Changing hifi sound (aka "Am I crazy?")

[Diapason]

Hi Mick, I certainly wonder about that myself. I don't really know how to test it, though. Is there a simple way of monitoring the supply into the house?

This week things have been okay, but I still don't feel we're back to where we were in the glorious days of a few weeks ago...

[Fran]

Essentially, no, there isn't unless you have access to measuring equipment and data logging..... not a hope.


Your ears are the best you can do....


Fran

[Ken Moreland]

Here's some relevant light reading . http://www.nordost.com/downloads/New%20 ... rement.pdf
I believe they are/were planning to sell some software package which could distinguish between cable A and B etc. Applicable to any other equipment or placement comparisons.
KM

[Diapason]

Well, it's happening again. I think...

Borrowed Leben on Thursday. Sounded gorgeous till Sunday, really lovely. Since Sunday, crap.

[Fran]

Well..... its unlikely to be the room, amp, source or speakers. So that leaves power supply or you. Can you check the mains voltage (safely!) and just see if its low or something?



Fran

[DaveF]

You have a poltergeist. Get the room blessed.


Seriously though, like what we spoke about yesterday, try to eliminate the possibility that the CD player is going a bit wonky after some playback or if it has some issues with its power supply causing problems elsewhere. The fact that your Shine amp was failing regularly in your place yet it was perfectly fine in other systems certainly suggests a power issue of some sort.

[Adrian]

Problems problems etc etc.

I have carried out a very quick search on the www and I found this.

http://www.tequipment.net/Fluke123scopeMeter.html



Fluke make very good multimeters but are also very expensive. The intrinsically safe models are mega bucks, however you would not require one for hazardous environments. I have seen these multimeters at work, but I have never used the digital graphic one myself.
But I am sure there are other digital scopemeters with graphic display / recording made by other manufacturers which are cheeper etc.

However like with most things, with time these multimeters get cheaper, so the model above is down to $1400. It may be possible to either buy a multimeter and set it up yourself and start recording the sine wave coming into your house / amplifier. You could record data when the HI Fi sounds good and then when it sounds bad, then check the waves and see the difference if any etc.

Alternatively some of the other forum members may already have a digital graphic scopemeter / multimeter and they might be able to pop over and do a few tests for you. Alternatively you may be able to hire a meter for a week from a hire shop, or get one on ebay or hire a electrician to carry out tests. However you may require to run a test for 3 to 4 hours per night for a week, save the results to a file etc.

What ever option you take, measuring the quality of electricity should be a piece of cake, however if you are going to do it yourself make sure you know what you are doing, if not get assistance. Any voltage above 50V is considered potentially lethal, which puts domestic supply (240V) in perspective.

I think some of the forum members are electricians, so they might be able to obtain a scopemeter for you, set it up etc for a small fee etc.

[DaveF]

Could Cloney's loan you one of those PS Audio Power Plant Premier's? That tells you what the incoming voltage is I think.
I seem to remember on another forum that one of those UPS's came recommended and perform better than any of the PS Audio stuff and are cheaper too.

[Diapason]

Thank you gentlemen. I'm going to talk to the Cloney boys today to see if they have anything to suggest, and I'll also ask around to see if anyone has a suitable multimeter/voltage meter.

There are a couple of things to add:

1) As DaveF mentioned, I had a Shine valve amp in my system for the past few months with which I had repeated problems. Basically, after a few minutes playing I'd lose a channel to crackles and distortion. The channel varied, but losing the left was more common than losing the right. It went back to Cloney 3 or 4 times for repair, and each time it came back with a clean bill of health. They used it in the shop for a week and it was fine. I'd bring it home, put it in, and problems would start within 5 minutes. On the most recent repair, it was run for 2 weeks on the bench with no problems. Once again, it came back to my house and the crackles started within 5 or 10 minutes. I even loaned it to a friend of mine and he used it without incident for a week. I took it back from him and you know what happened.

2) I'm getting transformer buzz in the man-cave on an intermittent basis, and I've discovered this with all amps. Sometimes they're deadly silent, sometimes they buzz. I'm not sure if this is normal, and I haven't tied buzzing amps to bad sonics yet, but I certainly didn't notice the Leben buzzing when I put it in first, but I did over the last couple of nights. Coincidence? Dunno.

3) The effect is subtle enough to allow me to persuade myself that I'm imagining it, but it's happening long enough now that I'm really convinced I'm not. I'm put in mind of a similar problem with my Sky box recently. I had a subtle issue with changing image quality that I thought maybe I was imagining. Certainly Hazel couldn't really see anything. When it returned to normal I noticed it immediately, and even though it was unexplainable, I know what I saw. I can now actually reproduce the image problems and watch them come and go, which is good for my sanity!*

4) I can think of 3 or 4 potential sources of the problem;
- Electricity supply
- Problem with Wadia
- Problem with a Kharma crossover
- Insanity
I'm trying to keep an open mind on all of these for the time being.

*For those who might be interested, it all started after an OTA firmware update on my relatively old Pace Sky+HD 160gig box. The colours were washed-out and flat, I could see it immediately, and some searching around online suggested others were seeing the same, but not many. There was a little to-ing and fro-ing with Sky, but for whatever reason disabling and re-enabling Anytime solved all the problems. Obviously some kind of software glitch. Now, if I leave the box paused for long periods (30-40 mins) it has the same washed-out and flat look when I restart, but it goes away.

[Fran]

Si - I missed completely the issue you had with the shine amp.


This is very odd indeed. The first thing here is to check the incoming voltage, at a scoket in the man cave. Have you a standard simple multimeter? Borrow one, or buy one for a tenner in a hardware shop. You should be getting 220-240V AC on that. Repeat the measurements in a few other rooms in the house.

FWIW, At one point my heating system was going into an error mode due to low voltage. I measured the voltage at 180V. I rang the ESB, they came out and put a recorder in my meter box for a week. Told me that the connectors on the pole had corroded and needed a good clean with a wire brush! Problem solved.

You could have the same thing easy enough.

If your voltages all check out OK, then it could be noise or DC on the mains line. In that case it may be the case that you'll need a proper recorder. I know ages back that Briano got this done by a fella he knew. Maybe shoot him a PM and see?


Fran