carefully built system on a budget. it has very good synergy. the addition of the cary on 9-4-09 has really taken it up a notch. prior to that, i was biamping with an arcam p-80 companion amp to the a-80 that i am now using as my preamp. the nottingham ace space turntable and tonearm have been a great addition. i have added the modwright recently as an upgrade to promitheus c-core passives that i was using with the dali helicon 800s. the andras are something special and thanks to my friend, tim, they are on loan to me for a while. the dalis will return following this loan.
120 watt ultralinear or 60 watt triode. updated with audionote caps
Doge Doge 8
8 tubes. using nos tubes in line stage and phono section. an unsung hero, the search is over.
arcam cd73t and r/dac and jitterbox
nice analog sounding system. a few years old now, but sounding good. the addition of the r/dac has given it new life. the old audio alchemy jitterbox still gives a good improvement.
Nottingham Ace Spacedeck with heavy platter
29 lbs. platter. deep silence. excellent uni-pivot. sitting on 30 lbs. of maple and 3 nordost sort kones.
vpi sds
this was amazing when added to the turntable. also works with cd. anyone with a table with a/c motor should try this or something like it. you can see the alchemy jitter box on top.
beyer dynamic step up transformer
on generous loan from a friend. works with the moving magnet stage of the preamp to allow lomc cartridges.
Wilson/Benesch carbon
basically a benz ruby in a carbon body. great benz tone with speed.
Zu Denon 103 modified
an incredible sleeper cartridge. huge body and tone.
Dali Helicon 800
lovely to look at, lovely to listen to.
Morrow Audio SP6
Excellent - very clean and clear
morrow audio mp 6 and ph6
great cables from a local guy and quite the bargain for the quality.
System edited: more changes. modwright 9.0SE preamp to replace promethius c-core passives and andra 2 speakers temporarily (thanks to tim) replacing dali helicon 800s. any club members interested in hearing this rig, feel free to contact me.
I have taken it with me due to its small size to a number of my listening buddy's homes. It usually is far more revealing than whatever they are using. I have heard a Einstein in my system and a heavily modified Ayre unit. The Einstein was a little smoother, but at 3 times the price. The Ayre is more defined, but there is no telling what the price would be. I think it is a great unit. It is made to work with a Benz, so it is excellent with my wood body. I just had a chance to use it with a Lyra Skala and it worked well, but was not a perfect match. It is very dynamic and open.
Bill, one of the guys I listen with regularly called them "velvet thunder". They are very refined and play deep bass. The Aerials had many qualities I liked, but these have managed to keep most of those qualities and build on them. For example, with the ribbon tweeter taking the very high range from 13,000 and up, the dome is tuned to sound more relaxed so to me, it has a more detailed, but at the same time relaxed sound. I had to do some experimenting with phono cables, but have gotten the sound the way I want. They are also 5 db more efficient, so I can run the amp in a much more relaxed part of its powerband. This gives more headroom and less distortion. I had to run the Aerials nearly wide open to get them to open up, not so now. So, I am very pleased with them. They were a guess on my part, never having heard the brand before, but it has turned out well. You are invited if you would like to hear them.
Those are called "room lenses" and were made by a company called Argent. They are movable Helmholz resonators. They smooth the sound and focus the soundstage. By changing the angle, you can vary the width and depth. The literature also claims some bass damping properties. They are very effective. I don't know if they would work with planar speakers. There is a third one behind the listening area. You tune them by ear.
Thanks for the compliment. They sound as nice as they look. Lets get together soon.
System edited: just added the helicons yesterday. when moving from a 7 inch woofer to dual 8 inch woofers, you expect a little more bottom end reinforcement. you get it, but pending some location refinement, i would not characterize these as "rock" speakers.
System edited: at the suggestion of one of our members, i moved the speaker wires to inside the crevices of the bricks. i had to use flash on the picture, otherwise, they are unseen until they exit the bricks. thanks for looking.
