This downgrading idea

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Originally posted by Tom Alves:
Thinking about this today & the Chopin thread in the Music Room. it occured to me that a lot of the music I now like I would never have got into with out the aid of a decent hi-fi. The difference between medicore & great may be several thousand pounds but to get those extra nuances which allow those great performances through can make or break a piece of music you used not to like.

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I'm with Tom.

The way I buy CD's is to go to the local independant and listen to a stack of the latest releases using headphones. I only buy stuff that strikes a chord (no pun intended). Once in a while I get a new CD home, play it, hate it, play it again, still hate it, and wonder what possessed me to buy this heap of junk.

Since my big upgrade I have revisited a lot of these albums and within a few bars I usually have my answer, and this extends past individual CD's and to whole bodies of work. For example, I have never really understood what people saw in Lucinda Williams. Raucous slapper. I have 4 or 5 of her albums because they seemed promising in the the shop. Each time I bought a new one I thought "OK, I don't like her other stuff but she really has her chops together on this one". Wrong ! With my new system it took about 5 minutes to realise that this woman writes great songs and has a great voice. What's not to like ? She has been on high rotation at my house for the last month. Was my old system so bad ? Hardly. It just missed some subtle part of these recordings that brought them to life for me. And it's not just me - my sister hated Lisa Ekdahl with a passion until a few weeks ago when she heard her at my house.

I can hear people saying "but I get chills listening to Lucinda Williams through my crystal radio and bakelite earpiece". Great. Maybe there are other artists that you would suddenly "get" if you heard them through the right system. Maybe the stuff that does it for you works on any system and better gear isn't going to change a thing. Get get a Bose lifestyle and spend your money on something more important. Do I envy someone who can
achieve maximum musical enjoyment from all of their CD's from low end hi-fi ? Only if their emotional response to music is at least as strong as my own.

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Perhaps in UK (or Wellington and Christchurch, NZ for that matter) it's always like Winter - even in the summer - and this is a purely an Auckland thing.

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You must be friggin joking ! What colour are the bombay hills ? Green ! It's like a feckin dust bowl here. Yesterday we had our first rain for I can't remember how long. It's officially winter in one week and it's still 15-17 degrees [insert long winded rant on Wellington's weather].

Right, thats it. I was going to let the Blues win tomorrow night but now I am afraid that your whole team will be killed by a swarm of a giant mutant painted apple moths. Your cheerleaders will sub and despite a brave effort will be unable to sustain the onslaught from the Crusaders who will go on to a 2 point victory.

We don't upgrade the system in Summer because a]there's too much cool stuff to do outdoors and b] because in the warmer months the sistem sounds a lot better than in the dark,damp middle of frickin July. Lets not forget that its not only LP12s that sound best in a warm room

Great to see the Auckland/Wello axis slugging it out. Great posts galore BTW

Interesting that with the possible exception of Pearcy most, if not all posters have felt compelled to share their views on why upgrading is a good idea and can be defended with logic thusly...

<Insert argument here>


Started the downgrader thread simply to see how many people around these parts had collided head on with the wall and maybe, just maybe, were prepared to do something about it. Not many obviously.

I for one am glad that contentment is in abundance. No, really, I am

My dealer (for lack of a better word) thinks I'm a chronic malcontent. This is of course true. Some of us are simply beyond help remember.


redeye

and Crusaders to win by a gnats

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I certainly have stopped playing Moby-Play for example. I would rather hear this on my walkman equalised to sound more appealing.

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I find 'Play' sounds fine.

As does the freebie Garage compilation on this month's Mojo mag.

Although I probably listen to a full range boom box emulator.

Paul

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The underlying point surely is that you shouldn't need a spur. It's the acceptance of 'spurs', 'spikes', 'run in', 'warm up', 'puckism', 'three boxes' etc that is a root cause of upgraditis. Installation and usage issues that get in the way of simply having a musical system.

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Hallelujah to that.

I really bloody hate the number of boxes I have, it pisses me off every time I look at it. It occupies too much of my limited floor space, has to be left turned on to sound OK, has a mass of bloody cables that are impossible to make tidy (and need dressing on order to acheive the ultimate in performance), etc. etc.

Unfortunately, the levels of musical enjoyment I currently get from this room-hogging rack of kit are not easily obtainable by more elegant means - I'm working on it though

In fact the whole box addict thing really gets to me, it's a total anathema to those that claim music to be the most important bit, just an essential evil in my view.

Andy (too many boxes) Weekes.

Tom,

Yeah, we have a brand new 10 screen movie complex with state of the art "dolby" sound that vibrates the place so hard that it "gets the ladys where they want's to go every time" (where did I get that quote from ?). Anyway, it sounds bloody horrible - just a gigantic wall of distortion. Funny thing is that there was a time when I would have actually thought that it was mindblowingly good. Still - it has "weight and scale" I suppose
so it has the most important bases covered eh chaps ?

Richie,

I play my system very loud sometimes and it is important that at these levels the system retains it's composure. On the other hand it is also important that I get the same picture in miniature when I turn the volume down really low.

Andy

I sympathise with your predicament. However, if you purchase either a Fraim or Hutter, your system will become a thing of beauty and will also sound much better.

Regards

Mick

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I sympathise with your predicament. However, if you purchase either a Fraim or Hutter, your system will become a thing of beauty and will also sound much better.

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Mick,

I thank you for your sympathy, although I have a nice looking Ash Designs rack that I like very much.

Unfortunately Fraim is another turn in the wrong direction - it consumes even more space as the width is way in excess of what it needs to be compared to the box widths. It also costs a stupendous amount of money that would be better spent elsewhere on much greater sonic improvements in my case.

I also prefer the looks of the Ash to Hutter, sonic differences aside.

Andy.

Minky,

The obvious solution to your Lucinda Williams predicament is to buy the headphone listening post from your local record shop.

All,

On the general point of downgrading I think its often the hi-fi equivalent of self-flagellation by puritanical Christians in the middle ages. People have got far too into hi-fi and are running around telling everyone stupid enough to listen how "my system sounded awful last might until I remembered to Brasso my fuse holders" or somesuch. Its kind of a "back to basics", put on a hairshirt and purge myself of this nonsense and rediscover my enjoyment thing. Once you;ve been through this process you can probably sensibly upgrade again although it seems most who go this route don't ever bother.

Ultimately the Golden Rule of HiFi is a wonderful piece of counter intuitive reasoning: Musical enjoyment is inversely proportional to effort expended. Show me someone screaming loudly about tweaking the last ounce of performance from their system and "going the extra mile" if you look again you'll also find someone who has stopped enjoying music and almost always has terrible taste as well. Almost all this mumbo-jumbo and hi-fi voodoo is a crock of shit IMHO and if you (or rather your dealer) cannot get many thousands of pounds worth of high quality hi-fi working properly in your home without endless and increasingly ludicrous fiddling then I think you are probably in the fool and his money category.

Once you understand this and have the difference between CDX + Nait + Kans and CDS2/52/135/SBL firmly in perspective then -- assuming musical enjoyment is your motivation -- it just becomes a matter of how much money you want to and can afford to devote to listening to your CDs. Nothing more nothing less.

Matthew

Mr Hockman,
Thanks for your kind words. My sympathy for you being unable to go to live performances for the time being.

I had a meridian system before my Naim, I did effectively downgrade (purely in terms of cost) to get naim. I like it better. It was definitely worth getting over budget hifi.

Strangely I listen to my system less since getting the Naim. A good thing... I'm picking up the guitar more often (to the distress of my neighbours) and I dance and sing along (when not playing vinyl because my floor is made of paper or something)a lot of the time.

*ReQuote
However, if you purchase either a Fraim or Hutter, your system will become a thing of beauty and will also sound much better.
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Yes! Thing of beauty! My reason for buying a nice smart rack!

Now I must leave you... I need to go polish my plugs and fuses. I need to make my TV sound better and look prettier.

Andrew

there are 10 types of people in this world... those who can read binary, and those who can't...

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Originally posted by Matthew Robinson:
Minky,

The obvious solution to your Lucinda Williams predicament is to buy the headphone listening post from your local record shop.

Once you understand this and have the difference between CDX + Nait + Kans and CDS2/52/135/SBL firmly in perspective then -- assuming musical enjoyment is your motivation -- it just becomes a matter of how much money you want to and can afford to devote to listening to your CDs. Nothing more nothing less.

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Matthew,

Or I could have put a lot of cash into a head rig that made me look like a cyberman, but what I really really wanted was all of this through speakers.

Totally in agreement on all of this tweeking bollockry. Isn't the point to get the thing working and then just let it do it's job ?

"I'll miss it, to be sure."


Mike,

check out your private topics.

cheers, Martin

E-mail:- MartinPayne at Dial.Pipex.com