thatopampguy

The West LA places are bit far out. Also, the places in Hawthorne and more ghetto areas are a lot cheaper. Burgers don't cost $12 in Hawthorne like they do at Father's Office or The Counter (where I once ordered a $20 1 lb burger w/ some kind of fruit sauce topping and goat cheese). The Monster Royal Burger at B&R in Hawthorne costs around $8 and is tastier and more unhealthy and equal to the size of the 1lb burger at The Counter. For Mexican food in a safe area near LAX: El Tarasco on Main St in El Segundo, plenty of seating, easy parking. There's another location on Rosecrans less than a mile away right by the Pacific Ocean, but there's limited seating. It's almost as good as the Taco trucks.

Also, if you are too cheap to pay for parking, there is very limited free street parking on W 98th St behind the Hilton Hotel. The entrance to that street is south of Sepulveda. Or you can enter on Century Blvd and Bellanca Ave (make left on Bellanca & W98th St) which is right by the LAX Hilton, next to the adult strip club and makes more sense. I believe there is parking on Airport Blvd too. All of this parking is very limited and you would have to beat the locals both in the morning and at night. Check the street signs too.

Grahame, I've been to all those places in Hawthorne and they are all excellent. If you haven't tried a breakfast burrito, California style, they are ridiculously large and greasy. You can usually find them at those "roach coaches" or mobile wagons which are all over the place. The good ones put in like 6 sausages + hashbrowns + eggs + ham + bacon. It's ridiculously good. I have been to B&R and they have some amazing burgers. There are a few places which are similar (like "The Counter" in Santa Monica and other places). The size and greasiness of everything is just amazing. I have also been to Dino's Hamburgers on Inglewood Ave. The bacon and sausage breakfast burritos are pretty good as is the chorizo and egg. I gotta warn you though, when you order stuff like pastrami and carnitas or chili verde, the cuts of meat can be extremely fatty. Usually, the locals and large hispanic community (roughly 60% in Hawthorne) like it this way. The donut shop I was talking about above is at Randys-Donuts.com, BIG DONUT LAX, ron & larry . I'm not sure about the quality of their donuts but they are a landmark b/c of the big donut on the roof. Also, a lot of people will tell you to try a California chain called "In & Out Burger" which is also on Inglewood Blvd. They have a secret menu. Google "4x4, Animal Style". All that being said, LA has some of the most amazing hole-in-the-wall places with gut-busting huge portions of mexican food and burgers. Hawthorne in particular is known for those mexican food trucks. I know it's good when the people running the truck don't speak a word of English. However, there is a reason I didn't mention Hawthorne. Parts of the area are a bit suspect at night. The area is largely working class and hispanic though because of gentrification, it has moved upscale a bit (in the right areas). It's still not exactly a good part of town. When I drive down Rosecrans going East, I stop before I get into Compton/Inglewood. I would not go down there alone. . . that's for sure. (FWIW, I'm a 29 year old Asian male who loves burgers and mexican food. I used to eat at these types of places every single day, for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. It did a number on my health, and by the time I was 25, I had diabetes, high blood pressure, and was overweight. I owe it to my parents to outlive them. Now I'm 29 and I always eat clean regardless of the situation. I haven't touched a burger in years) Let me know if you have any other questions!

I live and work within walking distance of this year's Can Jam Meet (and no I'm not a stripper working across the street from the Hilton. . . and no I don't work at that famous donut shop either . . . hahaha). You guys should all move down here right by LAX. Manhattan Beach, El Segundo. those are great places to live and work. It's like you're on vacation all the time. There's nothing quite like parking at the end of Rosecrans Blvd with your surfboard, walking down to the sand and taking a nap and then hitting the waves. Afterwards, I usually pig out at the El Tarasco. Then, I hit Fry's Electronics where I ogle the oscilloscopes and soldering irons. Also, I suggest a beautiful scenic drive down Vista Del Mar from Playa Del Rey to El Segundo. It's amazing, driving your leased Ferrari 360 Modena (which is rusty b/c you park on the street and live in 250 sq ft condo w/ salt damaged wood floors) with the top down, so close to the water! For years, my co-workers and I would take an extended lunch and go surfing. Then people started complaining about how we all smelled like dirty ocean water and Mexican food. It's really the life. When you're not at Can Jam and you are too lazy to drive anywhere, I highly suggest you visit Hermosa Beach (End of 190th St where it meets Herondo Ave), Manhattan Beach (Park in structure at end of Rosecrans Ave, walk down the steps to the beach). Malls in the area include: Manhattan Village Shopping Center (this is the closest one, has Macy's, Apple Store, etc, Fry's electronics at corner), South Bay Galleria (ghetto and full of delinquents), Del Amo Mall (ditto). Food near LAX/South Bay that's not a chain: El Tarasco's, El Burrito Jr, Back Home in Lahaina, that famous donut shop with a big donut on top of it in Westchester, Seafood Port (if you like chinese and can eat huge portions and are willing to drive to Torrance). If you have the will to endure the traffic up the 105->110->101 to Hollywood then I suggest the usual touristy stuff. (I've also lived there.) If you want to spot movie stars, I suggest a trek up Runyon Canyon off of Franklin in Hollywood. You just might run into Paris Hilton. While you're in this area, a trip up to Griffith Observatory is great and educational, though it's been Hollywood'ed out with the latest remodel. The other good to spot stars place is Robertson Blvd near Beverly Center at the Newsroom Cafe and the Ivy across the street. No doubt, it's mediocre food, but that's not why you're there. Hollywood and Highland is a huge mall near Mann's Chinese Theatre and parking is cheap in their garage. From there you are in the heart of Hollywood and can see the walk of fame and take those tourist trappy tour of the star homes. Also, if you visit Rodeo Drive, parking is free at certain times on the weekend in the public garages off of Santa Monica if you are lucky. There are only 30 or so spaces. Otherwise I think there is cheap Valet (oxymoron?) parking off of Dayton and Rodeo. Venice Beach is full of weirdos and stuff. . . but you just might like it. Don't leave that area without walking down far enough to see the Gold's gym that started it all. Beach parking is free on certain days (you'll know from the crowds) and there are free lots one block up from the beach (only on certain days). Oh yeah, don't eat at chains. Chain restaurants are for the uninitiated in LA. The most recent craze is the Korean Taco truck whose location is twittered regularly. For LA-style burgers (i.e. more veggies n crap and some mystery white sauce), I suggest Father's Office in West LA. It's really packed though with trendy broke LA types.

I did not do this for fun. It was my job. And yes, pretty much what the guy above said. The signal was taken in the time domain. We used Matlab for signal analysis (FFT, transforms, etc). Most of the "better" amps were very linear and did not add any THD to the signal (or at least none that I could see). The other stuff we did was common mode rejection and sinad testing. We used a Tek TDS7k scope in a rack. We ran the scope over GPIB-Ethernet bridge on software I wrote in LabView to acquire and save the signal which would then be post-processed and analyzed in Matlab. Also, I'm not really sure why I even brought up the topic over at head-fi or here (and regret doing so). . . it's not in my personal interest to dissuade people from buying amps. . . so I'm going to stop here by qualifying what I've said. I'll just add that low THD figures don't necessarily mean better sound. A lot of times, the reason why an amplifier sounds better is because those non-linearities in the signal path add harmonics/color that translate to "improved" sound to the human ear. And sometimes, when we remove non-linear components from the signal path, the sound "improves" because we are taking away the coloration. . . and that being the case . . . we are really looking for amps that color the sound just right, not "great" amps that are so minimalistic and linear that signal in = signal out. A lot of what "sounds good" in combination with an amp also has to do with how the audio was originally mastered. Anyways, sorry for polluting the "how did you discover head-case" thread with this stuff. . .

Initially was on headwize in the late 90's. Moved to head-fi in the early 2000. Got out of headphones and amplifiers when I discovered how little difference there was between amped and unamped output on an oscilloscope. Posted on head-fi and was surprised at the strong and extremely defensive reaction I got at suggesting that amplifiers do not make a tremendous difference in the sound. Anyways, I love my amps but as a guy who has graduate degrees in CS/CoE and EE integrated circuit design, science tells me those differences I'm hearing are more psychological than real. Over at that other forum, I was sick and tired of reading all this stuff from people reiterating the "company-line" and crap like "wow, those are great" and then a bazillion people going off to buy the same POS and restating the same review. Granted there are a lot of great products out there, but what about people who talk about the not-so-great products? It's fine to disagree. . . but damn over at head-fi, the slightest deviation from the company-line would cause a rash of unprovoked insults not related to the topic at hand. Found out about head-case via a google about head-fi and some other negative terms about said forum. I also see a lot of familiar and respected screen names here from the early days of head-fi. Oh well, I hope its better here. Thanks.