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not a charming day with snakes

so, all afternoon and into early into this evening, i listened to the digital side of my rig with a power snakes hydra inserted at different positions. my older son, a second-generation audiophile, was present during the greater portion of this session. during our time together, i began by plugging my pre/dac and transport into the hydra. we played numerous disks, mostly in the “groove rock,” “acid jazz,” “adult rock,” and “folk/pop” genre, including some direct-to-cd recordings done in the past few days ( this son is a consultant to radio stations and record labels, which gives me some awesome access to the current music scene). some examples of discs on our play list: radiohead, “kid a”; air, “moon safari”; phish, various; pink floyd, “echoes”; oysterhead, “the grand pecking order”; mark knopfler, “sailing to philadelphia”; the bobs, “cover the songs of.....”; dylan (also my 1st son’s name), “slow train comin’ ”; dave carter & tracy gammer, “drum, hat, buddha”, etc. (yeah, I know “etc.” doesn’t quite make it with this lineup but, hey....). after listening for an hour and a half or so to numerous cuts on the “play list,” our initial reaction was: wow, the soundstage has really widened but something’s not quite right. then it hit us both, almost simultaneously: the PRaT’s all screwed up. everything sounds constipated, slowed, without rhythm or pace. we then took the hydra from the frontend/source and moved it so i could plug my amp into it. at first, things improved. the supreme quickness of the system returned, while the huge soundstagen remained. as the hydra “warmed up,” however, the constrictions to the bowels increased. constipation again. the flip-side of PraT. unplugging the hydra brought everything back as it had been. the quickness was heard again in the cymbals, drums, lead guitars and mandolins. the bass tightened. voices were back where they should be, separated, focused and steady. thus my query: has anyone else had this experience with the hydra? i’ve heard so many good things about it that I was completely unprepared for the negative things it did in my system.

associated equipment (digital side only): boulder 1012 pre/dac; accuphase dp- 90 cd transport; jeff rowland 8ti amp; avalon eidolon speakers; tara, the one ic’s (pre to amp) and speaker cables; accuphase st att&t optical and accrotech 99.9999 coax digital connections; tara, the one and power snakes python pc’s; 5 dedicated 20 amp circuits w/ hospital-grade outlets.

-cfb
cornfedboy
cornfedboy OP
1,645 posts
 
albert: i also observed what you observed, tho this effect wasn't as disturbing as the loss of pace/"quickness" in my listening sessions. the PRaT problems i encountered were also manifested by bass muddiness on a number of discs. - kelly
garfish
1,840 posts
 
Hi Kelly; a couple of points; 1) it's been my experience that PRaT is a VERY fragile audio characteristic in high resolution systems-- it's easily destroyed or screwed up (you probably know this too?). I know it because I listen to a LOT of music where good PRaT is essential to its enjoyment (R&R, Blues, Soul, Pop etc.). And 2) in the course of attempting certain "upgrades", I've destroyed or seriously diminished it several times, eg by using a Madrigal AES/EBU cable between transport and DAC, Townshend Seismic Sinks under ML37 transport and ML 360S DAC, AND use of Shunyata Viper 2 power cord on any front end components. And on my amp, the Shunyata Sidewinder also did strange things to PRaT.

I should also mention that putting the Seismic Sink under my tube pre-amp actually improved PRaT, and that's where it's stayed. I also did not keep the Shunyata power cords in my system very long, but they were previously broken-in. BTW, The Syn. Res. Master Couplers that I use on everything had good PRaT right out of the box.

I'm not bashing any of the products mentioned, I'm just saying that they did not work in MY system, and that the loss of excellent PRaT is a VERY serious loss to me. Hell, I'd give up the sport (or start over) if my system permanently lost good rhythm.

A couple of months ago I got Vand. 5 speakers, and at first they didn't have very good PRaT, but I sweated, cussed, prayed, and generally perservered while breaking them in, and now they're great-- maybe not quite up with your Eidolons, but still damn good speakers-- AND with good rhythm;>). Re the Hydra, maybe it just needs some breakin or settle-in time as Rcrump mentions above? My dealer in Seattle highly recommends the Hydra, and I've considered one myself, and so am interested in your thread. Please keep us posted on your progress. Good Luck, and Cheers. Craig
cornfedboy OP
1,645 posts
 
tim: i was at my audio dealer's/best friend's place this am and poked my head around to see what i'd not yet heard in my rig. john suggested i try the hydra with a set of pythons, since i'd played around with some other pc's lately. of course, this was a yet another pathway on which to try to replicate the sound of horses' hooves with dried coconut shells. i've had the coax digital cable for some time; it's always fun to remotely switch cables and reverse polarity on the boulder just for kicks. (you can do much of the same on your accuphase dc-300.) FWIW, i'd try out various ic's B4 inserting a power conditioner (or whatever the hydra is) into your system. you can't make an omelette without first breaking a couple of eggs. -cfb
rcrump
427 posts
 
Cornfedboy, I heard flaws in the Hydra that you and Albert heard, but nothing is perfect....Upper midrange is down just a touch and there is a glitch way up top, a coldness as it were that bothered me, but not nearly like the ferrite bead tricks lots of folks use.....The lower mids/upper bass is a touch fat, but can speculate it is the cord used as understand it sounds that way.....The bottom line is that in most systems the Hydra will roll off the upper mids, fatten the lower mids and quiet things down a bit with the ferrites used inside the unit......These are good things for most digitally driven systems and I can sure understand the popularity.....I know Albert likes to hear how drunk the players are as do I and we use big analog rigs as a reference.....I think we are all being a bit too hard on the Hydra as it is a godsend to most folks out there that don't have 100K in their systems and the Hydra screws up the music much less than most all of the line filters available.....Oh, the unit I used to make is called a BybeeSucker and a two circuit unit would be necessary for your set-up with a digital preamp and CD player so the clocks don't talk to each other down the AC lines...I have not sold any in a while and there are updates available to those units in the field....It was set-up for those folks that primarily use analog and don't want to turn off the digital gear to enjoy analog as the digital AC backwave can ruin analog sound.......If I were you I would spend a little money and have three lines brought into you room, one for the CD player, one for the digital preamp and one for the amps and other analog gear and just forget about a line filter.....The inductance in the three separate lines should do a decent job of taking care of the digital backwave of one clock polluting other clocks or the analog gear.....
brulee
564 posts
 
Hi Kelly, I hate to go off the topic, but if the Hydra which I have not heard does not cut it, and if you have the opportunity, please try the LATEST version of the Sound Applications CFX. I was very impressed with this unit. It is the first conditioner I have heard that didn't do something wrong somewhere. I can't say the same with amps plugged into it. If you get the opportunity, be sure it has been fully broke in. I do not think you will find a PRaT problem with this one.
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