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Hello everyone,
It seems I've been incorrect in thinking audiophile meant only that you have nice equipment. It seems there's more to it than that. Back in the day when my dad spent thousands of dollars on a system (Carver CT-17, TFM-25, fancy vacuum tube CD player and tape deck, Kef towers and eventually that crazy little Sunfire dual 10" sub followed by more Kef, more Carver amps, B&K Ref 20 followed by a Ref 30. I always noticed everything was set flat for tone controls and wandered why all his music sounded like it had no heart untill movies brought that sub to life. With a little reluctance when I was grown, I was allowed to "borrow" the CT-17 and liberate it from my parents house. I went on to build a kind of vintage system of my own(his pre-amp, Carver M-200t and Paradigm 5se mk1. I loved my little system. Dynamically I think it put those Kef's to shame. Treble always set 66-75%, midrange a smidge less than 50% and the base 75%. Loudness never used but SonicHolography always on. I made one mention of leaving the with the wife and our little boy on the way and I was made to trade for the B&K Ref 20. I think yay, newer older tech. I set it all up at home and not one mention of tonal control in the manual. I call the support number only to find out that there isn't any. The guy on the phone tells me that most hi end pre amp/receivers don't come with that option, it's supposed to be supposed to be tranparent. You hear it as the artist/ engineer/ producer intended. I love bass (not excessive, but I wanna hear it all. I cut a sub cabinet on my CNC at work, painted it gloss black, tuned it 22hz and threw in my beloved 12" Eclipse (TC9) powered by a Crown pro audio amp. I would just prefer to hear my music the way I want to, not necessarilly the way someone else forces me to. Who makes something that sold for that high a price that you cannot truly make your own? Is this what it is to be an audiophile? Help me to understand.
Follow Ups:
I used to be in the same boat many years ago.
But I found that once I got my system to a certain level of transparency and wide range that the tone controls were a hindrance. This is because I could hear the coloration they introduced that essentially inserted a veil between me and the music.
The thing is, I have plenty of bass impact! That is a function of speaker capability and room setup. I happen to think that tube amps can deliver more tuneful bass without any loss of impact and I can demonstrate that fact easily enough on my system. I really do feel that tone controls are craved due to problems in the system- such as an overall dry sound, which one tries to reduce by increasing the bass level somehow. I've been there.
Now I've played string bass since I was in 7th grade, piano since I was four and I've played in orchestras, jazz bands, rock bands all my life. I'm hard to please when it comes to bass. I think one of the better preamps with tone controls was likely the old Harmon Kardon Citation 1 preamp which had switched tone controls so that when you set it flat, it really was flat. Ultimately I moved away from complex preamps like that and what I found is that quite often simpler preamps played bass better.
I also found that long speaker cables eat bass for lunch. So I keep them short, and run long interconnects from the preamp to the amp. My preamp can drive really long cables with no worries so this works. I found that keeping vibration out of the turntable and preamp also gave me more impact with a side benefit of relaxed sound even at really high volumes- in fact its hard to tell how loud my system is playing without a sound level pressure meter. That is how it should be - real music is like that too.
Clear as mud??
I'm working my way off that boat little by little. I've been making smiley faces on eq's since I had my first boom box at 5ish. I love music ,everything except country. I just don't get it. I played the clarinet in grade school and upgraded to Tenor Sax the rest of the way. Orchestra, Marching Band and of course, Jazz. I entered SF State as a music major and came out an Industrial Technolgist. Never lost my love of music. I listen to a lot of hip-hop because sometimes, they actually touch on things that matter and their recycling to make old new again is amazing. These producers will never be Mozart's or Tchaikovsky's though. Still love my jazz even contemporary (thank's dad 😒) and the Eagles, Zeplin etc. There are the Peter Gabriel's, Talking Heads all the way to Nirvana's and Marylin Manson's and of course my Mars Volta.
So, addressing the system, I'm in an apartment because normal people can't buy houses in California anymore so,
my placement of speakers are limited. Sub is in the corner behind a giant plant so my wife doesn't notice it as much and my Paradigms are pulled about a foot from the wall and flank the tv on either side. The Paradigms are off the floor on bookshelf stands but, I will try them on the floor since they're too big and tall to be on those stands. I imagine the higher the quality of components, how they interact and placement is where the hobby part comes in. Another thing, in regards speaker wires I always assumed they all have to meet certain standards so, is there really that big of a difference between a ten dollar wire and a two hundred dollar one?
Thanks
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