Nice Sound System for Home

Journeyman said:
LelandJ LelandJ - I've very little knowledge about quality audio stuff, so this may be heretical, but what's your opinion of older Bang & Olufsen gear, such as turntables?

The father of one of my friends used to collect B&O audio gear and he had an amazing set up in the 1980s, including a very solid-looking turntable that sounded good to my young, untrained ears - a Beogram 9000 or 7000, perhaps?
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As Leland said, it's meh. They were good at making space age designs, but they are not much different than Bose. Just because you have a famous name doesn't mean it's any good.
 
OfficePants said:
... Maybe some of the Pass Labs stuff, too. ...
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These or the newer ones?

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OfficePants said:
Ya, those are stunning. They'll last forever. What else you running? Looks like a Wadia. And speakers?
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Setup is fairly simple, CD is a - you guessed right - Wadia 860x. The built in DAC is not so bad and it has a volume control, so it is directly attached to the Aleph's. However, digital volume control cripples a bit of the dynamics, so I'm looking from time to time for a Pass Aleph P pre-amp, but so far no luck at all to find a good one. Most people are keeping that stuff. Speakers are Wilson Benesch ACT 2 in maple. That's it.
I have no turntables anymore. To me, there's still a difference between a MFSL record and a CD, but it is a huge effort to get it out. Proper setup of the turntable (I spent hours and hours and hours on that), cleaning the disks (I had a disk washer) and so on...I simply didn't want that anymore. Now it's just switch on, CD in and go.
 
pan51 said:
Setup is fairly simple, CD is a - you guessed right - Wadia 860x. The built in DAC is not so bad and it has a volume control, so it is directly attached to the Aleph's. However, digital volume control cripples a bit of the dynamics, so I'm looking from time to time for a Pass Aleph P pre-amp, but so far no luck at all to find a good one. Most people are keeping that stuff. Speakers are Wilson Benesch ACT 2 in maple. That's it.
I have no turntables anymore. To me, there's still a difference between a MFSL record and a CD, but it is a huge effort to get it out. Proper setup of the turntable (I spent hours and hours and hours on that), cleaning the disks (I had a disk washer) and so on...I simply didn't want that anymore. Now it's just switch on, CD in and go.
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Nice stuff. Don't know the Wilson Benesch name. Have you considered moving to streaming? I will never go back, it's so damn simple.

Does the Wadia have an input to just leverage the dac stage? Indeed, it is a good one.
 
OfficePants said:
Nice stuff. Don't know the Wilson Benesch name. Have you considered moving to streaming? I will never go back, it's so damn simple.

Does the Wadia have an input to just leverage the dac stage? Indeed, it is a good one.
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Actually do this, the Wadia has three additional inputs for the dac and I use the toslink one with an airport express. Pretty funny when party is on and my guests fiddle with the itunes server to get their music wishes...

Wilson Benesch is from GB, not even well known in Europe but their speakers are brilliant.
 
pan51 said:
Actually do this, the Wadia has three additional inputs for the dac and I use the toslink one with an airport express. Pretty funny when party is on and my guests fiddle with the itunes server to get their music wishes...

Wilson Benesch is from GB, not even well known in Europe but their speakers are brilliant.
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Yeah, I have a sonos via optical cable to a Levinson DAC. Same thing, save for the ipad app serves as the juke box.

I'll read up on W B.
 
Paid $970 for this brass adapter nut and the internal walls are off by a good .188" of an inch and my engineer says to take it to another machinist and make sure to get it matched within .001".

Mind I mailed the driver to my engineer so he could get the nut made and matched for me.

Really pissed.

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OfficePants said:
$970 for a nut??
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Welcome to custom audio, mind from the same engineer I bought the driver from who's now charging $4k more for it than what I paid (mine was a prototype with a one year turnaround) but doesn't excuse this piss poor adapter job.

Like a scitmat on steroids, Sarto would've had aneurysm.
 
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Found a local precision machinist quoted me as little as $60 to shave it down within a one mil tolerance!
 
I'd really like to see a large picture of this mammoth speaker - or whatever it is - in its proper setting, for context.

How's it all meant to work?
 
LelandJ said:
Welcome to custom audio, mind from the same engineer I bought the driver from who's now charging $4k more for it than what I paid (mine was a prototype with a one year turnaround) but doesn't excuse this piss poor adapter job.

Like a scitmat on steroids, Sarto would've had aneurysm.
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I get it, but I still think you're overpaying.
 
Journeyman said:
I'd really like to see a large picture of this mammoth speaker - or whatever it is - in its proper setting, for context.

How's it all meant to work?
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I only heard it for the first time a few days ago. It's much more sensitive than my smaller horn and it has practically zero listening fatigue which I can't say about anything I've ever heard before. The 13' internal horn path provides refinement that can't be replicated with boxed and coned speakers. But the mammoth is so responsive I really need my mastering console which is still months away to properly EQ my records now. I'm getting a stripped down prototype without the important hi and lo cut filters which will have to fill in for the time being next week.

Just got back from the mad science machinist who's going to bore and bush the nut from .774" diameter on the driver side down to .690" on the throat side. It's currently .770" throughout with a .754" bur on the edge.
 
LelandJ said:
I only heard it for the first time a few days ago. It's much more sensitive than my smaller horn and it has practically zero listening fatigue which I can't say about anything I've ever heard before. The 13' internal horn path provides refinement that can't be replicated with boxed and coned speakers. But the mammoth is so responsive I really need my mastering console which is still months away to properly EQ my records now. I'm getting a stripped down prototype without the important hi and lo cut filters which will have to fill in for the time being next week.

Just got back from the mad science machinist who's going to bore and bush the nut from .774" diameter on the driver side down to .690" on the throat side. It's currently .770" throughout with a .754" bur on the edge.
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It's very satisfying to hear them for the first time. It's quite a project you undertook. Nice work.
 
Took me two hours to install a new tonearm, cartridge, and step up transformer, apropos of surgery wore surgical gloves by time took them off hands were drenched with sweat.

Hoping impedance will match up well enough.
 
LelandJ said:
Took me two hours to install a new tonearm, cartridge, and step up transformer, apropos of surgery wore surgical gloves by time took them off hands were drenched with sweat.

Hoping impedance will match up well enough.
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Ya, I've had that happen, makes you wonder how someone can wear them for 8 or 10 hours at a time.
 
LelandJ said:
Took me two hours to install a new tonearm, cartridge, and step up transformer, apropos of surgery wore surgical gloves by time took them off hands were drenched with sweat.

Hoping impedance will match up well enough.
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OfficePants said:
Ya, I've had that happen, makes you wonder how someone can wear them for 8 or 10 hours at a time.
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Never used to happen. Climate change
 
So I get no sound from the new install at all besides a high impedance interference hum.

If the coil on my vintage cartridge is broken I'ma be very pissed. Now I gotta figure out which engineer I should troubleshoot without having to wait four months to get it back ugh.
 
LelandJ said:
So I get no sound from the new install at all besides a high impedance interference hum.

If the coil on my vintage cartridge is broken I'ma be very pissed. Now I gotta figure out which engineer I should troubleshoot without having to wait four months to get it back ugh.
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Ugh. Sorry.

You sure that's the issue?
 
OfficePants said:
Ugh. Sorry.

You sure that's the issue?
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I don't know what else it could be, I just had the tonearm and sut made and tested a few months ago by a very experienced German professional radio engineer.

I bought the cartridge on eBay last December and when I look for the listing now in my eBay account it only shows the price of the sale and I can't even access the listing page to see the wording of the description!
 
LelandJ said:
I don't know what else it could be, I just had the tonearm and sut made and tested a few months ago by a very experienced German professional radio engineer.

I bought the cartridge on eBay last December and when I look for the listing now in my eBay account it only shows the price of the sale and I can't even access the listing page to see the wording of the description!
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Yeah, they disappear in 90 days I believe. Try contacting the seller to ask about it.
 
Prototype arrives, one box just for tubes so not worried about no fragile stamps.

preboxes.webp
 
I don't even have a temporary shelving system for it yet, guess I'll have to hop over to the thrift or antique store smh.
 
LelandJ said:
I don't even have a temporary shelving system for it yet, guess I'll have to hop over to the thrift or antique store smh.
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Fuck that you need to get some shit custom made. Brazilian rose wood or reclaimed mahagony or something fancy like that. If you put this on an IKEA bookshelf I'm going to fly out there and smack you.
 
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