USB DA converter. I replaced the 3500.00 Wavelength Cosecant with this and I like it better! This has to be one of the best kept secrets in digital.
Oritek X2
from cosecant to preamp
Ayre Acoustics K-1xr
remote, no phono best piece of hifi I've ever bought!
Harmonix X-DC Wattgate
for the preamp
Oritek X1B
from preamp to amp
Parasound Parasound Halo JC-1
400 watt solid state monoblocks
Elrod EPS 3S
for the amps
Von Schweikert Audio VR4SR
Dynamic full range 4 way speakers system, in Ebony.
Von Schweikert Verbatim cable
single wire with built in jumpers made just for the VR speakers. I love the sound of these cables.
BPT 3.5 signature
everything plugs into it
Elrod EPS 3S
20amp cord for the BPT
Grand Prix Audio LeMans 5 shelf
everything sits on it
Grand Prix Audio LeMans 4 Shelf
rack
Grand Prix Audio F1 carbon shelves
I have 2 of these, one under the turntable and one under the Cosecant DAC
Grand Prix Audio Apex feet
Upraded feet for both Lemans racks
Alesis Masterlink
CD player/recorder. I use this to record from vinyl and casette
Audience Power Chord
for the Masterlink
Wadia 17
AD converter for use in recording from vinyl and casette tape. Hugely improves on the sound of the Alesis Masterlink doing the AD conversion. I get stellar recordings from my vinyl mostly due to this piece
Acoustic Zen Krakatoa
for the Wadia 17
Oritek X2
goes from preamp record out to the input on the Wadia 17.
Acoustic Zen MC2
SPDIF digital from Wadia 17 to the Alesis Masterlink
Nakamichi BX-300
Great tape deck for archiving some of my unreplacable old tapes to CDR
Oritek X1
from the tape deck to the preamp
Apple mac mini
Used to store and playback all my digital files via itunes. This is musically the single best thing I've ever done. I have over 2TB of lossless files and counting!
Apple Powerbook
I use this along with a virtual network controler (Chicken of the VNC) to control my mac mini remotely. I can sit in the sweet spot with my laptop and have access to all of my music!
The VNC program lets you use the laptop to control the mini, you see on the laptop screen what is happening on the mini. It works fine you can do everything this way. It is a little slower than using a monitor for the mini, but if you don't have a way to integrate that into your system it's a great option. I am using Chicken of the VNC program. It was free and not to hard to set up.
I don't have the version mini with the remote but my friend does and he says it is great for quick scrolling and playing. You can also use the iphone or ipod touch as a remote control for itunes. This is really cool and works great. When I am playing itunes I usually have the iphone with me and I can pick and choose and even lower the volume if needed.
I was using 5 250gb drives and one 500gb drive chained via firewire together. Recently I switched over to a Western Digital Mybook studio 2TB drive. It is not much bigger than one of those single drives and is very quiet and only costs about 400.00. The mini is quiet too. It makes a little noise when ripping music but other than that unless you are sitting right next to it you wouldn't know it was there.
I do have my mini and hard drive sitting on my Grand Prix Rack.
I highly recommend the mini w/USB DAC route. It is simple and has been very reliable for me. I have a huge library and it is no problem. It sounds better than any high dollar CD player I've used. I can't imagine having to dig through racks of CDs to find what I want to listen to, plus listening to your whole collection on shuffle is pretty fun and you can't do that with a CD player.
Don't lay down the cash for the Cosecant (or anything else for that matter) until you hear the Paradisea. The Cosecant for me was dull and on the lifeless side compared to the Paradisea. I would say the Paradisea gets much closer to the vibe of vinyl which is what I prefer most.
Mike, I can tell you the Dais is better, but if I could get all the money back that it cost to upgrade from the Horizon I would. If I were doing it again I would look at the 294 you mentioned. The real magic started with just getting a table then it was refined by getting a better one.
I'm sure a lot of other brands are just as good if not even better. The nice thing about Nottingham is how simple they are. I can tell you the Dais is pure luxury to use, so solid and well built.
My first table (other than like 15 years ago) was the Nottingham Horizon. I was so impressed by how good vinyl sounded and liked the sound of the Horizon I decided to jump way up the Nottingham line and get the Dais. It is a lot better than the Horizon for sure but the Horizon was still the biggest jump in sound. The Dais is quieter and deeper etc... but both have the magic. I just stuck with the Nottingham stuff since I wasn't that much of an analog expert and the Nottinghams are pretty user friendly. I wouldn't mind hearing some other stuff now that I am comfortable with setting stuff up.
System edited: Swapped out the Dynavector DV20XL for the XX-2mk2, which is a worthwile upgrade. Sadly I've found the more you spend the better the sound with cartridges. The magic starts to happen with the high buck stuff. The Wavelength Cosecant was replaced by the MHDT Paradisea +. WOW what an upgrade and a savings of 3000.00 over the cost of the Cosecant. I can wholeheartedly reccomend the Paradisea + to anyone looking for state of the art digital sound at a real world price. I've tried some high buck digital stuff over the years and I like this the best.
System edited: Updated changes that have happened in the last 1.5 years. I am done! I would like to get the Shelter Harmony cartridge and a top dog phono pre when funds are a plenty though, so I guess I'm not really done done.
