Here is an excerpt from an e-mail I just sent to Ric Schultz after his Ground Enhancer tweaks arrived in the mail.
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The EVS Ground Enhancers arrived this morning. They were secured to the negative poles of my speaker binding posts within 5 minutes.
Mind you, this is not a "high end" system, just something I put together for my wife after I veered off in the direction of dedicated headphone listening. The equipment consists of a RAM-modded Samsung DVD-HD841 (before I knew better), an AMC XIA integrated amp, budget-priced Virtue Audio interconnect and speaker cable, Wharfedale Diamond 9.1 monitors and a Martin Logan Dynamo 500 sub.
The without/with differences were clearly and immediately apparent: an appreciable degree of added ease and richness of detail and tonality, coupled with an expansion in the 3D soundstage, greater effusiveness, transparency and synergy with seamless transition across the frequency range. The Wharfedales' bass and lower mids seem to have acquired an optimal ripeness and blend indistinguishably with the Dynamo. I am listening at increased volume but with no fatigue whatsoever.
It's amazing, actually, how "far into" the development of instrumental and vocal sounds I am now hearing while spinning Hiroshima's "Distant Thoughts" from their Third Generation album. The koto strums and plucks come through with absolutely luscious depth and detail--a newfound and utterly open sense of detail. June Kuramoto's solo on "From the Heart" is simply resonant and vivacious in a way I have never heard--nor thought I would ever hear--from this relatively modest equipment.
In short, a full immersion, musical experience of the highest order. And the bang-for-the-buck factor for your GEs is at least two orders of magnitude beyond any other "tweak" I have tried to date.
Needless to say, I am very excited to discover the effects that your GEs will have on my headphone amp, a modded Bada PH-12 with parallel headphone outputs!!
Thanks again, Ric, and congratulations on your break through with the GE. Personally, I hope you corner the market on every continent with these devices! : )
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Here is a link to Ric's website with more information on the Ground Enhancers:
I welcome and encourage other head-fiers to try the GEs (with Ric's 30-day return policy) and to report on their findings on this thread.
As alluded to in the letter above, Ric is in the process of preparing a Ground Enhancer for headphone application. God willing, I will augment this thread with my impressions of that product after I have acquired it and have had a chance to audition. : )
Edited by pataburd - 1/6/11 at 12:11pm
, and used the German Maestro in parallel with the headphone plug GE. Again, the sound was congested and anemic initially, but opened up after a few hours and has since been nothing short of amazing. I was listening to some complex passages from Pink Floyd's DSOTM and Mahavishnu Orchestra's Inner Mounting Flame which were rendered with aplomb by the HDP. I never expected to get such full-bodied sound (and the separation, image, etc) from this modest setup (or with any headphone setup, for that matter). I've had only about 5-6 hours with it, but it clearly surpasses (by far) a more expensive setup that I use at work which consists of:
