New decade, end of the CD?

^ "Sound" advice

OK, I got back to my North Holland pad last night, and the first thing I did was to light up my hi-fi and listen to what Olivier and I heard together on his installation in Paris and compare it with mine.

Edited by Sean Trane - September 26 2011 at 04:42

Thanks for your detailed impressions Sean.

First (and sorry for being out of the subject) i did not know that you were so much impressed by our nice countryside. Well, it's true that it's an impressively peaceful and pastoral place so close to Paris.

We had a great time, too short of course and we did not listened to all the CDs we wanted, by lack of time. I must precise that the system was not perfectly "warm" when Sean came and that i blew an entry tube two days after. So maybe this tube was already downgrading the sound but not sure.

Sean depressed me a little with its (true) critic concerning the power installation not being legally correct. He's true but fortunatly my electric board is from the new generation and extremely sensitive.
So i take the risk.

His remarks concerning the room acoustic are good ones, indeed window glasses are terrible sources of reflection and a thick carpet in front of the system would make smoother highs.

I must also precise that my system has a certain handicap linked to the room size (i recently moved it from a small room -now the baby's room_ to a bigger living room with no door to the kitchen so actually this open space gather two rooms. And the system is "only" 40 watts tube helped by 200W solidstate sub which is not that much eventually for such a big room.

BTW sean, how powerful is your Nad amp, what's your Speakers sensitivity and how big (and full of furniture)is the room?

I wonder if adding a draught-screen two meters in front of the system in order to recreate a small room inside the living room would enhance?

Not sure at all but that would be something to try as well.

Another thing i want to point out is that to fully apreciate such a critical listening, one has to have belly full and to be well rested.
It may sound dumb, but i noticed that these two factors have a important influence on the sound perception. My system always sound harsher to me if i'm tired and i often need to put the volume higher.

And after dinner the system sounds better (it could be due to the sugar rate in the body). In french we have a proverb which says "ventre affamé n'a point d'oreilles" that would be translated as "Starved belly has no ears" and it applies well to Hifi listening.

I'm waiting for your impressions about the portable but also about the
cones i gave you that you can place either under the CD or the amp, as long as the below surface is flat.

Unfortunatly we did not had the time to perform the tests related to the arguments we had here, for example i wanted Sean to listen to 3 different headphone cables on the portable setup but we simply didn't find the time (Sean listened to the portable 3 minutes before we went for dinner with my neighbours). But it's something i can bring to Holland and quietly do the test to Sean.

oliverstoned wrote: Dean wrote: A nice balanced "report" Hugues, thanks for that, an interesting and informative read. I guess he didn't allow you to change any cables or remove any of the marble slabs from his system   I too noticed the scary wiring in the photograph Oliver presented, I'm glad you pointed that out to him and not me because I hope he will take your advice better than he takes mine on these matters. My advice is if he really must insist on using industrial power cables then he hires a qualified electrician to fit the proper IEC60309 industrial power connectors to his wall, which will handle the current he expects (but doesn't actually use) and not fall foul of any French and European wiring regulations. What do you mean by industrial power cable?

The guage of wire you said you used is heavier than domestic household power cable - it is intended for industrial use and is termed "Industrial" for that reason. It requires Industrial Power Plugs and Sockets for mains power distribution around a building.

"(i)much prefer a more immediate sonic or aural premature ejaculation than Olivier's long-restrained kama-sutra enhanced orgasms. But that a personal preference"

I'm sure it's not the same in your intimate life!

oliverstoned wrote: "(i)much prefer a more immediate sonic or aural premature ejaculation than Olivier's long-restrained kama-sutra enhanced orgasms. But that a personal preference" I'm sure it's not the same in your intimate life!

     

oliverstoned wrote: Thanks for your detailed impressions Sean. First (and sorry for being out of the subject) i did not know that you were so much impressed by our nice countryside. Well, it's true that it's an impressively peaceful and pastoral place so close to Paris. We had a great time, too short of course and we did not listened to all the CDs we wanted, by lack of time. I must precise that the system was not perfectly "warm" when Sean came and that i blew an entry tube two days after. So maybe this tube was already downgrading the sound but not sure.   Another thing i want to point out is that to fully apreciate such a critical listening, one has to have belly full and to be well rested. It may sound dumb, but i noticed that these two factors have a important influence on the sound perception. My system always sound harsher to me if i'm tired and i often need to put the volume higher.

oliverstoned wrote: Depends on which part of the "valley", here's a pic of the Chevreuse road

Those pictures are a little small, do you have any larger ones? That top one isn't even 10 megabytes. 

The T wrote:  Classical recordings from that era on vinyl sound horrible. Remastered recordings of that era in cd can be good, like the magnificent St Matthew Passion conducted by Karl Richter (1957). It all depends but in general I tend to agree. I have quite a few mono recordings from even earlier than 1955 but they have to at least be pristine mono, in cd, not scratchy vinyl...

Well I'm just kind of a stickler for a minimum level, although I don't care much past that point. But I was pretty disappointed to get the 1954 recording of Mehuin and Furtwangler playing Beethoven's and Mendelssohn's on clearance at Borders and finding it completely unlistenable. Great Recordings of the Century my ass...

Dean wrote: Henry Plainview wrote: Aw Dean, I spent 25 seconds googling it and everything :( And seriously, 3 CDs? It could easily fit on 2. [cynical]I think it's just a ploy to bump the price up to 30 bucks[/cynical]

Too bad we did not compare my excellent Discman D25s without amp Vs
Imod + amp because Sean would have realized that the amp really add something in term of bass, dynamic, soundstage.

Indeed the amp i currently use is big, but i'm interested in a new one which is as big as a little match box, which i suspect to do better mid/highs but not as good bass.

But i claim that my portable even in its current form is much more convenient than a Discman. My 80 Giga Imod can store something like 100 uncompressed albums which is great for a week end, imagine carriyng
a bag with a Discman and 100 cds! I wouldn't want to carry my Cds outside, especially on holidays.

My current amp (Iqube)



A smaller good one (Mustang P51 on the right, below the DAP)







Edited by oliverstoned - September 28 2011 at 09:43