HiFi....A means to an end?

I can't comment on that, but Hi-Fi certainly spelt the end to any means I previously had.

LOL Mike

I hate fiddling with my hi-fi. Fiddling, for me, is a symptom of upgraditis - I cannot imagine enjoying it.

JD

It looks like most people get to a point with their system and then will only upgrade because they want somthing to do. This is probably more often than not sidegrading.

Perhaps this is why people who have the space, and the funds have a second sytem.

Such systems tend to be made up of s/h components that can be picked up for little money, or made up from spare bits of kit. Maybe this is where the tinkering should be done, leaving the main system alone for listening to music.

An interesting question would be to compare the sound of peoples second system to some of the systems uninformed people put together for thousands of pounds with some of the modern overpriced cr*p that you can buy in shops like the one named after a place with a number of oaktrees in kent.


Simon

Like t'other Simon I'm not one to fiddle. My recent expenditure on hi-fi has been on repairing my amplififcation (it was seriously ill) and buying a decent CD player (we didn't have one with even pretensions to being hi-fi and therefore good to listen to).

My LP12 (1983 vintage) has been serviced occasionally, but I've never pulled it apart or removed the baseboard or tried any of the tweaks that others try. It doesn't surprise me that those who do tweak their TTs are unhappy with them!

There are also some who contribute profusely to this forum but not The Music Room, is this not a sign!

Someone on the forum (sorry can't remember who and I'm not going to search the forum for "Mullet") said that the ultimate Mullet system is one where the hi-fi costs more than the music collection. I think that sums it up nicely.

seagull,

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IMHO the true mullet system is one in which the cost of the equipment is greater than that of the music collection.

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this was from garth from canada.

If you are on this forum you are a tweaker.

Just admit it to yourself. You love the boxes.

I know the Music Room has some interesting threads, but lets be honest, it is no replacement for a well informed mag or other review medium.

There is nothing worng with planning out your next upgrade, listening the options, receiving opinions, assessing alternatives.

Remember the old adage - planning the holiday is half the fun, so why not plan two holidays and go on neither of them, and have the same amount of fun?

DS

p.s. what should I buy next ?

Chaps

I have two systems and am happy with both of them.

I am less upgrade conscious than of before and I now spent more time buying CD's and playing music .

However, having said that, I will probably go for a 552 and 500 at some later stage, not because I am hankering for it but just because it will make a good system sound better. I could easily live with what I have but if I can buy something better and I have the money tucked away to do it, then I will go for it.

Also I have noticed that most of the "fiddlers" are LP12 ownwers who seem to have a love/hate relationship with the thing because they are never sure if they are getting the best sound out of it. Thats why I will keep my Garrard 401.

Anyway, if it keeps you off the streets and stops you chasing women etc, its no bad thing.

Regards

Mick

Of how do you decide between buying a new box or a stack of new music..?
I posted a question ages ago about this and got very few replies, and most were questioning my reasons for asking such a question, but given a lump sum of, say, £2000, what would I do with it -more music, a box, or even take a trip, as suggested earlier...
I am with Thorsten - when the value of the hi fi is greater than the music, things start to look a little wrong, so a 552 will be some way off then.!

Steve

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My LP12 (1983 vintage) has been serviced occasionally, but I've never pulled it apart or removed the baseboard or tried any of the tweaks that others try. It doesn't surprise me that those who do tweak their TTs are unhappy with them!

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Who’s unhappy? I don’t know whether I would classify myself as a tweaker, but I certainly understand how a LP12 works, and like many here I am more than competent to service and set one up. As such I save myself cash by not having to pay a dealer, and have absolute piece of mind that my deck has not been abused whilst it has been away. I’ve seen decks come back from dealers with bent cantilevers, screwed arm bearings and cosmetic scratches and dints etc – not often, but certain dealers are not fit to be let near a turntable. As an example one of my friends now has a dull and slightly pitted LP12 platter because his fuckwit (Linn and Naim) dealer actually sold his original one by accident! He accepted it far better than I would have done – I’d have flung it back through the shop window and demanded a brand new one…

Removing the old style fibreboard baseboard makes a very obvious improvement to a LP12 (it tightens and improves bass control), if you would prefer to pay many hundreds of pounds for a similar gain elsewhere that’s fine by me – we all got our upgrades for nowt!

IMHO There are two key types of hi-fi listener:

Type One: Spend a lot of time learning about all aspects of system design and setup, and spend a great deal of time experimenting and end up getting their system to sound exactly the way they want it to in their room. I think this represents the majority of us here.

Type two: Put all their faith in their dealer, let the dealer do everything, if they grow dissatisfied with the sound, they simply spend more money, and more money, and more money, and more money, and more money… There are a couple of these here!

I have spent a considerable amount of time and effort getting my kit to work as optimally as I can (i.e. absurdly better than any type two listener who hears it would believe such cheap kit is capable), but I also try not to be obsessive (and possibly fail) – it’s a hard balance, but worth the effort. I’m very much more type one than type two, I have heard far too many type two systems sound like shite!

Tony.

PS I’m not having a go at all dealers, a few get it right!

This is a good thread and something that I think about quite a bit these days.

I think I have figured out why I constantly want to change things in my system, be they upgrades or sidegrades, transistors or tubes, analog or digital. It has to do with music. I grew up listening to classic rock. I like it it - a lot. I listen to modern music on the radio but have not really been inclined to buy any of it. The few times that I have bought some, I have generally been disappointed. Therefore, I keep listening to the same old LPs that I have been listening to for years. The only way that I can make them sound "new" again is to change the sound and the presentation of that same old music. It is great for a while, but then, after hearing all my favorites again, I get bored - its still just the same old music.

I have tried to figure out what it is about new music that I don't like. Every once in a while, when I am in just the right mood, I hear the stuff in the background, like the drum fills and the guitar fills, and I see how they contribute to the music and make it more interesting. I think about timing then. I have never got my system to time the way the first system I heard timed. That first system was an LP12, Exposure electronics and Linn Kans. I'm guessing that maybe the reason I don't like newer music is that it sounds so repetitive and alike. Of course, younger people may say that about classic rock. Possibly, if my system would time better, the music would become more interesting. Hell, even the rata-tat-tat of cymbals sounds good when the timing is spot on. I have never figured out why the timing isn't spot on. Budget constraints don't allow me to get some Mana or some upgraded boxes. So I have been content with moving things around, putting things under my boxes etc. Recently, I have gotten into single driver speakers (James, are you listening). I built a pair of Tapered Quarter Wave Tubes (for $40) that use a single Radio Shack 4 inch driver. The boxes are about the size of Kans except much taller. I get more speed out of these than I do with my Credos. They *almost* time well and I hear a lot more of the music. In fact, I have not listened to my Credos for last 6 weeks or so. And in those last 6 weeks I have listened to all my favorites again ... sigh.

Mike

Thing is, its a hobby.

Clearly a man thing, much like cars, football etc etc we seem to have to be into something.

As with anything these interests have strata. I layer of people will tweak, another layer will ask why that layer tweaks.

At the end of the day though we are all sat here talking/typing about it. There for its a hobby and we are all geeks.

Best just to get on with it then.

Cheers

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Originally posted by Richard van Laar:
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I ended my subscription of 2 Hifi magazines a few months ago and took a music magazine instead! That's why I bought all the damn gear in the first place!

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Care to share what is the music magazine you subscribe to?

This reply is not intended to cause any offence to any femanist readers who might be reading it.(I doubt)
Hi Simon,
I think the journey to the perfect system is rather like looking for a perfect woman. We find many nice ones yet keep changing hoping next one will be better than last or somtimes trying different types to see what is like(brunette, blonde etc.)
So what is the answer? I think we all be satisfied if we could have two or three diff. types of system to suit our diff. mood.

garyi

I think you might have hit the nail on the head.

I think that my facination with music and boxes started when I was about 12. I started buying music and listing to it on the JVC ghetto-blaster type thing in my bedroom. When it got to the stage that I needed a piece of furniture to keep my CDs, my mother used to say things to me like "haven't you got enough music now?", to which my responce was "well you have been buying newspapers everyday for the last 20 years, maybe you have enough of those"

Anyway, at university I starde to get frustrated with the sound of my JVC number, so for my birthday, I requested funds to purchase a new HiFi, and I went with my £260 to richer sounds where I bought my first seperates system. And even though it was cheap, it blew away, much of what my friends had at the time.

I then made the mistake of listening to my cousins naim system.

For a while i stopped buying music and only uppgraded my hifi, and started to get so much more from the music I already had,

then it went wrong for a few years, I became obsessed with getting the sound to be as good as it could be. After an ubgrade I would not sit and listen to a whole album, but just skip between bits of well produced songs, listing to just how good it sounded,after a guitar riff, or a drum solo I would change CD and jind an other one, then I might tweak my speaker position and start over.

Since getting my system to whee it is now, with Naim amps and a new CDP, any more upgrades are for me too expensive for the moment. I would hae to do maybe one thing every couple of years (until I earn more money) and other things are more important, like the mortgage.

Now I am just buying music, and happy with the sound, that I spent about three years achieving.

So for a while I was only interested in the boxes, and the sound, and my hifi was a hobby and indeed an end in itself.

In the last year or so I have come back round to seeing it at a means for music reproducion, and once again can be found in my flat listening to entire albums back to back, just like I used to, 10 or 12 years ago on my JVC in my bedroom at my parents house.

That is one full circle that cost me a lot of time, money and ffort, but I did enjoy it.


Simon

Hi Simon,

Personally I think the neverending quest for the "best" audio comes from it being a great hobby!

I also think some people spend more time on tweaking than acutally listen to the music. For me, the joy of music is much more important than listening to the hardware!

On the other hand I've met people who, imho, "hear" things between their ears instead of with their ears.

As an example there is this guy who spend some €500 on a Nordhost (did I spell this right?) digital interconnect between his CD and DAC. He insists it sounds better than his previous AudioQuest cable (lower bass, better imaging etc.) Nordhost claims that the improvement (less jitter) over other cables has to do with the fact that this cable is capable of data transmission at 98% of the speed of light against some 80% using other brands.

Maybe I'm wromg, but the interval of the databits at the receiving point is exactly the same as with "slower" cables. Aslo, there is only one-way communication (no error checking between CD and DAC).

Now, unless the AudioQuest cable is absolute crap and totally not suitable for digital datatransport (whitch I cannot believe), the guy must hear things between his ears! But wouldn't we all if we just spend €500 on a cable!

BTW this doesn't mean I believe Nordhost makes bad cables!!!!!!

Please inform me of any shortcomings in my reasoning!

grtnx Peter

Right on, Simon.

What is the point in having a decent hi-fi system? Surely it is to listen to music, not the system. There must come a point when, to extract joy from music, one needs to stop listening to the system. One can only listen to one or the other!

To enjoy a good sports car, you need to drive it around country lanes, not extract a couple more horsepower each weekend in the garage by tweaking!