Thanks, Frank! Of course something else in the system might be out of polarity, that's why I asked to see which way sounded best. Not to mention the Mercury CDs sound great even out of polarity. 😀
Synergistic Red Fuse ...
I installed a SR RED Quantum fuse in my ARC REF-3 preamp a few days ago, replacing an older high end fuse. Uhh ... for a hundred bucks, this little baby is well worth the cost. There was an immediate improvement upon installation, but now that its broken in (yes, no kidding), its quite remarkable. A tightening of the focus, a more solid image, and most important of all for my tastes, a deeper appreciation for the organic sound of the instruments. Damn! ... cellos sound great! Much improved attack on pianos. More humanistic on vocals. Bowed bass goes down forever. Next move? .... I'm doing the entire system with these fuses. One at a time though just to gauge the improvement in each piece of equipment. The REF-75se comes next. I'll report the results as the progression takes place. Stay tuned ...
Any comments from anyone else who has tried these fuses?
Any comments from anyone else who has tried these fuses?
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I have a polarity switch on my pre-amp... IMO, having a way to switch polarity on the fly is a must for a good system. I can readily hear the difference, and, more importantly, so can my wife 😉 The CDs in my collection are pretty evenly distributed as to which polarity sounds best, so switching speaker leads was not a viable option. My amp (Antique Sound Lab Tulip) came with a switch to invert the polarity in one channel for bridging purposes. I had a friend install a switch in the other channel, so I can easily invert both. oregonpapa, I also prefer the 4 ohm tap with my Audio Note AN-E speakers. It's definitely worth trying to see which sounds better with one's particular amp/speaker combo. |
Regarding polarity switches, a point to keep in mind is that when the position of the switch is changed not only is polarity being changed, but the circuit configuration of the component which provides the switch is also being changed. That in itself could conceivably have audible consequences, to a greater or lesser degree depending on the specific design. I would expect that to be unlikely to be an issue in the case of a fully balanced design such as Frank’s ARC line stage, since in a fully balanced design a polarity reversal can be accomplished by simply interchanging two internal connections. However in a design having a single-ended internal signal path changes involving the configuration of active circuitry would probably be necessary. Oregonpapa 4-13-2017 Thanks, Frank. I have that recording, on a CD having a release date of 1991, rather than on the 2004 SACD shown at the link you provided. Very impressive, as I recall, although somehow I haven’t listened to it in quite a few years. A digitized version of the LP can be found here: https://archive.org/details/StravinskyTheFirebirdborodinPrinceIgor-Telarc-Vinyl24-bit And it can be found in CD form at the following link. I see from the review comments, btw, that I’m not alone in liking it. It’s great music, as you indicated about the complete ballet, and the performance by Shaw and the orchestra is excellent as well. https://www.amazon.com/Stravinsky-Firebird-Borodin-Music-Prince/dp/B000003CSF And speaking of dynamics, it is absolutely stupendous in that regard, even relative to the exceptional dynamic range that is found on many other early Telarc releases. It so happens that I have on my computer the same Sound Forge audio editing program that is indicated at the archive.org link (above) as having been used to create the digital files that are provided there. Using that program to examine the waveforms in those files I have found that the difference in volume between the notes at the end of the “Berceuse,” at around 17:20, and the concluding note at the end of the work, is around 60 dB! Meaning that the amplifier has to put out around 1,000,000 times as much power to reproduce the concluding note as to reproduce the softest notes. That is consistent, btw, with SPL measurements I have made at my listening position, those being about 105 dB on the concluding note, and less than 50 dB on the softest notes. (My meter can’t measure below 50 dB). Best regards, |
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