Adventures in amplification

[tony]

thats ok once you are bringing over the wine. Make it a few expensive bottles when you are at it.

[DaveF]

From Claus' switch to conventional speakers thread.

until I narrowed it down to what the issue was.
That said, an initial listen to my hifi in my new place has left me pleasantly surprised but that's for another thread.

Tell me more!!

well I had the new system powered up in the new place for just an hour or 2 last weekend. It was the first thing I set up before anything else. Everything else is still in boxes strewn about the place.
I didnt spend time fine tuning speaker position, I was just curious as how the room would sound and if I'd get any of that treble resonance that I have been plagued by for months on some recordings so I just put the speakers roughly in the position that I thought would look well.

I started playing a recording that I found a little troublesome in the past, a number of pieces by Telemann. Not the worst recording but I could never relax to it as I always found it too forward. Chamber music being blasted at you is never pleasant!

Barely 5 mins warmup for the whole system from a completely cold start so I wasn't expecting much.
10 mins later, I sat there remarking at how relaxed the presentation was, no sign of treble issues that I could detect and instrument separation and soundstage was the one thing that stood out. In certain passages I thought to myself wow that sounds sweet. I havent heard the system sound this good before.

Now it's early days yet, and I dont want to get my hopes up but one thing is for certain is that the presentation of my system in the new place is definetly different from the old place, much better I believe so that gives me some hope.

The real listening testing will be over the weekend so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

If the system 'behaves' then all my conclusions about what the issues where before will have been turned on its head. Perhaps it was the room afterall or dirty mains affecting the ATM2.

[Claus]

Great news Dave! I kind of had the same experience here with just changing the orientation of the speakers: rooms can really change everything. Now we hope it will all remain sweet when all is back in place. I have some theories regarding high back sofas and chairs influencing sound....;)

[Diapason]

Excellent, and all the more intriguing given your earlier finding that room positioning didn't help, and that the resonance was coming directly from the tweeter.

Fingers crossed it all works out!!

[Ivor]

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy

[DaveF]

Time for an update........

As mentioned above somewhere I've recently moved to new place with a large listening room that has plenty of soft furnishings and a thick carpeted floor. No hard reflective surfaces or glass skylight windows like in the old place. Given the treble issues I've had before since the Airtight ATM2 entered my system I had high hopes that a new place with soft fittings in the room with solve the problem.

Initial impressions as mentioned a few posts above were favourable but alas I'm afraid to say that I still have this treble resonance in the system on certain recordings. I think I've pretty much proved it now that its certainly nothing room related and this was my conclusion in the old place anyway.

I've spent quite a bit of time over the last few days listening to my 'problematic' recordings and whereas the room is far less livelier than before, I still have those treble issues. On the upside, the soundstage depth and overall detail in the music has jumped to another level and I'm very pleased with this indeed.

So I'm faced with a big decision now...

1. Ditch the Airtight ATM2. A great amp, looks the dogs bollox but everything started when it arrived. It brought the same problem to my system with both the Kharmas and my older Usher speakers.

2. I'm quite certain that the treble issues went away when I had a Meridian G07 CDP in my system. While it was there I wasnt afraid to listen to any recording. Perhaps this is the route to take. An old G06 CDP has turned up in Clooney's and I could try out the new G08.2. Dont even mention the big Meridian player thats there! That still leaves me with the vinyl end to sort out which may be another frustrating route to take.

3. Sell the lot and take up a new hobby! ;-)

[Diapason]

I don't envy you that decision. Are there any other (powerful enough valve) amps around that you could try? Just to see...?

[Fran]

Borrow/Try another source first?

Fran

[tony]

Try JKDAC32 on trial?
I could swap the airtight for a Marantz PM66KI if you want to try a different amp.
Could it be valve types that are causing the problem? Is that the same amp as Ivors?

[Ivor]

That still leaves me with the vinyl end to sort out which may be another frustrating route to take.

get an "expert" to look at its setup. It would take only 20 minutes and, if successful, might also point to he problem being source or not.