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Bad recordings and high end audio

Hello. Have decided that the kids are out of the house and I can dedicate some space and money to my long ignored hobby. What is different now is there are so few audio stores. I firmly believe in listening to products so thus I start this great new chapter of my life. The first 2 stores I went to the people were very patient with me and I listened to a ton of combinations. They asked me did I want to hear anything else and I said  yes, ummm,.. how about Led Zeppelin? I received the same response from both stores which was “all Led Zeppelin recordings are horrible” except for this one version of Led Zeppelin 2…blah blah. So I said what happens if I am at home and i have a desire to play Led Zeppelin or another perceived poor recording? They did not have an answer for me nor did they play Led Zeppelin lol . I ended up ordering a pair of Magnepan 3.7i’s from a different store. 13 weeks until I get them, ouch. I am going to guess that people do listen to poor recordings on great systems because you just want to hear a particular album, right? Or am I missing something? Just looking for a bit of insight. Yes, I know they want it to sound the best so I will buy it but is that the only motivation. Or maybe they hate Led Zeppelin, lol.
daydream816
jimf42's avatar
jimf42
62 posts
 
sometimes good equipment brings out the worst in bad recordings...I too have Maggies, but have no problem listening to LZ.  There are other much worse recordings, both on vinyl and CD.  I think  vinyl masks the poor quality of the recording more than CDs.
jnovak's avatar
jnovak
415 posts
 
OP, I like many people here believe in at least two systems. I like folk music. I have many cassette tapes of original recordings that are of poor quality. (Many of these tapes were recorded by old hippies who never even considered the historic value of said music. One set of tapes I retrieved from the top of a commercial stove!) Some of these tapes, which I've transferred to CDR sound better on my home theater set up than my main rig. Oh darn! More toys to buy! Have fun sir. Joe
aubreybobb
86 posts
 
Just saying...

Class D amplification needs lots of help to sound punchy, warm and musical in a mid price system. Done right it can make a great and reasonably priced combination with Maggies. I say they need a lot of help, though NAD seem to have got it right all by themselves recently.

The kind of help I am referring to is reclocking and conditioning with a standalone clock or through good switches.  These are increasingly well priced nowadays.  Optical connector's should use the best quality sfp+'s (laser based, not LED) and glass fibre.  If that is done right you are home free, even with mid level dacs. At very fair value compared to Analog. 

gumbedamit
109 posts
 
Bad in and Bad out, especially with your 3.7's. Maggie's are very revealing,  and that's an understatement.  I own a pair of 20.1's and a pair of Acoustat Spectra 33's.  People are saying,  just turn the volume up...lol just going to sound just as bad, but louder. Over the years I've learned what a good recording sounds like and have managed to seek out the good recordings from the artists I like. Sometimes I play bad recordings because I want to listen to a particular song. Worst thing is having a few friends over to hear your system and you're playing a crappy song, them telling you how you got duped by your audio dealer... BTW, what are you using to power those Maggie's?
gumbedamit
109 posts
 
In my last message I asked what amps are you using, after further reading I see that you haven't selected one yet. I can't say this strongly enough.  Ignore anyone telling you that 100 watts is enough.  Maggie's are HUNGRY BEASTS..Will they sound OK with 100 watts, sure they will, but do you want them to sound Fantastic.  You will need to put some juice into them . I power my Maggie's with a set of Classe CAM350's Monoblocks 700 watts per block going to each speaker.  Those Maggie's suck every watt and ask for more..I mentioned in my other other post that I also have an Acoustat System. I run those with a pair of Acoustat TNT200's that were rebuilt and modified by a highly regarded engineer in the field (Roy Esposito). I originally purchased one amp which pumped out 325 watts per channel into 4 ohms. I had heard so much about the Acoustat panels, I was disappointed.  I got a second amp, had it rebuilt and modified by Roy,  now I'm running over 800 watts into each of the panels,  what a difference Night/Sun difference.  The dynamics you get with all that headroom is phenomenal, even at low volume. I know this is a long post, all this to say, you need to get a lot of power and amperage into those panels to do them justice...
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