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Musings on System Changes
#1
I have recently made several changes to my system and after a few week of listening I wanted to share some of my thoughts and see what other members felt about what they have done when making changes to their systems.  Acknowledging that if I were really going to delve deeply into the understanding of what each change did I would have invoked each change with greater time separation…but I didn’t.

So the changes I have made that made NO difference to the sound in my system:

1) Speaker Cables - Nordost Purple Flair to 10 AWG zip speaker wire, bi wired.
2) Nordost Power cables to stock power cables on D200/400
3) Moving music source to remote server as opposed to locally served.

Changes that made moderate difference:

1) D200 to D400 (400 better than 200 but for $8K….)
2) SAM speakers (though not SAMed for my speaker but a very close relative in the series)

Changes that made a big difference:

1) Removed centre component rack and placed components on isolation racks not more than 1 foot off the ground resulting an a much clearer sound stage.
2) Upgraded speakers (Totem Element Fire).  Awesome bookshelf.
3) Speaker positioning…very careful placement, measuring and listening.  Taking into account compromises that occur with directivity and distance apart and from walls etc.

I can listen to music now and wonder how it could get any better than this (in my modest room and environment)! Smile

Hope everyone has enjoyed their t-weekends!!

Cheers


Attached Files Thumbnail(s)
   
Devialet 400; KEF Reference 3; custom built Server 2012 with JRiver & Audiophile Optimizer; med grade wall socket; 10 AWG speaker cable bi-wire & un-terminated; AudioQuest Carbon USB with Jitterbug; Shunyata Venom 3 power cables.
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#2
Hi Matthew,

Excellent post- a great contribution. I like how you categorized the changes into classes based on the degree of change, and it is interesting what is in each category. Looking at your room, I would expect that even small changes would be quite apparent, as there appears to be little to interfere with the sound. If you found the changes to the rack and altitude of the equipment yielded a greater change than the D200 to D400, or power or speaker cables, I certainly believe that is the case.

I also know the Totem Element Fire speakers; they are wonderful, musical speakers and are very revealing. The whole Element series is very good. The purple rug is a total bonus as well.
Damon
Powernode, NAD M32, Cambridge CD transport, Analysis Plus, Nordost, iFi Nova, CSS Criton 1TDX, KEF C62
Vancouver, Canada
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#3
I have never heard your speakers, I have compared a single D-Premier to two rather than 200>400 and my cable trials were with different brands, but I would say the results of your evaluations pretty well parallels my own.

Changes to room layout, particularly speaker position and adjacent furniture plus speaker changes make the biggest SQ differences.
Devialet Original d'Atelier 44 Core, Job Pre/225, Goldmund PH2, Goldmund Reference/T3f /Ortofon A90, Goldmund Mimesis 36+ & Chord Blu, iMac/Air, Lynx Theta, Tune Audio Anima, Goldmund Epilog 1&2, REL Studio. Dialog, Silver Phantoms, Branch stands, copper cables (mainly).
Oxfordshire

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#4
Matthew,

My experience is similar to yours.

After trying a number of different power cords, I'm back to using the stock cables, but will replace these
with short DIY Supra LoRad MK.II  to take advantage of my new lower equipment rack.
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#5
(14-Sep-2015, 01:31)Damon Wrote: Hi Matthew,

Excellent post- a great contribution. I like how you categorized the changes into classes based on the degree of change, and it is interesting what is in each category. Looking at your room, I would expect that even small changes would be quite apparent, as there appears to be little to interfere with the sound. If you found the changes to the rack and altitude of the equipment yielded a greater change than the D200 to D400, or power or speaker cables, I certainly believe that is the case.

I also know the Totem Element Fire speakers; they are wonderful, musical speakers and are very revealing. The whole Element series is very good. The purple rug is a total bonus as well.

I did forget to mention that the purple rug also improved the sound in the room as well! Big Grin Well not the fact that is was purple....I also have 40 square feet of 4" acoustic panels behind the curtains.  The photo is a bit of a cheat as behind me is the kitchen and dining area....
Devialet 400; KEF Reference 3; custom built Server 2012 with JRiver & Audiophile Optimizer; med grade wall socket; 10 AWG speaker cable bi-wire & un-terminated; AudioQuest Carbon USB with Jitterbug; Shunyata Venom 3 power cables.
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#6
(14-Sep-2015, 21:01)mauidan Wrote: Matthew,

My experience is similar to yours.

After trying a number of different power cords, I'm back to using the stock cables, but will replace these
with short DIY Supra LoRad MK.II  to take advantage of my new lower equipment rack.

Maudian...I'd like to do the DIY power cable as well to keep the run short, did you us a low profile IEC plug into the back of the Devialet?  If so where did you get a reasonable quality connector for that.

Cheers.

Matthew
Devialet 400; KEF Reference 3; custom built Server 2012 with JRiver & Audiophile Optimizer; med grade wall socket; 10 AWG speaker cable bi-wire & un-terminated; AudioQuest Carbon USB with Jitterbug; Shunyata Venom 3 power cables.
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#7
(14-Sep-2015, 22:39)Matthew Wrote:
(14-Sep-2015, 21:01)mauidan Wrote: Matthew,

My experience is similar to yours.

After trying a number of different power cords, I'm back to using the stock cables, but will replace these
with short DIY Supra LoRad MK.II  to take advantage of my new lower equipment rack.

Maudian...I'd like to do the DIY power cable as well to keep the run short, did you us a low profile IEC plug into the back of the Devialet?  If so where did you get a reasonable quality connector for that.

Cheers.

Matthew

The Supra IECs work fine:

http://www.jenving.com/products/international-150
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#8
thanks for sharing Matthew. Much appreciate it
 
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#9
I'm using this one and it's fine as well
http://www.partsconnexion.com/CARDAS-76916.html
Devialet 800| B&W 802 Diamond | JL 113 | Linn Akurate DS + Denon HEOS for Spotify | Stealth Reverie speaker cables| Audioprana AES/RCA | DH LABS PC 
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