Hi Currawong, Thanks for liking my post… it made my day.
First off, I would like to preface this by stating in no way do I mean to offend anybody in the headphone or High Fidelity industry.
Also, it’s important to understand that if you are trying to reproduce the musical event–for the most part most consumer available audio that you would find in a Best Buy, or a local audio shop will not achieve that goal.
Sadly, the best audio equipment is expensive, but also interestingly the
very best audio equipment typically
is not the most expensive. But I preface the above paragraph as a caveat, because for a lot of people who may find themselves in areas that cannot support expensive audio equipment stores they may find that they have no exposure to hearing equipment that would convince most people that they were listening to the original musical event.
First off, there are bargains to be had, even in areas that cannot support a high end audio store. I cannot emphasize how important is to have a store as opposed to a mail order business. You can make your selections a lot quicker and with a lot more certainty in a store than through a mail order business.
Also, you will be able to tell right away if the salesman has opinions that agree with yours. So in regards to a near field powered monitor–that is relatively inexpensive and has a reasonable set of trade-offs as well is being widely available and affordable–for those of you living in the United States, you could go to Guitar Center and listen to Adam Audio A7 powered loudspeakers. They are small, are widely available, and Guitar Center has a very liberal financing policy (hello...$42 a month???). Realistically I think these are some small loudspeakers that can be used in small rooms (yes the tweeter is a bit glarey but can be tamped- they image well) and will always be enjoyable–and at some later point in your life they could be used in a home theater system. Other than that, there are certainly some bargains to be had in vintage audio. I put together systems for people all the time costing less than $600 that put many $2500 systems to shame, of course those components for the most part are purchased used. If you spend a little more, you certainly can come close to audio nirvana.
One of the great pieces of advice that I did not take, came from Lenny, the current owner of Lyric hi-fi in New York City. At age 14 I came into the store, and asked what $2600 would buy me in terms of a complete sound system. Lenny put together a very simple system with a reasonable turntable, a nice pair of B&W DM7 Mark2 loudspeakers, and a clean sounding amplifier. He said to me “this will do fine for the next 25 to 30 years, you shouldn’t get anything more than this.” I could have taken his advice...been in ignorant blissful happiness- and been a bit richer. But curiosity got the best of me.
I asked him after hearing them, and agreeing that they did sound quite good– "What are those pyramid shaped speakers in the back room?” Lenny replied, “Oh, you DEFINTELY don’t want to go back there.” Those speakers were Pyramid Metronome 3's, a Dick Sequerra design with ribbon tweeters. I heard a song by the Doors- “Soft parade” and Jim Morrison was not only in the room- but the cathedral seemed to be in the room as well. I was hooked- even though they had tremendous trade offs- I had heard what great audio could do- there was no going backwards..I was after the real Musical event.
Currently, a few things have changed my portable setup since that post. I noticed that there can be too much of a good thing, and the jumbo cryro dock cable was too thick and as a result the low frequencies were too pronounced and upset the balance of my system when used with an Imod.
So I then got an ALO 22 gauge LOD IMOD cable from Headphone Addict at the Rocky Mountain Audio fest- with this cool charging cable...which since then..has broken and I can not get a replacement (SAD SAD SAD>>>>
) and that when coupled with my TTVJ Portable Millet Hybrid Tube amp, Ultrasone Edition 9’s with APS V3 cable upgrade is my current rig- which is now shelved until I can get a replacement IMOD LOD 22 gauge cable with charger.. anyone got one???
I sold the 6th Gen Ipod as the Imod had better resolving power but only when combined with the 22 gauge Imod Cryro dock.
My home rig has changed again. I sold my RS1’a Infinities and my Wadia 860, and my Bryston 4b amps, my Apt Holman pre amp.
And after trying many different combos- and hearing loudspeaker systems at the 2009 Rocky Mountain Audio Fest costing between $6,000- $75,000, and hearing all sorts of DACs costing many thousands of dollars..including hearing the newest Wadia separates what new system did I get?
(2) sets of Infinity Reference Standard RS1’bs (in near museum quality condition) , A Wadia 860x (does 24/96) with USB input upgrade and Great Northern Sound Statement upgrade (holy crap this thing is amazing!), I’m going to do dual woofer towers with one set of high end panels to give me effortless bass equivalent to the Infinity IRS V! Looks like it will be Bryston 28sst mono blocks 1000 watts each on the bottom and Some very esoteric 400 watt monoblock amps on top.
I had bought a Audio Research VS 110 and had it upgraded by Steve Huntley of Great Northern Sound to his reference level- supposedly he claims it surpasses the current VS 115's resolution and tonality by a good margin. Steve Huntley is a good man, and when I found it did not have enough oomph (as in raw current) as a top end amp- he took it back. The amp sounds great at moderate volumes but does not let the speakers reproduce an orchestral crescendo. So the hunt continues. But I only have amps to fill in...should be easy.
SOOOOO...I am once again in Audio Nirvana. But realistically I could have been very happy with my old set up too. But the USB upgrade gives me easy computer streaming with USB error correction and low jitter. I moved to Venice, CA- beachfront…and yes….my condo neighbors hate me….and I haven’t even blasted it yet… we might get a house again next year.
Also- an inexpensive used set up… And yes it is very close to audio nirvana…
1. Used Apogee Mini Dac ($400 or finance new from guitar center- make sure it has Firewire!) or an Imod
2. Macbook Pro (preferably with solid state hard drive- also can be financed cheap through guitar center)
3. Audio research VT 100 Mk2 100 wpc tube amp ($2000 used)
4. Magneplanar Tympani 1-d ($400-800 used)
5. Wireworld Oasis XLR cable.
This will image- but not nearfield. Instead of 5th row (like with my RS1’bs) you get 15th row or further back but a convincing 15th row! You’ll get amazing "unified wave launch" and coherence. And it will give you a Super involving soundstage. There will be bass, much more than you would expect from a planar speaker. It is fast and has slam. It’s a “big wow system”. Play Enigma MCMMX a. D through it… you’ll be floating through space. Play Led Zeppelin through it and you are in Madison Square Garden’s upper deck in the 1970’s trying to see the Page and Plant through the pot smoke. It does Jazz, classical piano, just about any small ensemble too. Wow- that’s a fun system that you would have to spend about $50,000 in new gear to beat it! And it even sounds great for home theater too.
But you’ll really have to work with speaker positioning and not have anything in front of the speakers for at least 8 feet. Tilt the high end panels inwards and the two bass panels have to be “v’ed” in towards each other with the bisector of the “v” going off between a 15- 25 degree angle from the front line. And yes..an inch or two off and the image is lost. So Expect to tweek it for a few hours. Start with 70 Inches between the tweeters and move inwards or outwards about 3-4 inches off of that. At least 25- 38 inches off the rear wall.
Want to do super cheap great sound… like a 1980’s 100wpc $250 integrated amp (with an enormous torroidal transformer- with timeless styling) and a pair of great $200 speakers… drop me PM..I don’t want to tell too many people because I am always buying that set up for friends.. off of ebay.
If I had to do IEMS I’d likely do the JH –16s…planning on buying a pair soon. As I said before "you can't get there from here" but I at least will have headphones I can use when it is hot out.