What New Stuff Have You Bought? If You Care To Share Thead! :)

[adk highlander]

Drove a 292 mile round trip from my home in south-centra Massachusetts to New Rochelle NY this morning to fetch a Luxman EQ-500 phono stage that popped up a second or third time on US Audiomart.

No question that it was the right move for ME. I needed to have one good phono amp that has (at least) 2 inputs as I have two turntables and use them both. I needed at least 65dB of gain because 60dB in my Musical Surroundings Phenomena II+ was barely working with two cartridges I have with about 0.2mV output. Lastly, I want ALL the settings and controls on the front because my cable management and location of the unit made things a royal PITA to turn the unit around and juggle a light and a magnifier to fidget with two separate DIP switch pods for each channel when switching between a MM and MC cartridge.

The Phenomena II+ got a bit noisy and "shouty" with certain cartridges. That is now completely gone! Everything is now just smooth as melting butter and even more detail at the same time. Plus it sure is pretty to my eyes.
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Wow. That is a serious piece of gear and should be an endgame item like your integrated. Such an amazing setup. Thanks for sharing the progress.

 

[KenM10759]

Wow. That is a serious piece of gear and should be an endgame item like your integrated. Such an amazing setup. Thanks for sharing the progress.

Indeed it is! I couldn't believe how it blew away the Musical Surroundings Phenomena II+ phono amp for performance and especially convenience. Both this EQ-500 and the L-509X I got last week are very much my end-game pieces. Iwanted to get them because I'm approaching retirement age and do want to get all of this while I'm still working. There's one more piece coming, and perhaps one more next year. Next week, probably Thursday, a used Luxman DA-06 dac will show up. I found a no-box bargain on a USA voltage one on eBay.

 

[adk highlander]

Indeed it is! I couldn't believe how it blew away the Musical Surroundings Phenomena II+ phono amp for performance and especially convenience. Both this EQ-500 and the L-509X I got last week are very much my end-game pieces. Iwanted to get them because I'm approaching retirement age and do want to get all of this while I'm still working. There's one more piece coming, and perhaps one more next year. Next week, probably Thursday, a used Luxman DA-06 dac will show up. I found a no-box bargain on a USA voltage one on eBay.

Ha. I think I saw that one day while looking around. My next item will be an Eversound DMP-6. Then I can have a superb roon endpoint and DAC in one box. What are you using to stream to your Gustard now?

 

[KenM10759]

Ha. I think I saw that one day while looking around. My next item will be an Eversound DMP-6. Then I can have a superb roon endpoint and DAC in one box. What are you using to stream to your Gustard now?

The black box on the lower left... Bluesound Vault 2. Next year I want the new Luxman NT-07 streamer!

 

[lovinthehd]

The Ascend's arrived. So far, very impressive.
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Which version is that? I like my Ascends (Sierra1, Sierra1NrT,170SE, 200SE etc).

 

[Bobby Bass]

The Ascend's arrived. So far, very impressive.
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Look like next to Revel 105 or 106. If so please share how they compare in your system.

 

[crazyfingers]

I see a bowl of cat food.

 

[davidscott]

The Ascend's arrived. So far, very impressive.
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Really nice looking setup. Congrats!

 

[Bobby Bass]

My quick, hour 1 impressions with familiar songs.

Smilk- Last Rainforest: sound stage is wider and imaging felt more precise, I would need to listen to the Revels again.

Fink- Trouble's what you're in: Bass line is much more satisfying compared to the M106.

Bjork- Hollow (16 bit remix): you still need subs for the first 1 min of this, but still impressive for a bookshelf.

There is more detail and energy in the treble but not in any offensive way I've noticed so far. The bass improvement is easy, I'll need more time to flesh out the midrange differences.

Ran them in pure direct mode off my Denon 3800h to an Emotiva BasX 3, source is tidal through a Wiim Pro Plus.

Edit: Audyessy sets the LX as full range and the M106 at 40hz. Going to try the LX's at 60hz and try that out for now.

Impressive if you like them better than the Revels. They look like the Sierra-1 V2 that Erin’s Audio Corner gave a very positive review. Like that they are all US except the component build. Ascend look like winners.

 

[3db]

My order of blues cassettes came in

 

[crazyfingers]

I've been trying to find a better way to sample bands that I don't know much about. Youtube is a good source for finding music from different bands. But I didn't have a way to play it tough the good stereo because my laptop only connects to my preamp via BluOS, Airplay or Bluetooth. So I just ordered a 25 foot 3.5mm to RCA cable to run from a wired connection between the two.

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My wire arrived and it works to connect my Windows 11 laptop directly to the NAD preamp. But I wonder if there is a way to adjust the gain on the audio-out on my computer more than the volume slider on the computer. With the computer volume at 100% the volume is still very low and so I need to turn the volume on the NAD preamp way, way up to get decent volume. I worry I'll forget to turn it down again when I go to my normal listening mode over BluOS wifi and blow the speakers. They are that different.

 

[Eppie]

My wire arrived and it works to connect my Windows 11 laptop directly to the NAD preamp. But I wonder if there is a way to adjust the gain on the audio-out on my computer more than the volume slider on the computer. With the computer volume at 100% the volume is still very low and so I need to turn the volume on the NAD preamp way, way up to get decent volume. I worry I'll forget to turn it down again when I go to my normal listening mode over BluOS wifi and blow the speakers. They are that different.

The volume control on the task bar acts like a master volume. Right click on the speaker icon and select "Open volume mixer" and check that your sources are turned up. What software are you using for playback from the PC?

 

[crazyfingers]

The volume control on the task bar acts like a master volume. Right click on the speaker icon and select "Open volume mixer" and check that your sources are turned up. What software are you using for playback from the PC?

Thanks. I got into the mixer. It's a bit better. I still have to turn the preamp volume up more but perhaps not dangerously up.

Right now all I plan to use is Firefox. This is not for playing my own music. I use BluOS for that.

It's for sampling "new-to-me" artists/bands that I've heard about but don't know. So I'm going to YouTube and just checking out bands to help me to decide whether to order a Greatest Hits CD or something.

I can also sample in the iTunes store but they don't let you sample whole songs. But I'd use Airplay for that.

I listened to some Allman Brothers on YouTube. It's a bit too country for my taste I think.

I think I'll start a post in the music forum to get some more ideas of bands to sample.

 

[adk highlander]

My order of blues cassettes came in

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Who is your furry friend?

 

[3db]

Who is your furry friend?

That would be Daisy, a neutered female ragdoll.

 

[adk highlander]

That would be Daisy, a neutered female ragdoll.

Love it. My cat growing up was named Daisy.

 

[KenM10759]

Last (used) Luxman piece for a while, a discontinued DAC from the same era as my L-509X integrated amp and EQ-500 phono stage...the Luxman DA-06.

It is just awesome! Smooth as could be. I would only like to add the new Luxman NT-07 streamer, but I'll have to wait for the demo unit my dealer just got to age out so i can get the maximum discount on it.

 

[j_garcia]

I had tix before and they were cancelled during Covid. Just picked up tix to the 2024 tour in Oct.

 

[NINaudio]

Booked two track days. One at Gigerman raceway in April and the other at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in May.

 

[KenM10759]

Booked two track days. One at Gigerman raceway in April and the other at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in May.

Nice! Car or motorcycle? I did two track days on my motorcycle last year, one at Palmer Motorsports (Palmer Massachusetts) and one at Thompson Speedway, (Thompson Connecticut)