This is my first real audio-only system. It is in my living room, which is open to half the house. The pics don't really show it but the ceiling over the living room is vaulted and the room is open to the loft (above and behind the listener) and the dining room (behind the listener).
The sweet spot is the center seat on the couch in the foreground. You have to lean forward a little for best sound.
My music tastes are eclectic but heavily weighted to bluegrass / folk/ acoustic and female vocalists. About the only genre I don't listen to is hard metal.
Obviously at this point it is as much of a collection as it is a system but I am OK with that. All these components are well thought of, and several are very rare and hard to find.
A little old now (built 1995) but still a good player. Built like a tank!
Sony ST-SA5es
Very nice tuner
Sony Sony MDS-JA50ES minidisc deck
TOTL minidisc deck. Build quality is almost as good as the XA7ES CD player (it is about equal to the XA50ES). It also can be used as a DAC, which is how I mostly use it, using the Onkyo dock as the source.
Sony DTC-ZA5ES DAT Deck
Last ES DAT deck, made when it was clear that DAT was not going to make it. A decent piece but not as good as its predecessors.
Sony TA-E90ES preamp
MOSFET preamp - simple with no tone or balance controls. Stock volume pot was damaged so I replaced it with a motorized ALPS blue velvet pot.
Sony TA-N80ES
200 WPC bipolar powerhouse. Back in the day all the major Japanese electronic companies had 200 watt amps and Sony was no exception. Amps have been recapped and modded.
Cambre Timbre rack
4 shelf rack - I modified it to give more room above my amps. Currently it is beyond its capacity as I have 9 components stacked on it! Eventually I will be looking for something bigger.
Harrison Labs 12 dB attenuators
Two pairs are in use - one between the CDP and preamp, and one on the inputs of the amp that drives the mids and highs (level control for the bass is accomplished via the active crossover)
DIY 12 gauge biwire cables
Conducter is mil spec 12 gauge silver plated copper, teflon insulated. I twisted the wires up into a twisted pair then twisted two pairs in the opposite direction to form a four conductor bundle. I added heat shrink tubing and techflex sleeve for cosmetics. Termination is Nakamichi bananas on the speaker end, nude on amp end.
Terk FM+ antenna
Cheap little FM antenna but it works as well or better than any other indoor antenna I have tried.
Sony RM-AV2100 Remote control
A little old fashioned and clunky looking but you can get them cheap and they are very versatile.
Tripp Lite power strip 10 outlet
Rewired with hospital grade receptacles and power switch and breaker bypassed. all plugs have been replaced with Leviton 8215-C connectors.
Sony SS-M9
Top of the line tower speaker designed by Dan Anagnos
I have relocated to the Greensboro NC area and the offer for a listening session and bourbon tasting still stands! (Although lately I have been more into hi end rums)
System edited: System edited - Replaced the TC-WA9ES cassette deck with a DTC-ZA5ES DAT deck. I much prefer the DAT deck to the cassette deck. On good days the cassette sounded just as good (when recording FM radio) but the DAT deck has been more reliable and easier to deal with, as it can easily record a 2 hour program on one tape.
System edited: System updated - iPod DAC duties are now handled by a MDS-JA50ES minidisc deck instead of the SDP-EP9ES surround processor. I also replaced my own original iPhone with a 64 gb iPod touch, which (barely) holds my whole CD library at 320K VBR AAC. Using the Touch.Remote iPhone app and my iPhone 4 I can now access my whole library at will from my listening position. Really cool!
System edited: Edited to reflect recent changes. Preamp replaced with a TA-E90ES pre. Tape deck and Ipod transport and DAC added. Pics to come soon! P.S. Mjcmt- I came across a pair of Sony SS-M7s on a somewhat local Craigslist. I am using them in my surround system - They are very nice!
Sounds good although I prefer bourbon. Are you anywhere near Central NY :)?
I forgot to mention the XA7ES was another Craigslist find. Near mint condition and the seller said it had under 100 hours on it. Price was reasonable (but not a steal) - I couldn't pass it up!
System edited: Edit - Tentatively replaced the Denon player with a Sony XA7ES CDP. I have been thinking about getting out of SACD for a while now and finding this player has helped spur me along.
Yes I am comparing them to Focal Chorus 710s, which are pretty far down in the JM Labs/Focal lineup. It would be interesting to compare the NHTs to a higher end model like the Chorus 826 but I doubt I will get the chance.
I happened on the NHT's on Craigslist. I haven't tried any other speakers close to them. My only experience is with some mass market JBL and Focal/JM Labs speakers, and the NHTs are clearly on another level.
I have read good things about the classic 3. The Classic Four is basically just a 3 with a built in (passive) sub, so I bet they sound great.
The other night I plugged the port in my Fours with a piece of dense ethafoam cut to shape. I think it has improved the bass quite a bit. I did have a huge room induced 20 db peak at 80 hz. Now it is "only" 10 db. Still room for improvement but much better. I did lose a little bit of bass extension - I was getting noticable output with the 25 hz track on the Rives Test CD 2, and now I need to go to the 32 hz track before I start to hear output. If I was using them for movies I might not like that but for music I think the trade off is worth it.
System edited: System edited to reflect recent changes - the speakers are now actively Bi amped. I was going to cheap out and use Harrison Labs in line crossovers but then I saw NHT was closing out the X2 crossover for half price and couldn't pass it up. I am still fine tuning the various settings but I think the bass is noticably improved in presence and weight.
I did have it set up as you suggested but for domestic reasons I had to change it to the current configuration. It is going to have to stay the way it is through the holidays but after the tree comes down I will lobby to put it back the way it was.
It definitely sounded better with the speakers in front of the bookcases.
