UPDATE:
In my initial review of the Verbatim interconnects, I mentioned a top-end tizz in choral and opera music that I suspected might be due to resonance in the system that my cheap Lovan rack couldn't control. I've since focused on this.
Two weeks ago, I drove from my home in Eugene an hour up to Salem to visit a friend who owns an Esoteric UX-3SE CDP and also is a designer of audio racks. His platforms are based not on isolation or dampening but on resonance energy transfer. He has an R&D deal with a high-performance rack and stand company.
My friend explained to me that contrary to what most believe, it's air-borne vibrations that cause most of the trouble--more than any other source of vibrations. This is what his racks and tweaks are designed to address. However, it is against the laws of physics to isolate anything from vibration. He explained that vibrations are indeed captured in a moment in time but, in fact, can only dissipate over a PERIOD of time. Thus, a transfer system works better than an isolation system--otherwise, the vibration energy is simply stored in the component or the rack and, eventually, gets sent back around.
"It's like electricity," he said. "Vibrations are always seeking ground. And the best one can do is to expedite the transfer of those vibrations so that they can get away from the component and away from the rack into the subfloor back to ground." Hip-bone connected to the thigh-bone stuff, seems to me.
My friend wanted me to come up to hear the improvements he'd made in his system--NuForce 9.2 SE monoblocks (Class D), NuForce pre, Esoteric UX-3 SE, Aerial Acoustic Model 10T 3-ways (86dB/4ohms)--amazing, elephant-leg sized speakers--Foundation Research line conditioners, and cryo'd wires from Audio Tekne. I went although it was a small bit of hardship, as I'd just returned with my family from a two-week trip to Los Angeles over the holidays.
After the listening session, which went very well, my friend offered to buy me a tank of gas--no small expense, actually. I declined and proposed that I borrow some equipment instead--his prototype stainless steel T-Square rack, a powered line conditioner, and some Audio Points.
I spent half the afternoon the next day setting everything up. But only after having to re-arrange my study/listening room and pull my Chinese rug about 8 more inches from the back wall. I couldn't have the spikes of the rack going through my prize piece of indigo-dyed wool! It was a big job, but I got it mostly done before dinner. Placing the components on the rack is very, very tricky, as the rack's got an open design and the components rest on steel pods that slide side to side on these rods and lock in with Allen-wrench screws. The trouble is, you have to adjust any given pod with an Allen wrench from below it, which means you can't have a component in the rack below or above when you do this. There is measuring and more measuring, and I found myself building phantom templates of spatial arrangements in my mind as I worked. Rudimentary tasks of engineering to predict the alignment of component footer spikes with the pinholes on the surface of the pods--sort of like scripting the oil-rig landing of a helicopter, which is an interesting experience for a non-architect or non-engineer. Several kinds of painstaking work, not the least of which is the blue-collar job of sliding the equipment into the rack. After nearly bashing every piece of componentry more than once (thank god I caught them each time), I got everything in the rack, with the 75 lbs. Air Tight stereo amp on top (as it should NOT be, as it's best for stability placed on the bottom, but I couldn't quickly figure out any other way).
My friend the designer said I wouldn't tell much difference for 7-9 days, as the rack would need to settle and spikes dig into the sub-flooring. He was wrong. There was a difference immediately. Everything was clearer, and the top-end tizz, overdriven trebles, and somewhat hard or harsh top all vanished. I've now got the clearest, cleanest sound I've ever had. My friend speculates the immediate and dramatic improvemenst are most likely the result of switching from a non-performance-oriented racking system to a performance-oriented one. But he continues to prophesy that the biggest gains will occur after everything remains stable and untouched for 7 to 9 days. We'll see.
There is more clarity and an overall a cleaner sound and subtler micro-dynamics. I like what it does for the music. I can only imagine that adding Verbatim speaker cables and having the rack settling will improve things even more. But the sound is presently much clearer and punchier than anything I've yet heard in my system.
SOME DAYS LATER, AFTER RETURNING FROM CES:
I'm playing von Karajan's Mozart "Requiem" and it's never sounded better. Much more resolving and that overdriven top I wrote about in the initial Verbatim cables review is gone now. So there you are! It was resonance all along, as I'd guessed and the Verbatim cables allowed me to discern. No issues with the top being hard, overdriven, or tizzy. Best sound I've had yet out of this system.
TRIANGLES! There's a triangle at the back of the orchestra in "Cum sancto spiritu" I've never heard before. Literally. It's such a cliche of audio, but there you are.
I'm playing a Vivaldi choral hybrid SACD now ("Vespri per l' Assunzione di Maria Vergine" by Concerto Italiano, Naiveclassique) which has always tended to be "hot" and overdriven. No problem. Clarity and dynamics to beat the band.
For speaker wires, I'm using the A+ Oval 12s I bought a year ago (as my 2nd pair of "expensive" speaker cables) and they're doing great. They react much less to interconnect changes than any other speaker cable I've had and preserve the clarity of the Verbatim interconnects. I paid about $300 for this 12' pair of Oval 12s.
My sound is amazing--clear, liquid, without congestion or haze. And, at CES, over a breakfast of crab and asparagas omelettes at the Venetian Hotel, I was able to persuade ctm_cra to sell me his .7m Verbatim ICs--so now the complete set of two I pairs need is mine. The rack I'm using is a prototype and may eventually find its way out on the commercial market.
Malama,
In my initial review of the Verbatim interconnects, I mentioned a top-end tizz in choral and opera music that I suspected might be due to resonance in the system that my cheap Lovan rack couldn't control. I've since focused on this.
Two weeks ago, I drove from my home in Eugene an hour up to Salem to visit a friend who owns an Esoteric UX-3SE CDP and also is a designer of audio racks. His platforms are based not on isolation or dampening but on resonance energy transfer. He has an R&D deal with a high-performance rack and stand company.
My friend explained to me that contrary to what most believe, it's air-borne vibrations that cause most of the trouble--more than any other source of vibrations. This is what his racks and tweaks are designed to address. However, it is against the laws of physics to isolate anything from vibration. He explained that vibrations are indeed captured in a moment in time but, in fact, can only dissipate over a PERIOD of time. Thus, a transfer system works better than an isolation system--otherwise, the vibration energy is simply stored in the component or the rack and, eventually, gets sent back around.
"It's like electricity," he said. "Vibrations are always seeking ground. And the best one can do is to expedite the transfer of those vibrations so that they can get away from the component and away from the rack into the subfloor back to ground." Hip-bone connected to the thigh-bone stuff, seems to me.
My friend wanted me to come up to hear the improvements he'd made in his system--NuForce 9.2 SE monoblocks (Class D), NuForce pre, Esoteric UX-3 SE, Aerial Acoustic Model 10T 3-ways (86dB/4ohms)--amazing, elephant-leg sized speakers--Foundation Research line conditioners, and cryo'd wires from Audio Tekne. I went although it was a small bit of hardship, as I'd just returned with my family from a two-week trip to Los Angeles over the holidays.
After the listening session, which went very well, my friend offered to buy me a tank of gas--no small expense, actually. I declined and proposed that I borrow some equipment instead--his prototype stainless steel T-Square rack, a powered line conditioner, and some Audio Points.
I spent half the afternoon the next day setting everything up. But only after having to re-arrange my study/listening room and pull my Chinese rug about 8 more inches from the back wall. I couldn't have the spikes of the rack going through my prize piece of indigo-dyed wool! It was a big job, but I got it mostly done before dinner. Placing the components on the rack is very, very tricky, as the rack's got an open design and the components rest on steel pods that slide side to side on these rods and lock in with Allen-wrench screws. The trouble is, you have to adjust any given pod with an Allen wrench from below it, which means you can't have a component in the rack below or above when you do this. There is measuring and more measuring, and I found myself building phantom templates of spatial arrangements in my mind as I worked. Rudimentary tasks of engineering to predict the alignment of component footer spikes with the pinholes on the surface of the pods--sort of like scripting the oil-rig landing of a helicopter, which is an interesting experience for a non-architect or non-engineer. Several kinds of painstaking work, not the least of which is the blue-collar job of sliding the equipment into the rack. After nearly bashing every piece of componentry more than once (thank god I caught them each time), I got everything in the rack, with the 75 lbs. Air Tight stereo amp on top (as it should NOT be, as it's best for stability placed on the bottom, but I couldn't quickly figure out any other way).
My friend the designer said I wouldn't tell much difference for 7-9 days, as the rack would need to settle and spikes dig into the sub-flooring. He was wrong. There was a difference immediately. Everything was clearer, and the top-end tizz, overdriven trebles, and somewhat hard or harsh top all vanished. I've now got the clearest, cleanest sound I've ever had. My friend speculates the immediate and dramatic improvemenst are most likely the result of switching from a non-performance-oriented racking system to a performance-oriented one. But he continues to prophesy that the biggest gains will occur after everything remains stable and untouched for 7 to 9 days. We'll see.
There is more clarity and an overall a cleaner sound and subtler micro-dynamics. I like what it does for the music. I can only imagine that adding Verbatim speaker cables and having the rack settling will improve things even more. But the sound is presently much clearer and punchier than anything I've yet heard in my system.
SOME DAYS LATER, AFTER RETURNING FROM CES:
I'm playing von Karajan's Mozart "Requiem" and it's never sounded better. Much more resolving and that overdriven top I wrote about in the initial Verbatim cables review is gone now. So there you are! It was resonance all along, as I'd guessed and the Verbatim cables allowed me to discern. No issues with the top being hard, overdriven, or tizzy. Best sound I've had yet out of this system.
TRIANGLES! There's a triangle at the back of the orchestra in "Cum sancto spiritu" I've never heard before. Literally. It's such a cliche of audio, but there you are.
I'm playing a Vivaldi choral hybrid SACD now ("Vespri per l' Assunzione di Maria Vergine" by Concerto Italiano, Naiveclassique) which has always tended to be "hot" and overdriven. No problem. Clarity and dynamics to beat the band.
For speaker wires, I'm using the A+ Oval 12s I bought a year ago (as my 2nd pair of "expensive" speaker cables) and they're doing great. They react much less to interconnect changes than any other speaker cable I've had and preserve the clarity of the Verbatim interconnects. I paid about $300 for this 12' pair of Oval 12s.
My sound is amazing--clear, liquid, without congestion or haze. And, at CES, over a breakfast of crab and asparagas omelettes at the Venetian Hotel, I was able to persuade ctm_cra to sell me his .7m Verbatim ICs--so now the complete set of two I pairs need is mine. The rack I'm using is a prototype and may eventually find its way out on the commercial market.
Malama,
