ALERT! - Iaudio IN Chennai THIS weekend
- Thread starter suri
- Start date
nice write up iaudio
thevortex,
a platform under the speakers and the platform on spikes would help the bass immensely. either granite or wood or slate. also i've noticed the room seems relatively undamped and that would definitely add to the decrease in sound quality. a few filled bookshelves on the front wall and perhaps a carpet would help quite a bit. i've gone from a wall with sofas to an empty wall and the sound is quite terrible and uninvolving compared to some damping being present.
regards
I plan to add a granite slab below the speakers, Stevie. Lets see how that alters the experience. The room has several wooden racks on the right hand side and on the far wall where there is also a sofa. The side windows are curtained - although not with thick material. Perhaps I can look for some thicker curtains. And yes, I will add a carpet to complete the setup. Alas, that would not leave too much room for a bookshelf, but lets see.
Am curious after Rajiv mentioned - are your speakers too sized about the same?
I'm astonished just by the appearance of Bala's speakers
Very intrigued to know how they will portray big-orchestra sound: I know you're not that keen on the music, but please let me bring my Mahler CD round soon
Sure, Thad. Drop in when you get a chance. I have been curious as to how the system would do with that kind of music.
The USB out from the PC is far more preferable than SPDIF (coaxial). Just as SPDIF is preferable to Optical (though not to the extent of the previous example).
Asynchronous USB connections have a way with jitter - so I read. Contributes to a further elevated musical experience. I have not had a chance to compare the SPDIF out and the USB out from this DAC.
But the creator of the kit, Douma holds that the USB DAC is much superior to the SPDIF.
Alert - since Titus, Rajiv, Vinay and Captain dropped in I have made a couple of changes.
- Changed the toe-in angle of the speakers a bit thereby achieving marginally larger sweet spot.
- Integrated the EPOS ELS Sub with the setup. Rajiv did mention that it might be hard to integrate the sub with this single driver setup. To my ears though, the combination sounds good. Lets see if this opinion changes over time.
- Changed the toe-in angle of the speakers a bit thereby achieving marginally larger sweet spot.
- Integrated the EPOS ELS Sub with the setup. Rajiv did mention that it might be hard to integrate the sub with this single driver setup. To my ears though, the combination sounds good. Lets see if this opinion changes over time.
Thad E Ginathom
Well-Known Member
Did you have to book a crane?
Those speakers are just huge!
I'll be in touch within the next couple of weeks regarding giving you the opportunity to introduce them to me
iaudio
Well-Known Member
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iaudio
Well-Known Member
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iaudio
Well-Known Member
Part 2: Rajivs stereo set up
We had to make a run for Rajivs place as Capt.Rajesh and Sasi were already on their way there. In addition, we had to grab some grub as we had been too busy to eat despite Lalitas and Balas insistence. Got there just in time to catch Capn and Sasi making a move to take a sutta break. Herded them into the Bolero and back to Rajivs residence. We all had our crosses to bear up to the apartment, I had my laptop and Camera bag on my shoulders, Sasi lugged in the Caiyin mt35(el34 tubes) and Capn his Marantz cd6003.
Rajiv showed us around his place, which has enough exquisite vintage stuff( tube pre-power set ups from Quad, Dynacothe list is long and many exotic drivers) for a vintage audio museum! The man is a walking encyclopaedia of tubes, vinyl ,vintage audio, electronics, and audio in general! Me being a toob noob sat dumbfounded while the others discussed toob rolling et al.
Finally we sat ourselves in Rajivs listening room.
He patiently went through the routine of setting his Linn Sondek , cleaning his records etc. I am not sure which track we played first, I think it was a Dave Brubeks Take 5 and THE Magic Began! Creamy smooth and was I floored!
I was all set for critical listening to see if I could make out the difference between Balas SET tubes and this one. But I forgot all that when Rajiv started playing music on his rig! Nope, the brain just went dead and my heart just swayed to the Jazz that was being played. The sound was very live, very soothing , very intimate. Just a few minutes of play time and I knew this was the kind of system you could listen to 24/7 and still not have fatigue. I was pretty impressed with the same quality in Balas set up, but this one just set the bar higher!
Luckily, Rajiv had Dire straits Lp and we played my preferred track Sultans of Swing. The drums were fast, tight and had amazing texture! The vocals were as usual brilliant. The 15 driver handled all the bass thrown at it with aplomb. The top end was slightly subdued and Rajiv says he prefers it that way to reduce fatigue and this is a characteristic of the particular horns he has used.
We played the Sheffield Labs Test disc Drums track and the texture shift when the drummer switches to brushes was brought out very clearly. Please keep in mind all this action is taking place in a 100 sq ft room. No booming, reverberation, nothing. Bass control and resolution-Check.
Swapped the Linn for the marantz cd player and played a few of my cds. First played Saraswati from Into the Light by U.Rajesh. The mandolin notes had beautiful tone and body and the amp rendered the fast piece towards the end with excellent resolution ( there was no bunching or cloudiness)! Speed and dynamics-Check.
Couldnt play Temptation by Diana krall as I had left it at Balas.
Played Black Velvet by Allanah Myles and Capn Rajesh remarked that he couldnt listen to this song on his set up because of the harshness, while here it sounded very good.
Next played Black magic woman by Santana. Well rendered, layered but slightly lacking on the highs towards the latter part.
We did up the volume on the Lyrita amp to max while the source wasnt playing and there was no hum or hiss whatsoever.
Around this time, we decided to swap the Lyrita amp for the Cayin m35(32 wpc against the lyritas 1.5wpc). The same Sheffield Drum track came out with astonishing power and there was a lot of tactile bass too.
Though I had brought along Niladri Kumar, Anoushka Shankar CDs, due to limited time could not play these.
Listened to Sargam a Malayalam movie soundtrack with lots of Carnatic based tracks sung by K.J. Yesudas. Vocals sounded quite natural on this one.
Even at low volumes, the Cayin had good detail level.
But we unanimously agreed that the Rajivs Lyrita edged out the Cayin when it came to vocals, while the latter scored when it came to drive.
Finally went back to Rajivs usual set up and heard a few more records before we wound up for the day.
If I were to describe Rajivs setup in a few words, Smooth, Live, lucid but very musical and fatigue free. Best seat be in after a hard day at work.
Rajiv asked me how it sounded relative to my experience with Suris witches. I felt these two set ups were two entirely different animals. Rajivs had excellent clarity, tonality et al but fell short of the huge soundstage and airy top end that Suris system has. But thats way it works best for Rajivs room and music and thats what counts.
In the end, I came out of the room a very happy man! Vinay, I know you had a bad back, but you seriously missed it.
I guess its the result of the hours and years of hard work, learning and tweaking that leads to such a good sounding system and by that count I have a long way to go.
Partin shot
We had to make a run for Rajivs place as Capt.Rajesh and Sasi were already on their way there. In addition, we had to grab some grub as we had been too busy to eat despite Lalitas and Balas insistence. Got there just in time to catch Capn and Sasi making a move to take a sutta break. Herded them into the Bolero and back to Rajivs residence. We all had our crosses to bear up to the apartment, I had my laptop and Camera bag on my shoulders, Sasi lugged in the Caiyin mt35(el34 tubes) and Capn his Marantz cd6003.
Rajiv showed us around his place, which has enough exquisite vintage stuff( tube pre-power set ups from Quad, Dynacothe list is long and many exotic drivers) for a vintage audio museum! The man is a walking encyclopaedia of tubes, vinyl ,vintage audio, electronics, and audio in general! Me being a toob noob sat dumbfounded while the others discussed toob rolling et al.
Finally we sat ourselves in Rajivs listening room.
He patiently went through the routine of setting his Linn Sondek , cleaning his records etc. I am not sure which track we played first, I think it was a Dave Brubeks Take 5 and THE Magic Began! Creamy smooth and was I floored!
I was all set for critical listening to see if I could make out the difference between Balas SET tubes and this one. But I forgot all that when Rajiv started playing music on his rig! Nope, the brain just went dead and my heart just swayed to the Jazz that was being played. The sound was very live, very soothing , very intimate. Just a few minutes of play time and I knew this was the kind of system you could listen to 24/7 and still not have fatigue. I was pretty impressed with the same quality in Balas set up, but this one just set the bar higher!
Luckily, Rajiv had Dire straits Lp and we played my preferred track Sultans of Swing. The drums were fast, tight and had amazing texture! The vocals were as usual brilliant. The 15 driver handled all the bass thrown at it with aplomb. The top end was slightly subdued and Rajiv says he prefers it that way to reduce fatigue and this is a characteristic of the particular horns he has used.
We played the Sheffield Labs Test disc Drums track and the texture shift when the drummer switches to brushes was brought out very clearly. Please keep in mind all this action is taking place in a 100 sq ft room. No booming, reverberation, nothing. Bass control and resolution-Check.
Swapped the Linn for the marantz cd player and played a few of my cds. First played Saraswati from Into the Light by U.Rajesh. The mandolin notes had beautiful tone and body and the amp rendered the fast piece towards the end with excellent resolution ( there was no bunching or cloudiness)! Speed and dynamics-Check.
Couldnt play Temptation by Diana krall as I had left it at Balas.
Played Black Velvet by Allanah Myles and Capn Rajesh remarked that he couldnt listen to this song on his set up because of the harshness, while here it sounded very good.
Next played Black magic woman by Santana. Well rendered, layered but slightly lacking on the highs towards the latter part.
We did up the volume on the Lyrita amp to max while the source wasnt playing and there was no hum or hiss whatsoever.
Around this time, we decided to swap the Lyrita amp for the Cayin m35(32 wpc against the lyritas 1.5wpc). The same Sheffield Drum track came out with astonishing power and there was a lot of tactile bass too.
Though I had brought along Niladri Kumar, Anoushka Shankar CDs, due to limited time could not play these.
Listened to Sargam a Malayalam movie soundtrack with lots of Carnatic based tracks sung by K.J. Yesudas. Vocals sounded quite natural on this one.
Even at low volumes, the Cayin had good detail level.
But we unanimously agreed that the Rajivs Lyrita edged out the Cayin when it came to vocals, while the latter scored when it came to drive.
Finally went back to Rajivs usual set up and heard a few more records before we wound up for the day.
If I were to describe Rajivs setup in a few words, Smooth, Live, lucid but very musical and fatigue free. Best seat be in after a hard day at work.
Rajiv asked me how it sounded relative to my experience with Suris witches. I felt these two set ups were two entirely different animals. Rajivs had excellent clarity, tonality et al but fell short of the huge soundstage and airy top end that Suris system has. But thats way it works best for Rajivs room and music and thats what counts.
In the end, I came out of the room a very happy man! Vinay, I know you had a bad back, but you seriously missed it.
I guess its the result of the hours and years of hard work, learning and tweaking that leads to such a good sounding system and by that count I have a long way to go.
Partin shot
iaudio
Well-Known Member
Rajiv, edited the photo in GIMP. You like it?
Saw those four musicians as I was getting out of your listening room, so clicked that too. But I do regret not taking more pics of all the great stuff you had.
Saw those four musicians as I was getting out of your listening room, so clicked that too. But I do regret not taking more pics of all the great stuff you had.
Hi Rajiv,
You have a nice setup! What are your speakers?
A question - from the pictures, it looks like you're not using any vibration dampeners like the Vibrapods or Vibracones, which are supposed to reduce or eliminate inherent vibrations and improve sound. Have you considered using them?
-thekinge
That was a nice review Titus.
iaudio
Well-Known Member
thekinge, capt, thevortex Thanks! The pleasure was mine.
thekinge, do you use gimp too? I am only getting familiar with it. Though there are loads of tutorials available, I am quite lazy!
Btw, one tip I picked up from Rajiv that day was that one must never power on a tube amp without load connected to it.
thekinge, do you use gimp too? I am only getting familiar with it. Though there are loads of tutorials available, I am quite lazy!
Btw, one tip I picked up from Rajiv that day was that one must never power on a tube amp without load connected to it.
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Yep, I do Titus. I have used Adobe PhotoShop before in my work environment but did not want to spend so much money buying it for personal use because my editing mostly consists of cleaning up pictures, cropping, resizing etc. For all that, GIMP was the closest to PhotoShop I found in open source software. Since the basic concepts of image editing in GIMP is the same as PhotoShop, I found it really easy to use coming from PhotoShop world.
Hi,
Thank you.
The speakers are vintage Altec Lansing 515B woofers and Altec Lansing 288-16G HF compression drivers.
The crossover is a simple 6db slope first order crossover at around 950--1000Hz.
The HF horns are 650 Hz round Tactrix horns and the LF cabinets are half horn cabinets designed by Bill Woods of Acoustic Horn fame.they are different take on the old Jensen Ultraflex and Onken cabinets.
I use the Linn Trampolin baseboard under the TT.
Linn - Trampolin
On the heavy rack I use the Trampolin works well,but on a lighter rack I like the sound without any baseboard at all.
I tried metal cones(DIY Tiptoes) under the amp and phonostage but found the sound hardening up,so I stick with the stock rubber feet Viren fixes to the bottom of the amps.
Regards
Rajiv
Thank you.
The speakers are vintage Altec Lansing 515B woofers and Altec Lansing 288-16G HF compression drivers.
The crossover is a simple 6db slope first order crossover at around 950--1000Hz.
The HF horns are 650 Hz round Tactrix horns and the LF cabinets are half horn cabinets designed by Bill Woods of Acoustic Horn fame.they are different take on the old Jensen Ultraflex and Onken cabinets.
I use the Linn Trampolin baseboard under the TT.
Linn - Trampolin
On the heavy rack I use the Trampolin works well,but on a lighter rack I like the sound without any baseboard at all.
I tried metal cones(DIY Tiptoes) under the amp and phonostage but found the sound hardening up,so I stick with the stock rubber feet Viren fixes to the bottom of the amps.
Regards
Rajiv
iaudio
Well-Known Member
Rajiv, I sure did. Thanks for pointing it out.
thekinge, You work in image editing/graphics?
OT but this is good news! So I can take a good photoshop tutorial and quickly master GIMP?
Cheers
A beautiful, well-constructed speaker with class-leading soundstage, imaging and bass that is fast, deep, and precise.
