This is my carefully matched Japanese HiFi system, with flagship TAD, Accuphase and Esoteric components. Cables all either Zonotone, SAEC or Esoteric, continuing the Japanese theme. Treated room.
The system doubles down as two channel sound for home theatre, but its main purpose is stereo listening.
These speakers replace my TAD Compact Reference speakers still seen in some photos. I fell in love with the TAD sound with the CR1, and this continues now with the R1TX. Same precision and naturalness, with more scale and authority.
Audiophilia is full of flowery and exaggerated descriptions, but Japanese companies are largely immune to this and TAD is particularly matter of fact. When they say “ astonishingly transparent, direct, and precise” it is literally that, without being analytical. The only downside is how unforgiving they can be with poor recordings, as are most speakers with a studio monitoring heritage.
2x Accuphase flagship 50th Anniversary Class A monoblocs. The ultimate expression of the Accuphase house sound - silky smooth, leaning on the warm side, with the power and high damping factor to drive any speaker. A perfect match for the TADs.
In Japan it’s well known that nobody Class A better than Accuphase and nobody does digital better than Esoteric. I’m not a vinyl guy but I value the organic feel of analogue sources. This DAC is the best of both worlds - convenience of digital with analogue playback quality. I upgraded from an N01XDSE, brought more liquidity and I’m able to skip Ethernet and go SFP direct to the network engine.
My Esoteric N01XDSE network DAC already has an award winning clock (the basis for the SE designation) so I didn’t expect the addition of a high precision 10MHz clock to make a huge difference. It was meant to be icing on the cake. In reality it was a significant jump in “naturalness”, there’s no other way to describe it. Everything sounded a little more “real”. A most delightful icing on the cake indeed.
The PS1 adds even more power separation and isolation to the already excellent power supply architecture of the N1.
I can’t tell you for sure exactly what difference it makes because I didn’t listen to the N1 without the PS1 for long. I can tell you the Esoteric Grandioso digital stack (N1 + G1X + PS1) is nothing short of spectacular.
2x Accuphase PS-1250 power conditioners, that clean and generates and perfect sine wave using waveform shaping technology that doesn’t affect dynamics. In my experience, clean power is an essential part of maximizing system performance.
For the same reason, I run a dedicated line from the distribution panel (Doepke Audio RCCB) to the system using high gauge solid copper cable (Oyaide FS EE 2.6 v2) to minimize noise from other circuits in the home.
This is one of those rare cases where the product name sort of makes sense. Mad, Extreme, Video Processing that can cause Envy :-D
In my system, the most important feature is MotionAI. I’m very sensitive to motion judder and this is the best motion interpolation available, as far as I know. Sure all the other features are great, the tone mapping and everything else MadVR can do. But MotionAI is the killer feature, at least for me.
High quality HDMI audio extractor and reclocker that I use instead of an AVR. Lipsync can be an issue without an AVR, so I also use an AES EBU matrix mixer (MiniDSP DDRC88BM) to sync everything up nice.
I now know. I just installed a couple of C214s. Not remarkable or essential, but noticeable and preferred. I find it akin to turning on a well-integrated subwoofer.
@mitch2 thanks for the kind words. It’s indeed a great system and we enjoy it a lot. Have since upgraded to TAD floorstanders so it’s no longer stand mounts + subs but I do know what you mean. It’s a different sound, trading off different benefits. Also upgraded to Esoteric’s new streamer DAC recently.
Congrats on a beautiful system and a beautiful room. Because of your component choices, I first wondered whether you might be in Japan where my daughter lives but then I read you are in Switzerland, which we visited late last year. What a beautiful country! Our trip included stops in Interlaken, Grindelwald, a train ride to Klein Scheidegg, the gondola up to Eigergletscher, a boat tour on Lake Zurich, and the Christmas lights and Christmas village to round out a fantastic visit. I am a fan of large stand mounted speakers with two subs and I can understand why you like those TADs so much. Well done!
There are two incredible places to visit in Switzerland, Jungfrau and your listening area. I have only been to one.
As an American, it's expected that most of the citizens will soon be asked to leave the country and Switzerland will be a wonderful place to live assuming you're allowing people in at this point. Why is this happening, no one knows.
@emergingsoul I’m very happy with the VanityPro. I’m not sure it made a huge difference in my system, since my DAC is already super well isolated and clocked. But there is no better or more capable HDMI audio extractor. It’s in a different league to the many consumer extractors out there, and better than 99% of AVRs.
@emergingsoul I’m very happy with the VanityPro. I’m not sure it made a huge difference in my system, since my DAC is already super well isolated and clocked. But there is no better or more capable HDMI audio extractor. It’s in a different league to the many consumer extractors out there, and better than 99% of AVRs.
@emergingsoul MadVR is video only, does nothing for audio. It’s an incredible product but don’t know much about its use with a TV. The HDR tone mapping will probably help any TV, but the Extreme costs 15x a decent 65” so that wouldn’t make much sense. There’s a cheaper Envy Core that has most of the features. MadVR benefits with projectors and larger screens are well documented. My screens are 130” and 160” and MadVR makes a huge difference, particularly MotionAI.
Kaleidescape video and audio quality is unmatched. The audio quality boost over streaming is particularly startling, similar to BluRay but without needing physical media. Video quality is very very high, but probably only relevant on a large screen. I also use Apple TV for content not available on Kaleidescape, but for anything available on Kaleidescape there is no contest.
You had me at tad. Always liked these speakers. there is a lot of room to fill. I do have a center speaker but I don't use it because the main speakers which are biamped are good enough for home theater stuff.
How is the kaleidoscope working out? It's disappointing that all the other streamers have not kept up. Do you feel limited since there are so many other things being streamed that are not accessible on kaleidoscope. 20 years from now expanded bandwidth will be widely available, hopefully, and hopefully a lot sooner. YouTube videos do offer very good bandwidth for lots of music
Thank you for the kind comments. Welcome to visit and listen in Switzerland. Toro3 - it’s an illusion, in reality they are balanced. Imaging is fantastic :)
Love this system. TAD, Esoteric, Accuphase - all within a beautiful listening space. Out of curiosity, your Left speaker is closer than the Right speaker - or is this just camera optics? If so, I’ve done the same to ensure balance and a clear phantom center image.
What a beautiful environment for immersing yourself in beautiful music. Congratulations! Indeed, the TAD CR1TX is a sublime speaker. Glad you mentioned power conditioning. Cabling? Thx for posting your system. No doubt, it brings much joy.
Oh thank you! I’m an old audiophile but new on Audiogon and was just playing with the virtual systems feature. Will add some info about the components :)
That is a handsome bit of kit! You say what a few of the pieces do under the components sections, but I have no idea about the others. If you have a few minutes, I'd be curious about which piece does what.
Anyway, that is a nice room with what I suspect are first class components.
