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wspohn

Responses from wspohn

My Home Theatre Room Challenges - Is It Worth It To Upgrade Speakers
Full range main speakers are a necessity but augmenting with powered subwoofers is also a good idea. Even more important is to have the room analyzed, treated if necessary and set up properly,  
Do You Play Or Save Your Best Cartridges
Have to be bonkers to want to change cartridges more than you have to.  Each time you do that there is a small but finite chance you will damage it  - brushing against the stylus with a sleeve or any number of ways. Plus it is a PITA to do . If t... 
Previous Ownership...does it matter to you?
If it is in good shape and sounds the way it should why would I care if it had been owned by one owner or many? We have a large Asian community here and most of the audiophiles in it change their gear every year or two when the latest and greates... 
HT and 2 channel in same room? 1 or 2 systems?
I went through this when I added video to an earlier system and again when I moved house and gear to a new location. Some of my conclusions: 1 - you need main speakers that are dual purpose, i.e. that have the range and sound good with either pur... 
TT Arm-base Unipivot vs Gimbal-base Designs...
Theoretically I think there is less to go wrong with a unipivot.  With an arm with conventional bearings, the clearances are crucial to good sound and smooth operation, so if you opt for a well made arm. They needn't break the bank - even the lowe... 
A public service announcement
I never play analogue (nor order gear or music) while under the influence. As a wine aficionado, I figure listening to digital is small price to pay while sipping.   
What is the current retail cost of your reference system?
About half of what my car collection is worth.  
Tube or solid state
I like whatever sounds best. Tubes in main system with efficient speakers, and big Class A power and pre in the other two systems, one with conventional speakers and one using electrostats.  
radio?
One or two Sonos Ones would do it for you.  
Warm and accurate bookshelves that can handle volume
These would do it for you:  Totems      
Best turntable under $4000
Best way to spend $4K is to buy a used well cared for turntable that originally cost double that.  I have done that several times, once getting a VPI TNT/ SMEV for the price of the cartridge it came with!  Takes research and careful examination of... 
Speakers with deep/powerful bass
It isn't hard to get lots of low bass, quite often rather poorly controlled but it is very hard to get really good well controlled low bass. I have two speakers that are excellent at low bass (one is 3dB down at 23 Hz and the other at 20 Hz.  Imp... 
VPI dust cover
I just got some plastic rod stock, cut it into four 'legs' and glued them to a flat sheet of plastic a bit bigger than the turntable (I have a TNT V) . Doesn't look bad and keeps most of the dust away.  
Best sounding low power (under 80watts) Class AB amp?
Interesting to see mention of the Robertson 4010 - I thought everyone would have forgotten about them long ago. I still use one in my 4th system and it is indeed a sweet sounding amp (it replaced another very decent amp, a Bryston 2B, which was de... 
Speakers that are good with tubes
I drive my Wilson Maxx 2 with tubes because I prefer the sound to using a very good solid state amp.  Tube amps tend to be lower output power so you need speakers with fairly high sensitivity.