2. speakers
  3. 1390011053

Thiel death do we part . . .

OK, stupid title, I know...but so is my question, probably. So in spite of years of owning lots of different gear - speakers (Maggies, B&W), preamps (Bottlehead,AR), amps (C&J, Bryston) and so on, I've never quite got "the magic" I often hear about. I sort of went the path of least resistance and settled on a small setup - Theil(1.6s) & Bryston(B60) with Rega front ends (analog & digital).

The other night, however, I set it up in a near field format for the first time. After playing with speaker placement a bit, everything suddenly snapped into place, and it all sounds amazing. Magic. I found myself digging into my record collection (maybe 4000 deep) for the 1st in years and now there's not enough hours in the day to listen to it all.

One thing I've noticed is that the system is just brutal with poorly recorded media. While well produced material (Patricia Barber, Cowboy Junkies, some Rickie Lee Jones, Stan Getz and so on) can be just stunning, detailed, spacious and even deep, lots of others just aren't pleasant to listen to. Things I used to enjoy can now sound lame and muffled. I understand this may be a Thiel "take no prisoners" issue. So, just as an experiment, I swapped out the Thiels for a pair of old B&W 802s that are passing thru on the way to eBay and was surprised that while good material sounds adequate, bad material doesn't sound too bad...at least not embarrassing.

So the question is, without swapping nice speakers for not as nice on a regular basis, is there something that I can do to get the set up to be more "forgiving", at times? I listen mostly to what you might call intimate music, small groups and individual singers, often in live recordings.

Listening area is 12x18 with a low ceiling (open joists) off a corridor.

So maybe alternate cables (Zu Julian now) or a subwoofer or an equalizer? Thanks for your patience.
dancub
timrhu
2,779 posts
 
I owned the 1.6s for a while and actually bought them to get that extra detail I felt was missing. The Thiels supplied the missing detail but for me it became too much. Or as you are finding, poorly recorded music was difficult to listen to.
Far too much good music is recorded poorly so I had to sell my Thiels. Not suggesting that, just relaying my experience.
onhwy61's avatar
onhwy61
5,252 posts
 
It might help if you listed a few recordings that don't sound so good with the new setup.

Here's a thread about someone contemplating upgrading a Rega 3/Bluepoint combo.
mapman's avatar
mapman
22,408 posts
 
Ditch the blue point special. Try a denon dl103r.

I ran a blue point for years, it is likely a big limiting factor as you describe.
dancub OP
82 posts
 
Hummm, another set of thought provoking suggestions. Just got the set up back together so will try out tweaking the speaker locations first and report back.

I would look at a new cartridge (Onhwy61 & Mapman thx) but the issue I'm chasing now lives in CDs as well as vinyl - but I do know my vinyl chain is weak (great link Onhwy61).

I'll pull together a list of "sounds great" & "sounds crappy" to try to make my point. That will take a few days . . . but a terrific idea.
royj's avatar
royj
151 posts
 
Mapman is right about the Blue Point being coarse and not as musical as it could be. Try a new Ortofon Red or Blue at least. Other modern carts are good, such as those from Denon, Dynavector, and Goldring, but these Ortofons and the latest cartridges from SoundSmith are really musical designs, with lively dynamics, great separation, proper tone balance, and are happy in most tonearms.

Too bad Thiel's new designer is blowing off the concept of 'time-coherence' as a design goal.

Best,
Roy
More to discover