[StimpyWan]

One of the highlights for me was after she finished her solo and Beck absolutely looked like a proud father.

Yea, I love that part too. It's like Tal glances over and asks, "Was that OK". All in a look.

 

[RCBinTN]

Tal and Jeff play well together, that's for sure.

A couple more suggestions ...
Metal - Opeth Garden of the Titans recorded live at Red Rocks.
Jazz - Jazz at the Pawnshop from Stockholm.

 

[45longcolt]

Speaking of live albums, surprised no one has mentioned...

If you enjoyed Waiting for Columbus, you'll dig this - plenty o' horns. Someone once called The Band the only rock group that could have warmed up the crowd for Abraham Lincoln. (Though most of them were Canadian.)

 

[W3WEB]

I have posted about Eva Cassidy on this forum, but I wouldn't claim to be the first person to do so....
I first heard the album 'Live at Blues Alley' shortly after its release, in 1998, as a demo CD for some ATC loudspeakers at a speaker specialist here in UK.
I was completely blown away, sitting in a listening room on my own.
'Tall Trees in Georgia' made a lasting impression on me.
I bought the CD shortly after hearing it and also vowed to get some ATC speakers one day, when I could afford them!
I finally got some ATC speakers ( used, SCM 100 ASLs) in 2007 and, fed with my wonderful Yggy A2, 'Live at Blues Alley' still sends shivers down my spine.
I now have all of Eva's CDs.
There aren't a huge number of recordings, as tragically, her life was cut short by cancer at just 33 years of age, and her huge talent was only fully appreciated after her death.
She left us with some beautiful performances as a lasting legacy.

+1000 likes

Seriously, Eva is breathtaking. Listening to Live at Blues Alley right now on my headphone rig. She is right "here" with me -- or rather, I'm there in the blues club with Eva.

 

[judson_w]

Flashbacks to a couple weeks ago. When I went to go check the mail, the cat was sitting next to my laptop, enjoying the heat from the side vents. When I returned, he was like this:

When I took this picture, I thought it was cute. Then I took him off of the laptop and realized that he had been sitting long enough he buffered.... a lot of keystrokes. It took a couple reboots to get the laptop to work properly after that. Now it is good again.

 

[RCBinTN]

Speaking of live albums, surprised no one has mentioned...

If you enjoyed Waiting for Columbus, you'll dig this - plenty o' horns. Someone once called The Band the only rock group that could have warmed up the crowd for Abraham Lincoln. (Though most of them were Canadian.)

Thank you, I just ordered the CD. I love Levon Helm and Robbie Robertson; Dylan, Toussant and the horns will be lagniappe

 

[Les Strat]

Flashbacks to a couple weeks ago. When I went to go check the mail, the cat was sitting next to my laptop, enjoying the heat from the side vents. When I returned, he was like this:


When I took this picture, I thought it was cute. Then I took him off of the laptop and realized that he had been sitting long enough he buffered.... a lot of keystrokes. It took a couple reboots to get the laptop to work properly after that. Now it is good again.

Don't give him your credit card details, or he'll be ordering expensive feline stuff online

 

[paradoxper]

2022, Chapter 4
The End of Tube World As We Know It?

Did you catch the play on words in the title? If not, I’ll forgive you—the world is in an profoundly weird place right now, and sometimes it can seem if anything can happen.

If you didn’t catch it, here it is again, bolded for emphasis: the end of TUBE world as we know it?

Now, did you catch the question mark?

If not, again, I’ll forgive you. Lots of people aren’t very precise with their writing. But decades of English-majoring, copywriting, and fiction writing have made me, ah…extremely specific.

So there’s a question mark because I don’t know.

But, after I received this via email today…



…I figured it might be good to talk to you about what to expect with our tube products, both now and in the future.


Brief Public Service Announcement

Okay, let’s make this clear: this can descend into politics realllllllllll fast. Let’s not do that. This is just about what the current tube availability problems might mean for tube gear. That’s it.

Oh, you want to talk about the—

NOPE. NO POLITICS.

Or the—

AGAIN, NO!

But you really think you should correlate—

GUYS, YOU KNOW HEAD-FI MODERATES THIS THREAD, RIGHT?

Do you want it to continue to exist? If so, lay off the politics.

Got it? Cool.

Back to the scheduled programming.


Tubes Already Sucked

Even before the latest craziness, tubes were already a pain in the ass. At least in terms of availability. We’ve been having a helluva time getting good tubes for a long time.

Now, someone’s gonna argue. “Well, hell, I can get NOS RCAs all day long!” they say.

Yeah.

You can get one of them.

Or 4 of them.

When you’re looking at 4,000 of them, that’s a different ballgame.And for us, 4,000 isn’t really that much. We’d much rather be looking at tubes in 5-figure terms. Which causes, ah, a bit of a case of the vapors for tube manufacturers. Or at least the ones we can talk to. More on that in a sec.

Aside: Yes, you read that right: even before the export ban, new production tube manufacturers could not meet our demand.​

But, before I get deep into woe-is-us mode, I should explain the various sources of tubes we have today, and their whys, wherefores, advantages, and disadvantages.

• Russian (new). New tubes are being made in Russia, and were available in decent quantities—not quite enough for us, but hey, we take what we can get. Electro-Harmonix and Tung-Sol are a couple of the brands you may recognize. Until recently, we used both Electro-Harmonix and Tung-Sol tubes. They are good tubes. We have some stock, and, if you order a Freya+ now, it may ship with either Electro-Harmonix or Tung-Sol.
• Russian (NOS). NOS stands for New Old Stock. These tubes were made in the days of the USSR. There are still large stocks of 6N1P, 6N6P, 6N8S, 6N9S, 6N3P, and others. Over the years, we have built up large stocks of these tubes. 6N1P and 6N6P are used in Valhalla and the upcoming Folkvangr. The good news is we have good stock of these, enough for several years. The bad news is if you don’t want Russian tubes, you’re kinda outta luck.
• Slovak Republic (new). JJ tubes are made in the Slovak republic, and they make some excellent tubes. We frequently shipped Freya+, Saga+, and Lyr+ with JJs. As with Electro-Harmonix and Tung-Sol, we were never able to get quite enough of them, but they were an important part of our tube supply. We have standing orders with JJ, but I expect that with the disappearance of Russian tubes, they’re gonna get slammed—and our supply situation will get worse than it ever was.
• Chinese (new). China is producing some very nice tubes. Unfortunately, we never successfully got a Chinese tube manufacturer to talk to us. I doubt if the quantities were an issue. Maybe there’s another limitation we don’t know about, or maybe we’re just not that important of a customer. Ah well; for whatever reason, China was never a viable source of tubes for us.
• Georgian (new). As in, Georgia, USA. Western Electric is rumored to be making a 6SN7. Unfortunately, it hasn’t been released yet. Also unfortunately, it’s probably going to be (a) blindingly expensive, and (b) in limited supply. How expensive? I suspect if you wanted Freya to be a $5K product, this is one way we’d get there. Hopefully I’m wrong on that.
• NOS (domestic). In addition to Russian NOS tubes, there are also domestic NOS tubes from a wide variety of suppliers—RCA, Raytheon, GE, etc. We have used tons of these tubes in Lyr and Vali 2/2+…enough that we have apparently used all the 6BZ7s available. This is pretty amazing, because the 6BZ7 is a television tube that was made by the ton back in the day. The problem with NOS tubes is (a) they are not being made anymore, (b) there aren’t that many good ones available, and (c) they’re really better for someone looking for a matched quad, rather than 40,000 pieces. So NOS can’t save us.

“Sooooo…your tubes came from Russia and the Slovak Republic, mainly,” says someone who’s been following the story. “Russian tubes are now a no-go and JJ is probably crapping sideways trying to keep up with orders. That means you’re mega-boned, right?”

Weeeeeeeeeelllllll…not so fast.

Remember how I said that tube supply was already iffy, even before the latest blow?

And remember how we have a tendency to look forward, and try to address problems that might impede our production (either by buying tons of stock, or designing something different, like with AKM)?

Yeah. So let’s talk what we’re doing.


Tubes, 2022 Style

Now, while this may be the end of tube world as we know it, it doesn’t mean there’s nothing we can do. So let’s talk strategies, and pros and cons, before we get to the specifics.

And yeah, I know, you’re skipping to the specifics. But know that:

• For some people, strategy is interesting
• I won’t be giving all the specifics

Okay? Ready? Let’s talk strategy. Here’s what we can do:

Limit production. We could simply limit production to the tubes we can get. That is usually accompanied by price increases to keep demand somewhat in-control. That’s not us. We’d like to continue to provide great value, and we don’t do that by limiting production. Plus, to be frank, we don’t know if we’re getting any tubes, yet.

Sell with no tubes. We already have this option on Freya+; it could be extended to other products. However, we’re not thrilled with this idea—we’d much rather give you something you can use right away, rather than looking around for NOS tubes.

Wait for new suppliers. This is related to the “limit production” strategy. Here, we’d limit production, and/or Kevork tube products for a while, and wait for new tube suppliers to show up. Logically, if there’s a market for something, new suppliers will eventually show. The problem with this strategy is you don’t know when new tube manufacturers will come on the scene, or how good the tubes will be when they arrive. So this is super-chancy. Not us.

Stockpiling. We’ve already done this for several tube types. As a result, Valhalla is safe for a while, and we can make some Folkvangrs. We also have some other tube types we’ve stockpiled, which may or may not make their way into new products. And no, I’m not trying to be mysterious…some of these tubes are, well, kinda microphonic, so we may not want to make any product based on them…but then again, maybe we can manage it somehow. We don’t have any hard answers yet.

Go all NOS. Start buying all NOS tubes we can. Ahhhh…no. First of all, the quantities of good NOS tubes are lower than you think. Second, to get enough tubes to sustain our production, you’d be looking at dedicating one or more staff to doing this full-time. Seriously. So that’s not viable.

Bring back LISST. Although LISST was difficult to make and not super-popular, it would give us a viable tube replacement and allow us to ship something as a tube-optional product. Like I said, it’s a lot easier for you to find 1-4 of your favorite tubes than for us to find 4000. So yeah, this is on the burner. We’ll see when we can convince someone to make them…with all of our assemblers slammed, this may be a while.

Redesign. In some cases, we could redesign for more “gettable” tubes—gettable as in already stockpiled. This is not a long-term strategy, but it’s better than nothing. And if you have a lot of some kinds of tubes—which, in some cases, we do—this starts looking more interesting. Beyond that, you can start playing with a pie-in-the-sky seamlessly-switchable tube/solid-state “fusion” design, but that ain’t gonna be easy or quick to market.

Start our own tube factory. Ahhhhhhh...no. That's, ah...kinda bonkers. And even if we did have a line on an old tube factory, complete with fixtures, that's not going to be a real solution in 3-6 months. Maybe 36 months. Maybe.

And now, what you’ve probably been scrolling for…

…what’s gonna happen with current products?

Freya+. Since Freya+ uses 4 6SN7 tubes, it’s the biggest tube hog in our line. It’s the one that always puts us in tube backorder. And now, with new-production 6SN7 supply iffy, it’s the one we have to address first. Unfortunately, our stockpile of 6N8S aren’t easily usable here—they are fairly microphonic in Freya. So here’s what we’re doing:

• Selling without tubes. You can already buy Freya+ without tubes. Find some cool NOS tubes, and you’re set.
• Rolling LISST back in. When LISST comes back, it’ll go in Freya. Then you’re set with “tubes” until you add in your NOS tubes.
• Considering a Noval version. “Noval” tubes are 9-pin tubes, like those used in Valhalla. The 6N1P is a great noval tube, and we have a ton of them…and a good option to replace the 6SN7. However, the circuit needs some tweaks; you can’t just plop 6N1Ps on adapters into Freya.

Saga+. Using only a single 6SN7 tube, Saga isn’t so terrible. It can also use the stockpile of 6N8S tubes we have without significant microphonic issues. So expect to see it shipping with 6N8S. When LISST comes back, that’s another option.

Lyr 3. Another single-6SN7 tube product. We’re currently OK shipping these with new-production 6SN7 tubes, but don’t be surprised if we have to start shipping with 6N8S as well. LISST would be a good option here as well.

Valhalla 2. Surprisingly, we’re OK on this, at least for now. We have a lot of 6N1P and 6N6P tubes. Eventually, we’ll run out. But I’ve been saying “eventually” for 10 years now. For the moment, no changes.

Vali 2+. We’re almost out of 6BZ7, and we’re not sure how gettable a new-production, say, JJ 6922 will be. Fortunately, we began stockpiling an alternate tube before the current crisis. Unfortunately, it will require a small redesign. So don’t be surprised if Vali 2+ gets a minor tweak. But we do plan to keep selling these as well.

Folkvangr. The crazy 10-tube amp? Ironically, it was designed (at least in part) to use up our large stock of 6N6P tubes. Given the current situation, it would be most logical to kill it, to preserve tube stocks. But it’s very far along to production. So we’ll make at least one run of these! However, don’t expect this to be an ongoing product, unless things radically change.

And that’s what we know right now.


Is It Truly the End of Tube World As We Know It?

Like I said at the beginning, I don’t know. I don’t have all the answers.

What I do know is that our tube supply was, ah, profoundly constraining before Russian tubes were taken out of the picture. Which means that it’s gonna be even more constrained now. Which means we need to make some changes to how we do tube products.

If we do it right, you’ll be able to continue enjoying tube gear, without crazy price increases or worse out-of-stock situations.

And if we do it really really right, and get a little lucky…maybe we’ll even be able to help start an entirely new tube world!

As always, we’ll see…if, in the end, I feel fine.

It's survivable, adaptable, and thrive-able. Modern Freya works. Thanks for the most complimentary device in my fabled stable, Jason.

 

[BLacklWf]

2021, Chapter 10
A Trickster You Didn’t Expect

Ha!

That’s all I can say.

You thought you knew what we were doing. Hell, I’ve been talking about Loki Max for a while now. I’ve shared a photo of a prototype board, I’ve said that it’ll be Freya-sized, I’ve told you it will be totally insane, with relay potentiometers, 67 relays, and remote control.

Except this ain’t Loki Max. It’s Lokius.

As in, Loki Maximus.

As in, it’s exactly the same size as with Magnius and Modius, and it’s also sized to stack with any of our “6x9” products (Asgard, Jotunheim, Lyr, Saga, etc).

And, as in, it has both balanced and single-ended inputs and outputs, so you can use it with a whole lot of different stuff that we make. And, with two more bands than Loki Mini, it’s offers a lot more options to control how your system sounds.

Aside: yeah, I know, I know, some people here undoubtedly think equalization is the devil, having absorbed far too much high-end propaganda from the 1980s and 1990s. We have a chapter or two for you on that. Have fun reading those if you want to dismiss equalization out of hand.​

Aside to the aside: and yeah, I know, digital parametric eq, software, infinite control, draw curves on a screen, others are saying. Yeah, that’s an option too. This is an option for people who want to twist some knobs to compensate instantly for bad recordings or imperfect systems. There’s no need to fight. The existence of Loki Mini and Lokius in no way will result in the elimination of software EQ options. They are not alien pods or Borg cubes. There’s nothing to fear. No need to nuke the site from orbit. Cool?​

I know some of you are confused. I mean, we have Loki Mini. Now we have Lokius. We’ve promised a Loki Max. How does all this work? Why are the names related-ish? How do we expect people to choose?

Aaanndddd…where the hell did Lokius come from, anyway?



Loki Family Geneaology

Let’s get this out of the way first: Loki was intended to be a family of products from the start. That’s why we started with “Loki Mini.” Because we were also playing around with more complicated designs, and expected to shortly introduce a Loki (a 5-band remote EQ, Jotunheim sized) and Loki Max (a 6-band relay-based remote EQ, Freya sized).

But there was trouble in paradise.

Loki never really worked right, mainly due to size constraints—motorized potentiometers, inductors, and a power transformer don’t interact well, even when shielded, if you’re talking something the size of Jotunheim. And Loki Max had huge operational problems that were so intractable that it took several revs before we ever got it to function from input to output.

Because of these troubles, I figured, “Well, heck, maybe we just do a Loki Mini.”

But Loki Mini was popular…and it kept getting more popular…and people kept asking for more capable EQs…

…and so I kept trying.

First, I revived the Loki Max and actually worked through its huge problems. More on that when it’s introduced. But Loki Max is like 10x the price of Loki Mini+. It’s not for everyone. It takes a lot of crazy to do a real LC equalizer with relay potentiometers (NOT the same thing as relay volume ladders, not at all), Nexus, and remote control. So it won’t be cheap.

And reviving the previous mid-sized Loki wasn’t really in the cards. The motorized pots made it expensive. The transformer wouldn’t be able to be inside the chassis, either, so it would be the first Jotunheim-sized product that used a wall-wart. There was limited space for custom inductors, and the inductor cost also went crazy on us…which meant that we might end up with a $800 product that used a wall-wart, and still had two inductors that weren’t exactly ideal due to lack of space.

However, if I threw out the idea of remote control, and used gyrators for the two lowest frequency bands, we could conceivably do an affordable 6-band equalizer with balanced and SE I/O, especially if it shared the form factor of Magnius/Modius…

…and that’s how the idea for Lokius was born.


A Hard Truth

Some of you guys are probably super excited to see balanced inputs and outputs on Lokius, because you can finally achieve the One True and Perfect Balanced Path Through All Components.

Well, yeah, but no.

As in, yes, Lokius has balanced inputs and outputs, but internal processing is single-ended.

Oh gawd, cue the wailing. Cue the crying.

Well, relax. Because:

1. It really doesn’t matter that much
2. Balanced LC equalizers will cost a lot more
3. Balanced LC equalizers won’t fit in a Lokius chassis
4. Chasing balanced is sometimes really stupid, and this is one of those times

Here’s the thing: a true balanced LC or gyrator-capacitor EQ like this just ain’t gonna happen. It’s so different that literally every part is different—potentiometers, capacitors, inductors, gyrators, etc.

And yeah, I’m sure some of you are thinking you’ll just wait for Loki Max, that will do it, right?

Well, also again, no.

A true balanced relay-potentiometer LC EQ would be at least 2X the size of Loki Max, and would use something like 134 relays. With all the additional testing required, and a new chassis form factor, it might be well over 2x the cost, as well. This is getting mega-stupid.

Aside: but more on that later, when we intro Loki Max. Suffice to say, I have no problem putting it up against any equalizer from today or yesterday, even if it is converting from and to balanced.​

And that’s why we concentrated on making Lokius a real step up from Loki Mini, rather than chasing a balanced internal signal path. Things like a much higher-current, lower-distortion discrete gain stage, a two-stage complementary “superbuffer,” and quality parts used throughout, including film capacitors even in the gyrator stage, as well as custom inductors. Add a super low-noise power supply based on a custom two-stage topology, and you have a truly insane equalizer that doesn’t need to make any excuses.

What’s more, adding two bands to Lokius allows us to offer more precise, better placed controls. The 6 bands we’ve chosen are very similar to the much-celebrated Cello Audio Palette equalizer, in fact, and very similar to Loki Max.

Now, I know some people are thinking that there are equalizers with more bands, and, yes, there are. Those are typically going to be constant-Q equalizers, implemented with multiple gain stages (op-amps), rather than a single discrete gain stage and LC filtering, like Lokius.

And I know there are others saying they like parametric EQs, and that’s fine, too, but again, it’s a different approach. Parametric also uses multiple gain stages (op-amp), unlike our more “purist” or “old-skool” approach. Lokius won’t be for everyone—but neither will software, constant-Q, or parametric equalizers be for everyone.


Other Development Notes

Lokius’ development was actually fairly straightforward. I really hate it when it works like that, because it usually means I’ll get boned bad on something else coming up. But hey. Take the win, right?

I really only hit snags in two areas:

1. Buffer performance. Getting a buffer to drive a reactive load (and, by “reactive load,” let’s call it what it is—a metric asston of inductors and capacitors, plus the relatively low impedance of the inverting input terminal of a current-feedback amp) is not trivial. Sure, you can use an op-amp with a billion dB of feedback around it, but that’s pretty boring, especially when you’re using a discrete gain stage. Because of this, I played with a bunch of different buffers:

a. Your typical buffer—say, a diamond buffer—falls to its knees and whimpers in pain. Well, not literally. But they don’t work well.​

b. Some buffer topologies have very poor DC output control, which is exactly what you don’t want to be feeding into a gain stage, even if it has a servo​

c. A lot of buffers are fine until loaded with 600 ohms or so, then they fall apart​

d. And yeah, I tried tons of stuff, from Broskie’s triadtron stuff to enhanced diamond buffers to error correction​

e. What I settled on was actually a combination of two buffers, which have DC offset problems in the opposite direction, so they are essentially DC correct, and, when used together, they are both low-noise and load-invariant. I don’t really feel like naming this “superbuffer,” so I’ve just been calling it “superbuffer.”​

2. Power supply performance. One drawback of discrete current-feedback stages is that the power supply noise gets through to the output much more than with, say, an op-amp.

a. Throwing a simple LM317/337 pair on the power supply and calling it done wasn’t going to be good enough​

b. We’d already improved Loki Mini with filtering after the LM317/337, so I decided to experiment a bit with other, more modern parts​

c. We eventually settled on a new TPS part from TI that does both positive and negative voltages at once, and offers much better ripple rejection, at the cost of still being fairly wideband-noisy​

d. So I added the filter from Loki Mini afterwards, and boom—our quietest power supply to date.​

Yeah. Kinda boring. Two prototypes, and we were good to go. It doesn’t hurt that Lokius uses the same bottom chassis as Magnius (exactly, down to the screen), so we only had to get specific top chassis.

What can go wrong, right?

LOL. Of course, the single glitch we had was related to the tops. When we received first articles of the Lokius boards (way back in March!), we tested them, made sure they made the same specs as the prototypes, and then put them in chassis…

…and instantly realized the potentiometers weren’t poking through the front holes far enough to use!

Yeah.

This is what happens when you don’t do a 3D print of the top chassis. Argh. We really need a larger 3D printer.

So what did I do?

Simple. I moved the potentiometer on the board, re-ordered a new run, and I told the PCB assemblers to throw away all the current boards.

Yep. Boom. Gone. All boards wasted, because a potentiometer was 0.050” off.

So maybe the development wasn’t so simple. After all, one mistake put us months back. But in the craziness of today, where parts are frequently delayed or unavailable, this is really what you’d call smooth sailing.


So How Do I Choose?

Now we have two equalizers. And soon, three. Furthermore, they all share a family name. How do you choose?

Well, it’s easy, especially if you don’t believe in EQ. If you don’t believe in EQ, you choose none of the above, and that’s the end of that.

But if you’re sold on wanting one of our single-gain-stage, LC-style equalizers, then it’s also pretty easy:

• Loki Mini: least expensive, matches Magni/Modi sized products, 4 bands—easy to try and see if you like it!
• Lokius: still pretty affordable, matches Magnius/Modius/Jotunheim/Saga sized products, 6 bands, balanced I/O means you can plug into anything we make
• Loki Max: blindingly expensive (for us), offers features not found on any other equalizer, a true shot at the best of the best, matches Freya/Urd/Gungnir sized products, balanced I/O means you can plug into anything we make.

Loki Mini and Lokius are desktop friendly, Loki Max is more rack friendly. Loki Mini and Lokius are priced at $149 and $299, both in the sane realm. Loki Max will be $1499 or more.

And there you have it. Beyond that, it's perfectly fine if you don't want an EQ at all, or a different type of EQ, like a parametric, or constant-Q, or software. As I said in the last chapter, there's no "T" in engineering!

Hi Jason - I just want to say that I love Loki Max. I think this will be one of the core components for many years to come. With that being said, a favor to ask you. Any chance Schiit can manufacture an active crossover in Loki Max's chassis? I suppose it will be a niche product. But, I'm sure it will be loved by many people who either bi-amp, tri-amp or use a sub or two.

 

[Balthazar B]

It's survivable, adaptable, and thrive-able. Modern Freya works. Thanks for the most complimentary device in my fabled stable, Jason.

Don't think I've seen anyone running Sophia tubes in a Freya+. How do they do in the output vs. gain stage?

When/if we see a new generation of LISSTs, those might be interesting in the output stage, paired with conventional tubes....hmmmm....

 

[paradoxper]

Don't think I've seen anyone running Sophia tubes in a Freya+. How do they do in the output vs. gain stage?

When/if we see a new generation of LISSTs, those might be interesting in the output stage, paired with conventional tubes....hmmmm....

They are a little less warm in the output comparatively yet balances out the more neutral Treasure II, however, they remain as open and big sounding regardless and are equally a nice visual. Quite comparable to NOS performance although they can't quite match my favorite MELZ 1578 perforated plate.

I'll pay either silly price for tube enjoyment, sincerely.

 

[macdonjh]

Never need to be reminded to post cats more than once!

That reminds me of a Star Trek episode. I hope the cats get along better.

 

[Plautus001]

The one on the right is family of Fok-Yu?

Left is Sox, the Mom.

Right is Thomas, her first born. He is the one that catches mice, rats, robins, crows, fights raccoons, the terrier next door, the iRobot vacuum, anything... except Sox - she kicks his ass once in a while to remind him who is boss.

 

[OldRoadToad]

That reminds me of a Star Trek episode. I hope the cats get along better.

"Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" with Frank Gorshin?

Cool episode and those kittehs do resemble the two combatants.

ORT

 

[artur9]

Dropped the Mani II in an listening to Albinoni Adagio, which wasn't written by Albinoni.

Definitely a more powerful preamp than the Thorens MM-008 I have been using.