Is there an Audio/Video thread?
Is there an Audio/Video thread?
I think there is now...
Everyone please post your stereo, home audio/video setups for when you are not out in the garage.
Ok then, here is my project I have been working on for over 10 years. I have been scrounging Ebay, Craigslist, and local selling markets accumulating obsolete audio/video (A/V) Yamaha receivers and old speakers from the 70's from churches, movie theaters, and father/son build projects (Boy I love Bose, but not for their sound quality, but for the churches and people that downsize and want to dump their old small refrigerator sized commercial speakers) . I have built 4 complete sets, one for myself and 3 for my kids. Mine is the best and most expensive.
The world's greatest $1500 3.1 audio unit. 112dB effortlessly at +3dB on the volume knob which is as loud as I can take it. You will quit turning up the knob before you hurt anything.
That price doesn't include the cascading failure when the $150 Behringer crossover failed and sent full volume through everything and took out one side of the Crown amp ($$$?).
Not sure if it's supposed to look like that down there. Hope I never have to rewire it.
And before I moved the piano and destroyed the living room.
Here's my HiFi listening setup. Most of this is nice vintage stuff my dad gifted to me.
Spectral DMC 10 Preamp
Transcendent T-16 tube amplifier (aka "The Space Heater")
LS3/5a mains
Rythmik F12G subwoofer
Turntable is an old Rega Planar 3, with a Grace tonearm, and Denon DL-110 cartridge
Old laptop with limited battery life, and a decent DAC for digital music
My record collection is on an old record store display shelf.
That's pretty sweet Beer Baron. I take it that your dad took good care of his records? 
My son wanted to experience the wonders of vinyl so I gave him my old Technics SP-1800 turntable w/ a Stanton 681 cartridge and my boxes of records. Before I did I tried out my old favorite albums only to discover how scratched and warped they where and I remembered how much I didn't miss them and how much I love CDs. I also discovered that the subwoofer could bounce the needle all over the record and I would have needed to move the turntable into another room with it's own preamp for the extra length of wire I would have needed.
One is located in each area of the house.
VolvoHeretic said:That's pretty sweet Beer Baron. I take it that your dad took good care of his records?
Thanks!
I presume he's taken good care of his records. He's only sent me a couple, nearly all that collection is me. He's a tech geek and audiophile, and the few from his collection are in excellent condition, so I'm sure the rest are as well.
I believe he said the equipment was stuff that he originally gathered and put together for my grandfather in the late 70's or early 80's, that he's been holding onto. Except the cartridge got replaced before he sent it, and I added the sub myself because those speakers have no bottom end.
I also recently got a nice vacuum record cleaner and that makes a HUGE difference on a lot of used records.
It's down in the basement where the floor is concrete, and resting on cinderblocks, so no issues with the bass shaking the turntable.
In reply to VolvoHeretic :
Those Altec speakers are pretty cool. The Pavek Museum of Broadcasting in Minneapolis has a gigantic pair of Altec Lancing Voice of the Theater speakers that are about as tall as I am that I've always admired.
My hearing has degraded enough in my old age that while I can appreciate high end audio systems, there's no point in owning one anymore. I still have a decent mid-range system I put together in the late 1970s that's more than good enough for my ears.
My system is a mix of old high end classic stuff and recent. Here goes:
Don't have a recent pic with the whole system, but here's a speaker and amp. Crossovers are hiding under the amp stands and are now analog, having replaced the DSP crossovers.
The Linkwitz's are awesome, ended my search for the "right" speaker. https://www.linkwitzlab.com/LX521/Description.htm
In reply to stuart in mn :
Hi Stuart, yah, the last online hearing test I did a few years back, I couldn't hear anything above 12kHz and my wife was 13kHz. But, almost all musical instruments range between 40Hz and 10kHz, so it doesn't really matter if your setup can reach 20Hz or 20kHz and professional speakers don't even try. Here is a musical instrument frequency chart I borrowed from JE Labs.
I don't really have anything to show here. Several nice sets of headphones for various purposes, but apartment life and small kids means I'm waiting to put a stereo together for a bit. Left to right: Sony beater drumset phones, Bose (came with phone purchase) phone buds, Sony 7506 (closed recording), AKG k240 (open recording/mixing)
In reply to jwagner (Forum Supporter) :
What are you using for a power amp? I'll bet that sounds awesome.
In reply to barefootcyborg5000 :
Well that's understandable and good headphones have gotten a lot more affordable these days. It's kind of hard to have a dance night with them though.
In reply to VolvoHeretic :
Emotiva 5 channel for each side. Sounds better than you'd figure a mid range amp should. I'l like to try some high end amplification, but I need ten channels...
Fronts - A pair of C-notes with black spray-on bedliner. So impressed with these I got another pair as my studio monitors
Center - Polk Audio S-35 center that I bought open-box with a wee scratch on top from Crutchfield. This was before they offered the C-note center channel or I would have done that.
Sub - Definitive Tech ProSub 800
Surround - Definitive Tech ProMonitor 800. I had originally bought three of these to be my three front channels, but the Polk and the C-notes absolutely blow them away. The ProMonitors completely fail to fill the mid-range gap above the sub. $100 C-notes absolutely crush the $300 Definitives in every way.
Receiver - Yamaha RX-V383. Just solid and impressive.
The whole system (minus the projector) cost under $700 and I absolutely love it. The DSP in the Yamaha is one of the best I've heard, but I can always hear things I don't like in any DSP. The Definitive Sub is stoopid impressive. 300W with a high-excursion 8" and a passive radiator, but it truly thumps clean. -3dB is advertised at 20hz which is usually a lie. I expected 30hz maybe, but throwing a tone generator at it, I believe the 20hz. I really wanted to focus on small footprint which explains the removable (soon to be roll-up) screen and projector. The true surprise here is the C-notes. They are easily the most impressive in the bang-for-buck category. Seriously capable pieces, and in my studio they reproduce brilliantly to 60hz. For right now (mostly guitar and voice), that is more than I need. Overall I'm pretty proud that I was able to build/cobble/assemble darn near close to audiophile sound for a third of challenge budget.
Until recently I had a dedicated 10-seat home theater with a full Magnepan 5.1 system and a home-built tapped horn sub. I think I had in the neighborhood of 2Kw of power. I've moved and am going to go to 2.1 channels with a tume preamp and an Emotiva amp. Speakers will be home brew.
In reply to Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) :
Do you find you get different sound staging if you adjust your empty beer can placement?
Beer Baron said:In reply to Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) :
Do you find you get different sound staging if you adjust your empty beer can placement?
It's more important to ask if the empties are audiophile quality or not.
In reply to Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) :
My daughter built a set of C Notes when she was 15 or 16. Absolutely blew me away with what $100 and an afternoon will get you.
just wow.
I always wanted to build small 2.1 desktop speakers out of two 12" earth globes and a couple of 6.5" coaxial speakers except they all seam to be 4 ohm car styles or 8 ohm ceiling speakers which have too large a diameter (8") with the mounting ring. I might have to build my own.
I can hardly use my stereo to watch movies because the music and sound effects "are just too darn loud" compared to the dialog. Maybe I don't know how to adjust it correctly but I think some sound engineers should be punished severely. We usually just use the built-in TV speakers.
Our favorite entertainment is watching live video concerts except it is hard to find good DVD's to buy of the bands we want to watch. We watch a lot of YouTube but you have to enter the search exactly like: (Pink Floyd official live video concert) or you get a bunch of home made crap videos. YouTube quality sucks, but if you find something you really like, you can try to find the DVD or BluRay disks on Amazon. Usually not. Every time we go to see a concert (all of our favorite bands are in their 70's now) I go up and see if they have any live dvd's, but they never do. Luckily our kids turn us onto good modern music we like but it is usually 10 years after the bands became popular.
In reply to VolvoHeretic :
Have you looked at Qello? I've been thinking of subscribing since they seem to have more concerts to stream than anywhere else. Looks like it might be available from some public libraries.
In reply to jwagner (Forum Supporter) :
I've never heard of that, I will check it out. I am letting my Brother in Law who lives with us watch some Metallica on YT, but the live concert from 2021 is blocking out the video of several songs. I wonder if they aren't new material and don't want us copying them?
Beer Baron said:In reply to Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) :
Do you find you get different sound staging if you adjust your empty beer can placement?
No, but they have an annoying rattle at about 75hz.
Here's my little setup.
Samsung 85" Q70
Yamaha RX-A780
Totem Dreamcatcher Left Center Right
Totem Dreamcatcher surrounds
2 Totem Dreamcatcher subs
1 SVS PB 1000 sub
Oppo BDP 93 blu ray player
2 Monitor Audio C165 in ceiling
Audio-Technica TT
I've recently moved and drastically changed my lifestyle. Had nice HT (7.2 setup with 110" projector) and full fledged electrostatic headphone setup in the recent past when I owned my house. Quit my job last year/sold my house and moved out to help my parents in northern Arizona/southern Utah region.
I've found over the years that I actually prefer headphones over speakers... specifically headphones with biodyna drivers. You get the low end subbass like that of a nice HT speaker setup and have the intimacy and clarity/detail which headphones provide over speakers.
Here's my HT setup I had, actually built the projector shelf and screen support structure to put the projector throw length at optimal distance.
Epson 8350 projector - Elite Screen 110" solid frame screen - OPPO BDP-93 Blu-Ray player (modded to region free playback) - NAD T747 receiver (used as preamp) - NAD C275BEE stereo amp (for mains) - NAD T 955 amp (for center & surrounds) - Polk Audio RTi A5 mains, CSi-A4 for center, RTi A3 for rears, FXiA6 dipole/bipole ceiling surrounds, & twin DSW PRO 500 subs. Was an enjoyable system... but once got serious with headphones never really enjoyed it much afterwards.
Went through quite a few sets of headphones (close to 30) and the ones that I found I really loved were the Denon/Fostex biodynas (AH-D & TH-X00 series), Koss Porta Pros, and STAX Lambda series. The top headphone setup I had was a rack based electrostatic rig I assembled to run STAX compatible electrostat headphones. The rig was a Sanus 15 PU rack with Furman M-8x AR Voltage regulator/power supply, the OPPO BDP-93 and a laptop for sources, RME ADI-2 DAC, the NAD C275BEE stereo amp, Mjolnir Audio STAX SRD-7 based custom electrostatic transformer box, and 22" ASUS monitor on a swing arm. My electrostat headphone of choice was my modded STAX SR-L300 Limited (modded with SR-L700 lambskin pads and headband assembly & blu-tac sealed for better subbass response). They sounded pretty much like an SR-L700 clone. I also really like the STAX SR-404 Limited Edition... never heard a headphone or speaker setup with the subbass harmonics and details it presented. The 404 Limited was a much warmer and more intimate headphone than the L300 Limited... the L300 Limited gave a really nice open and expanded sense of 3D space with beautiful treble region and absolute clarity and unmatched speed/response...
As brillant technically the STAX are, they just weren't musical to me... listening to them was more about the ability to pick everything apart a track has in it... I didn't find myself enjoying music with them - everything I was listening to with them became an exercise in breaking down all the details of it and I couldn't help it. I do love how they present bass, but at the same time they just bring so much detail, speed and insight into everything that couldn't just sit back and enjoy a track. This is one of my favorite videos I liked using to demo my setup to others (notice it isn't a song...)
Found I was much preferring the modded Koss Porta Pros and Fostex TH-X00 Purplehearts to just enjoy listening to music. Denon AH-D2000 were my first good headphone I got and fell in love with, after almost a decade I upgraded to Fostex TH-X00 Purplehearts and liked them more. Modded the Purplehearts with Lawton driver housing damping, the JMoney V3 Lambskin pads off the AH-D5200, and custom attenuators under the pads (to restore subbass)... and they were my all time favorites until I circled back around to new Denon AH-D5200 because of a black friday sale ($210... normally are $600 retail price). The old Denon AH-D series and Fostex TH-X00 series is known for its subbass impact. Warm and punchy headphone with massive low-end presence. The new Denon AH-D series are a bit different... more neutrally balanced and cleaner clearer sounding. Has subbass extension every bit as good as the old Denon/TH-X00s but much less subbass presence and the treble is a bit more forward. Wasn't quite a fan of the AH-D5200 stock... a bit of experimenting/modding pushed it to my favorite though - all it took were different pads (Yaxi TH610 Alcantara pads). Does everything better than the Purplehearts with just a bit less subbass presence (much better subbass presence than stock though). The Koss Porta Pros are a great compliment to it - while the AH-D5200 is an excellent neutrally balanced precise headphone the Porta Pros are warmer sounding more vocally centered and very relaxed headphone. Mods to my porta pros are Yaxi pads, Parts Express headband (for less clamp to improve sound quality), and custom leather strap/band (to better secure them on head with the PE headband).
Which brings me to my current setup... running the RME ADI-2 DAC with Schiit Loki mini EQ to a Garage 1217 Project Ember 2 headphone amp with Sovtek 6H30P-EB tube. An XBOX ONE and laptop are my audio sources. I'm enjoying my audio/video now every bit as well as with any other setup I've had... rented the new DUNE movie a few weeks ago on XBOX and the audio was jaw dropping... the system with AH-D5200 didn't miss a thing... absolutely detailed with powerful and immense lowend. The tube amp is now permanent part of it. Will never go back to solid state... they simply lack the sense of 3D spacial presentation and instrument separation you get from a good tube. May loose a little punch and ultimate precision with tube setup but the gains you get elsewhere are worth it and it's absolutely musical.
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