, I believe declining marginal returns set in quickly with TTs, definitely a reel to reel too many lights and moving parts to be ignored, DACs any competent design between $500 and $1000 is probably sufficient the chip guys may have hit a competence plateau..... though Lampizator says not all of the big 5 chip sets work well...... pops clicks etc like anything digital error handling, clocking and recovery and failures sort out the men from the boys. Cables, for me 10GA is plenty of copper or other metals. For me: Main system: Horn loaded speakers, TT, reel to reel, DAC, 10GA copper cables. 30-50 watt tube amp with SS or surround processor front end.

Just returned from Axpona, toured around with opusk2k9 Definitely worth the $25, you probably need a full 2 days to see everything. I can't say that there was anything radically new like the first CD. This is my first one of these, I am accustomed to having everything in a large hall, but with 200 stereos blasting it might be a bit confusing. I may do a write up on my impressions.

Which day(s) are you going? I might take Friday off and go to the show. Beat the rush?? How busy does it get???

I'm likely going to the show.

Agree!

Yes

If someone has the schematic, see what the little green grounding pin on the connector connects to inside of the Mac amp. If it's a null aka no connection, then the amp floats. If it connects to something in the amp, then it may not float. If it is supposed to connect to something inside of the amp and it does not, that may cause a fault condition inside of the amp triggering a protection of some kind designed to keep you from killing yourself or the the amp of both.....something like a GFI breaker. It could also be that the green ground is a null, and one of the two conductors either the hot or return-ground was damaged and the amp went into a protection mode since it sensed the cord was damaged, and it won't come out until a tech resets it. Speculation on my part, but they do seem to do more with the safety and grounding than they did in the 1980s Forgot, it could be that the amp failure is completely unrelated to the cord..

I am just wondering if a tube setup will be way off in sound since using my AVR for the rears and center. I am looking to enhance sound, details and clarity, but I don't know if all three can be pulled off with a modern style tube amp or an old school set of MC 30's or a mc225. I suspect that the sonic signature of the amps and voicing would be different, I would use the same pre or surround and amps all the way around. I actually have two systems mostly because of space constraints. The MC 30 was designed with high efficiency horn loaded speakers in mind, the manual give the performance specs for the first .5W which are impressive and where you would do most of your listening. Would I use them for a surround system, no.

I've looked at the same road. I had a line on a 7200 and passed since the specs were not significantly different than my MC 2205, which sounds great. I would look one gen newer where the specs all change significantly SN, THD and damping to name a few.

On the subject of expensive cables power or speaker. It would be interesting to do a blind test between platinum speaker cables and 12 GA power extension cord with the ends cut off.

All of the old stuff floats, my impression is that the new stuff does not.

You can go on E-bay tonight and buy a 200WPC THX Ultra rated amp from Parasound for approx $250. THX specs and bench testing mean something and test not only optimal operating parameters, but sub optimal and fault conditions. If you don't like, you can sell it the next day and be out one way postage. Parasound has made several versions, if you go to their web site they have all the manuals for download. The used THX amps may be the best deal out there. http://www.ebay.com/itm/Parasound-HCA-1000-2-Channel-High-Power-Amplifier-350-180-Watts-THX-/131464355255?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1e9be2ddb7

I use the HW store fork spade connectors, crimp them then solder them. Same thing I do on motorcycles where I use ring connectors for safety.

If it ain't broke............

While nice for the money I have a hard time saying two of those cheaper 12's are "world class" and can keep up with everything else you just mentioned. I had a less expensive down-firing synergy, then bought these when they went on sale from $1000 down to $300 So I can honestly say they are the best subs I have owned......if you can think of some that you know well that are better put them up here! What makes a good sub .....................well a good sub????

Yes sir, you're spot on. It's important that his wife sees this as a positive experience and not an exercise in self-indulgence. One thing this hobby is all about, IS self indulgence. Who buys $3K networks for their K's, as says "oh these sound extremely lovely, but I sure hope I wont be viewed as being self indulgent" or We just dropped $20,000 dollars on a two channel "stereo" setup, but we kept it positive and real, heavens no, we have not over enjoyed the whole system either and don't intend to. It just wouldn't be positive. "Don't spend so much money that you run out of money before you run out of life. Don't spend so little money that you don't enjoy life while you have it." The Wisdom of Roland

Hey, who left the door open and let a multi-channel guy into the 2 channel forum! Maybe we need a secret handshake or something? Think of a totl surround processor as a really good DAC with room EQ

As to the Heritage LaSclas this is Volti's interpretation of the LaScala the Vittoria. Worth a look. It would be nice if Klipsch took at look at updating the Heritage designs with performance first followed by form and style.

Some thoughts: There is lots of good used and new gear out there besides Mac and Yamaha, these are my two favorites since I sampled them all new in a fully stocked Audio Associates Showroom in the very early 1980s; my friend was the manager, so I spent hours there over several days before my first purchase. I sampled and purchased 5 used 1990s Yamaha amps first because the sound is as good as it gets, and they were comparatively dirt cheap and easy to work on. Japan has the best manufacturing engineers in the business and Yamaha makes musical instruments too. Agree, the autoformers set Mac apart and offer a higher level of speaker protection for the expensive speakers, the damping rates on the newer ones are above the magic number of 20. Not all Mac amps have the same level of desirability. The THX certified Parasound products should sound pretty good and have much lower resale than Mac amps, like most products. Haven't heard their Halo line, Parasound fans love it as do others. EMO offers a lot of bang for the buck, I haven't heard their second generation amps and would have to read the reviews on them and listen to some. Their XDA DAC was a groundbreaking product and worthy of recognition and emulation. Like a lot of Hardware companies, they appear to struggle with software, I'm guessing the Pres or Managing Director is a HW Engineer, the best engineer in the company. There are a several THX rated surround receivers out there that are AB with Class D becoming more popular for some reason, that probably sound great, they passed the spec and the bench tests. Mac in known for their Amplifiers, and some of their pre amps and a few of their tuners, I haven't heard their speakers. Some of their gear sells used for very low resale values, not the top respected amps which sell at a premium, but not all amps. You would have to check the history of the integrated amps on the bay to see how fast they drop. As to OPPO, I'm sure it does everything very well, I prefer to minimize the investment in things that have moving parts to the absolute min. OPPO would be well advised to look at the EMO XDA and Mac D-100, 150 products and field a competitive pre-amp product if they haven't already done so. Internal ideological battles sink most product companies, they forget the competition is outside of the building. As to the performance of Klipsch products, I have a strong preference for the Heritage line since it was performance first over style or form factor. Not just Klipsch, but many of the newer speakers are the triumph of form and style over function, like politicians I suppose.

Some general comments If it has to be new, you can't go wrong with the Yamaha high end gear, I own piles of made in the 80s and 90s. Same goes for the McIntosh gear and the Cornwalls, LaScalas and K-Horns. My preference is for separates, which yes take up more space. To me a quality DVD player or BluRay with a coax output is all that you need for CDs and I would use the stereo for their movies too. I prefer a stand alone Digital Pre Amp like the Emotiva XDA or their pro model which might sound 2% better or not, or the Mac Digital Pre amp I think they are the D-100 and 150. I have to give Emotiva the nod for their groundbreaking product, the component and build quality on the Mac may be better and not worse than EMO. With a digital pre amp, you get lots of interfaces inc USB, you will need all of them. By far the best quality sound comes off of BluRay disks, DTS and the Dolby equivalent. So what I would do is build a stereo, that takes advantage of all of the wonderful tech that has been developed for DTS soundtracks, and the unbeatable amplifier technology of autoformer McIntosh amplifiers. As to BK speakers, as much as I have tried to find a pair that sounds as good as LaScalas I haven't heard any that were even in the same weight class, shouldn't be allowed in the ring. Here is my system. Surround sound, preferably THX certified, processor aka 7.1 pre amp that does auto room EQ, standing wave cancellation, EQs the speakers etc, and run in into a Mac Amp feeding a pair of LaScalas or Cornwalls and possibly 2 quality sub woofers that are set to always on. The surround processor has all of the digital interfaces and built in decoders, if I recall correctly if you run them in Direct Mode the SN jumps up to 110-120db. It also has analog interfaces that a Tuner or TT pre amp can be connected to. Balanced outputs to the Mac would be a big plus. Some have built in FM etc tuners, or buy one that is in black. Mac MC152 is I think their smallest auto former model, but it's a beast at 75lbs like all of the autoformer models. Mac MX 151 is Mac's surround processor if you wanted to go all Mac and has analog and phono inputs. If I were spending my money: Go to the Home Theater board and ask the guys about surround processors and suggest the EMO (2 models), Mac and Parasound, as long as they are available in black they are in the game. Pick one the TOTL EMO is $1900 since they sell direct think of it as everyone else's $4000-6000 offering. Tell them you want to downmix DTS master to Stereo, EMO supports this as does my Pioneer etc... Surround Processor TOTL EMO XMC $1900, Mac $12,500 may not be as good as EMO or Parasound https://emotiva.com/products/pres-and-pros/xmc-1 Mac Amp MC152 MSRP $4,500 LaScalas MSRP $7,000 in cherry A couple of the Reference series Klipsch Subs, we were getting them on New Egg for $300 ea. TOTL Sony BluRay player less than $100 2000 + 4500 max + 7000 max + 600? + 100 = $14,200 This would be a world class system, that you could spend a lot more money and may still fall short. This is with some research. Before I threw down the cash, I would do a lot more homework on the processors and possibly verify that the Mac is solid. I own this sub and love it, I own LaScala1 and think they are world class, I own a Mac stack and think it's world Class, I own the Sony BR player, I own an EMO XDA DAC and love it.

So can I extract from this that you recommend that I do not continue using the Monster equipment as it didn't do anything back then and it isn't doing nothing now? Please provide the detail missing about the Whole House protection. I plan to research this and any help you can provide would be appreciated. Update: I just spent a few minutes cleaning this up so my teachers and parents wouldn't feel like total failures if they stumbled across this post. Short version First fix the house and verify that the service is adequate, then go from there. Most builders use the cheapest switches, wall sockets and circuit breakers that will pass code or not, see what you have and probably replace all of them, TOTL are only a few dollars each.If you are experiencing problems with the electricity in the house, and don't know how to trouble shoot and repair it, or have a friend who can help you; do your homework, check references and get an electrician in to diagnose and repair the service. It's better and cheaper than burning to the ground or an extended stay at the hospital.Insufficient service to the house can be a problem, this may require a new breaker-distribution box and better breakers, why not use the best since your life depends on it.....your stereo too. Once the house service is installed and functioning correctly, and quality switches and sockets are installed, there are a number of threats to your equipment and appliances that can be managed or minimized by adding various types of protection: Lightning hits can be highly destructive. Under voltage is bad news too, and can have lots of under voltage spikes. Surges through the electrical service from the city power can be a problem Inadequate or minimal grounding is frequently a problem Improper grounding, frequently a problem. Defective or high requirement appliances can be a problem Creating ground loops by using multiple outlets for your stereo gear Some protection solutions: Dedicated 15-20 amp single outlet for the Audio gear Whole house surge suppressor in the breaker box. Additional ring config grounding points (8ft rods) for the house and service and antennas. The electrician I consulted, went back and grounded the metal roof and gutters at his brother's house plus more rods. For coax cables; mil spec gas arc fuses that tie to grounding rods or water pipes in the basement, in addition to the exterior grounding lugs and 8 foot rods. You can attach the coax through the power strip for 3 layers of protection. Exterior grounded metal copper bulkheads and loops with 1in pieces of black gas pipe can be added for additional protection. Coax cables can be connected with gas arc fuses in the basement using UHF connectors, these make excellent connections and allow you to quickly detach the Coax from the equipment side of the arc fuse when storms are in the area, lightning storms are a common problem in the Chicago area. The best protection, for your protected gear, is to disconnect the power cord and coax lines when Lightning Storms are in the area. Dedicated power strips like Monster, I like others better, for your fav electrical gear, that have RF, Common Grounding, under-voltage and over-voltage protection. You can even buy the transformers on-line that are sold to the military and use them for 1:1 as line filters, they are dirt cheap. If you live somewhere where the electrical service is poor, you can have a whole house transformer installed as a filter. You would need to consult a very competent Electrician and possibly EE for a whole house transformer; I'm pretty sure you would need a high quality suppressor between the transformer and the city wire. When we were stationed overseas, these were common in poorly served areas. Grounding rods are dirt cheap, quality switches and wall sockets are dirt cheap, grounding lugs are dirt cheap, quality breaker switches are dirt cheap but do add up, a whole house quality suppressor is $50, a good power strip with under-voltage is about $150 but does give you a common grounding point for your gear that is closer to earth than the other gear.

The power supply in the amps should have plenty of reserve for any peaks. I don't think the power filters have a power buffering capacity, none that I've heard of. Surge suppressors, under voltage and over voltage protection and line filtering for RF are all good things. I would listen with and with out the filter units and see if you can hear a difference, which is highly unlikely.

The Hanna Montana runner up, no daddy to pull the ratings. Bad girl Taylor Momsen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocl9tU516a8 baby Momsen early career

Sweet Poe https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEv6NotxuC4

The 2505 is a second gen SS Mac amp. The damping number is lower than 20, which seems to be the magic number. So somewhere above 20. The next step would be eliminating capacitor coupled amps, I think this refers to coupling the transistors. 100% power increase gets you 3db, so on a LaScala or K=Horn 2 watts will take your head, to keep it simple 4 watts should do the same on your speakers. Since most of your listening will be at the first ,5 watts or less, this is where you need to focus. There is some argument to be made that the larger SS amps operate in Class A at low watts depending to the design and how they are biased, Pass on his amps published this spec which on his 250s is something like 30 watts class A. I'm not an engineer, but my understanding is that for peaks the amp pulls heavily on energy stored in the caps and if I understand it correctly the Transformers have some reserve too. This is a discussion that crops on the Mac forum on AK regularly. The next gen up from your amp that should be measurably different is the MC 2270, 3rd Gen SS amp. As stated above, the source is GIGO, to me the RF 7s always sound good but I like the Heritage speakers better, probably because that is what I have been using for 40 years. Get a good piano recording to test the amps rise and fall, nothing like a piano strike. For accurate I like female voice smooth and as natural as possible. You can tell if it's life like in seconds. A girl and a piano in a practice session as an example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Oox5S-HM74&index=1&list=PLgugWBANrQyU39SWyIM6sCIJWo-A3GBlD Another stripped down (minus the orchestra) girl and a piano on an FM promo tour for their LP https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BljhBQpo9c0&index=19&list=PLgugWBANrQyU39SWyIM6sCIJWo-A3GBlD