Slaughter A Few Sacred Audiophile Cows

To me, that's the stereotype. The better the gear I've been able to move to, the more I enjoy the music. I'm enjoying a borrowed Sphinx preamp as I type this and I cannot believe how much better it sounds in my system than what I thought was already a pretty damned good preamp. So whattaya do ? Actually, I'm thinking that even this might not be the bucket-list preamp for me. Why do it? Because it enhances the enjoyment of the music for me. I just listened to a SHM-CD of Bowie's Diamond Dogs ( hard to believe, I know... ) which is an album I am extremely familiar with and I was stunned at how much more I was hearing - it was a huge treat. So I don't necessarily subscribe to the idea of the gearhead who doesn't enjoy the music as much as the gear although those people definitely exist. I know a few myself. But I ain't one of 'em. And I own a few more than five CD's...

D.D.

 

Killing a cow doesn't make you a carnivore.... It makes you a cow-killer. There's a difference.

D.D.

 

Rocks on your speakers somehow improve the sound!

 

I'm not on these forums to ridicule anybody. Most of the time I am found to be posting about my favorite bands, masterings, etc. and passing on my experiences about stuff I've tried, so perhaps that they can be of use to someone.
I happen to really like 1970s/early '80s hi-fi both stylistically and sonically and am really thrilled to be able to acquire it so cheaply. It satisfies me, and I can relax with it. I worked in a hi-fi store in the 90s, and saw how much you could spend, and bought quite a lot of gear then too, but what I have now is clearly more direct, earthy, musical...because of this I have begun to question the validity of spending thousands when several hundred gave me pretty much what I wanted, and didn't make itchy for an upgrade every 2-3 months..

 

Especially on the 1210M5G where the cabling is high quality OFC, and the arm is better damped.

 

It sounds as though you've found a good place for yourself in terms of your system. The problem with discussions like this is when people start thinking that their good place is the best place for everyone. That's when things start going sideways into the weeds.

D.D.

 

$40,000 cables

 

Shak I am genuinely curious about what turntable/cartridge you have?

thx

 

Using “audiophile” playback software on Apple Macintosh computers because plain iTunes just sounds dreadful.

 

well it took them a couple years to even fix the gapless playback issue

try listening to an album like "Dark Side of the Moon" with a gap between every track...damn right I used something else!!

 

I don’t see how this should be related to the allegedly inferior playback quality of iTunes compared to the various “audiophile” alternative software, however: Assumed the orginial audio CD actually is a gapless one, of course music playback in iTunes will be gapless too — as it always was from day one. Please see the article Gapless Playback in iTunes 11 from the iLounge website for more details.

 

Akai AP-307, switchable between Direct Drive and Quartz Lock Direct Drive. I have the following cartridges mounted on separate headshells: AT11 (with ATS10 [spherical, 2.5g], ATS11E [Elliptical, 2g], ATS12s [Shibata, 1.75g] stylii), AT95e, AT92ECD, AT13eA [Nude Elliptical, 1g].

If I can't get the sound I want from a record from mounting one of the above, I declare it to be a dud! It seldom happens though.

I also have a Dual CS-505-3 with an Ortofon OM10 (had an OM30 stylus for it, which was great, but sold it).

Until recently I had a CS-503-1, which has a quartz controlled motor. Had an OM5e on that. In the past decade I've had Dual CS-5000 and Linn Axis also.

 

Ridiculously high sampling rates such as 24/192 and 32/384(!).
Redbook CD, SACD and 24/44.1 should be considered sensible limits.

 

All I wanted was a clean mat to replace the old one, which FWIW more appropriate. Instead I got something that robbed the sound of it's 'completeness' and brought issues to the fore that the old mat did so well to hide. A good example of an audiophile accessory wrecking a perfectly good set-up. Of course you never realise it at the time, you just go along and get another product to improve/fix the problem that has been created for you!

 

You can get a good amount of vintage gear from eBay etc. for $500. A lot of these components were expensive in their day - a solid state amp retailing for $500 in the 1970s, that would be about $3000 today in inflationary terms. To be able to get this stuff so cheap is a scream. It's also perfect for me as I like the '55-'75 era in music primarily.

 

Cold pressed virgin olive oil if you ask me.

 

Why stop there? Who needs fidelity better than 8-track tapes or 56k MP3s? And buying anything fancier than a $100 York all-in-one stereo purchased at a drug-store is clearly a total waste of money.

 

What are you hearing at these hugely inflated sampling rates that say, redbook is not giving you? Mp3 is only a fraction of CDs 1411kbps and sounds like it to me. 8-track I never considered to be worthy.

 

*Reads thread*

*Bangs head on desk*

 

Must be a pain when synching with The Wizard Of Oz

 

Coconut oil, organic and fair trade. Hard finding virgins these days. Best sauteed in in a six-nines copper frypan, preferably silver-clad.

 

What happen to my cow?
She was grazing right over THERE.. next to the stereo... (a really nice expensive stereo mind you) and now she has vanished. Blood EVERYWHERE.. The kids are screaming, The cops just showed up and are calling in the FBI and mumbling something about a terrorist attack...

 

To be perfectly honest, yes, I am pretty amazed by what some people fret and obsess about. But this is by no means contained to audiophiles. And quite frankly I don't care what others spend money on. Doesn't hurt me.

 

Oy vay... here's a couple commonly trotted out pearls of wisdom that should be put to bed:

that measurements are meaningless and don't tell you anything;

that any one variable in a design makes it always better than another design (such as that tubes are always better than solid state, or that vinyl is alway better that digital, or that MC cartridges and always better than MM cartridges, that discrete transistors are always better than op amps, direct drive vs belt drive, etc);

oh yeah, and that inexpensive Japanese DD turntables of the 70s and 80s represent the state of the art record players that deliver everything vinyl has to offer and can't be bested by other tables and designs.

 

I just want to point out that I've been 99.99%* vegetarian since 2002 and that I can't stand the sight of blood.

*thought the deep-fried chicken finger I ate in May this year was a deep fried mozzarella stick, decided not to spit it out.