Magico S5 Speaker - SET UP ADVICE PLEASE - Tow-In - Etc.

Absolutely easy to use a soldering iron if you are handy at any form of DIY. The only thing you have to be careful of is to "tin" the wire a bit before soldering the connection and in order to make a good solder you must get everything heated up - so a bead of solder touching wire and connector and iron tip will do the trick.

I am sure their are YouTube videos about soldering. The only thing you can't fix is SMC components as that requires a special iron but most high end audio is discrete anyway.

@fsmithjack 

The Kubala Sosna cables are filtering the sound and no doubt removing some of the treble and brightness. Glad that this band aid works for you for now but you really should try to get to the bottom of what is causing a sound that is giving you headaches.

@fsmithjack 

Your Bricasti M1SE DAC has adjustable output.

quote from manual 

"
The next stage, at the analog out of the converter for the gain and filter sections there is a fully differential analog design with fast high slew rate analog operational amps. This is followed by 2 transistor designed output buffer sections, balanced and unbalanced, each separately buffered and isolated. The balanced output level as shipped is set with a fixed resistor at +13.5 dbm. For custom level matching, an internal the jumper on the board can be moved to engage a precision adjustable potentiometer. This adjustment is set from the rear panel screw near the XLR connector. When the potentiometer feature is engaged the level is adjustable from +8 to +23 dbm and can be referenced to a fraction of a db to match any setup. This level is set as a default +16 dbm at the factory so when the jumper is engaged this will be the new level. Please contact us for detailed instructions on how to change and set these levels. The unbalanced is set to normal hi fi levels of 2V RMS (+8dbm) by precision resistor values on the board."


You should check check to see what you have set. It is possible you may be sending too high of a signal to your amplifier and therefore clipping and massively distorting the input stage ...

At +22dbm the balanced XLR output voltage will be about 18 volts which is a pro audio signal and too much for most consumer grade amplifiers.

No need for toe in. Those speakers are well designed and actually have good wide even dispersion. Just point them straight ahead for optimal Soundstage.

I looked at pics of your room. You should be fine in a similar spot as the previous speakers.