aerius

"My Heart Will Go On" by Celine Dion. Even though I've never seen Titanic, and plan on never seeing it, the song still makes me sick. "Achy Breaky Heart" edges it out on my hate list, but if I had to watch the music videos for both it would be too close to call.

I wonder if he's able to have kids...

Boobies! I demand a booby forum!

See the Sovkiller crybaby thread...

At this rate, probably never. I should have new transformers coming in tomorrow. Toroidal output transformers, that should be interesting.

And a 100-pack too. Damn that guy must be busy, how does he have the time to post?

At least your amp has a case. Mine probably violates at least a dozen electrical & wiring safety regulations. Also note the liberal use of blue sticky-tack and hockey tape. On the bright side, it does sound pretty good.

After their "review" of the Fab Audio Model One I gave up on a lot of their reviewers. Mid-bass suckout, agressive tweeter, lack of bass weight, what a load of crock. I've heard the speakers in 3 different setups now and they're nothing like that.

Oops...

I dropped by at his store once in '99 or 2000 and got introduced to the Apogee Centaur speaker. I like his writings because he seems even more skeptical and cynical than I am.

I'm sleeping with a Princeton swimmer chick, and I don't even live in the US. How hard could it be?

Yes I'm a virgin, an ass virgin that is, and I hope to remain an ass-virgin for the rest of my life.

I dropped by the bookstore today on my way home from work and leafed through a copy of the Stereophile "Recommended Components" issue. It was depressing, and quite unbelievable. For one thing, there's an average of 10-15 components in the "Class A" list in every single category of gear. This is close to and in some cases exceeds the number of components listed in "Class B", and in all cases it exceeds the number of "Class C" components. That ain't right. Am I supposed to believe that there's more "best of the best" gear than solid decent bang for the buck stuff? That for every piece of "above average" gear there's 5 pieces of "best of the best gear"? I also noted that the "Class A+" categories are growing at a nice rate, in fact for digital sources there's now at least 10 "A+" pieces of gear. Instead of demoting everything in "Class A" to "Class B" and dropping a bunch of gear off the list, they added a whole new class. Pretty soon they'll have to make "Class A+++" to fit in all the crap they want. It's depressing because the list has lost its meaning. You can't have 15 pieces of gear that are all "the best", it can't be that way by definition. By definition, "the best" means the one component that beats everything elses ass, meaning there can only be one, like the Highlander. But I'm a generous guy so I can live with 3, which happens to be the number of medals they give out in championships. But 15? That's ridiculous. Anyways, rant over, carry on.

I'm indifferent towards religion until the believers start shoving it in my face and trying to convert me or "save my soul", then it gets ugly, and I'll cut loose with a string of compound-complex cuss words. Otherwise, do whatever you want in your own home or place of worship, I really couldn't care less. Politics pisses me off but it is interesting in a perverse way.

The K701 got bitch-slapped by both pairs of modded K340's. It was more of a beating than putting a pair of Grado SR60's up against the PS-1.

If the software allows it, a good idea would be to have the editing restrictions in place for the more contentious forums only. Forums such as Off-Topic, Music, or other ones where there isn't much potential for editing to cause shitfests can have unrestricted editing. Others where people throw hissy fits and try to delete evidence can have editing disabled or heavily restricted.

More impressions...The Senn 650 was also kind of odd, this pair had way more bass than the other 2 pairs I've heard in the past. I can now see why people are making those comments on the 650's having boomy bloated bass. Problem is that unlike the PS-1, the bass is slow, and low notes blend into each other in both pitch & time. Fast individual low notes played on piano like the left hand part of "In the Springtime of His Voodoo" by Tori Amos end up sounding more like chords than individual notes, and the electric bass blended into the piano. Which is really odd since the other 2 sets I've heard didn't do this, well, they did but not nearly this bad. Then there's the 3-blob soundstage & fuzzy imaging. So far I've only heard one good pair, and that one has extensive modifications, balanced cables, and a whole bunch of other stuff. Biggie's setup. I wanted to check out the amp to see how my own DIY amp is progressing in terms of sound. Well, it needs more work. They have similar characteristics but Biggie's setup has more speed & refinement, better imaging & soundstaging, and more blackness between notes. I'd hit a point recently where further improvements in my amp were pretty much indiscernable with my K340, so it was nice to use the PS-1 to find out where I'd come up short. I'll have to go hunt for more tubes and possibly do a complete redesign at some stage. The PS-1. More bassy than last time, but damn is it ever fun & groovy. Fucking hell, I need to win the lottery so I can buy one, I think the Super 7 jackpot's at $15 mil this week...I need to get some tickets. The HF-1, better than last time, not as warm & slow as before, not sure if it's break-in or amps, probably both. At the Hamilton meet it had nice tone, but it was just sluggish and didn't get up & boogie like a Grado. I liked jazz, and refused to rock. Fortunately, that was cured, and it didn't die when I made it play Gn'R and Metallica. Speaking of which the PS-1 has dethroned the 225 as the best rock & metal 'phone, I made it play Slayer, and it was fucking fierce. Back to the HF-1, before I thought it was pretty much a side-step from the 225, now I feel it's an upgrade. On a side note, I think my word of the day at the meet was "dickwad".

Soylent Green anyone? Besides, everything supposedly tastes like chicken, though I've heard human flesh tastes more like pork...

I thought it was the psychoactive drugs in the cables... >:Dg

Enough bass for me is defined as "similar in quantity to the PS-1", which means most headphones don't have enough bass. There is no way the K701 comes anywhere close to that. With either one of Dido's albums there's a fair bit of deep filling bass that's missing with the 701, the bass should rumble & fill the entire soundstage but it barely fills the front-centre area unless I wing the volume control wide open. Then there's the opening to "The Waitress" by Tori Amos, where once again, I get some impact but no filling rumble, and same thing on "Space Dog". Other problem is the dynamics are kinda lacking except from the midrange on down unless the volume's cranked to levels which'll make my ears ring, and then there's the 3-blob effect with the soundstage, it's not seamless like with the K340's and Grados. The mids, while better than my Senn 580, aren't K340 or PS-1 nice. Too airy & spacey, there's not enough density & solidity to the mids, kinda like see-through ghosts instead of live solid people. I really wanted to like it, but given my preferences it's just not going to work for me.

Biggie hosted an Oakville meet today. I'm still working on my impressions file but here's the quick summary. Lavry Black is good, but not as good as tubes. HF-1 is better than last time, probably amps & break-in. My tube amp needs more work or better tubes. The Senn 650 at this meet has way more bass than the other 2 650's I've heard in the past. The K701 doesn't have enough bass. The 2 pairs of K340's are getting closer in sound, but still rather different. The PS-1 still remains my favourite headphone. The SR-60 is the best headphone for the price ever. People who say "Grados have no soundstage" need new batteries for their hearing aids, or they need hearing aids in the first place.

Actually I'd suggest using the corner to your advantage and try out a diagonal setup if you have the room for it.. Leave everything as is, but move the desk along with the speakers such that the desk goes diagonally across the corner. This way you end up with one speaker on each side of the corner and it helps out the room symmetry. Article on diagonal setups from the Decware site.

Sounds good, I'll have to give the surplus shop another check and see if they have any GT's lying around, I need my instant gratification. And if that doesn't work out, I see another tube ordering spree happening. It also looks like I'll be staying away from the 6BX7, my amp uses ECC40's for inputs and as far as I can tell those tubes are dead neutral with no sound. I have 3 different brands and 5 distinct types and they all sound the same. Thanks again, and now it's time to go shopping...

Ok, so earlier this week I upgraded the filament power supply on my amp so that I can use 6BL7 tubes in addition to the 6SN7, 12SN7, and 1633 tubes that I'm already using. My local surplus store had some GE 6BL7GTA's in stock so I picked up a couple pairs, both of them have black plates with a top getter. One set has an O-shaped getter and the other has a D-shaped one, using the former in my amp and haven't tried the latter yet. Impressions so far, somewhat similar to the GE Canada 12SN7GTA, but a bit warmer & smoother. Doesn't have the soundstage depth & height of the RCA 1633 and the images don't feel as "real", but it has better frequency extension on both ends. Quite dynamic with lots of slam in the bass, and it's a fun tube. So, here's the question. What are some other nice 6BL7 tubes to try out? Are there any that have the general sound signature of the grey glass RCA VT-231 but with more bass slam?

Nice speakers. A friend of mine had them until a couple years ago or so when she moved to a new place. Then she moved again a few months ago, and now she's considering a set of Living Voice OBX-R's. God I hate her.