Description

My listening room is (19.5x15 with 8 foot ceiling sloping to 11, w/four dedicated 20amp lines). This is probably the biggest and best change I have made to my system.

I recently made drastic changes to my equipment. I went from high power (ARC VT200) and 'Stats (Martin Logan Prodigy's) to an SET amp with Avantgarde horns. I added the Aesthetix Callisto, and upgraded some PC,s as well.

Recent tweeks have included the Realtraps, NOS tubes, home made diffusors and maple butcher block, Lead blocks for components, Valid Points....... and a VPI record cleaner

I would love to get some feedback and/or comments from fellow Audiogoners, any advice is appreciated.

Thanks for looking

Chris
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Components Toggle details

    • Avantgarde Avantgarde Duo 3.2's
    Upgrades include: Cardas internal wiring throughout, Cardas Power cords, Cardas jumpers, Black Diamond Racing footers and pucks.... Cactus Green!
    • Art Audio PX-25
    6 glorious SET wpc!!! Low gain version w/Cardas conncects and stepped volume. NOS tubes: Amperex 6922's, RCA 12BH7's, Herbies tube dampers, valid points.
    • Aesthetix Callisto Signature
    All NOS tubes at this point... Telefunken AX7, Mullard 6922 goldpin, RCA 6SN7/5692's... The biggest improvement came from the Genelex NOS KT-66's.
    • Audio Research Ref. Phono
    Tube phono stage
    • Garrard 301
    I restored and built the plint. Added the Triplanar and Holy Cow!!! This thing is a killer!
    • Triplanar VII
    Tonearm........ Nice
    • ZYX Airy 3S-SB
    .24mv
    • Theta Miles
    Balanced
    • Alesis Masterlink
    A great tool for production work (mastering home recordings), burning CD's etc.
    • Purist Audio Designs Venustas
    3-meter XLR pair from pre-amp to power amp
    • Purist Audio Designs Venustas
    1.5 meter pair RCA phono pre to pre-amp
    • Purist Audio Designs Venustas Bi-wire
    Bi-wire 3 meter set
    • Purist Audio Designs Venustas XLR
    1 meter XLR CD player to pre-amp
    • Audioquest Ski XLR
    Balanced IC's from CD to Preamp
    • Hovland Music Groove II
    Phono Interconnects Turntable to Phono Pre
    • Argento Reference Level 2
    one on the Art Audio power amp and one on the Aesthetix Callisto
    • Shunyata Anaconda VX
    1.8 meter for Theta Miles (digital)
    • Zoethecus 5 tier
    z-slabs
    • Zoethecus 3 tier
    3 tier stand with Z slabs
    • Walker Valid Points Valid Points
    Resonance control
    • Realtraps Mondo, Mini, HF absobers
    Room tuning products
    • My own Diffusors
    Oak Diffusors......... I use these at the first reflection points to good effect (loosly based on the RPG model).
    • My own Maple butcher block
    2 inch piece under the Art Audio. 4 inch under Garrard with decoupled pod for the tonearm.

Comments 64

Showing all comments by kevinzoe.

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Hi Chris,
Great gear, great room, great music storage shelves!
It looks like you've mixed some RealTraps Mondo(?) by the left speaker with ASC Tube Traps by the middle of the front wall. What are you using, that looks like a diffusor, on the left wall? Any treatments behind the seating position or on the right wall?

I know at one point in time you were exploring bi-amping with your ML speakers. Like you, I have the same PX25 amp and when I met Joe Fratus of Art Audio at the Montreal stero show in April he said it'd be better to bi-amp with either another PX25 amp (although I wanted SS for the bass) or one other model of his amps (whose name escapes me now) so as to best match the two amp's sonic characteristics, impedance etc etc. Matching a SS amp with tubes would be dicey - different speed etc etc.

Isolation looks very important to you - have you heard of an interesting company called Minus-K? They are a scientific company that as a biproduct of their main work now offer audiophiles very impressing amp stands . . . just FYI.

Congrats again on a great looking system.

kevinzoe

Cmo,
Very nice system! Did you ever get around to trying passive bi-amping the ML speakers? And if you did, did you vertically or horizontally bi-amp them? Did bi-amping sound different/better than a single amp and if so was one biamp approach (e.g. vertical) any better than another?

Cheers,
Kevinzoe

kevinzoe