It's All About Increments

I'm in the middle of revamping my system and going from a preamp-less, single-amped system with transport & DAC to a preamp-less, active tri-amped system with a CDP source. By no means do I have an unlimited budget...although I did find myself regularly buying up about 10 grand's worth of Alan Maher Designs electronic noise-reduction gear over the course of about 4 years. In fact that was going so entirely well for me it became the impetus for me to change my system. I, too, have always been a tinkerer and part-time DIY'er. But, the AMD stuff, for one example, has allowed me to rethink my system for the better - while still keeping those costs down from the word go...much lower than I believe they otherwise would be for me to get the same or similar sonic results. There were scores of AMD pieces bought and I refused to buy any of it other than one or two pieces at a time, so that I could evaluate as I went...to buy all at once would've been crazy, of course, so it was indeed a series of incremental changes. But, the cumulative effects have been wonderful. Apart from that, I've made an unbroken string of non-AMD tweaks. Here I tend to go where others do not. I buy equipment infrequently, but with the intent to hang on to it. After I've satisfied myself a piece of gear is not going to fail on me within the first 2 or 3 months of using it, I think virtually nothing of making modifications that will void warranties. I don't buy anything with the main intent of resale and always fully prepare myself for the possibly that my actions may render a given component of mine unsellable, un-returnable...or even unusable...! (although I've come close once or twice, that hasn't happened...yet...knock on wood). But, over the years, I've found all that to be entirely worth the risk for me (though, I will admit that this sort of approach is certainly not for everybody).

Non-AMD tweaks have included simply putting some adhesive-backed flocked paper on my (2-way) speaker baffles - covering the whole baffle and right up to the edge of the operating portion of tweeter. This no-tech tweak was unexpectedly a major breakthrough - like I'd spent $$$$ on my speakers. No more residual brightness (kissed all contemplations of cable changes, EQ compensation and, for the moment, even room treatments goodbye) This idea is not entirely new, but I don't know of anyone here at Agon who's currently doing that. They should. We spend all that time and focus on room treatments for reflections that are well away from the source while we entirely overlook the ones closest to the driver - exactly where they are doing the most harm! Cost: less than 5 bucks.

Also, having been at the tweaking game as long as I have, I've come to accept that all connectors are actually, of course, the spawn of Satan...! That is, generally if they're not made of (solid) copper, silver or gold, I either replace them or bypass them. I've learned brass can be ok for duplexes...and I've even used some Mapleshade IC's that had brass connectors of a certain kind that were great (there's always an exception to the rule), but they are otherwise almost always a problem. I know some folks cryo them.

I've also (carefully) cut away the outer jacket of my speaker wires. I did that after my own experiments with a Hagerman FryBaby convinced me there were gains to be had with wires that already had hundreds of hours of use on them...much more open sound. But, for me, the best way to treat the outer jacket was to just simply remove it - no need to treat what isn't there.

And I've learned, of course, after just about every change I make, to revisit moving my speakers around to best take advantage of the improvements...can make all the difference sometimes.

Usually, when I try a tweak, even if there initially seems to be no, or very little, difference from it, I very much resist the urge to remove it right away or otherwise declare it useless. From my own experience I know sometimes a tweak is not necessarily audible until other tweaks or changes are in place that can unmask the difference. Conversely, I also I know that just because I've used a tweak and I've found it to make a good difference doesn't necessarily mean that particular tweak is the best of it's kind...or even a halfway decent one, really. Experimentation is the key and that usually takes time in the long run. Of all the tweaks I've tried through the years, I can only recall one that was a complete dud for me. That was the green Marigo dots to be used on a mid driver. Tried them on 2 different pairs of speakers. No matter how equidistant from each other or how close to the edge of the cone I placed them, they did absolutely nothing except create cone breakup, even at moderately low volumes and with any kind of music...yuk (oh well, will never spend money on that again). But, I try to learn from everything - success or no.

For me, every system comes with its own set of distortions - its sins of commission that need to be chased down and banished. Remove one of them and it can reveal two more. Spending gobs of money on each component is often no guarantee of immunity from this effect. That's the way it goes. But I think, particularly as I have gotten more practiced at it over the years, it's become possible to end up with a system that truly has nothing but sins omission - even with rather modest gear. About the only requirement has been that I must pay attention and learn to follow the avenues toward that wherever they may lead.

So, all the while I find these discoveries have been shaping my own attitudes and approaches toward getting good sound and have even been helping me to zero in on how to compare how my system sounds to live (acoustic) music. Ultimately, I feel that ends up being the only enduringly correct goal...regardless of wherever we are ultimately satisfied (or not, for some!) to declare the pursuit at an end. Hopefully, by this time next year I, too, will be closing in on my "winding down" phase. But, I will agree, by and large it is the "incremental changes" that rule the day.

Regards. John

In regards to the above, I suppose what I'm getting at as well is that all the AMD gear has changed things for me. I should point out that I regard it as a different animal than power conditioning. Electrical noise is basically infinite...and in ways that are rather random in nature. Squash it in one place and it pops up in another. So, no matter how many different products you apply, or how much money you spend, there would still be electrical noise present. But, power conditioning can only reach a point of saturation after which performance is either curtailed or it begins to introduce a negative impact on the sound - weird tonal balances, lack of dynamics and so forth. So, with power conditioning there will always be the law of diminishing returns on your investment whereas with electronic noise reduction there is no technical limit to the amount you can spend...it simply becomes a practical matter of how much you prefer to spend. If the amount you've spent brings you a satisfactory level of sonic improvement, then that's all you need to spend. And if in the future you should change your mind, you can always add more (that may be a blessing for some and a curse for others, I suppose). Also, in my view, from what I can see of it, power conditioning makers like to spend most of their time stealing each other's ideas and rebadging them as their own, anyway. So, I'm not exactly surprised whenever someone says what you have about the ubiquitous $5k all-in-one-box conditioners out there that everyone seems to have these days.

All of that is on one side of it for me. But, the other side of it is that I'm supposing what you could be bumping up against is the failure of the high end in general. If that's true I imagine that may well bare out for a lot of us. Many cite high-end greed and the willingness of many companies to sell one (ultra-expensive) piece of gear versus several less expensive ones as exactly what's killing Audio for the rest of us, and so on. If we end up with that discussion, then the best answer I've found (apart from AMD) is for me to mainly look hi and lo for upstart companies that appear to offer some worthwhile innovation...ones that do not yet have the visibility in the audiophile community to start commanding high prices. The only problem is, of course, that I must be willing to be a little adventurous and take the risk on an untried product, not waiting until it is the next big thing. I could buy used, but there's often a lot of recent technology that is left out by doing so. But, I'm increasingly indisposed to behave, as a buyer, the way high-end companies expect me to behave - to come to someone highly visible...just because it's presumed I want to play it "safe" with a well established (and nameless, faceless corporation of an) audio company. This is where I know I'm getting hosed and feel that I should likely be out there putting my 40+ years of experience in this hobby to better use than that. I don't know how to exactly quantify all that, but that's about what it may come down to for me. In any case, I may just have to be prepared to take the alternative route, whatever that may end up being for me. But, I find the AMD works so positively and is such a game-changer that I can concentrate on a lower end of the market and not run into the problems you describe - or, the ones that are usually associated with less expensive gear either, I've found so far, anyway. Although, like I said, I don't have an unlimited budget, but I have every reason at this point to believe this will be the last system for me, and by far my best. And beyond what I've already outlined for myself, I don't see much of anything that will need to be revised, but we will see...there's always the unforeseen isn't there? But, I've generally welcomed my re-evaluations of what it means to "get there" whenever things have gotten to the next level...but...somehow, I remain committed to my original goals more or less. I think that's where the comparison to live music comes in. It's that the sins of commission are invariably 'unmusical' and being as free as possible from them goes a long way for me, even if the system is not mega-expensive or ultra-high-end. We may disagree on where "there" actually is, but this is what does it for me.

Even an incremental upgrade would be something, when stacked in series. But all too often what this really means is an improvement in some areas and a downgrade in others, with the appealing "newness" of the new component winning out just long enough to convince us it was all an upgrade -- rather than (more realistically) a lateral move or even an outright loss. Chasing the latest trends and flavor-of-the-month is far more likely to keep you in the neutral/negative side of these transactions -- all the while burning money and patience.

Sometimes a new component's over-emphasis on one particular area can result in the "wow, I never heard THAT instrument in this recording before!" phenomenon. No, you just never had it stand out enough to be noticed all on its own before -- go back and listen again with your old gear; you'll certainly hear it this time. Hard to say which rendition is more accurate without a good reference system already in place. If your old gear is truly obscuring entire instruments (even in the background at low levels), then it's flat out broke.

That said, there are true upgrades to be had in this hobby, for all levels of systems. The hope is that as you gain experience (the kind more deep than a 5-minute audition), and as your reference system truly improves, you will become far more effective at sorting out real upgrades from impostors. Then you can go about your business of confidently building a wonderful system at the "next level" (whatever that means to you).