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Post by antonio on May 30, 2023 15:09:11 GMT
brucew268 Listen to some music and enjoy what you have. I've been messing with ethernet cables and switches, I can no longer tell the difference at my age. Give yourself some time and then try the spikes, it may or may not make a difference.
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Post by brucew268 on Apr 9, 2024 16:13:52 GMT
Chasing an elusive HF issue Over the last month the music was sounding especially good out of the HiFi on most recordings. Naturalness and transparency were excellent. Every once in a while, though, I’d play an album that didn’t sound as good as it did in previous years, so was wondering what was causing that.
Looking around, I noticed that the mains lead to the DAC is long enough that it’s in tension against the wall behind. That is probably having a damping effect that helps some part of the frequency range and hurts another, fortunately on only a few albums. When I rearranged the mains lead to hang free, the high frequencies now were a bit ear-bleeding and in your face. So, I put it back, but it niggled.
Had it been that bad before I moved the DAC to a place that levered the mains lead against the wall? In any case, I knew that if I moved the mains lead, I’d have to compensate somewhere else.
In the end I had to make three changes to get back close to the desired sound:
Preamplifier feet: I had small 9mm hard cabinet bumpers for feet and so changed out to regular 21mm rubber tapered feet. That tamed the HF but now had too much mid-range bloom. The feet were 20mm from the edges at the corners and so I moved them closer, 9mm from the edges and that helped but had still a little too much midrange. I then switched them out with 16mm rubber feet which helped further.
Balanced Transformer damping: the balanced transformer case is a bit oversized and steel with a 36mm disc of SilentCoat for damping. I changed that out for a smaller one and have played with removing it altogether. Between the less damping here and the smaller preamplifier feet, the midrange and the HF were now pretty balanced but with more HF detail than before the start of these changes.
Wall Acoustics: With that increased HF detail also came glare, unfortunately. And I was also noting that the imaging had suffered since last week moving one of the cabinets to a spot behind my listening position. After a little experimentation, I added two more acoustic absorption panels which seems to have resolved the glare and the imaging again has good depth and specificity.
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Bigman80
Grandmaster
AA Founding Member & Bigbottle Audio Creator
Posts: 16,075
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Post by Bigman80 on Apr 9, 2024 16:20:09 GMT
Mad how all of these little things are having an effect on your listening. Once you have dialled it all in, you won't be able to change any components or you'll be back to square one!
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Post by brucew268 on Apr 9, 2024 16:29:15 GMT
Mad how all of these little things are having an effect on your listening. Once you have dialled it all in, you won't be able to change any components or you'll be back to square one! Isn't it! Quite.
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optical
Moderator
BIG STAR
Be Excellent To Eachother
Posts: 1,559
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Post by optical on Apr 9, 2024 16:33:29 GMT
Very impressive commitment and findings Bruce, as ever.
Great stuff 👍
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Post by brucew268 on Apr 9, 2024 19:20:22 GMT
Very impressive commitment and findings Bruce, as ever. Great stuff 👍 It is a bit maddening at the time though when you just want to enjoy the music... in spite of the room and your means!!
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