How to identify my weakest link?

Speakers/system a bit bright?

Do you have a SPL meter? It’s my latest kick, wish I bought my own a long time ago. The question mark will disappear.

I learned a lot and made improvements with an inexpensive meter. I realized, they don’t need to be perfectly calibrated, they just need to measure relative differences, test band to test band. then see if too bright relative to mids, how the subs crossover effects things ..., see if slight changes of speaker location, toe-in, cables, anything are beneficial, detrimental, inconsequential (do one thing at a time).

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Meter on tripod, seated ear height, listening position.

test CD with individual bands, this one has 1/3 octave, each 1 minute long (not annoyingly short).

 

CD’s you can change tracks, pause, resume, much more convenient. No player? you could buy a cheap player just to do this.

or test LP for you, but then it is telling you what the cartridge, as aligned, is outputting, maybe that’s best for you anyhow.

I prefer using a CD, then comparing favorite music: LP version to CD version when refining cartridge alignment.

last thought: maybe they don't measure too bright, but you prefer less bright. meter will help you achieve that by confirming changes.

Synergistic cables will help a lot. They won't fix the B&W top end nothing will but they will help a lot by balancing it out with a bigger fuller deeper all around sound. Also Green Dream PHT on the cartridge will help with a more liquid sound. Black Beauty are good too, very neutral across the board clarity, and both can be used together. Their new stuff is best but they have been making so consistently good for so long there's a huge supply used so that you can pretty much shop by price and whatever level you are at there will be something good. 

Nobsound are very good, I used them extensively for a while, but Townshend Podiums will be a huge step up. Huge. Even compared to Nobsound. 

Room treatment, I know what you mean. Synergistic HFT are very unobtrusive room treatment, especially if you get them for the speakers as I recommended. That is why I recommend them first even though everyone says do the room do the room. Well the speakers are in the room. So do them. Same product, same results, just stuff stuck on speakers is a whole lot more acceptable than stuck on the walls. Either way they greatly improve clarity, help make speakers and room disappear, deepen and broaden the stage, etc. Really impressive for how small they are. They also make it seem like you have to get one kit per speaker. That is best, but you can also split one kit between two. That's what I did in the beginning when I wasn't sure. Works fine. Study their info, the same HFT are used on the walls, so once you have a speaker kit you can experiment with more than just the speakers.

The vibration tape is TA-102 fO.q tape sold on eBay or maybe Amazon. Also Cable Co has it but higher price. The price keeps going up! I don't even want to look any more! 😂 But it works so well you will not believe. Very small strip run along the under side of the tone arm, and then just keep looking around it works on everything even chassis of phono stage, caps, etc.  I've never been able to use too much but one guy wrapped his whole arm and said that was too much, so go step by step a little at a time you will see.

Purple fuse is Synergistic. Sold all over the place. I like Betty at high end electronics, she has always been good to me, even helped me get an extra Green Dream. They come in pairs, Green and Black, but she figured out some way to help me out, I forget, couple years ago. Friendly and with a little friendly talk you might be able to learn about any upcoming deals. I got a lot of mine buy 2 get one, or buy one thing get another free. Might be running something like that this time of year. I wouldn't know, all tapped out! 😂🤣

Hana Umami?

@millercarbon 

Thanks for all the info and ideas! I’ll dig in for sure! You hooked me up with the Nobsound springs idea awhile back and as skeptical as I was, I was proven very wrong. Huge improvement. I’ll will look at upgrading to pods at some point. Sounds like they’re the way to go! Appreciate the detailed response. 
 

@noromance yeah the Umami is an option too. I definitely like the Hana SL and have thought about going the MLroute but then I came across the Purple Heart reviews. I get it, they’re reviews but it seems to get a thumbs up everywhere I turn. 3x the price though. I doubt it’s 3x the cartridge but maybe? Only one way to find out. Try it. People talk about finding deals on this cart, but where? I feel like buying a used cartridge is a bad idea. 

1+ for the Umami!

If you are going to look for speaker platforms, take a look at this before. I wish I could post pictures.....I could show the decay difference between the Credo Audio and Townshend Podiums... Both are very good, but the Credo has an edge IF they have the platform that fits your speakers.

 

Here is a video that compare different setups. tedious but good. I did my own comparison using REW and I can confirm that at least on my room with my setup i can repro what he claims.

Either way as mentioned before isolate everything, worth 10 times the room treatment because you are addressing the sources and not the symptoms.

Take a look at the decay difference!