Has anyone else ever reached an audio impasse?

Poorguy - As I stated in a previous post, we compared a digital source to an analog source and the difference was very simlar to the difference between various digital sources - nearly nothing. I don't think you are understanding the problem here.

For the record, I "helped" Bwhite a bit in his system building - although, to be quite honest, I doubt he needs much help (he just doesn't know it yet...) - so I have more than a passing interest here. Bryan, how did the CJ pre that I suggested for comparison (ART, I see you picked...nice) compare to the Syrah, price aside? You had said you thought the Syrah was the culprit. Did the ART resolve that pre issue, but leave the alleged synergy issue, leaving you to still focus on source? I get the feeling that you are still ot sure if its pre or CD thats the problem. Frankly, so far, I can't tell either..

Well, I don't know whether its the culprit for the CD anomaly, but I think you may want to listen to Detlof (Hi, Detlof). He knows of where he speaks. And that "where" is, perhaps, about speakers, and particularly in musicality areas. The Dynaudios - beautiful drivers all - are voiced to load the initial transient with energy. This listening bias accentuates detail at the beginning of notes and leads the mind to "see" speed. Some speakers of this bias are spitty and others less so (lessened mechanical artifacts, ie distortion, like the Dynaudios). They are "accurate" to one degree or another, for lack of another word. Many times speakers designed with these listening criteria have performance limitations with regard to spatial qualities (the source sound is favored over the surrounding space). This is not a proportion issue in terms of quantitative measures like size, but an existential issue in terms of deep realism (how the stereo piece catalyzes one to seep deeper into the music, as opposed to thinking too much). To discern this deeper issue, and tune it to greater system integration, and regardless of the CD quandry, you may have to consider that the system you are arranging wants to present you with a musical experience that goes beyond detail-orientated speakers (and their designer's attendant musical values).

Swap in a world class speaker that is not detail-orientated and is not a current black hole for the amp (and, no, B&W's don't count). It may not matter, but I'd be interested in your long and short term reactions.

Asa - thanks for the response. The ART and Syrah are VERY close. Both are extremely liquid and wonderful - but I think the ART has a bit better bass than my Syrah - we haven't had time to do a fair comparison between the two since we have been more focused on the source components which all sound the same.

This is mind blowing and its making us second-guess all the decisions we've made in the past.

Just this morning however, my friend noticed a spark fly between his RCA interconnect and the RCA input on the CJ P8A as he changed interconnects. Shortly thereafter, he saw lots of smoke. Once he shut off power, and removed the interconnects, he found one of his Stealth PGS cables to be 2 1/2 inches shorter and burnt through to the outer mesh. The outer mesh actually changed color from a golden yellow to a crusty brown.

Initially, we thought it was the amp, we did some testing and discovered the wall outlet to be broken - it was cracked inside.

Something tells me the source components will start sounding like themselves again once the power problem is fixed.

An electrician is on the way!

YOW !!!! You bring up a good point about checking our electrical systems and checking what our insurance policies will cover. While i just changed a few outlets myself, i can imagine how fast your buddy's jaw dropped and heart sank when he saw what he did. Let's hope everything is okay. I'm kind of leary of that though, as it would take one helluva lot of juice to actually melt down an interconnect. Sean
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My friend had two new dedicated circuits installed. So far there has been no smoke or fire. The electrician wired his system with 10 gague Romex strung to a pair of PS Audio Power Port AC recepticals. I have not listened yet but he claims this made a modest difference regarding the bandwidth of his amplifiers. He says the system seems "cleaner" but still notices no significant differences between source components. Bummer.