[Strayngs]

awesome stuff. I'm looking to transition into speakers myself, currently building a dedicated speaker listening room. plan to have my records on display, a few posters, and a kick ass spesker/vinyl setup. some leather recliners, and that will be just for detoxing and taking in some tunes with a Glass of red. may keep my headphone rig at the pc for work though. and I may or may not upgrade my player from the regar p10 to maybe technics sl-1000r. eta for new room is year end or early next year, depends on construction guys, which are pretty swamped in cayman right now due to everyone wanting to come here due to being covid free.

Got my new speakers in.

 

[matthewhypolite]

Got my new speakers in.

Ouu, nice, is that a ribbon tweeter? and what speaker is that?

Also noticed the prima luna on bottom shelf, are you powering the speakers with that amp? And which amp exactly?

 

[Strayngs]

Ouu, nice, is that a ribbon tweeter? and what speaker is that?

Also noticed the prima luna on bottom shelf, are you powering the speakers with that amp? And which amp exactly?

It has a AMT tweeter in the front and a small rear firing ribbon tweeter on the back. It is a PrimaLuna Evo 300 Integrated and yes it is powering the speakers.

 

[UntilThen]

I had a Primaluna Dialogue Premium HP running with 8 x KT88 before but I'm using a Redgum Rgi120enr black series now. Should have kept the PL.

 

[Strayngs]

Ouu, nice, is that a ribbon tweeter? and what speaker is that?

Also noticed the prima luna on bottom shelf, are you powering the speakers with that amp? And which amp exactly?

I forgot to answer what speaker. It is a Lawrence Audio Violin SE

 

[matthewhypolite]

It has a AMT tweeter in the front and a small rear firing ribbon tweeter on the back. It is a PrimaLuna Evo 300 Integrated and yes it is powering the speakers.

Nice, how's the prima's ? i currently use tubes for my headphoen rig and i love tubes, so when switching to speakers i'd prefer to stay tubes and was looking at the prima's as the way to do it.

I had a Primaluna Dialogue Premium HP running with 8 x KT88 before but I'm using a Redgum Rgi120enr black series now. Should have kept the PL.

Can you elaborate?

 

[UntilThen]

Can you elaborate?

Not much to elaborate. I was using the Primaluna with my setup which consist of the Rega RP8 with Apheta cartridge, Avid Pellar phono and Axis LS88 floorstanders and Axis Voicebox S monitors. I was surprised at how the PL with KT88 sounded so tight and impactful. Almost wanted to buy 8 x KT150 to try when John Reilly (designer of the Axis speakers) brought over the Redgum Rgi120enr black series. The Redgum make my speakers sound with greater texture and a slightly warmer tone. Great bass too.

Having said that, I love how my Sennheiser HD800 sound with the PL. Pretty amazing clarity, details and lovely soundstage. The PL would make a lovely headphone amp but many would have shudder at that thought.

The PL when I had it.

 

[Strayngs]

Nice, how's the prima's ? i currently use tubes for my headphoen rig and i love tubes, so when switching to speakers i'd prefer to stay tubes and was looking at the prima's as the way to do it.

The PL is my favorite single piece of equipment I own. It is a great match with my speakers and truely makes them sing. It even did a fantastic job driving magnepan 1.6 that I used to own. I would still have them if they were not so big and my wife frowning on having them LOL.

 

[Mightygrey]

The phono-equipped Jotunheim 2, stacked on top of a Bifrost 2 has really made my listening station complete. Being able to seamlessly switch between vinyl and digital has made my life much, much easier. Oh, and it sounds great too.

 

[Toad_of_Toad_Hall]

Audience - HF readers of modest financial means who are considering entering the world of vinyl

I want to balance the OP's experience with my own. Four years ago I dabbled with vinyl, purchasing a Project Debut Carbon and fitting a 2M Ortofon Red. This was connected to a Project Phono Box Pre, which fed a pair of JBL LSR305's / Schiit Vali 2 -> HD600. To my mind this represented a good entry-level (which, of course, is a relative term, related to the audiophile's means) rig.

And so began my vinyl frustration. Second hand records could be had for prices similar to new CD's but they were plagued with surface noise that couldn't be improved with any amount of hand (ie not machine) cleaning. The price of new records was often in excess of double the price of the same releases on CD (and, quite probable, commonly used the same digital mastering).

Setting the tracking weight was reasonably straight forward, but the various required other adjustments of alignment were exercises in torture and planted the seeds of paranoia. Minute adjustments can make audible differences to sound. The amount of patience required would test a saint to his limits. The minutiae of manipulation of head and needle would give the most pragmatic of realists sleepless nights. Hyperbole aside, it was frustrating and in the end, CDs sounded better, having no surface noise, very little in the way of audible distortion and no problems with pitch variation resulting from uneven platter speed.

There's no question that vinyl can sound great and offers some great tangibility to the audio experience. Just be prepared to throw away a butt-load of money, sanity and hair in your pursuit of this goal.

But that's just my opinion.

 

[matthewhypolite]

Not much to elaborate. I was using the Primaluna with my setup which consist of the Rega RP8 with Apheta cartridge, Avid Pellar phono and Axis LS88 floorstanders and Axis Voicebox S monitors. I was surprised at how the PL with KT88 sounded so tight and impactful. Almost wanted to buy 8 x KT150 to try when John Reilly (designer of the Axis speakers) brought over the Redgum Rgi120enr black series. The Redgum make my speakers sound with greater texture and a slightly warmer tone. Great bass too.

Having said that, I love how my Sennheiser HD800 sound with the PL. Pretty amazing clarity, details and lovely soundstage. The PL would make a lovely headphone amp but many would have shudder at that thought.

The PL when I had it.

I got my hands on the following stack:

Prima Luna Evo 400 Monoblocks + Preamp

Been testing it out past few days, think i'll start up other thread to discuss as I'm building a dedicated audio room to transition into speakers.

Spoiler Alert, Prima Luna Rocks!

 

[UntilThen]

I got my hands on the following stack:

Prima Luna Evo 400 Monoblocks + Preamp

Been testing it out past few days, think i'll start up other thread to discuss as I'm building a dedicated audio room to transition into speakers.

Spoiler Alert, Prima Luna Rocks!

I know the Prima Luna Evo 400 preamp is very good from reviews and owners reports. My speakers setup are in my signature block. Nothing too fancy but generates a healthy meaty tone from amp and speakers. Stairways to heaven never sounded better !

I'm still very much hooked on head-fi, especially with the arrival of this SET KT150 amp that can run a whole lot of power tubes and drivers. I call it Odyssey. This has 15 watts into 8 ohms in triode mode or 20 watts in UL mode to drive speakers.

 

[matthewhypolite]

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/transition-to-speakers-tube-magic.959951/#post-16589340

Thread started here.

 

[Redcarmoose]

That’s amazing. Those amps are probably miles better than tube amps from the 1960s-1970s. They run the tubes at a very low wattage, you will experience lasting tube life!

 

[bagwell359]

Oh the card, cleaning, rituals are all pretty much the reasons why digital is taking over on top of some more reasons

let's see, fear of snapping my $4k cantilever... the space needed for a 12.2k vinyl collection.

it was easy to resist digital at first - Telarc digital vinyl? Ugh. First copies of every LP... portable digital - garbage.

2nd generation and some engineers (Doug Sax) made headway w/ digital - but only $20k CD players seemed to be able to unwrap it (ARC, KRELL).

Then the Schiit Gumby 1, and that was it. Turntable, tone-arm, cartridges, LP's (only 175 left), amps, pre-amps, ASC traps. Since 2015, analog almost all gone. After 52 years of analog I don't miss it (VPI record cleaner, zerostat, carbon brush), and my low cost digital DAC, streaming, and CD transport plays back as good or better in > 99% of the time.