Synergistic Red Fuse ...

Oregonpapa

Thanks. Now this is an example of an insightful post. Got it Mapman?

The greatest audiophile I know of, is Peter Moncrief and he reviewed the Chinchilla a long time ago in his quarterly magazine IAR. I learned so much from this great man. In fact he is why I purchased my McCormack preamp and my Odyssey khartao extreme power amp. He taught me about the value of passive components (caps, resisters, diodes, wire and so on. My son now builds his own tube traps from information made available by Peter Moncrief.  Sometime around 1985 I was among a group of  audiophiles who decided to build a preamp designed by Professor Marshall Leak of the Georgea Institute of technology. Although each of us was building the same circuit as published in Audio magazine we used different parts from a range of manufactures. Because I subscribed to IAR, then called an "under ground" mag I was aware of the best sounding film capacitors ("wonder caps" ), the best sounding resistors ("resista" resistors from Germany] and Signal transformers from the USA.  preamps.

He was a great fan of McCormack products and described the Mccormack preamp as a solid state preamp that even tube lovers could love. He also said similar good things about the Odyssey power amp of the day.  He
loved the Von Gaylord Chinchilla interconnect so much that he rated it above all other interconnects regardless of price. I will not purchase any cable without a prior audition, but if this option is available I will certainly give it an audition. Have you been able to audition the current Chinchilla? If so perhaps you could write a few words on what you heard.

wolf_garcia    7.26.16

" Damn…where’s my Dremmel tool... "

Wolf, I am just as frustrated with Synergistic Research as you and many audiophiles are. The language used to describe cables made with a few strands of wire is really difficult to deal with. At least twice in the last 5 years I decided not to ever deal with them again.

However, since I am a member of the cable company, which provides their products on loan for a small fee, I continue to deal with them if their products prove to be good value when auditioned.

I have been trying to figure out why the overblown language and here is my current thoughts. The products that synergistic research manufacture are basically simple and relatively easy to make, if you know how. I believe SR is reluctant to fully explain exactly what basic materials are used and how the cables and other products are made. Why? Because SR spend a lot of money, using basic trial and error, to develop their products. They probably believe if they let everyone know exactly how to make their products they would be unable to make the same amount of profit as they now do. This of course is just conjecture on my part.

I used to be employed in a company who refused to provide what they regarded as Company secrets to any of their customers. Requests by customers who requested information not in the instrument manuals were simply told That their manufacturing process is "Proprietary" and this was standard in the industry.

It is precisely because you have your dremmel tool ready and waiting to copy their products that I suspect SR behaves as it does.   I really can't blame them. The other aspect of the SR quandry is that they are always
looking for new materials and technologies to maintain market share. Many  of their new technologies are not understood by most audiophiles. How can a few dots placed on walls affect bass frequencies? There are people whose opinions I trust have tried these little dots and have been impressed by them. I will eventually audition them

I remember whenBowers and Wilkenson (The well known English loudspeaker manufacturer B&W ) marketed their DM 4 loudspeaker decades ago. It was built under license owned by the BBC. This bookshelf loudspeaker had not only a bass/midrange driver but also a "Super Tweeter" that handled the range from above 13 Khz. There was an outcry from members of the audio community who maintained that since human hearing goes up to only about 19Khz, there was no need for a super tweeter. But keen listeners welcomed the super tweeter and claimed that its benefits extended not only to the mid-range, and horror of horrors "THE BASS". Today this is a well known phenomenon and super tweeters are now routinely used with tremendous success.

Nyame wrote,

"
I remember whenBowers and Wilkenson (The well known English loudspeaker manufacturer B&W ) marketed their DM 4 loudspeaker decades ago. It was built under license owned by the BBC. This bookshelf loudspeaker had not only a bass/midrange driver but also a "Super Tweeter" that handled the range from above 13 Khz. There was an outcry from members of the audio community who maintained that since human hearing goes up to only about 19Khz, there was no need for a super tweeter. But keen listeners welcomed the super tweeter and claimed that its benefits extended not only to the mid-range, and horror of horrors "THE BASS". Today this is a well known phenomenon and super tweeters are now routinely used with tremendous success."

You might not remember the Ultra Tweeters but if you are alarmed by or put off by marketing jargon this might be the ticket. The Ultra Tweeters operate at frequencies above 1 GigaHertz only, I.e., they have no output in the audio spectrum. Yet, with the Ultra Tweeters in the room there was considerably better high frequency response with more air and overall dimensionality. They attached to the regular speaker posts and could be placed anywhere that was convenient since they didn't have to be time aligned.

nyame ...

I agree with you on IAR and Peter Moncrieff. I was a real fan and subscribed to his publication for years.

It was Peter who led me to the original Well Tempered Turntable. He loved it and continually raved about it. Too bad he didn't hear it with all of the mods and tweaks that can be done to it. I've had mine since it first came out. I bought the arm, new in the box, from an engineer who bought it directly from Bill Firebaugh after Bill demonstrated it at the engineer's audio society meeting. Then, I subsequently bought the bare table from a WT dealer. Total outlay was $1,900.  That was the best buy I've ever made in the audio hobby.  Thanks to Peter Moncrieff I will never need another table for the rest of my life. I've been told by really credible sources that to get better than what I have now,  I'd have to exceed $50,000 for a new table. 

I've searched the web over and over for Peter's Well Tempered review. Not attainable.

Here's Peter's review on the Von Gaylord IC's:  

http://vongaylordaudio.com/beta/wp-content/uploads/pdf/pmoncrieffreview.pdf
 
On the Von Gaylord IC's. I have one pair of balanced between my preamp and amp and an RCA pair between the turntable and phono stage. They are the Von Gaylord "Return of The Legend" IC's.  $1,995 for a meter pair. I was so impressed by them that I now have the Von Gaylord speaker cables as well.

When I refer to my system as a "Magic Music Machine," the Von Gaylord cables are a big reason. Ray Leung, the designer, is truly a genius ... and he knows the sound of music too. I heard his system this past year at the Newport Show .. .and was so taken by how accurate and musical the sound was that I had to try the cables. Not looking back at this point. No need.

 The Von Gaylord cables are very compatible and synergistic (no pun intended) with the Synergistic Research power cords too. Great combo. For those who say cables don't make a difference, I'd say ... get the wax out of yer ears. 

I'm tellin' ya nyame ... its Nirvana. :-)

OP