None come close. (BD-Design)

by MikeH , Friday, January 25, 2008, 11:54 (5936 days ago) @ PeterSt.

I havent tried GChighend yet. I think I should if it works with my DAC (only 96kHz/24bit). I'll be running windows XP or Mac-os on my music PC, (I'm about to buy a new one)

I'll have to read your advice a few times more and think about it, I'm not understanding something in it and I'm not sure which part. Perhaps the controlled angle of output from a horn is part of the reduced room problems. I'm probably missing the point completely.

At this stage I'm looking at revealing detail and those quiet little background noises and ambience in the recordings that only become apparent with good equipment. If the source doesn't reproduce the detail the later stages can never get it back. I'm only trying to judge the source by the headphones. The impact in the first milliseconds of a drum beat caNot be reproduced by any headphones.
Trying to judge a whole system by headphones is like judging the handling of a Ferrari without releasing the handbrake and putting it in gear. It makes nice noises but you won't know how it FEELS.

I have a couple of tripath based D amps I am experimenting with at the moment. I don't have quite enough gain from my source to drive these so I'm looking at pre-amps along the lines of an Aikido (either high voltage MOSFET or tubes) with 6-8dB of gain and stepped ladder attenuators. I believe increasing the gain of the T-amps too much can increase the noise. I have been paying attention to impedance matching at every stage, as an RF technician I do it by habit, your confirming that makes me feel I am on the right path. I'm not sure if you are implying D amps are a good thing or a bad thing. I've been trying to spot what chip is used in the Crazy amp but it's been rather well concealed in the pictures which is entirely understandable, I have no idea if it's digital or not.

My speakers will be replaced, I know them reasonably well now and I am far from satisfied with them. the cabinets are wrong for the possible placements in my listening room, the drivers are (relatively) cheap and lack high frequency finesse. I will continue to experiment on them and learn until I know what I want. Great speakers and amplifiers will not be able to reach their potential without a worthy source.

You have helped me a great deal Peter, thankyou.

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