Phil's System

by philb7777 on All Out Assault
Analog Front End
Listening Chair

Description

My room is dedicated, 15 ft wide, 21 feet long and 9 foot ceiling. Walls built custom with ASC tube traps wall damping system and double sheetrocked with 2x6 studs on 8 inch centers. Surrounding damping in room with ASC tube traps, base traps and wall traps. The room is exceedingly quiet with minimal audible reflections. The system has great synergy between components and by my ear offers the best qualities of 'tube like' sound with the best qualities of solid state.
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Room Details

Dimensions: 21’ × 15’  Medium
Ceiling: 9’

Components Toggle details

    • Rockport Technologies Cygnus Loudspeakers
    Newest Rockport/Andy Payer design.  Exceptional build quality, custom drivers, new tweeter wave guide.  Fantastic bass - tuneful, textured and detailed, yet fast and extended.  Palpable midrange with great image density and texture.  Smooth extended and extremely 'open' highs with great decay and ambience/space retrieval.  Sound staging with 3D images even in the back portion of soundstage.  Great macro and micro dynamics.  Overall, realism of soundstage is so believable its spooky.  Cant find a fault with them with the exception that one must be extremely patient with set up - it pays off big time though!
    • Cardas Golden Reference
    Interconnects XLR and RCA
    • Cardas Golden Reference
    single wired
    • Billy Bags Turntable Stand
    VPI Aries 3 and SDS on stand
    • VPI Industries HW 16.5
    Record cleaner
    • ASC Tube traps, bass traps, wall traps
    ASC tube traps, wall traps and bass traps
    • ASC Wall Damping System
    Walls built with ASC tube trap wall damping system (see system description for details).
    • TW Acustic Raven AC - 1
    TW Acustic Raven AC-1. Great turntable. Build is fantastic. Images rock solid, great harmonics and decay. Very musical. Black backgrounds.
    • TW Acustic Raven 10.5
    TW 10.5 tonearm. Great build, Nimble and tracks great. Joy to use. Gets every bit of data from the grooves.
    • Silent Running Audio Ohio XL Isobase
    Custom built Ohio XL Isobase for the TW-Acustic Raven AC. Great product and great isolation, No noise floor what so ever!
    • TW Acustic Black Knight Feet
    Tope of the line TW Acustic Black Knight Feet for turntable.
    • HRS Analog Disk Center Weight
    Great and effective center weight from HRS.
    • Gingko Acrylic Turntable Cover
    Effective turntable cover from Gingko
    • REL Acoustics Gibraltor G1
    Seamless integration with the Avalons to get the last few 20-25 Hz bottom end in my room.
    • Marantz SA-8004
    CD/SACD/DAC. Great for streaming with Apple TV or other device.
    • Audio Research Reference Phono 2 SE
    Fantastic tube phono stage. Super quiet with all the benefits of tubes. All the reviews are right - super refined and detailed with incredible flexibility.
    • Audio Research Reference 250 Monoblocks
    Super quiet, fast and detailed. Great bass control far surpassing most tube amps that I have experienced. Best of solid state and best of tubes in these amps!
    • Audio Research REF 5 se
    REF 5se preamp. Great dynamics, bloom, ambience and texture. Phenomenal detail. A powerhouse preamp with finesse.
    • Auralex Q Diffusers
    Added diffusers to room to balance absorption and diffusion.
    • TW Acustic TW Turntable mat
    New TW turntable mat - custom for TW tables
    • Dynavector XV-1T
    Dynavector XV-1T. Big step up from XV-1s.
    • Avalon Acoustics Eidolon Diamond
    Incredible sound and synergy with Rowland and Cardas, great with almost all types of music, fantastic holography, soundstaging, air around images and very musical
    • Silver Circle Audio TCHAIK 6 and Vesuvius IIE Power Cord
    Fantastic non-current limiting power conditioner
    • Billy Bags Design Three Level Rack and Amp Stands
    • TW Acustic Black Knight Platter / Bearing upgrade for Raven AC
    Great upgrade, more air, transparency and even lower noise floor than what I already had which is amazing.
    • TW Acustic Three Motor Pod upgrade
    Similar to the Black Knight motor - speed stability is now spot on at 33.3 or 45.0 RPM without variation.  Better pitch, PRAT and deeper and tighter bass.  Great upgrade.
    • Air Tight Opus -1 Cartridge
    • Silver Circle Audio Tchaik 6
    • Miyajima Labs Zero Mono Cartridge

Comments 96

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The reason I asked you that question is that Avalon distributor in Hong Kong told me the same thing that Rowland and Cardas are the best match for Avalon. I am living in Shanghai and had to buy Avalon through my HK distributor. I am using Krell Evo 400 monoblocks and Audioquest Everest speaker cables. I have no problem with this set up, but just don't know how different or whether they are better with Rowland/Cardas.

Yes, I love the Avalon speakers. There is really nothing like them out in the marketplace. Had B&W 801 Nautilus before and was thinking about upgrading to the Diamond series until I demoed at Avalon dealer in Hong Kong. Could not believe how sweet and musical they sounded, with an incredible transparency and sound stage. Felt like I was totally wrapped in music....

avguy

Hi Phil, I love your set up. I also bought recently a pair of Avalon Eidolon, not the Diamond, but Vision. I love the sound of these speakers. Just curious, what made you choose the Jeff Rowland amplifier and the Cardas Golden Reference interconnect and speaker cables?

avguy

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