My SuppaDuppa iTunes Hifi.
Hello.
Decided to turn to itunes for a Audiophile set up. So I bulit a system around Musical Fidelity components, Nordost cables, Mac mini Intel CoreDuo 1.66 and of course the best speakers in the world.
Rack is custom made from RoseWood
Special Insert for Sony LCD for FrontRow.
Here it is :
Source: Mac mini Intel CoreDuo 1,66 1GB RAM, 100 GB HDD.
Bluetooth Foldable Keyboard from Think Outside.
Bluetooth Mouse from RadTech (not shown)
DAC: Musical Fidelity X DAC V3. 192 KHz upo sampling.
VALVe Stage: Musical Fidelity X-10V3
Int. AMP: Musical Fidelity X-150
Speakers : ProAc 1 SC fed by Nordost Blue Heaven Bi Wire cables.
Pics: From the Musical Fidelity WebSite gallery.
PS: The ProAcs are, of course , those cherry wonders on top of the lighter floorstanding ones ( used as stands because they are so BAD comparatively ...)
Decided to turn to itunes for a Audiophile set up. So I bulit a system around Musical Fidelity components, Nordost cables, Mac mini Intel CoreDuo 1.66 and of course the best speakers in the world.
Rack is custom made from RoseWood
Special Insert for Sony LCD for FrontRow.
Here it is :
Source: Mac mini Intel CoreDuo 1,66 1GB RAM, 100 GB HDD.
Bluetooth Foldable Keyboard from Think Outside.
Bluetooth Mouse from RadTech (not shown)
DAC: Musical Fidelity X DAC V3. 192 KHz upo sampling.
VALVe Stage: Musical Fidelity X-10V3
Int. AMP: Musical Fidelity X-150
Speakers : ProAc 1 SC fed by Nordost Blue Heaven Bi Wire cables.
Pics: From the Musical Fidelity WebSite gallery.
PS: The ProAcs are, of course , those cherry wonders on top of the lighter floorstanding ones ( used as stands because they are so BAD comparatively ...)
Comments
Originally posted by progmac
i don't really know much about what you're talking about, but it looks pretty and shiny.
Thanks ;-).
I showed this to my Audio dealer and it blew him away.
The mini is the perfect Digital Source for Audio.
Now, my next project is to use the Mac mini to stream to another one ( no word on Video Airport Express, yet) conected to my DLP Cinema projector and Focal ICube Amplifier/DAC/Sub unit with Anthony Gallo Micro speakers
my stereo does not yet have an iTunes hook up. Until the airport express is updated to have fewer audio dropouts, I am staying with my little iPod dock.
http://www.pbase.com/e1618978/great_room_stereo
Originally posted by e1618978
nice - beautiful stand, and I like the speakers too.
my stereo does not yet have an iTunes hook up. Until the airport express is updated to have fewer audio dropouts, I am staying with my little iPod dock.
http://www.pbase.com/e1618978/great_room_stereo
GASP..Took a look at your speakers....
I wouldn't call any of my stuff audiophile gear after seeing your set up. ( is that a AudioNote phono stage next to the turntables...?)
Very nice and impressive. ( i think we talked before , no ?)
regarding drop outs , I can't say I noticed any when using Airport Express streaming AIFF files, but I was on the same room.
I think that for CDs, the transport is dead. I mean, as long as yiou have a good clock generator, or regenerator and a decent DAC you don't really need one.
Not the same with turntables. That's a different story.
I am also buliding another stereo (low budget) setup and thinking about ...
1- Benchmark DAC 1
2- Audio Research VS55i or PrimaLuna Prologue 2
3- ProAcs reference 8 signature ( Iknow, It's an addiction...
I agree about transports not mattering very much - which is why I buy cheap ones (like my DVD changer). If you go too cheap they break after just a few months, though - like my Apex player did.
turntables: Nottingham hyperspace w/12" anna arm, Benz micro ebony cartridge (for me) and a Rega planar 2 (for the family).
tuner: Magnum Dynalab Etude
pre-amp: cheap tube preamp (Antique Sound Lab) - this is a stand in for my real pre-amp which is home-made (TX-102 passive transformers, built in K&K audio phono-pre and RAC DAC - www.kandkaudio.com) - but it is in pieces in the shop right now as I expand the number of inputs. The DAC has an accessory board for clock regeneration, but I haven't put it in yet.
phono pre: (copper fronted chassis in picture, seperate copper fronted power supply on bottom) made myself. It took 18 months of weekend sweat and tears - Kevin Carter of K&K audio custom designed it based on some things I heard about the Aesthetix Io phono pre.
rack: RixRax (www.rixrax.com)
amps: Bryston 4Bs drive subs, homemade amp in the middle (push-pull KT88 ) drives towers. Active crossover comes with speakers.
speakers: Nearfield Acoustics pipedreams.
Originally posted by European guy
1- Benchmark DAC 1
2- Audio Research VS55i or PrimaLuna Prologue 2
3- ProAcs reference 8 signature ( Iknow, It's an addiction...
I don't have any experience with the first two - but I love ProAc speakers.
Originally posted by Trendannoyer
e with all those hard surfaces your audio must bounce around the room something awful, what sound absorption have you in that room?
Its not as bad as it looks, probably due to the toys and such. Hard surfaces are not a problem if they are irregular (like bookshelves) so that they break up the sound. In general I think it is better to have a room that is too "live" rather than too "dead" - you can deaden it down with stuffed furnature or bookshelves, but nothing can save a too dead room.
Now - when we clear the room out, particularly when the rug behind the speakers goes away, then it is really bad. We have had some teenage dance parties in that room that sounded just horrible.
It is not the best sound room I ever had, but not the worst either. My mother-in-law has a stone floor, glass walls, and a wood ceiling - now there is a bad room.
Originally posted by e1618978
I agree about transports not mattering very much - which is why I buy cheap ones (like my DVD changer). If you go too cheap they break after just a few months, though - like my Apex player did.
I acctually love apex: they play DVDs regaurdless of region, they have optical and coax surround out, and they are like $15-30 here...
Originally posted by e1618978
Its not as bad as it looks, probably due to the toys and such. Hard surfaces are not a problem if they are irregular (like bookshelves) so that they break up the sound. In general I think it is better to have a room that is too "live" rather than too "dead" - you can deaden it down with stuffed furnature or bookshelves, but nothing can save a too dead room.
re a too dead room.. mirrors!
just disscussing this very topic today (for a studio control room) large HEAVY curtians etc. going back in. replaceing the carpet with some wooden flooring.. the rooms now empty and sounds like turd.. cant believe how much shelves and wall hangings and this and that... mostly some sound absorbing foam.. helped
Originally posted by e1618978 Now - when we clear the room out, particularly when the rug behind the speakers goes away, then it is really bad. We have had some teenage dance parties in that room that sounded just horrible.[/B]
teenage dance parties... arnt they MENT to sound horrible
Originally posted by e1618978 It is not the best sound room I ever had, but not the worst either. My mother-in-law has a stone floor, glass walls, and a wood ceiling - now there is a bad room. [/B]
dear me, sounds nasty.
Rod
id hate to have to do the internal wiring
Originally posted by Trendannoyer
ment to ask.. what ohms are those speaker "towers" rated at?
id hate to have to do the internal wiring
I'm not sure - the manual does not specify, but they are somewhere between 4 and 8 ohms. The towers are so sensitive that you can drive them to loud volumes with a 2 watt tube amp, but the subs take much more amplifier power to drive.
The towers each have 32 tweeters and 18 midrange drivers (wired in some kind of series parellel combination, I imagine, to get a reasonable impedance).
The subs (barrel like objects in the pictures) each have a pair of 18" drivers in a push-pull configuration (one pointed up and one down).
You get very low distortion sound, because each driver has such an easy job to do - I'm sure that the speakers could go over 130dB in my room, so normally they have almost no load on them.