The cold is starting to set in a little and I'm starting to get back to tinkering with my stereo. . . :D
I have two pairs of minis still stacked in a back bedroom, an XCD-99, and an A120mkII amp that I got a while back that I had yet to turn on. A couple nights ago I had a few free hours and was starting to get back to cleaning the house. I figured I could waste a little time tinkering, so I just threw together a 2-channel setup in that back room with whatever junk cabling I could scrounge up in five minutes or less. Please keep in mind, I didn't really put any thought in to calibration or setup; just plugged everything in, eyeballed speaker placement, and left the bass controls on the minis at wherever they were when they were pulled from the last system. Also keep in mind the room kind of sucks - 10x15x7.5, no treatments, placed along the short wall, and there are enough reflections in the highs that the room rings like a bell. . .
I had never heard the minis blow me away like they did that night.
All that said, and I could only listen for a little at a time because the reflections in the highs were tiring my ears out, I thought I had it pretty good before with the minis driven with my Outlaw 990/770, but this combo just had dynamics, detail, and extension I'd never heard the minis put out. In its stock form, I'm not sure if the A120 is the right amp for the minis (sounds a little bright/cold for my particular tastes), but this little experiment really got me thinking again about all this gear.
I don't know really where to start with this conversation/thread. . .
The difference in rooms - I really need to drag all this gear into the main room, gut the current system in place (!), and see where its at. I know that setting up the room right would do that much more for me (no matter what room I put gear in), but focusing on the gear right now, I could tell there was just so much "more" music on tap with this setup. . . this is really all just a wake up call that there seems to be something (pretty big) I'm missing out on right now from the gear I've basically had shoved in a closet. . .
The difference in amps - okay, I can follow the more power is better train (found that out moving from the receiver to the separates), but there is something else going on here. Am I hearing a difference in quality of internal components here (not so sure this would be as dramatic) or is this the difference current on tap can create, or is there something else I'm missing???
I knew the DAC in the CD player was pretty good, but is the 990 really holding that much back in 2-channel (I had the cdp set up as a transport via coax to the 990 prior)? Makes me even more intrigued by the Underwood mods for the cdp and amp - maybe just me now seeing the potential I knew was there when I was shopping for the gear but hadn't heard yet.
I know there is a lot more where this came from, but I took the day off and figured I'd write a little bit as I've been out of the loop for a while. I think I'm going to be busy for a while sorting all this stuff out. . . :)
I have two pairs of minis still stacked in a back bedroom, an XCD-99, and an A120mkII amp that I got a while back that I had yet to turn on. A couple nights ago I had a few free hours and was starting to get back to cleaning the house. I figured I could waste a little time tinkering, so I just threw together a 2-channel setup in that back room with whatever junk cabling I could scrounge up in five minutes or less. Please keep in mind, I didn't really put any thought in to calibration or setup; just plugged everything in, eyeballed speaker placement, and left the bass controls on the minis at wherever they were when they were pulled from the last system. Also keep in mind the room kind of sucks - 10x15x7.5, no treatments, placed along the short wall, and there are enough reflections in the highs that the room rings like a bell. . .
I had never heard the minis blow me away like they did that night.
All that said, and I could only listen for a little at a time because the reflections in the highs were tiring my ears out, I thought I had it pretty good before with the minis driven with my Outlaw 990/770, but this combo just had dynamics, detail, and extension I'd never heard the minis put out. In its stock form, I'm not sure if the A120 is the right amp for the minis (sounds a little bright/cold for my particular tastes), but this little experiment really got me thinking again about all this gear.
I don't know really where to start with this conversation/thread. . .
The difference in rooms - I really need to drag all this gear into the main room, gut the current system in place (!), and see where its at. I know that setting up the room right would do that much more for me (no matter what room I put gear in), but focusing on the gear right now, I could tell there was just so much "more" music on tap with this setup. . . this is really all just a wake up call that there seems to be something (pretty big) I'm missing out on right now from the gear I've basically had shoved in a closet. . .
The difference in amps - okay, I can follow the more power is better train (found that out moving from the receiver to the separates), but there is something else going on here. Am I hearing a difference in quality of internal components here (not so sure this would be as dramatic) or is this the difference current on tap can create, or is there something else I'm missing???
I knew the DAC in the CD player was pretty good, but is the 990 really holding that much back in 2-channel (I had the cdp set up as a transport via coax to the 990 prior)? Makes me even more intrigued by the Underwood mods for the cdp and amp - maybe just me now seeing the potential I knew was there when I was shopping for the gear but hadn't heard yet.
I know there is a lot more where this came from, but I took the day off and figured I'd write a little bit as I've been out of the loop for a while. I think I'm going to be busy for a while sorting all this stuff out. . . :)
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