That’s fine Gregg. Your money, your choice. Just know you might just be missing out on two of the biggest things that have happened in vinyl for like 100 years-or-so…
Yes, the Supatrac certainly is no looker. The first thought that came into my head when I saw it was “CyberTruck”! But then one of my vinyl buddies started banging on about it in a way he doesn’t usually do and I decided to look into it properly. That’s when the penny finally started to drop. This is really new and really good.
Now Fremer has posted files online from needle drops done with the Supatrac and the SAT CF-1 (that’s €64,000 thank you, Sir), both mounted on his Oswald’s Mill K3 turntable and running Lyra Atlas cartridges and the internet is going into meltdown trying to figure out which is which. Luckily I got my order in before that happened!
After some weeks testing the SC and XLR cables from Nordost Odin Gold and the Synergetic Research full loom i took my decision of changing my cables loom to the Synergetic SRX and the Power Block SX.
At the end because the lower noise i had, the SRX have more detail and much more bass, it was deeper and powerful than the Odin Gold but for a considerable margin.
Also some bad recordings and other good but with some louder mids like some musics from Adele sound more in control and less harsh.
This up-grade was an bargain, i know its a lot of money but its the best upgrade for the money i did because it was like changing my entire system to some levels up, thats how it sound. It’s one of the best systems i ever heard.
Yesterday when I told my usual and trustable sales person witch i deal for more than 2 decades that i would buy the SRX he was sad, but thats life and i even invited him to come to my house to give an listen to the system, I’m sure he would be amazed with this.
My conclusions, the Nordost for my experience its a good deal for the money up to the TYR2, for my experience now i know you can find better value for your money and Nordost is definitely pushing the price bar to far. I was their costumer for like 20 years but the crazy money they ask for the Odin Gold mad me try other brands. I still have Nordost in my Tv system in all the rooms, the Ethernet cables, switch, dc power and grounding. If you don’t believe me, try the SRX and then let me know
Brief update as I’ve tweaked a couple of things since my last post back in February.
I have moved (very slowly, an inch a week to avoid arousing suspicion) the speakers out a further 7" from the wall behind. They are now 32" from the center of the backplates to the rear wall. This has further improved the soundstaging, particularly the depth, although I suspect it would improve further if I could pull them out just a bit more, maybe another 6" or so would be optimal? Unfortunately that is just not possible due to the configuration of the room. I have thought long and hard but failed to come up with any way to rearrange things in a way that would enable me to site them further out without losing a whole sofa’s worth of seating space.
On the recommendation of a fellow Ktêma user I have swapped the Cerapucs I had them resting on for IsoAcoustic Gaia Is. This made another small but worthwhile improvement to the soundstaging which was not something I was expecting. I was anticipating improvements in the bass.
@keiserrg asked me to comment on synergies with the Vivaldi and I must say I struggle a bit there. Neither the Vivaldi nor the Ktêmas have any particular tonal coloration that the other could compensate for, to my ears they are both very faithful reproducers (as is the darTZeel power amp which undoubtedly deserves some of the credit here). But a couple of things spring to mind:
The Vivaldi produces excellent dynamics (which should work very well on that Gil Sullivan disc as he seems to love exaggerating the dynamic swings to the greatest possible degree) and the Ktêmas reproduce this most faithfully. This is one area were small speakers will never be able to match large floorstanders and one of the first areas I would expect you to notice a difference between your Guarneris and the Ktêmas.
The other is the bass, which is one of the first areas one notices when moving up the dCS line, and again, one where floorstanders generally able to show bookshelves a clean pair of heels. I know that the Ktêmas are giving me decently low bass (only really starting to roll off below 20 Hz in room per my measurements above) but the detail and tunefulness of that bass is something I can really enjoy through the Ktêmas. Again, that Gil Sullivan disc would probably show this well as the left hand of the C major sonata opens with a C2 followed by a G1 (ca 49 Hz) iirc. Now I haven’t listened in your room nor seen any measurements but I would expect your Guarneris to be several dB down at that frequency and certainly unable to reproduce it at anything like realistic volumes.
One anecdote just to put this all of this in perspective. A couple of months ago I had the pleasure of visiting the dCS factory in Swavesey and auditioning both the Vivaldi and Varèse systems in the demonstration room system - which at the time consisted of a large Constellation power amp (Reference?) and Wilson Alexx Vs (apologies if I’ve got the models wrong, maybe one of the dCS folks can jump in and correct me). I have to say, despite historically not having warmed to the Wilson sound I thought this system was sounding absolutely superb, it had clearly been dialed in to perfection! I played a few of my favourite demo tracks and was in awe of the size and stability of the soundstage, the effortless dynamics and the layers upon layers of detail it was presenting. Definitely one of the best systems I have ever heard!
Anyway, point being that while it was impressive beyond words there are still some things I actually prefer with my system. It is somehow mellower, more “organic”, and even if this departs from absolute fidelity I have to say it suits the music I play (a lot of classical, esp choral) and is a sound that is extremely easy to live with. So while I know I am missing out a teeny weeny bit, I don’t necessarily feel I am missing out on anything that I would enjoy more. And even if so, I fear it would be accompanied by some hard sonic edges I would rather be without.
So, @keiserrg, while it is hard to know for certain that the Ktêmas would “happily ever after” for you (although given your current choice of speakers I have my suspicions ) I can confirm that even a night out with a supermodel has failed to convince me that I chose the wrong partner or that we won’t continue to be ”happily ever after”.
I expect that moving the speakers must have improved things. However we all have to live with compromises ( you will be aware of mine).
Ultimately you cannot change the laws of physics and speakers designed to be used in free space will not function optimally when against or close to walls. That goes for the majority of larger speakers.
Whilst I am delighted with what I’m hearing from my Wilson Alexia V’s, I have absolutely no doubt that, due to the limitations of my listening room, I am not getting the best out of them.
I hope that, at some point in the future, I’ll move to a property which will enable them to get closer to their full potential…
The listening room is certainly a factor, we are currently looking for a larger house with quite a heated housing market over here. Maybe I should say I am looking, I am working on convincing my wife.
If it works out with the house I am currently looking at it would definitely have room for a separate listening area (and perhaps even a dedicated home cinema). Fingers crossed.
Had some friends over for a playdate yesterday and I have to say I am really happy with the way things are sounding. No major changes since the last report but the cumulative effects of some small tweaks have clearly resulted in another notch up in SQ:
Speakers 7" further out from the rear wall (now 32" IIRC)
Swapped Cerapucs for Gaia I footers under speakers
Reconfigured, tightened and levelled rack (always easier second time round)
Swapped around units in the rack enabling much more rational cable dressing
and what I suspect is the biggie…
Swapped AQ Dragon RCA for AQ Wild Blue Yonder XLR from Vivaldi-to-power amp.
The WBY is about 2 rungs (and about €5k) down the AQ ladder from the Dragon so quite a bit of field tilt against it, but the better quality of the balanced output clearly more than makes up for it. In fact the magnitude of difference between the balanced and single-ended outputs is (in the context of marginal gains) quite an eye-opener. If you are running single ended out of your dCS DAC and have the ability to run balanced I would strongly urge you to give it a try.
I am still finding 6V comfortably beats 2V even though the latter is the “correct” setting for my power amp’s input sensitivity. I swapped to 2V in the middle of the listening session and everyone screamed “no, change it back!”
Anyway, my friend T, the piano tuner, clearly approved. Not only did he not point out any deficiencies but he actually begged me not to make any further changes. Progress indeed!
Since I have been eyeing your rack how about a photo of the new setup. How long did a rebuild take? One of the reasons for my lust is the belief it is extremely easy to set up and install.
Interesting and perhaps worth a revisit by me. As you know both Ben @all2ofme and I found 6V, to quote Ben‘s own words, “Crunchy”, when used with our (and your) DarTZeel
A number of amps, including Boulder, now offer a Balanced connection as the only input option.
If I could retroactively have one hardware “wish list” item on the Rossini it would have been two pairs of balanced outputs to run long distances to another part of the home.
It wasn’t a major change, I just moved the taller spacers from the top to the bottom level (which given that the rack builds from the top down (but upside down) meant a complete disassembly/reassembly). Took maybe a 2-3 hours?
In retrospect it was silly to attempt this on my own but it’s fall break here and my neighbors are all away. Each shelf is a deadlift in itself and then inverting the whole rack to get it on its feet is definitely a two-man job. I have no idea what it weighs but it is heavy. Luckily I managed it without damage to rack or back, fingers or toes. The build/rebuild isn’t difficult by any means (although it is a lot easier second time round), just time consuming if done with proper care. The tricky part is not pinching the rubber washers and getting all the spacers to seat properly so the shelves sit exactly evenly. Takes a little bit of practice but you’ll get there. The tools and instructions provided by HRS are exemplary. Get a (strong) friend over and it will be both quicker and safer.
The difference the reshuffling of the boxes makes to the cable dressing is hard to capture in a photo due to the proximity to the wall, but it went from “snakepit” to pretty clean.
Have to say I agree. Only just realized the compromises I inadvertently introduced by using the balanced outs for my headphone amp (which is balanced-only) and running SE into the darTZeel!
…am I allowed to say that the last of those photos triggers me massively?
I bought a laser cutter (personally - not a company purchase) simply so that I don’t have to endure those pick-and-pluck inserts and instead can cut my own custom inserts from proper foam that doesn’t collapse when expected to cushion anything of any actual mass…
…which of course I’ve needed to do once in the last two years since I bought it but that’s beside the point!
