After a decade of ultra open sound, looking for well isolating closed cans. AKG K1000 has been my poison for a decade now, not having desires for anything better. Just love the sound presentation, effortless treble, great dynamics, all that. But the ultra openness presents difficulties at times...

Hello everyone. Looking all-arounder IEM setup for music and movies. I would prefer best possible isolation and good comfort for multi-hour sessions. Source: a Linux machine. DAC: I have one (Electrocompaniet ECD-1 which is on the warmer side) but new ones can be suggested. Wireless...

I always get the same thrill when listening to Theatre of Tragedy - Assembly. Particularly the song Motion at the end. The same happens with Mike Oldfield's Five Miles Out. I seem to have a weak spot at vocoder'd vocals. :o What albums there are that sport a healthy dose of vocoders?

Hello everyone. I bought a nice amp and I wanted to share a few bits about it. This little text got a bit silly because originally I was just going to write some kind words about my gear, now we've got a lengthy tale and adequate descriptions of two amps doing their job fine with the K1000. The...

Is it correct to pronounce the article word 'a' like the letter a? The spoken English may not have that strict formal rules but I wonder if there's a preferred way to say it. Because there are so much foreign people on this forum, maybe this thread could serve as a collection of small...

I don't know much of the power amp markets, but there seem to be some some or more amplifiers that are particularly good at driving single driver speakers, or otherwise nasty loads (such as ribbons or K1000). I know Pass Labs, but what other manufacturers or amps there are?

I ripped my Tchaikovsky DVDA disc to computer and it is a 6-channel beast. I only have two ears, so I thought of downmixing it to stereo. What are the ways to do this? Are there general guidelines for this? I'm using Linux, and audacity seems to be appropriate but I couldn't catch a...

I feel like a fool here, but after hearing such "news", I haven't been able to think anything else. Has anyone else heard about this?

Hello you all jazz lovers. I've spent my day browsing the Music section, looking for existing threads about the complexiness of modern jazz scales and stuff like that. But to my surprise, a sufficient thread wasn't found. So I simply have to begin one. I wouldn't be sure to include the term...

This acrossed me. The current disc transport of mine, the Pioneer DV757Ai, isn't bad (I'm using its toslink optical out) but I thought I might as well get something used if it's got AES/EBU SPDIF out. Is there anything not too expensive around? The small toploaders that Bel Canto and Stello have...

I saw this in an Amazon newsletter: Tubular Bells - The Ultimate Edition: Mike Oldfield: Amazon.co.uk: Music Didn't think much of it since it looks just another 2009-brickwallremix stuff. However, there I glimpsed the words "original mix". And the package looks alright. Has anyone got...

Download a 4-page PDF version here. Electrocompaniet ECD-1 I bought an Electrocompaniet ECD-1 digital/analog converter device in the beginning of the year and now I'd like to share some thoughts about it. There's been long pauses between the chapters and even paragraphs as I've been...

We all know how rigs consist of sources, amplifiers, speakers and the cabling between them. But do you know good analogies for them? I'd be interested to hear various. I thought of one somewhat good: a rig's like a movie (or its production). The movie's script is the source. It's where the...

While listening to some Son Kite and Infected Mushroom with my Stax 2020 system and reading Haskell documentary and keying commands into vim and irssi a question acrossed my mind: the Staxes sound so heavenly with trance music and have everything a hacker needs, but are they the best a hacker...

I got so lucky to have a deal on an Electrocompaniet ECD1. It'll take a while to ship to Finland and meanwhile I can think out how to get it 230V-ready. The sold piece is configured for 110V but I emailed with Electrocompaniet and they said it's easily modificated for 230V mains. I don't...

Because we all like Mike and his great albums and works, I thought a little classification and voting would be both appropriate and fun. Many people feel that a song is long if it's over six minutes or so. Mike has done many long tracks that could be classified as long so I divide those to...

Being a big fan of Love Supreme and listened mostly to the Deluxe version I bought a live version, released by Just Jazz in 2006. The code's JJCD-1001. It's very cool, very acid in a way. Just the things I like in cool jazz and this, combined to the 'ordinary' and superb Love Supreme is giving...

As we speak. If I get lucky, an eBay auction ends to my favor soon. I'm replacing my Juli@ for Audiophile 192 because the linux ALSA drivers (ICE1724) for ESI are bad. M-Audio offerings, on the other hand, seem to be on ICE1712 and 'Envy24' drivers are said to be very good and stable. These...

1. The Dawn of Can Man Please allow me to introduce myself; yes, I tell first something about my journey here on Head-fi. My Stax journey really began when I joined Head-fi in the fall of 2007. Browsed through these large threads containing pictures of rigs. Usually my favorite kinds of...

The superb album with more superb title track! I bought the HDCD one but I long after original CD prints. These are what I found: Mike Oldfield - Crises Mike Oldfield - Crises Now, the first one looks promising. But was the first CD press of Crises really launched in 1983? Must be old...

Hello there. This Friday some (not many) Finns are put up with their graduation exams in English language. Matriculation exam, or A-levels, if you know the thing. I'm performing it, too. I'm just a little afraid how it's going to end. I feel somewhat certain about my skills, but too often I...

Howdy ho, how are you doing? I've been a happy Amarok user, forwarding the music without alterings to ALSA and from there my sound card, the ESI Juli@. So, I have thought all these months Amarok is very transparent (in this case, bit-perfect). Then I happened to try this lovely piece of...

Good morning everyone. Last night I set up my bad but unreliable analog rig and listened to few records. I was amazed on how the sound was. I've listened to my analog records many times, but this time was illuminating. For curiosity, I mention two albums I listened to: Tangerine Dream -...

The time of ignorance were good to me. I would buy an album and listen to it with my surround headphones or $30 computer speakers and be happy with them. Now I check everything very carefully, see if it's a good press or something like that. I do random checks with audacity to see if some song...

This acrossed my mind just now. Since many of us have multiple sources, not only digital ones, how do you cope with the preamps? Let's say we had two digital sources and a turntable, and a speaker- and a headamp. So there's a certain need for a preamplifier. If we consider the DAC having two...