Tuning My Musical Journey

Hi Sonic

A question for you. Are you doing any constant play, or turning the system on each day and running a few hours each day?

I'm watching what you are doing, and don't want you to think I'm not, I know this cable so well that I'm holding back on any real comments till things have a chance to start burning in. In other words, you think things are good now wait till they start to mature a little. The recordings will take on these spacial events that are so real you will be fooled into thinking you are there and can walk through the stage.

Love the day by day accounts I've been working on a project this whole week and has taken me somewhat away from the action, so it's great to see these sessions playing out.

One thing I enjoy is when you guys walk me through the sound so I get to experience it in close to real time. This type of info is a huge benefit to the readers and myself.

great job

Just getting started, but I believe now you can hear the interaction of the field around the Essence and the cable itself. Many designers in this business think about how to shield from the fields, I am the opposite, why do I want to shield nature? I feel bad for those who live in high RF areas, but look at how much sound they loose by shielding. There is ton more music there than this hobby understands, and once we learn how to use physics in our systems we get to experience how to get more through letting physics work, with a little tuning help. Current, signal, waves, fields and mechanics all want to work together, not be isolated from each other.

DAY 6 WITH T3

Sonic is now able to hear the effect of other equipment plugged in and switched on….the whole phono chain sounds better if the CD player is unplugged. Even if it is not powered up but plugged in there appears to be an effect. Vice versa, when playing CD, the musick is more natural if the phono stage is off and the Rega Turntable not turning. A Roy Gandy thing – keep your platter turning and place records and lift them off, less stress on the belt than if you stopped and started the platter.

This is consistent with what Michael said. Given how long it takes the equipment to sound anywhere good after a cold start (>2 hours) Sonic may have to choose analog days and digital days.

Sonic can hear "infra-notes" in the sound of the Chinese Qin, a plucked zither with a large wood body. Playing Copland's Rodeo (Dallas Symphony, Donald Johanos cond. -- Analogue Productions CD), I get beautiful dynamics and when the full orchestra "roars" my room is filled with sound. The brasses have weight. Well separated cello and bass lines. Images at and on the speakers positions are still flatter than behind the speaker panels and elsewhere, more so on the Right than the Left.

Bass drum strikes move the gut even at levels I used to play this CD and “halos” of the sound of instruments and the orchestral bass drum start going through the side walls. Sonic can hear details in the decay of the bass drum stroke too, it doesn't just roll off into silence, something resonates in there on the way down

Addressing Michael's question -- my burn-in is only for several hours a day unless Sonic is all day in the dwelling. Terms of use say I must not leave unessential electrical equipment powered up and operating when no people are present in the dwelling. Technically I am not to leave the mains outlets switched on feeding the equipment when they are switched off especially with my open gear. So to run the T3 cables in Sonic has to select CDs with long play times and let them play as I go to other pursuits within the dwelling. The Sony blu ray player has no Repeat so I have to restart the CD each time. Such is life.

Sonic

Hi Sonic,

Reading through your post have given me an understanding that you have tried all 3 of Michael's cables (T1,T2 and T3).

Could you please give me an insight on how all 3 of those cables sound with your setup ?

Regards

TJ

Hi tjbhuler

Your question is a good one but it raises some pungent difficulties for Sonic in the telling. Because I had to review my old threads all the way back to the old Tuneland site and it saw my "long and (unnecessarily) winding road".

As far back as March 2008, my system was on doubled and thick cables from Michael. At that time my room had the bookcases against the back wall and I sat ahead of a row of FS-PZCs.

By about a year later in mid 2009, I had gone down to a single run, split in two feeding + and -.

Then followed the adventures with the Janis W-1 subwoofer, the bookcase walls, the long BOO! saga. How much of these were my advancing in the tune and how much was my trying to correct the flaws of using excessively thin speaker cables (T2 split) when my system could not support their use?

My learning from all this is: if your system is untuned or at the start of the Tune, go with the thickest speaker cables Michael can supply (T3 or T4). Go thinner and you could end up fighting problems you may never solve till you get to the root cause like I have now.

Sonic will be developing this idea and where I might go next to close the circle.

Sonic

Hi Sonic

Having to leave the system off will mean the cable will take a lot longer, but sounds like your off to a good start.

So your hearing the pre multi-plug-in effect. That's good, not good that it happens but good that your system is that revealing. Once I hear this it almost makes it impossible to go with a multi-source setup for me.

Enjoying the talks on the different Essence Types. They all 3 bring something to the table for me, so it's interesting to hear what others are doing with them. Just beginning on this topic

DAY 7 WITH T3

A friend of Sonic’s and an observer of what is written on this thread asked me “is something wrong? You have mentioned very little about analogue since you started playing the T3s.”

There are two reasons:

1.   in periods of concerted run-in CD is used because of the non-wear and fast switch back to repeat and because of the nature of my Sony blu ray player I have one or two burn in CDs with playing times of over 70 minutes and Sonic plays them over and over but I don’t listen to them, repeated playing can drive someone crazy regardless of how good the sound is getting

2.   Sonic plays analog only on weekends and the T3s arrived on a Monday…we are at the weekend now.

But playing LPs Sonic has been doing and this is something special by way of observation: like CDs the bass is more prominent and goes deeper, girth bigger, dynamic impact greater BUT the difference in the changes between CD and analog is with digital (CD and SACD) Sonic is getting more lateral width, while with LPs I getting a more focus of images between the speakers.  The outside loudspeaker imaging with LPs is more subtle, though on one rock LP, Sonic could hear some voices softly whispering something beyond the Right speaker which I hitherto it was some unidentifiable noises.

Among the LPs played this weekend are:

a.    String Quartets by Women composers – L Valiere, S W Aderholdt, R Schonthal, A Beach (The Crescent Quartet - Leonarda)

b.    A Night at the Taj (Vilayat Khan - sitar, Imrat Khan – Surbahar a.k.a. bass sitar….the bass sitar sounds wonderful)

c.    The Hits of Les Paul and Mary Ford (Capitol)…Mary’s voice is warm and real

d.    Green River (Creedence Clearwater Revival – Fantasy)….Sonic can hear how this recording was made including how the multi-tracking has been done

and this rather sought-after record which I have now landed for a very reasonable price in my collection:



After a play through there is a big soundstage and a lot of bass.  Sonic has to say that I find this music intelligently crafted and even likeable which might surprise Zonees who are familiar with Sonic’s musick choices.    

There is another reason to play CD/SACDs solely on some days and LPs on others – cartridges have a warm up time.  The first LP played of an evening isn’t the best. The second LP is good and it gets better through the evening from there. So along with my warm-up CDs, Sonic has a couple of warm-up LPs…Mantovani stuff.

Now that we are at the 7th Day with T3, the rate of improvement is still climbing but the gradient of change appears to be flattening…..but by Michael Green’s yardstick of burning-in systems on 24/7 repeat, I am merely at Day 2.

Sonic

DAY 8 WITH T3

Michael! Sonic expected a big a change to occur on the 7th day that you predicted.

Sure...the change came in a way I did not expect.

What I got was not deeper bass that goes into the 15 hz range, not a soundstage that extends 100 ft to both the Left and Right of my listening chair.

What Sonic got is a weird sound and my tune instinct (which has been both accurate and wildly off) telling me "don't you hear what the foam is doing to the sound???"

Yes, the sound has great bass, everything is there that Sonic described in the last week but overnight it sounds strange. Like an over ripe sound and no see through soundstage. The soundstage is closed down around the front wall.

Now it is super early days and the T3s are barely warmed up let alone run in. Should Sonic sit it out and tell my "tune instinct" to shut up or start removing some of the foam?

Sonic

Hi Sonic

We knew the foam would have to be re-visited someday. As I have said in the past, my systems have gotten to the place where if I had foam in the room, I could shut my eyes and point to it.

When I read this post 4 things came into my head.

1) check the tubes
2) time to de-torque the cable (would be a little surprised this early)
3) system settling, trying to adjust itself
4) you are now hearing the foam, and it is throwing the newly found stage pressure zone (zones maybe) out of balance

The question is, do you feel comfortable enough with the system to start making changes? If so, your very good at keeping notes so I doubt you will get too lost, and who knows more than likely with your system being more energized you will find more places to make improvements.

One thing I do guarantee, those Pressure Zones are filling up more, and with that things like the foam will stick out.

Hi Michael

Thanks for the quick reply.

Could you elaborate:

1) check the tubes

What should Sonic check?

2) time to de-torque the cable (would be a little surprised this early)

Agree this might be early -- but how to de-torque? One untwist at mid length or every six/eight inches down the entire length as you once advised Hiend001?


4) you are now hearing the foam, and it is throwing the newly found stage pressure zone (zones maybe) out of balance

I'll take a could of pieces down and see what happens. This is the easiest test. De-torqueing is early and requires removing the cables and I have to undo the twist at the connectors for the cable to fully free up and that requires a lot of settling again, right?

Sonic

Hi Sonic,

Thanks for the reply .

Sonic wrote :

My learning from all this is: if your system is untuned or at the start of the Tune, go with the thickest speaker cables Michael can supply (T3 or T4). Go thinner and you could end up fighting problems you may never solve till you get to the root cause like I have now.

This is a good advise for me and point noted regarding cable thickness.

Regards

Tj

Hi tjbhuler

You're welcome! Do your speakers have separate terminals for bass/mids and tweeter with jumpers when not bi-wiring or bi-amping? The jumpers you use between bass/mids and tweeter affect the sound, more so if your crossover point is low like in the Magneplanars.

Apart from the main speaker cable which could be T3 or T4 from Mr Green, he can advise what to use for the jumpers. Some may ask will a 4 inch bit of wire affect the sound? Depending on the crossover design, that wire becomes part of the entire speaker's electrical system. An idea....

Sonic

DAY 9 WITH T3

After Michael’s reply this morning, Sonic thought “let’s go for it!”

Listening and guided my Tune Instinct (am I possessed?) two pieces of foam directly in the path of the backwave of the Magneplanar MG1.5QRs were taken down. Then Sonic detached the speaker cables one by one at the amplifier end, untwisted the strands then gave the twist an untwist every eight inches down the length of the cable to the loudspeaker end. This gave a series of nine or ten untwists per cable, then gave the cable a shake, re-twisted the ends and reinstalled. The cable is now noticeably more floppy

As Sonic got on with the day, happily today there is someone in the dwelling trustworthy enough to repeatedly every hour or so to restart the CD! So this was done through the day.

When Sonic returned in the evening, what a change!

The sound now “flowed”, the bass no longer had the earlier “full and extended but sluggish feel”.

Sat down to listen to David Wilson’s recording of Beethoven Sonata in G major, Op 96 for Violin and Piano. The choked up soundstage in the front corners where the foam was is now gone, no holes in the ambience.

Wilson’s well-written liner notes say that “The sonic image of the violin should originate just to the right of the inside edge of the left speaker. The overall tonal balance of this recording reflects the recording site (Mills College Concert Hall), the instruments and the recording approach, being slightly warm and never strident.” Even with Sonic’s system in its still settling state, I indeed got a sound that is slightly warm and never strident. Better still, the Steinway D piano is full sized across my 14+ ft listening room width and on loud passages is larger than the room. The Guarnerius violin is not “just to the right of the inside edge of the left speaker”. The violin appears to ignore where the speaker is. It is large and is about 3 ft behind the Left Speaker, the size of the instrument is focused, the image moves around a bit as you expect a violinist to move while playing. You can say on a diagonal from the listening seat it is around the inside edge but it cannot be defined simply to be in that location, in terms of tone the violin is warm but very powerful sound that throws a sphere that is larger and “absorbs” the speaker and the area round it as the violin image footprint.

Now Sonic must get critical: with the two foam pieces gone, there is occasionally a lower treble edge that sticks out on some CDs I played. A BOO! test was conducted and showed a hint of the old trouble at the trailing edge of the BOO! but Sonic thinks the settling of the relax T3 will deal with this. The evil of BOO! is still there ready to pounce. The foam still serves its purpose.

Sonic

Hi Sonic

Thanks for the suggestion, as a matter in fact I was thinking of replacing my stock jumper plates to hear the difference. Using Michael's T3 (didn't know there was aT4 too ) is a very good suggestion

Yes my speakers does have separate terminals for bass/mids and tweeter as for the crossover point it is at 2800hz.

Reading through your progress and daily improvements with the T3 is very motivating to me .

Regards

Tj

Hi tjbhuler

There was a T4 option for subwoofers some time ago but you will have to ask Michael if he still offers it. You won't go wrong with the T3 in your set up.

Have you found what is in those passive network boxes on your speaker cables?

As for jumpers you'll have to experiment. Sonic uses 2 inch long single strands of 22 AWG solid core from Michael -- the older, thicker version -- as my jumpers. They are so well settled and burned in (in use for about 5 years) Sonic is not inclined to switch to the new cables.

When you order your T3s, you can get some T2 and T1s to experiment with. The most obvious is to use T3 for the main speaker cable and T3 for the jumpers, but who knows T2 or T1 might be better. Certainly you will get significant improvements over the jumper plates that come with the Sonus Fabers.

Yes, go for it

Sonic

Hi Sonic,

Sonic

Have you found what is in those passive network boxes on your speaker cables?

TJ

Well to what I know off they consist of capacitors, resistors, inductors in various "filter" designs. Depending on which series  you are going for which can fetch a very hefty price tag . The reason they have these boxes is to reduce those RF and in  the end gives a slight "flavour" to the sound.

I am all in for the jumpers . Thanks Sonic

Thinking about it maybe Michael could chime in and contribute his opinion and views on these passive networks found in some speaker cable manufactures ( Transparent, MIT).

Regards

TJ

Hi tjbhuler

Sonic too would like to hear Michael's views on the network boxes.

Hey, Michael where are you?

Here is Sonic's observation from many years ago:

Sonic has a friend who uses tubed preamp and main amps and he once bought a set of cables with the network boxes (the manufacturing company has a name whose abbreviation is similar to a US university) and had no end of trouble with switching noise in the preamp. Say you left the volume up and switched to mono or changed inputs the BANG! through the speakers will make everyone in the room shout "Adoi!"

At the same time the sound was dark and heavy when his speakers were not known for this characteristic. It just sounded wrong. Then at the advice of an honest equipment seller who suggested he use some simple cables and ditched the interconnect with the network boxes, the sound came alive and no more BANG! when switching done on the preamp.

Sonic

Yep, feels like I've been gone for a month

I'm here but by the end of the day can barely keep the eyes open.

network boxes

Personally I like simple. Everytime I start to mess with anything complicated and complex I start hearing the materials and or parts. There's a line between electronic and organic that everyone must deal with. Both can sound very nice but I lean toward the organic. If I can find the answer without adding parts I'm usually a happier camper in the long run.

I do enjoy the complexed but it feels and sounds more like a stereo hobby to me after a while, and when I go after the raw sound or slightly fattened (cooked) with that natural bottom punch I'm more at home. The thing that Picasso & Bare Essence gives me is honesty and flexibility. These are a must for my listening. I like to be able to create sounds within the recorded code and I need to be able to make a tune when I want to knowing I'm not falling into distortion. All these cables are extremely tunable and are pretty much what you tell them to be. With the cables and cable grounds I find so many choices that sometimes cables become an all or nothing part of the fun.

I was playing with the new cable grounds today and was fairing blown away with all I could do.

DAY 12 WITH T3

Since Sonic’s last post on the progress with the T3s certain things were certainly notable:

a.     untwisting of the T3 speaker cables was required to remedy the dulled sound I heard. It made a strongly noticed improvement to the ease and girth of the sound. Volume at each given setting is now higher

b.      the system is trying to adjust itself

c.      the pressure zones might be filling up, which makes for some odd shifts in the sound which Sonic has difficulty in describing. It is wrong, but it is not right either…

The slight upwards shift or midrange effect that Sonic can hear in the BOO! test after removing two foam pieces plays on my mind.  

Then it plays on Sonic’s mind, then I hear it everywhere and all the time.

When I played Neil Young and Crazy Horse’s Come On Baby Let Us Go Downtown, Sonic thought “this balance of the fuzz guitars and the bass is too much on the fuzz guitar and not enough bass. It is a sign of the BOO! evil attempting a return.”

So back up went the two foam pieces that I took down. So now the only change made is therefore the untwisted T3 cables. The sound is delightfully warm and big again but some of that airiness lost. The higher volume is maintained. Better to let more settling happen and if Sonic can get the services of that person who can be in the dwelling to work plus every hour or so restart my burn-in CD through the day, this system will settle faster.

Yet with the brief removal of the foam, Sonic can tell there is an effect from foam which down the road may have to be revisited – that is the opening up of the areas round the foam zones, yes we have pressure zones and foam zones too, Zonees!

Today Sonic took the Power Box from Michael to my expert solder slinger to discuss soldering T2/T2 as the mains feed for the system. He opened the device, looked quizzically at it and asked “where did you get this?”

Sonic beamed “Michael Green!”

His reply “Michael Green told you to power your whole system with this thing? He’s got to be joking.  Look at how thin each of these plates (pointing to the copper conductor strips to feed electricity to the plugs) are.  They don’t have enough conductor metal to feed your amp, you will lose dynamics.  I will go at least three times thicker than this to pass all the current a 100W amp needs. I’ll solder, but if your dynamics go flat, I warned you. Then run your amp off another plug and wall outlet.”

Sonic thinks “yeah”.

But the weekend is here so it is time for less experimentation but to spin them LPs and 45s and enjoy musick.

When I get the Power Box back, it will be the next thing Sonic intends to apply to the system.

Michael: what should the Power Box stand on for best sound?  Two Low Tone Redwood blocks or a couple of Cable Grounds on the tops of the H formed by the Cable Ground shape?  

Sonic

DAY 14 WITH T3

The Power Box is back with Sonic soldered with T2 x T2, with T2 internal links, an excellent job from Sonic’s favourite solder slinger.  He used just the right heat and though he feared it might happen, didn’t melt the plastic.



Now everything goes through one power switch/socket and the whole is system is connected to one Power Box.

After half a day of continuous play, the system sounds WONDERFUL!

Played LP after LP, among them these:





On these two LPs the sound of Sonic's LP playback system has more transient punch and instrumental body. CD is very good, don't think I mean otherwise, however it sounds more "there", while vinyl is more "here" and SACD somewhere in between.

Now this LP:



This last LP has a huge thumping bass which you don’t get on CD.  For all the roll-offs that are required for record cutting the LP’s bass appears deeper and more extended (possibly through clever boosts before the roll off) and the rhythmic thumping of the sync’d bass drum and bass guitar makes sense to this work of art.  The acoustic guitar is distinctly Martin D45 on Old Man, Martin D18 on Needle and the Damage Done, in the second half of A Man Needs a Maid, the orchestra is led in by a piercing piccolo, obvious on LP but on CD it might as well be a sine wave generator.

It will get better over the next days and weeks.

Sonic must listen for the beauty of musick yet be a careful listener especially as I am a novice in tuning.

Sonic is not yet able to reliably to tell the difference between the sound of a moment which might call for patience and hearing a trend-path of settling which indicates a direction to the right or wrong sides of the Tune.

Sonic

"a. untwisting of the T3 speaker cables was required to remedy the dulled sound I heard. It made a strongly noticed improvement to the ease and girth of the sound. Volume at each given setting is now higher"

nice, there ya go use that energy

sonic

"Michael: what should the Power Box stand on for best sound? Two Low Tone Redwood blocks or a couple of Cable Grounds on the tops of the H formed by the Cable Ground shape? "

mg

Can I get some more pics of how things are running and what's near it? With that particular unit you should be able to hear changes pretty clear. I can't quite tell what it is sitting on.

don't forget to tell your solder buddy the sound

DAY 15 WITH T3

Sonic is in a good state of ecstatic sound with the system settling with much play through the weekend.

The settling trend of deeper and more bass appears to be tapering, now the transients and the sense of the size of instruments are opening up.

As Sonic played The Legacy of the Blues Volume 12: Lightnin’ Hopkins (Sonet), the overall presentation of sound is getting bigger and bigger, huge, more dynamic.  

This bigger and “huge” sound in my system is more evident on vinyl than CD I am afraid to say AND the sense of sound around me 360 degrees in both formats is only hinted at and inferred not presented consistently.  

Michael, comment on this if you will.

And there is another improvement – on Rita Coolidge’s cover of Neil Young’s Journey through the Past (from Nice Feelin’), there is a note in the bass in the bass that is played over and over that was too loud, out of control, rumbles the room and eardrums. Not pleasant and not like real music. Now the bass range is stronger yet the unevenness gone with the T3 and the Power Box + T2/T2 - that note doesn’t stick out, not out of control any more.  The whole bass range anchors the music but is not uneven. Very good!

For a recapitulation:  the equivalent AWG of my speaker cables using T3s is between 17 and 18 AWG in terms of conductor area.  Jumpers the T1 (22 AWG). Each pole of the mains (Live and Neutral) feed to the Power Box is T2 (2 x 22AWG) for 19 AWG. The earth drain wire is 22 AWG.

Sonic is intrigued as to why running all my equipment (now five pieces of gear…eventually pieces) from on Power Strip and from one mains outlet sounds better than running the system from two mains outlets.  Michael, why is this?

Here is the picture of the surrounding of the Power Box.  It is inverted due to it being top heavy from the wall warts.  The wall warts rest on two Low Tone Redwood blocks.



What do you suggest Michael?

Sonic

Hi Sonic

you said

"This bigger and “huge” sound in my system is more evident on vinyl than CD I am afraid to say AND the sense of sound around me 360 degrees in both formats is only hinted at and inferred not presented consistently.  

Michael, comment on this if you will."

mg

Magnavox 2300

As I promote the 2300 again, I don't know how many CDP's can do what they do to be honest. The spooky 3D the Magnavox gives and the ease of tuning is a freak. The Sony might do it (I don't know) but I know the Magnavox does some amazing stuff.

I also think what you are beginning to hear is the recording differences and maybe getting to the place where your music is telling you to tune per recording and component and not just one setting. Kinda goes back to me talking about one source systems and how I got to the place where I only wanted one source to use instead of trying to make the system play both, knowing how the mechanics are different for each. In other words, the 360 is there, it's a matter of letting the recording play the system and not the system play the recording.

sonic

"And there is another improvement – on Rita Coolidge’s cover of Neil Young’s Journey through the Past (from Nice Feelin’), there is a note in the bass in the bass that is played over and over that was too loud, out of control, rumbles the room and eardrums. Not pleasant and not like real music. Now the bass range is stronger yet the unevenness gone with the T3 and the Power Box + T2/T2 - that note doesn’t stick out, not out of control any more.  The whole bass range anchors the music but is not uneven. Very good!"

mg

nice

Simplicity leads to effortless.

sonic

"Sonic is intrigued as to why running all my equipment (now five pieces of gear…eventually pieces) from on Power Strip and from one mains outlet sounds better than running the system from two mains outlets.  Michael, why is this?"

mg

Physics

In physics we learn that there are more forces at play than what we picture in our minds as "the audio signal". Before you had two separate electrical sources fighting for the same space domain. Breaking it down, you have the Earth's magnetic field wanting to be in-tune with the other (mini) sources of electromagnetic field. You see it's not really a bunch of "fields" but "A" field with many parts feeding into the overall. The "field" the electronic parts are creating are done within the same core function of the Earth's and solar interactions. Their not so much creating their own but more responding to the generated field of the Earth/Solar relationship. We don't create magnetic anything, but borrow the energy that is already there. Basically giving birth to baby fields all part of the same field. This is why I don't use the word "isolation" in regards to "the" electromagnetic field. There's one parenting field and all the activations that we harness using that field.

Your system wants to be in "harmony" with the Earth's (parenting) fundamental forces. In audio we think of discrete as being the answer, but in reality discrete doesn't really exist. Another myth about our hobby unfortunately. When going from two strips to one, you removed a layer of fighting. A fight that is much bigger than 2 or 3 feet, but actually a fight that plays out in the overall Earth's field structure.

picture the waves in context with the field



You know how I always say "look for an increase in volume"? When the smaller becomes a part (in harmony) with the overall, power increases.

What you have done in going to one unit successfully is made the energy involved more relaxed, which allows the fundamental forces at play to increase the bonding between your system and the electromagnetic overall. Pretty simple stuff really

"What do you suggest Michael?" meaning this



I don't know where you will end up but I think setting it up like this for wall warts is a stroke of genius, and looks to be very sound technically. There are a couple of things to try, but lets let this settle in a while.

might I add

some excellent posting Sonic

DAY 17 WITH T3

This evening Sonic's system had a noticeable expansion of girth and bass weight. I think we are getting to the 7th day point. Listening to a Harmonia Mundi CD of Haydn's Fortepiano Concertos.

Sonic is hearing musick that is big and "here" yet I am not relating to it now in audiophile terms as "how wide is the soundstage?" With CDs it is the joy of her listening to instruments making musick. Better yet with LP and my SPs/78s, it is listening to people playing instruments which are making musick. A subtle distinction but the sound is so enjoyable with either source.

As settling progresses Sonic is thinking of next placing Low Tone Redwood blocks in threes under the main amp transformers like Michael suggested just before the shipment of T3 cables arrived.

Sonic

DAY 19 WITH T3

On DAY 17 Sonic said that with CD the musick was like instruments making musick while with LPs/SPs I heard people playing instruments that made musick. Then I played one CD in my collection – Two Gentlemen Folk (Benjamin Luxon, Bill Crofut and Friends – Telarc). At the right volume, the sound came alive and the realism of the two singers’ voices was real and goosebump inducing! This is the best and most realistic Sonic ever heard of this CD  

As I listened Sonic noticed an effect of how the soundstage “density” might be uneven across the width of the soundstage.  The foam, while capably dealing with the BOO! evil, may contribute to this.  So Sonic tried this idea from what many tunees and pre-eminent amongst them Drewster and Hiend001 do:







Notice how close the FS-DRTs are to the front wall. This improved the central PZ without any noticeable compromise of the bass or return of the BOO!

Michael please comment: after the recent success with using T2/T2 to feed electricity to the Power Box, Sonic was planning to rewire my amp now wired with T1 mains with T2 and maybe all my mains cables to the preamp and CD to T2/T2? Is this overreacting? Sonic doesn’t want to repeat the mistake I made years ago but this time in the opposite direction – is T2 excessive for the mains?  This is because Sonic looked through the site and examined Drewster’s old system and saw the Sherwood he tuned powered by T1 and T1.  And since Drewster knows what he is doing and you (Michael) heard his system it appears the T1/T1 was enough. If it is, Sonic will stay the course and not risk spoiling what I got now.

What other Tunes have you got in mind for the Power Box, Michael?

A Thought

Sonic thanks Michael for the nice and insightful comments recently but Sonic changed color and gets pallid when I hear Michael say: ““I also think what you are beginning to hear is the recording differences and maybe getting to the place where your music is telling you to tune per recording and component and not just one setting.”

It is certainly true Sonic might now be able to hear recording differences and the music is telling me to tune per recording but to me this is the Danger Point and a line that Sonic does not want to cross. Endless tuning of recording by recording does not fit the way I enjoy music.

Because over an evening of listening I play a kind pre-planned programme which will not permit “one source systems and how I got to the place where I only wanted one source to use instead of trying to make the system play both, knowing how the mechanics are different for each.”

Anyway if Sonic can get 360 degree soundstaging with any one format I will be happy. At least Sonic got 360 degrees with something….but I have PM’d you about an idea, Michael!

Things Sonic has been listening to:











The sound is smooth and balanced from bass to treble.  CDs and LPs that I know to be thin and bright are smoother and listenable.  Good sound from the Tune!

Sonic