Jack n Roberts, I feel for you if you never try seperates again. Frankly, I have only heard one integrated amp that I would say is better than most of the solid state seperates I have ever heard. That 'integrated amp' is made by the German company ASR and sells for $10,000 Euros. It also has 3 boxes, one box for the control section, one box for the poweramp/power supply section, and one box for the battery power section that powers the preamp part of the unit.
Sad to say though, I have tried a number of the above things people (listed) will never do again. Some I have had a lot of success at... heh heh.
5 things I will NEVER do again
1 - Run a passive preamp. Passives might theoretically be the simpliest way to run a signal, but almost invaribly their sound quality is not constant over different levels of volume a system outputs.
2 - Run a subwoofer in a 2 channel system. If your speakers you have were not designed to hear low frequencies, getting a sub may let you hear those frequencies afterall; however, getting those frequencies to sound coherent (with your speakers) is next to impossible.
3 - Use stock anything when aftermarket gear is oh so much better. I do not even unpack stock AC cords.
4 - Buy speakers sight unheard. I have never had bad luck with this; however, I recently was very close to buying a pair of speakers, and I had the amazing idea of hearing them first at a dealer. I did not like the sound of the speakers at all, and I was glad I listened to them first.
5 - Buy a component solely based on one rave review. Reviews are probably the single worst ways to research components short of using a dart and a catelogue to selct components to buy.
Honerable (or dishonerable) mentions
- Place a fridge on a shelf above an amplifier... I did this in college, we had a huge blackout... Fridge dethawed and leaked...
- Run amps that get REALLY hot. I have had it with Class A amps that I can roast food on. I do not have AC (not that I really need it), but an Amp should not raise the temperature of a listening room significantly.
- Run a solid state DAC... I will probably go back on this in the future, but great tube dacs are almost as addictive as any hardcorde narcotic drug.
- Commute 130 miles to a Hi Fi show each day for 4 days in a row. At the end of HE2003, I was almost a vegetable.
- Plug a vacuum cleaner into a PS300 power plant. Actually I did not do this but a friend of mine did. I'll be sure to never do it.
KF
