[Triode User]

Love those ATCs! What are the items on your bottom row?

The speakers in that shot are my Spendor SP200 driven by the Pass Labs monos each side. Below pictured are my ATC150 active speakers.

On the bottom under the table, left to right, Innuos Zenith SE server with on top a Music First TVC passive preamp with silver wound transformers. To the right is a Border Patrol 300B SE tube power amp and the silver box to the right of the table is a Border Patrol tube rectified high voltage power supply for the 300B amp.

I use the TVC passive pre amp between the Dave and the 300B tube amp because that sounds better than taking the Dave direct into the preamp. Normally I have the Dave going direct into the Pass Labs mono power amps. The 300B amp is just a bit of a project but it does sound glorious with its Western Electric 300B tubes.

 

[dawktah2]

No, I use a small netgear switch at the moment.

What is this thing you mention called a hifi rack? That's a novel concept. I must look into it.

Hi-Fi Racks

www.nice-racks.com use this exact URL if you google it you will get something entirely different.

 

[andrewd01]

No, I use a small netgear switch at the moment.

What is this thing you mention called a hifi rack? That's a novel concept. I must look into it.

Nice system. I have always been interested in trying one of the Music First passive pre-amps.

Please report back when you get your Cisco switch. Perhaps you will be tempted to go down the rabbit hole of an audio ethernet cable? I have not tested that yet, just using a cheap Supra.

 

[gnomen]

The speakers in that shot are my Spendor SP200 driven by the Pass Labs monos each side. Below pictured are my ATC150 active speakers.

Aha. Thanks. The drivers and the cabinetry all very similar (Very British!). What is the source chain for the ATCs then and how similar/different are the two systems?

 

[JaZZ]

Oh, no. @andrewd01 asked a question that I haven't re-explored for a while. I knew Roon DSP EQ is not completely transparent based on what Rob Watts has said in the past. But my speakers despite optimal placement in my living room with limited options for listening seat positioning has certain bass peaks that I cannot tune out without DSP EQ (like +10dB at certain frequencies). I just re-tested this and with musical material with very little bass, there is no doubt that no EQ means a subtle increase in depth and detail resolution but what it actually provides is a bigger jump in realism of the musical presentation. However, the moment I play music with more bass material, I start hearing the droning of the bass peaks at e.g. 52Hz that makes the music unlistenable over the long run. So reality dictates that I have to accept the subtle/mild deterioration in transparency to get a much more even frequency response. Or I can switch back to headphone listening I guess.
My take is that for speakers, it is likely that Roon DSP EQ would improve your sound if you have significant bass peaks. But I think for headphones, people are better off picking a different set of headphones with different frequency responses, rather than introducing parametric EQ.

My experience is the opposite: An adequate compensation curve with a good equalizer makes the sound more transparent, sometimes the effect is dramatic. You're reading too much into your single experiment with room tuning. Another logical and even more plausible explanation for your negative result would be that your compensation curve wasn't precise enough. While it took care for the bass peaks to some degree (because the involved frequency range was indeed reduced), it had a negative impact on the rest of the music without the bass (because some neighboring frequencies with correct intensity were reduced).

I'm speaking from extensive experience with equalizing. It's not an easy thing by any means. Every change in the chain has an impact on the required compensation curve. The latest was the introduction of Wave Storm cables between M Scaler and DAVE. It was a few magnitudes more difficult and laborious than with the M Scaler to get the sound right again – and took me two weeks of intensive trial-and-error exercises. The effort finally paid off in an ultra-transparent sound with immense clarity and depth. I'm speaking of the HE1000se, which showed the worst reaction to the change due to its revealing nature (= accuracy).

I know it's common practice around here to use several headphones for different genres according to their individual strenghts and (particularly) weaknesses. That's not what I do and not what I want. You've carefully worded your statement, instead of saying «...picking a headphone with an even frequency response»! That would be an impossible task (look at all the available variants here!). I for one try to get all of my four (main) headphones as neutral as possible by means of equalizing. There are two good justifications for the pretension that an even frequency response makes for better transparency. Firstly, you minimize masking effects by dominating frequency bands or peaks. Secondly, a linearized over-all amplitude response goes hand in hand with a linearized over-all impulse response. Isn't that what everyone wants?

So please let's not cultivate a new myth of the evil digital equalizer! Also, remember that 99% of your music collection has already run once or thrice through DSPs (and that's a good thing, considering that no microphone is perfectly linear).

 

[ekfc63]

Is it just me, or does the TT2 make other sources irrelevant?
I have a decent turntable, and also a decent SACD player. However, since using TT2/HMS, both sources have become almost redundant, as the Chord combo with Roon/Qobuz/Tidal sounds so good.

I have a pretty high end vinyl rig and am looking to do the same comparison. Maybe over the xmas break I'll have some time/energy. The last time I briefly tried it with MSc/Hugo 2, the vinyl still won (albeit not on the same piece of music). I'm curious to see how the TT2 steps the sound quality up.

 

[Triode User]

Aha. Thanks. The drivers and the cabinetry all very similar (Very British!). What is the source chain for the ATCs then and how similar/different are the two systems?

we risk going off thread but the ATC system has an Auralic Aries (Femto version) as a Roon endpoint connected the Roon core installed on the Zenith SE in the other room.

The Aries is connected to an MScaler by optical and the MScaler is connected to another Dave.

The Dave is connected to the ATC 150 actives by XLR cable and the Dave is used as a preamp to control volume.

The systems are in different rooms and they do sound very different but I love both of them in different ways.

 

[gnomen]

Thanks. I don’t see it as off topic since we are talking about ancillary equipment to the MScaler and other Chord products. I would expect the systems to sound different of course, but perhaps to have the same ‘signature’ provided by the Chord equipment at heart. Appreciate you sharing.

 

[Ards]

I have a pretty high end vinyl rig and am looking to do the same comparison. Maybe over the xmas break I'll have some time/energy. The last time I briefly tried it with MSc/Hugo 2, the vinyl still won (albeit not on the same piece of music). I'm curious to see how the TT2 steps the sound quality up.

Still no contest for me - vinyl significantly outperforms digital all the time in terms of believeability/enjoyment of presentation, even though I'm digitising my vinyl anyway through the Sweetvinyl SugarCube. It's a bit of a head scratcher for sure: if digitised vinyl sounds THAT good, why don't native digital sources??

I'm waiting for a new SugarCube which will allow me to feed the internal digital stream from the ADC direct to the M Scaler/TT2 as I'd like to see whether that sounds better than going through the SugarCube's own DAC.

 

[kelly200269]

I have a pretty high end vinyl rig and am looking to do the same comparison. Maybe over the xmas break I'll have some time/energy. The last time I briefly tried it with MSc/Hugo 2, the vinyl still won (albeit not on the same piece of music). I'm curious to see how the TT2 steps the sound quality up.

Yeah, vinyl still has its 'charms', and still sounds very good (even with my humble Linn LP12), but I've been surprised about how good HMS/TT2 sounds, and how far it has gone in making my other sources basically redundant.
Saying that, I'm now thinking of some upgrades to the LP12!

 

[x RELIC x]

/off topic...

With regards to vinyl vs digital one thing to keep in mind is the analogue nature of the format. This necessitates better mastering with much less artifacts and dynamic compression / clipping than straight to digital masters. If there is dynamic compression / clipping then the stylus would likely skip out of the groove and those that have listened to a damaged record know how that sounds.

looking at the Dynamic Range Database website one can see clearly that the vinyl version is almost always better than the straight to digital masters. It’s an awful trend with the loudness wars starting around the 2000’s where dynamic compression and clipping is prevalent in music. This would easily explain why vinyl converted to digital still sounds better, because the dynamic range hasn’t been compressed.

If there is a digital version of music where the track’s dynamic range has been maintained it would sound extremely close to the vinyl version, if not the same. Dire Straits, Brothers In Arms original 1985 master is one such example. The same album with re-masters produced after 2000 is more dynamically compressed, even for the vinyl version (which is still relatively better than the digital version).

so, it’s not just the format and sampling rates, etc, but very importantly the quality of the master.

 

[betula]

/off topic...

With regards to vinyl vs digital one thing to keep in mind is the analogue nature of the format. This necessitates better mastering with much less artifacts and dynamic compression / clipping than straight to digital masters. If there is dynamic compression / clipping then the stylus would likely skip out of the groove and those that have listened to a damaged record know how that sounds.

looking at the Dynamic Range Database website one can see clearly that the vinyl version is almost always better than the straight to digital masters. It’s an awful trend with the loudness wars starting around the 2000’s where dynamic compression and clipping is prevalent in music. This would easily explain why vinyl converted to digital still sounds better, because the dynamic range hasn’t been compressed.

If there is a digital version of music where the track’s dynamic range has been maintained it would sound extremely close to the vinyl version, if not the same. Dire Straits, Brothers In Arms original 1985 master is one such example. The same album with re-masters produced after 2000 is more dynamically compressed, even for the vinyl version (which is still relatively better than the digital version).

so, it’s not just the format and sampling rates, etc, but very importantly the quality of the master.

Another good point, as always from you RELIC.

I have never really gone into vinyl, mostly because of financial reasons and my age I guess. I am in my mid-thirties and never had too much to spend on audio until the last 1-2 years. Vinyl is expensive if you look at the records. You also need space for storage. And a proper system that can play vinyl nicely.

I did hear some nice vinyl systems, and I do appreciate the sound. I can feel the vinyl magic. It is somehow a warmer, more enveloping experience in most cases. Like vinyl had the ability to convey more emotions. Or conveying emotions in a more sophisticated, more natural way.

That said digital is more affordable, more available and it is the future. I think Chord has done a tremendous job to blow that vinyl life into digital audio. That's one of the reasons they got me hooked, stretching my tight wallet to a crazy and for most people unreasonable price of 4K with their TT2.

 

[jarnopp]

Another good point, as always from you RELIC.

I have never really gone into vinyl, mostly because of financial reasons and my age I guess. I am in my mid-thirties and never had too much to spend on audio until the last 1-2 years. Vinyl is expensive if you look at the records. You also need space for storage. And a proper system that can play vinyl nicely.

I did hear some nice vinyl systems, and I do appreciate the sound. I can feel the vinyl magic. It is somehow a warmer, more enveloping experience in most cases. Like vinyl had the ability to convey more emotions. Or conveying emotions in a more sophisticated, more natural way.

That said digital is more affordable, more available and it is the future. I think Chord has done a tremendous job to blow that vinyl life into digital audio. That's one of the reasons they got me hooked, stretching my tight wallet to a crazy and for most people unreasonable price of 4K with their TT2.

When I went off to college in (ahem) my crates of records and stereo system took up more room in my car than anything. If I’d had a TT2 and some good headphones, I’d have been set. Only got there lately, some 30 years later. Kids today have it so easy.

 

[gnomen]

Kids today have it so easy.

Kids today don’t seem to care about hifi. Everything is streamed off YouTube. We used to call it Muzak.

 

[Ards]

/off topic...
looking at the Dynamic Range Database website one can see clearly that the vinyl version is almost always better than the straight to digital masters. It’s an awful trend with the loudness wars starting around the 2000’s where dynamic compression and clipping is prevalent in music. This would easily explain why vinyl converted to digital still sounds better, because the dynamic range hasn’t been compressed.

While I agree with the above, it's not only the dynamic range that I hear when listening to vinyl that makes me enjoy it more - it's more that vinyl throws a fully open window realistic soundstage in a way that I just don't hear with digital. Instruments sound palpably real - SOLID if you like - in the space they occupy. Digital always sounds like a lesser shadow of that reality. On my scale of enjoyment, vinyl being 100%, the HMS/TT2 combo *has* got me closer than any other kit - let's say 95% there, but there's still *something* in the digital chain causing a problem. I suspect it's in the mixing/mastering stages somewhere that processing is damaging something important. When I digitise vinyl it's just a pure high resolution ADC/DAC process with no such extra processing and so the vinyl is perfectly captured, showing that digital CAN work. Maybe I need an HMS/Dave combo to eek that last few % out of native digital sources.

Crazy thing is that after spending 20 years chasing digital's "Perfect Sound Forever" I got the urge to try some of my old vinyl collection and bought a cheap £200 deck with a built in phono stage. It blew away my digital setup. 20 years of listening lost! That sent me even deeper down the rabbit hole, which is how I ended up with the HMS/TT2 (desperately trying to keep thread on topic!!) which as I said above made the biggest leap forward in digital I've yet heard. Vinyl is crazy expensive these days (you have to chase down all-analogue/first press recordings to get the most benefit) but it's worth it. And combined with digital through the HMS/TT2 my system has never sounded better across all sources.