My Audio Day

For my own record if not others I am inspired to start keeping a daily audio diary, I have a terrible memory, so I may need this.

 

I expect this will reflect just how audio obsessed I really am, I hope some find it of interest

 

 

Sat 1st March

 

Wife and Kids out in the morning and early afternoon, so fired up the Prima Luna Prologue 2, give it 10 mins to warm up, turned the Dell XPS420 on,

it automatically powers up the Audio Engine D1, and launched Foobar. I have never been happy with Foobar, I struggle again to find a layout I like, and 

go back to using Windows Explorer to choose albums to listen to. Today it was Midlakes Trials of............and McCartneys Almost Full.

 

The Macca CD is really badly mastered and has to be turned down 25% compared to The Midlake, great songs as ever by Mr Pop but a very 

harsh listen, my eyes and brain are still recovering from the previous nights lightshow at a gig I went to.

I put an LP on instead, Ashes to Ashes on my LP12, that is better. 

 

In the early evening, off to a family 60th party nearby, the people are nice I know, but what gets me there on time is that the birthday boy

has Quad 63s with Gradient subs, a sublime speaker, powered by a full Quad 66/606 CD/Pre/Power system. As with early Quad systems

the Cd player and pre amp lets things down. I turn it up a bit, but at any volume these never sound loud. He is lucky to have a big room

, by London standards anyway, and it does the speakers justice, as we say in SE London, Well Jell.

Edited by KT66 - 3/3/13 at 3:26am

Sunday really should be family music day , TV and games should be stopped for one day, hey even turn off the web for one day...

Listened to 99 Bowie remaster of Diamond Dogs , this time the Steve Hoffman forum was right, it is ear bleeding and horrible. Avoid

Spent some time thinking about cassette players, I miss them, so much more fun than ripping CDs, will try to put a needle drop on cassette into a 24/96 flac, can't be any worse than most HD tracks ! It is the analogue format we all forgot about. More fool us

Spent 20 mins today looking for RCA Bowie CDs in Berwick Street, None, only 99 remasters , looks like I not the only one that hates these

The one good thing about Mondays is back to work means back to my HM-801 and Dt1350, bliss , I don't do headphones at the weekends , my main system is too good and I. Like to give my ears a rest

Still no sign of the Nova N3 ....

Spent Monday tweeting about SACD and DVDA , don't companies realise the disc is dead ? If HD tracks sell internationally I can see good retailers like Diverse going bust very soon.

Why can't I buy hi Rez in the UK , just how useless is the record industry ?

In between working I catch up with ripping my CDs, now onto the Who, just how many compilations does one band need?

I must have 10 different versions of I Can't Explain, next time an audio friend is around I will bore us both stupid comparing them.

 

5 months since I have my Iphone5, still not using it for music, I am the only person amazed that there are still no audio add ons? like a DAC or Headphone amp? I really thought Fiio or Ibasso would have something out by now.

 

Even though there was no-one else in the house I plugged my AH-D2000s into the HM-801 - sonic bliss, if only I could get away with wearing them outside!

Edited by KT66 - 3/5/13 at 10:06am

So it's the first not freezing day in London for months and for some unknown reason I left the DT1350s at home and took the ATH-ES7?instead, got my Hm-801 4 months ago and hadn't tried it with the ES7s yet.
I forgot just how hot these get on your head.
First impressions are not great, the sound is far too warm and lacking both detail and treble,
I think the 55s might be better than the 7 , will check tomorrow.

Nova n3,have had it now for a couple of days, it's gold like 80s Marantz champagne gold.
I think the black N1 looks better , but my female Belarussian work colleague likes it.

I think this does say something about perceived values in the east and west . Gold coloured things to me ( in the UK) look cheap, like there is something to hide or the glamorous finish in someway makes up for what's inside
Gold Audio components died about 20 years ago. In the West anyway. Brass can still look ok eg Conrad Johnson, but in high end audio silver and black is still preferred by the hi end. Eg Audio Note,, Quad and Linn

I guess the Nova is aimed at eastern markets more than the west, we need to accept that China is now market número uno , so we need to get used to how they like things to look and use. I will ask Jack Fu about the colours and if they could be in silver

Maybe the N5 :-)
Edited by KT66 - 3/9/13 at 8:53am