Laying it on the line
After years and years of reading and posting on Audiogon, I want to lay a few things on the line about equipment and sound. I am no expert by any means but I think my experience has taken me to places where nobody else has ever been. I want to share some thoughts and I will probably get all kinds of comments some kind and some no so kind but hey, like the title of my forum thread says, I'm laying in on the line. I hope this will be helpful to some anyway as I have been guilty of most of this also.
Here goes:
Over the years I have read the tube versus SS camps. Read about different sound descriptions such as warm, musical, lush, liquid, soundstage height and width, NOS tubes, capacitor upgrades, speaker placement, cables, cables and more cables, isolation thingies, matts, dampeners, AC treatment, cones, spikes, room treatment, placement (you get the idea). Then there are sources, DACs, preamps, amps, speakers, shootout after shootout, comparison after comparison, system/component matching, upgrades, modifications, etc., etc., higher priced gear versus value, bang for the buck, etc., and PC audio versus CDPs.
So where am I going with all this. Most of what I read here is IMO a waste of time. To me it all comes down to your source and then down the chain in the line of where the signal goes and ends. Cables, tweaks, etc., are the last thing to me and to be honest, I don't use anything special as the improvement versus the cost was poor if any. I see to many threads where the people replying to them have high priced speakers and a so-so source or vise a versa, etc. I am guilty of not posting my system until recently and while recently reading threads I see lots of comments/suggestions but many commenters don't have their system listed. What are the best threads are really funny because most people are comparing components that they heard at a dealer or in their own system. Upgrades/modifications are funny to. The last several years my partner and I began building a tube preamp. We both learned so much from the experience especially when we used all the recommendations about NOS tubes to try, capacitors to try, volume controls to try all based on forum threads. What we came to realize is that most of the recommendations were a big waste of time. Most of you don't really know crap probably because your system limits you to hear only what it can produce. I cannot tell you how many times I have had recommendations about something only to try it and be totally unimpressed. So I kept saying to myself why this is. Do these people need hearing aids? How can they say this about that and I get the product and it does nothing in my system? It became clearer as my partner and I began the journey in building our own preamp and repairing/upgrading/modifying components.
OK, OK, what is this really all about and what did I learn. I learned that most manufactured components are built to a price point and many manufacturers really don't know sound. When you look inside a $10K preamp, the parts are nothing special such as capacitors, resistors, volume controls. I see many comments about how someone upgraded the RCA jacks and IEC and how much of a difference that made, holly crap! I see upgrades costing $2K-$5K, holly crap! I know parts are expensive but come on, most of the sound improvement could have been achieved with a lot less if someone really took the time to experiment to see what part really had the biggest impact on the sound versus replace every low priced part in the component. I have read about how different people who modify gear are geniuses? Really, I found most of them to just do more of the same old. Few if any changed the design of the component so are better parts really that much of an improvement? How do they know what capacitor or resistor works they best in that component, did they try them all? How do you know if they like the sound that you prefer? I changed the filament resistor on a power amp recently to find that it made a huge impact on the sound. Why didn't the manufacturer just use this $.99 resistor? Well that is because AC voltages differ in the different parts of the country so they picked a universal value. Holly crap, it was that simple and I did not have to upgrade RCA jacks, the IEC, tube sockets, capacitors, resistors, power cable. BTW if you send me your amp I will do the modification for you for $1K!
OK enough of this, here goes:
The price of a component means nothing to me as it relates to the sound (bigger isn't better, only sometimes).
Most upgrades are a waste of time if you are just swapping out the parts, sonic benefits yes but generally not versus the cost of someone doing your modification.
Your source is the most important component IMO so take the time to get that right first.
I don't like SS preamps. I have not found one that gets the piano correct (I’m gonna get slammed for this). Most of the tube preamps I have heard are nothing special unless they don't use capacitors in the signal path. Capacitors produce a sound no matter what so get them out of there (yes there are capacitors that are better than others – I am really gonna get slammed here to). They are what most of you are hearing when you compare preamps. They color the sound so that makes it hard for you to know what the system is doing (sounding like). That is most likely why you hear what a cable in your system does but the same cable in another system does not sound like it did in your system. The hump in the mid-range/lower bass may be all caused by the cap in your preamp and not your speakers or room. Your preamp probably limits the sound coming from your source in areas such as resolution, soundstage, clarity, depth, TONE (did I mention TONE), speed, edginess, hardness, sounding SS or digital, bass definition, air, openness, etc. Also, the chassis has a sound, at least dampen it.
Power amps, they amplify the sound. My old Lafayette KT-550 tube amp made way back in the day still sounds and competes with current power amps today even in stock form with old caps and resistors and nothing special tubes. An old FM Acoustics SS amp beats most SS and tubes amps that I have heard. My dare I say upgraded Counterpoint amp competes with current amps today (cannot believe I set myself up for this one but the old amps are just unreliable because of the mosfets)! I am not sure but so far IMO, the amp seems to be the least important component in getting the best sound from my system. As you can see by my comments, my experience is limited in this area even though I have heard tons more amps than most of you will ever hear. If I ever decide to build an amp I will probably learn more about them and be able to make better informed comments. In doing some modifications to amps and repairs I have begun to understand how certain upgrades change the sound but I do not have a definitive recommendation on it all yet. I’d have to think about it some more and then maybe a little more.
Speakers. I searched and searched for the perfect speaker. There is none. They all are limited to and reproduced what the components send to them. I have three pairs of speakers and they each do something that I like over the other ones. When I upgraded my source and preamp I found that the sound of the speaker changed and so did some of the issues in the sound that were now eliminated. Funny, I may have sold a few of them until I changed those components. That is why I find comparisons of gear not to be trust worthy. I recently went to hear the ZU Audio speakers. Based on all of the comments here on Audiogon, I thought that I was going to hear something very special. At first take after I heard the first two pairs of speakers, I said to myself, what the heck are you Zu speaker people hearing. They must all be deaf. BUT understanding what I have been trying to say in this thread, I thought to myself, the speakers cannot be this bad and looked to see how the line of components was affecting the sound. I told a few listeners that the amp was the issue; it could not drive the speakers even though they are very efficient. Someone in the group swapped out the amp and there was now such a huge improvement in the sound. Now we are taking I thought to myself. So you ZU speaker fan boys can really hear! I was almost guilty of the same old, same old.
In conclusion, if you are posting your opinion here on Audgiogon that is fine but list your system so we can have a base to understand how the sound is produced in your system. Post helpful comments and stop all the pissing matches; your pecker is not really that big (mine if the biggest). Know that hearing a speaker at a show does not represent how it really sounds. Understand that sound comes down the line of the components and it ends with the speakers.
Last, in all honesty, I did this forum thread because I read a thread today that mentioned a well-known reviewer and that his thingie did not work out the way he said it did in a particular system. Well probably not in that system. So should I think that that particular reviewer is dishonest, cannot hear, sold out to the man? In my limited experience reading reviews and meeting a few reviewers, I have come to realize that they are in a no win situation. They fall into the love’ m or hate’ m camp. Most of you have not heard the sound from a reviewers system so you will never get to hear what they hear. I only trust a few of the ones that I have met and have been able to hear what they hear in their system. My system will probably never get there no matter what I do. The first time I heard one these systems, my thought was to sell it all and just get a Bose Wave Radio because I will never get there. But I love music and all I need to do is build a system that I like to listen to and forget about that comparison. I like many of you want the best from my system and that is the love of being an audiophile. Like I have stated above, if you begin to understand the line of components in the system, you can get a better understand of what they are hearing when they do a review. Don’t hate them for this, learn from it. This is a business, like it or not. Reviewers do get perks! So was the comment on the thingie that the reviewer showed another piece of snake oil? Well no, not to me as that same thingie worked well in my system.
I do cherish the people who I have met on Audiogon and consider many friends. I did not post this to be a prick or know-it-all, but just to help many understand why their system may sound the way it sounds and to keep an open mind when others post comments. Opinions are opinions but also please understand that a few of us know when you are posting BS or are a fan boy of a manufacturer.
Happy Listening.
Bigkidz
