Stewart's Page

(click on pictures for a larger view)

Main Music System -

Sony CDP715E – a curious player, not a ‘flagship’ by any means, but it brought together all Sony’s best CD chips in a way not really improved since (of course, I would say that!).

Sony ST-S505ES tuner – one of the best analogue tuners I’ve heard, certainly better than 99.9% of current programming… :-(

Krell KSA-50mkII power amp - an all-time classic, still keeps on doing its job. Transparent and will drive *anything*. Would only change it for something that will put at least 800 watts into 2 ohms!

Apogee Duetta Signature speakers - another all-time classic, sadly now difficult to get spares, since the company went belly-up. I live in constant fear of a blown tweeter, although the enormous 'voice coils' will absorb *huge* amounts of power without complaint, much more than my 'titchy' Krell will put out. In the main picture below, the speakers are pushed back into their 'party' position, where they are swapped left to right and placed at 45 degrees to the back wall. This works incredibly well, due to the dipole radiating pattern of the speakers and the edge positioning of the tweeter ribbons, but for 'serious' listening, I still use them pulled out five feet into the room, and three feet from the side walls, with the tweeters on the inside. With no toe-in, the angle to the listening position is actually the same as in the 'party' position, but the sound is even more 'open', which is a particular strength of this system.

Just as important is the room itself. which is 25 x 18 feet with a split-level floor giving 8 and 9 foot ceiling heights. Construction is concrete floor, 13-inch thick brick and block walls, and heavily joisted ceiling with plasterboard covering. There are four triple-glazed six-foot windows in the long walls with full-length lined velvet curtains, a heavy wool carpet with thick rubber underlay over most of the floor, and solid oak flooring in the sunken section. The room is fairly 'dead' with virtually no 'slap echo' when the curtains are drawn. The listening position is about ten feet from the speakers in their 'pulled out' position, and I'd describe it as a good listening room with the necessary symmetry to develop a convincing stereo soundstage.

Interconnects are home-brewed unshielded twisted pair made from 0.6mm solid-core Teflon-coated silver-clad OFHC copper (just standard MIL-spec hookup wire), while connectors are either Neutrik XLR or Deltron Teflon/alloy RCA jacks. The treble ribbons on the speakers are wired with the same twisted-pair, the resistance of this skinny wire is used to bypass an internal switch and resistor which are normally used to set the treble level. The bass panels are wired with Naim NACA5, no reason other than the dealer offered it free with my previous Magnepan MG1C speakers.

Vinyl is played by a Michell GyroDec with RB300 arm and Audio-Technica OC9 cart. I'd like a SME10/V with Lyra daCapo, but I can't justify it - especially to 'she who must be obeyed'! The Gyro is the black/gold 'export' version with smoked acrylic plinth and lid, modified with silicone damping of the springs and bitumastic inserts in the plinth arms, while the arm is rewired with silver-clad 30AWG Tefzel-coated solid-core OFHC wire (OK, it's standard wirewrap wire!), dressed to minimise torque effects across the record surface. The Gyro has the standard cone feet, which rest on three pound coins (I can't afford sovereigns!) to protect the wooden table. Yes folks, I used to be a 'tweak'! In fact, in the main system pic, you might be able to spot a bunch of Michell cones to the left of the Krell. They used to be under my Maggies, but now they're just a table decoration........

There's a home-brewed phono headamp in an 'Eddystone' alloy box at the back right of the 'table, hard-wired to the arm with my usual unscreened twisted pair. There are no hum problems from the tightly twisted pair, and connectors are the source of most problems at microvolt levels. The design is balanced input with 3 opamps/channel, shunt feedback, and passive HF EQ to kill transients and avoid saturation.

There's a home-brewed passive controller using Pickering ruthenium-tipped relays, a 10k Penny & Giles studio pot (not 'studio grade' - the real thing!) and Neutrik XLR connectors. A low-noise home-brewed 30-0-30 volt DC supply drives the relays and the phono headamp. The 'preamp' doesn't look much, but the parts alone cost over £500! In the picture, you can also see my JVC XRCD collection on top of the housing unit. As a group, they have the best quality I've ever heard from CD, and there's no fancy technology, it's just 'CD done right'.

 

Telly sound system -

Sony KV-X2972U TV (does a decent job, but may soon be replaced by a 16:9 36" Tosh – I’m scared of screen burn with current plasmas!)

Pioneer DV-515 DVD player - a decent 2nd-generation player, soon to be replaced by either a Sony NS-905V or a Pioneer DV-757

Sky+ Digibox and HD recorder - a brilliant device, worth every penny to be able to pause and rewind live TV! Shame about the programmes......

Home-brewed passive controller with 20k Alps 'Black Beauty' pot hardwired to Deltron DGS-1 coax cable and Deltron alloy-bodied RCA jacks, with a passive equaliser giving +10dB at 20-30Hz and flat above 90Hz. The equaliser gives 'slam and rumble' for movie soundtracks but avoids boominess on speech, thanks to the sealed box bass alignment and good power handling of the speakers.

Audiolab 8000P power amp - A classic 'no nonsense' power amp, just sits there and passes through whatever's fed to it. Can't be split from the Krell in blind listening. You can't see it in the picture, because it sits at 45 degrees behind the telly.

Tannoy 633 speakers - Good all-rounders, with especially powerful bass response in this application. I'd like to replace them with something like B&W N804s, but it's hard to justify that for most of the source material played on this system.

I've thought about going full ‘7.1’ surround sound, but I find a room-sized soundfield distracting with less than a ten-foot screen, and the present system works pretty well with most movies. I do have plans for a proper 'home cinema' in a spare room, but they're on the back burner until 16:9 DLP projectors come down to a sensible price.

 

Kitchen System -

My wife's system really. The kitchen is 24 x 15 feet with a 7' 3" beamed ceiling and ceramic tiled floor, so it's horribly live - not great sound but goes suitably loud for parties!

Sony KVM 1400U TV - might be replaced by a small widescreen LCD sometime soon

Denon TU-260L - still the classic budget tuner

Denon PMA350II amp - a solid performer, just a little rough at very high 'party' levels

Denon - DCD-825 CD player - works OK, matches the rest of the stack, what can I say? :-)

Mordaunt-Short MS20 speakers - still great-sounding against more modern 200 quid speakers, ports are lightly stuffed to curb boom in the wall-mount position.

 

Computer System -

(Keeps me amused while I'm spending all that time on Usenet.... :-)

Evesham Axis 1900+RK with CD-writer and DVD drive

Soundblaster Audigy soundcard

Rotel RA920AX amplifier

KEF Q15.2 speakers

Cambridge Soundworks CSW4300 5.1 surround system

The KEFs are used for near-field listening to CDs, the CS system for games and the occasional DVD. It all sounds better than you might think, although certainly not 'high end' by any means!