Jim0830 Your reviews are a treasure...and agree with catcher10 Keep on sharing your experience .. Thanks Best wishes
After my daughter's boyfriend helped get it out of the box, I used furniture sliders to slide it across the floor and into my audio rack.
As for me no such help, however ....slipped slid pushed JC5 box doorway to living room. After thinking over my unboxing maneuvers...kept box vertical and kitty catted the JC5 out of the box and over to the nearby ampstand. Then slip grunt slide JC5 on to amp stand....then slide amp stand with JC5 to it's permanent place of abode....given a troublesome lower back this whole and simple thing took 4 hours....and still had to hook it up.... So did I finally get it hooked up....I won't tell ya.... Was it worth it??? OOOOHH Yaaaa indeed so Best wishes
That's what I have found as well. Seems like a tube preamplifier and this 21/+ (likely the 23 /+ too) is a killer combination.
Headphones is not a need for me.....Yes I know the JC2 will be the better performer, just kinda waiting to see what they do with the P8. The ultra low/almost zero floor the JC2 has is enticing....
I'm currently listening to my A21+ at a very low volume; 60db and probably using 2 or 3 watts of pure Class A. I can totally understand why people don't care about the heat that Class A generates. It sounds so liquid, holographic, live and natural. It's just very musical. Kate Walsh, Roy Harper and Gregg Allmans' emotions are on full display. I think that Class A opens up our ears and, ultimately, emotions in a unique way.
Now that I am retired, I am also retired from heavy lifting too. I bought new subs, the JC5, JC2 BP, the JC3+ and a power conditioner 4 months ago. Some of the advantages of buying this Parasound and SVS gear from my local audio dealer is I got a good trade in on my old Parasound gear, the opportunity to audition the equipment in store, in-home testing of some of the speaker cables, interconnects, AC cords and power conditioner. But the best part is I got a very fair and good price on the whole bundle INCLUDING in-home installation. I removed and boxed my old subs, the HINT 6 and JC3 Jr myself. The dealer was more than willing to do this too, but my system is a bit complex. I needed to relocate some of my gear on my equipment stand to suit 3 pieces where I had 2 before this. I wanted to to reroute the new audiophile cables to the new locations and install all the new audiophile power cables into my new power conditioner and route them to the new gear locations. I did the removal and boxing the easy way. I rolled the subs so the were bottom side up and put the boxes over the subs and simply rolled them over back onto the bottom side and taped and sealed the tops. The HINT 6 and JC 3 Jr were easy enough to box and my wife helped. I have a 2-wheel hand truck and we put the sub-boxes on the base plate-zero lifting require. We did one sub at at time riding on the hand truck. The HINT 6 went on top of one sub and the JC3 JR on the other. I had two piles waiting by the front door for the installers. They hadn't expected this and were pleased to say the least. The $$"toughest"$$ thing I had to do on installation day was write the check out for the balance of my system. I had all of the speaker cables, interconnects, and power cords moved, identified and hanging out the front of my equipment rack. Quick work to install and little chance for error. I sat back in my home theater recliner and answered a few question from the installers on intent. They installed all the gear, programmed the remote, optimized all the settings for the gear and used the SVS app to set up the subs. They turned every peripheral on and made sure it worked. They made quick work of it, but they did not rush. That stayed until they knew I was satisfied and all my questions were answered. Best installation I never did. But even saying that... The second "toughest" thing was waiting for the installers to finish the installation and for me to decide which record to play first. In a bit of kismet, when the installers left one of them brought in package that just arrive via Fed Ex. It was my Steely DAN Can't Buy a Thrill UHQR which had arrived 1 day early. Decision of what to play made. The album name was a bit appropriate because as I was cleaning it in my UCM, my brother called and I needed to leave and meet him for 2 1/2 hours. aaarrrggghhh
i realize the HINT6 has been out for a while, but it's on my radar....or rather, a new Hint. Interested to see if Darren works on a replacement. In my family room (which is shared with family/television), feature set, connections and bass management have become more important than Ultimate Sound Quality. I'd love to see HDMI ARC and/or Roon Ready network and/or room correction
My dream/retirement system is complete as of today. I don't know if I mentioned that I added a Topping A90 Discrete Headphone amp about 2 weeks ago now. It sounds really great, but with the new Parasound system I'd rather listen to the speakers. This is particularly true because the JC5 operates in Class A for the first 12W. So now that I can listen to the JC5 at reduced volumes and still hear a great amount of detail. I don't feel like I need to listen to an LP the next day to "really hear it". My headphone listening will be much, much less going forward. Now before I talk about the final item that completes the system, let me warn some people. This post is about audiophile speaker cables. If you are in the non-believer camp that is your prerogative. Please don't bother replying to this post with all of your negativity and disbelief. I am not going to reply to the nonbelievers. I trust my ears and what I can hear with them. Also I will discuss break-in. Non-believers, again don't bother with negative posts, there is nothing to see here. For those of you who are left, I picked up my 5' AudioQuset Robin Hood Zero speaker cables that I had ordered a few months ago. My dealer let me audition a broken in pair around the end of December and within 5 minutes of plugging them in I knew I HAD TO HAVE these cables. No need to A-B for me. There was an immediate improvement heard compared to my Audience Ohno III Speaker Cables. Today the dealer gave me a great discount on the AQ speaker cables, a generous trade in for my old Audience Ohno III Speaker Cables, and a great trade in price for a 2m RCA cable that I only needed as 1m. I ended up paying only 60% of retail for the AQ Robin Hood Zero's. This is why I treasure having a great local dealer who carries Parasound and all this other great gear. The dealer told me the cables sound pretty good right out of box, but they need about 200 hours break in time to sound their best. He said they sound great after 50 hours. Today as I was leaving to pick up the speaker cables I got the Craft One Step of the Vince Guaraldi Trio – Jazz Impressions Of Black Orpheus. After what the dealer said about break in, I decided to try the speaker cables right out of the box on the One Step. This LP sounded fantastic I must say, I heard no harshness even on the most dynamic parts. But I have no frame of reference because I have never heard this record before. Let's just say if this is the sound with no break in, I can't wait to hear it again fully broken in. I also listened to the 4 disc box set Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis with Shirley Scott – Cookin' With Jaws And The Queen: The Legendary Prestige Cookbook Albums, also a Craft Records release that I received yesterday. I had listened to Disks 1 & 2 this morning before I got the phone call my speaker cables had arrived. I listened to Disc 2 again on the new cables and there was quite a noticeable improvement. The other speaker cables sounded damn good, but the AQ's were clearly better. The instruments sounded more real, there was more space around the instruments. As a result you could hear more detail and accuracy. The music had more dynamics and the soft passages were clearly heard in great detail. I am also hearing details and instrumental touches that were more buried in the mix. The mono sound stage was dead centered and the speakers just disappeared. No doubt a lot of this was due to my JC5, JC2 BP and JC3+. These speaker cables let the great Parasound gear show off more of its talents. Color me VERY pleased.
Hey Jim it is a beautiful and wonderful thing when our systems arrive at this point.... Couldn't agree more on your setup and experience... Very very similar experience here as well... Congratulations Best wishes
I’m in the believer camp as well. Had AP Copper Micro Oval-In XLRs between my P 7 and A 21. “Borrowed” SR Foundation (all silver) XLRs from CableCo and had the same reaction …
Yes this really wasn't even very close. No need to A-B. These weren't subtle differences. Makes me wonder what I would get for even more money, but I am definitely quitting here. Now my task is to revisit some old friends to hear them like I have never heard them before.
If you have the dough the JC5 is the way to go. It has boatloads of power and the case and connectors are first class.I’m glad I purchased mine when they were a little cheaper.
I’m “with you” on all these statements. I think what I have now will be sufficient until I can go for wholesale upgrades as you have done. Another topic … I spent $2500 on room treatment (GIK, “reasonably priced”) and it also made a world of difference. I hate to say, unless one has covered this aspect one is not hearing things with the highest fidelity. IMHO of course.
You got this right on!! A great review from Audio Bacon on the JC5... Whole heartedly concur on their sq evaluation of the JC5!!!! Intentionally posted page 2 of review first....for convenience....the 2nd link is page 1 Parasound Halo JC 5 Stereo Amplifier Review - A 400-Watt BEAST - Page 2 of 2 - Audio Bacon Parasound Halo JC 5 Stereo Amplifier Review - A 400-Watt BEAST - Audio Bacon
I'm considering Bi-Amping my (2) A23+ amps on my main system as an experiment. Has anyone had good results doing this?
I would caution that system synergy has to be considered- including preamp and speakers. I wanted to love the JC5 but after 400 hrs. or so I just didn't blow me away. It was powerful enough but the midrange was just not there and at times the class A warmth was too overbearing with my Class A tube preamp. Surprisingly enough the a21+ has a much better sounding midrange in my system and I it continues to sound perfect for me after ~ 3 months of use.
System synergy matters but avanti1960 your experience with the JC5 is not what some of us have experienced with our JC5s. Read through Jim0830's and Audiofan1's experiences.... Don't let avanti1960's dissatisfaction with his JC5 experience talk you out of getting one....Music Direct has a 60 day money back satisfaction guarantee return policy... Best wishes
Nice review! And I’ve been a believer for years! And both the “Black Orpheus” (Mastered by Kevin Gray)and “Cookin With Jaws And The Queen: The Legendary Prestige Cookbook Album” (Mastered by BG) arrived at my house yesterday and I must say….Craft Recordings (Concord Records) did a fine job with these records.
