show us your HiFi

strumstrum said:
I had the Avantone actives for consideration but got a good price on some Mackie's(which were also being considered) so went for those instead.
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I mix on a pair of Mackie's fairly often, but personally don't rate them. I only use the Cubes for referencing, the genelecs are my main monitors.

And yeah, i'll echo everything said here, room and placement are by FAR the most important things.
 
robhooley167 said:
That might just be the best pseudoscience I've ever heard...
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Then you, my friend, need to head over to Russ Andrews' website and have a read. A few extracts:
"Leave your equipment switched on 24hours a day, 7 days a week. The sound from your system will take at least a week to settle down and stop changing. If subsequently, you turn any part of it off, even for a few minutes, expect it to need 24hours to settle again. The improvements in smoothness, sweetness, and musicality are enormous"

"Back in the 1970s, Russ discovered that cables are actually directional and that they perform best when used in the right direction"

"Place your CD in the freezer without the paper booklet. Leave them in there for 72hours and then transfer them into the fridge and remove them 24hours later to come gradually back up to room temperature. You should notice improvements straight away, ranging from subtle to significant changes depending on the disc". Seriously?!?!? How can putting it in the freezer make a positive change to the digital data on a disc? Does it add in some '0.5' values to the otherwise digital data?!
 
TopBanana said:
Then you, my friend, need to head over to Russ Andrews' website and have a read. A few extracts:
"Leave your equipment switched on 24hours a day, 7 days a week. The sound from your system will take at least a week to settle down and stop changing. If subsequently, you turn any part of it off, even for a few minutes, expect it to need 24hours to settle again. The improvements in smoothness, sweetness, and musicality are enormous"

"Back in the 1970s, Russ discovered that cables are actually directional and that they perform best when used in the right direction"

"Place your CD in the freezer without the paper booklet. Leave them in there for 72hours and then transfer them into the fridge and remove them 24hours later to come gradually back up to room temperature. You should notice improvements straight away, ranging from subtle to significant changes depending on the disc". Seriously?!?!? How can putting it in the freezer make a positive change to the digital data on a disc? Does it add in some '0.5' values to the otherwise digital data?!
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Dear god... I'm fascinated and horrified at the same time.

But I mustn't go there right now, I have real science to do...
 
I'm going to go find a Russ Andrews Dscount code :-)
 
I stopped reading hi-fi mags when I read in the same issue:

1. The colour of the insulation on your interconnect wires makes a difference to the sound. Grey is best, IIRC.
2. Removing the 'power on' LED from your Linn Lingo makes a difference to the sound. (The Lingo is a power supply for the *motor* on your turntable!).

You couldn't make it up...
 
Mr Bump said:
Funnilly enough the one thing that worked for me in a truly massive way was using a high grade computer UPS for providing power to my stuff to the point where I used to take it to a friends house for listening sessions. It was a 900VA thing weighed a ton, it was just full of massive capacitors to smooth out and provide reference grade power.
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I went down the 'clean' power supply quest. Run a dedicated power cable to my HiFi system, changed the consumer unit to a high quality version & used sockets without any switches on them.
I then had a 240AC - 240AC transformer for some of the components to ensure I had no external noise from the grid.
 
TopBanana said:
Then you, my friend, need to head over to Russ Andrews' website and have a read. A few extracts:
"Leave your equipment switched on 24hours a day, 7 days a week. The sound from your system will take at least a week to settle down and stop changing. If subsequently, you turn any part of it off, even for a few minutes, expect it to need 24hours to settle again. The improvements in smoothness, sweetness, and musicality are enormous"

"Back in the 1970s, Russ discovered that cables are actually directional and that they perform best when used in the right direction"

"Place your CD in the freezer without the paper booklet. Leave them in there for 72hours and then transfer them into the fridge and remove them 24hours later to come gradually back up to room temperature. You should notice improvements straight away, ranging from subtle to significant changes depending on the disc". Seriously?!?!? How can putting it in the freezer make a positive change to the digital data on a disc? Does it add in some '0.5' values to the otherwise digital data?!
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Kept my system one 24/7 for these reasons & enjoyed listening to music later at night when most of the big consumers on the grid had shut down for the night (would even shut off the fridge for periods of time to get a better sound).
 
By the time you're old enough to to afford decent hi fi you can stand outside a shop that has one of those high pitched devices to scare teenagers away and not hear a thing

What possible difference can changing speaker cable make

As an aside I used to have an amp with a high pass filter switch , the first time I pressed it the kids came in with their hands over their ears, turn it off turn it off

Turn what off, the high pitched whistling ,turn it off

I couldn't hear a thing, it was great , the ultimate in teenager torture
 
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wack61 said:
By the time you're old enough to to afford decent hi fi you can stand outside a shop that has one of those high pitched devices to scare teenagers away and not hear a thing

What possible difference can changing speaker cable make

As an aside I used to have an amp with a high pass filter switch , the first time I pressed it the kids came in with their hands over their ears, turn it off turn it off

Turn what off, the high pitched whistling ,turn it off

I couldn't hear a thing, it was great , the ultimate in teenager torture
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Lol The guy who created that device was from my hometown of Barry.
 
piggin said:
I went down the 'clean' power supply quest. Run a dedicated power cable to my HiFi system, changed the consumer unit to a high quality version & used sockets without any switches on them.
I then had a 240AC - 240AC transformer for some of the components to ensure I had no external noise from the grid.
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Then you sit down and listen to sh!t music :D:D:D
 
wack61 said:
What possible difference can changing speaker cable make
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With all this stuff people/businesses have taken it to the extreme i order to make money. But there is basic truth in it, so door bell wire will sound notably worse than a decent cable, but there is clearly a point (and its not a particularly expensive point) where the product is a decent quality and most people wouldn't be able to hear an improvement with more expensive ones.
 
Bobsyeruncle said:
Then you sit down and listen to sh!t music :D:D:D
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lol, good music is very subjective but was never into house, dance, trance etc (could listen to than via bean tins & piece of string).
However one of my all time favourite albums was Jeff Buckley 'Grace'

Maybe we could start another thread - top 5 albums & why? :)
 
Good speaker cable does make a difference mine was about 6 quid a metre I upgraded from some qed 69 strand I think which was about 2 a metre and I noticed a huge difference
 
Mr Bump said:
Good speaker cable does make a difference mine was about 6 quid a metre I upgraded from some qed 69 strand I think which was about 2 a metre and I noticed a huge difference
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I noticed between my £2 cable and my dads £6 stuff too, but I wouldnt write off it being placebo.
 
piggin said:
I went down the 'clean' power supply quest. Run a dedicated power cable to my HiFi system, changed the consumer unit to a high quality version & used sockets without any switches on them.
I then had a 240AC - 240AC transformer for some of the components to ensure I had no external noise from the grid.
Click to expand...

I had one of these suckers
 

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Going back to the original question I picked up an 80s silver face Sony TA-333 amp and speakers from a second hand shop about 12 years ago - still going strong and sounding good to me
Bearing in mind that the source audio is poor quality, the speaker arrangement in the room is very bad and it's only on as background music not critical listening!

It's one of these:
integrated_stereo_amplifier_ta_333_1763043.jpg


It's so loud that I've never got the little level LEDs beyond about the third one up.
 
Steve Smith said:
Here you go @PMN - My Hi Fi from 1990. This appeared on Facebook a couple of days ago. Less than half the power of yours but all horn loaded so a bit more efficient.

http://stevesmithphoto.webs.com/smallbrook.jpg


Steve.
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Nice! I grew up on systems like that. I had a rig in an arena in Belarus only a couple of years ago that had very similar old horn loaded boxes as groundstacks, DAS line array flown with probably 30-40 boxes a side of old stuff on risers with about 16 double 18" subs in the middle. Gotta love touring countries like that, you either get the most perfectly set up high end stuff or it's a massive jumble of all sorts!

The rig was the least of my problems in there though, the 7 second natural reverb of the arena would have been just as much of a pain to deal with if I'd have had 2 big drops of D&B J!
 
Anyone built there own speakers? I've been tempted for a while.
 
A ford xr3i, the 1st car I bought when I was 17.... Many many many years ago now.... feeling old!!

Its literally just a big stereo housed in a car that's can be all musical when it needs to be but also so vilent and shake you to bits when you turn the dial lol
 
Nice
When I was going to the shows early/mid 90's that would have been a new world record for the UK lol
 
Sadly this was 2003, by this stage it's just considered just a street basser
 
Just couldn't get over his system he had in that brown ford cortina (must have been cheaper ways to flip 50p on your roof)
 
I used to have a nice Arcam/Creek audio/Mission/Thorens rig but when I became confined to bed all the time it just wasn't practical anymore.
I settled for a small streaming based system due to the size constraints of my bedroom so went for a Naim Unitiqute 2 coupled with a pair of PMC Twenty 21 speakers and fed by a NAS drive running iTunes server and using 48 kHz ALAC files in the main.
To be honest it's the best sounding system I've ever had and I've had more than a few over the years.

No AV gear, I don't even own a TV, just a Revo superconnect internet radio for other entertainment and my DVDs via the laptop.
 
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I spent thousands in the 90s and early 2000s.

I was given a separates hifi (JVC) by a military copper when I was 15 years old in 1987. That started a slippery but enjoyable quest for the perfect hifi (doesn't exist, I know!) Had stuff by Audiolab, Rotel, Tag, Musical Fidelity, Monitor Audio, Cyrus, Marantz....and on and on and on!I I don't have many photos as hifi was probably my first true love and came before photography.

Anyone remember the clamour for Ken Ishiwata badged hifi in the 90s? The CD 63 KI Signature Series was something I always lusted after! I also lusted after the Meridian gear, especially their transports and DACs and the 555 power amp. When I used to visit London, there used to be a hifi shop (now closed down) on Tottenham Ct. Rd that I always went to look at (it was downstairs). I remember there being Levinson amps, Nautilus speakers and a Wadia CD player that I couldn't take my eyes and ears off...about £40k then!

Now I'd settle for a pair of power amps hooked up to a Wadia 6/8 and a pair of bookshelf speakers.

The stuff I wished I kept....Marantz CD10. My two Rotel RB970 BX mkII's. My Musical Fidelity power amps. I've recently got the bug back although I won't be going to the extremes I went to in the 90s.

Excuse the crooked photos!!!!!!!:confused::confused::confused:


 
I remember the KI badged stuff!

I could never afford then what I have now. I dreamt of one day getting a wadia CD player as they were the danglies.
 
Yeah I can remember the ki signature stuff. I met the guy in the Bristol sound and vision show, lovely stuff.
 
Used to have the marantz CD94 which I bought around 1987/88 it was described at the time as the most analogue sounding CD player on the market at the time
I think it was the CD player that put marantz in a position to be taken seriously
it gave me a lot of years of listening but was finally replaced with the meridian player I have today

Apparently the players of that era with the DAC chipset they use have quite a following and are quite sought after in some hifi enthusiast circles
 
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