Thread: Chops' Current System Pics ....

Originally Posted by chops

Again, please... My name is Charles.

Ok, Charles if you knew how many guys I know whose name (baptized, whatever) is Charles and go by Chuck, Chaz and or Charlie, well you get the point. Try not to get so upset...........

As for your listening experience with the new hybrids I suspect it was in less than stellar room set ups. The new hybrids are clearly superior with respect to bass / panel integration over the previous generation cousins.

I do wonder tho with regards to your right speaker, it appears to be firing into the sofa ?

Everyone keeps talking about the walnut rails on these 22 year old SL3's, so here they are in all of their minty fresh glory.

With regard to your listening experience with the new Renaissance line from Logan, one of the members over on the M/L forum has just made the switch from SL3's to the 11a's ...................

Impression 11A in the house | MartinLogan Owners (MLO)

With regard to your listening experience with the new Renaissance line from Logan, one of the members over on the M/L forum has just made the switch from SL3's to the 11a's ...................

Impression 11A in the house | MartinLogan Owners (MLO)

Removed the Aegir amps and replaced them with a single Roksan Caspian Mk I amp. Also removed the Panasonic DAT and will integrate it into the cassette deck stack in the back of the room at a later date.

Here's the latest, with the 22 year old Roksan Caspian powering the 22 year old Martin Logan SL3's. Surprisingly, a fantastic combo! Also swapped in the old NOS 1930's RCA 6F8G tubes into the preamp stage of the Freya+, keeping the stock JJ 6SN7's in the voltage stage.

Update... Polk PSW505 subs out, JL Audio e110 subs finally back in after 3 years of them sitting in the closet with faulty amps. Finally repaired and updated.

Some better daytime pics...

Just reinstalled the IsoAcoustics iso-200sub isolators under the JL's. Man, putting the subs on these and getting them off the suspended wood floor, it's like the subs gained a solid 3+ dB of output below 30 Hz, now easily pumping out very usable output below 20 Hz. I actually had to turn the gains down a touch. Apparently, the suspended wood floors soak up a lot of that low frequency energy. I listened to the Greyhound soundtrack (Tom Hanks movie) the other day with these subs, and there was plenty of deep bass, but not like now. Now it's really deep.








And of course, my "little" music girl, Charlie.

I did a few more things recently... Sold the Music Hall mmf-7.3 turntable and Schiit Mani to my oldest brother, drove 130 miles round trip to pick up an absolutely mint Emotiva XPA-2 Gen 2 amplifier, installed taller shelf poles and cross braces for my Vulcan rack to make room for that huge amp, and removed all of the cabling coming from and going to the stack of cassette decks in the back of the room for now.

Originally Posted by Spock

And the sound ???

Well, I've been able to listen to them for a bit today at decent volume levels, and I am quite impressed.

For the volumes that I would ever normally play at, the sound is completely effortless. I pushed the system a little harder today than I ever will on any other day (just to test things out), and still, completely effortless sound. Open, smooth, refined top end, a full bodied midrange that gives vocals a very natural sound, and great bass that has a lot of control and texture. This bass is also portrayed through my subwoofers since they receive their high level signals from the amp.

Something that I noticed immediately at all volumes, even at low and moderate, is that this amp lets the SL3's create a larger wall of sound. This wall of sound seems to be taller than the speakers and definitely wider, sometimes beyond the walls depending on the recording.

For the most part, I would say the overall sound is neutral with just the slightest lean towards the warm side. This was determined with the Schiit Freya+ in both tube mode and mosfet mode.

Running the two Schiit Aegir amps sounded good. Running the Roksan Caspian sounded even better. So far, I can confidently say that this Emotiva amp sounds considerably better than those amps. So far, I believe this has been a good decision going with this amp, and the Gen 2 in particular.

so what do you play your Lp's on ??

Originally Posted by Mikado463

so what do you play your Lp's on ??

We still have an older Project TT in the bedroom system, which that system has been seeing some upgrades lately as well.

Originally Posted by Spock

I was curious because I already had a Roksan Caspian that I considered an excellent amplifier.
If Emotiva surpasses him, then surely he enters high end territory.

Congratulations on the up grade.
You have now a beautiful system

The Roksan is definitely a great amp. It does pretty much everything right. It just doesn't have the oomph for these hungry Martin Logan's. With that being said, going to this Emotiva amp, in my system also paints a much larger picture, even at low and medium volumes, volumes that the Roksan had no issues whatsoever to play at as well. So well within the power capabilities of the Caspian to run comfortably for days on end, the Emotiva just does better. tonality wise, they are very similar, just that there's a little more meat on the bone in the midrange with the Emotiva. And the bass with the Emotiva is a bit tighter, a bit more textured, and just as meaty as the Roksan. Treble on both are very similar.

Congratulations, it can be a long process getting a system to sing.

Originally Posted by steve59

Congratulations, it can be a long process getting a system to sing.

This is true. A lot of trial and error.

Last night I had the opportunity to really crank the system for several hours, playing a variety of albums from The Rolling Stones, U2, 311, David Bowie, Sting, Jimmy Buffet, some original soundtracks, and a few others.

I wanted to push the system and was playing these tracks at louder than normal levels than I would ever normally do. After about an hour the top of the amp was getting decently warm to the touch, so it was getting a good workout for sure. It's a good thing I bought those 10" rack extensions instead of using the stock 8.25" ones that came with the rack. It would have left about a half inch of air space above the amp. With these longer extensions (and cross braces), I have nearly 2 inches of clearance there. Plenty of breathing room.

One thing that stood out immediately was the completely relaxed, unstrained, non-fatiguing sound, especially on the top end. Crisp and airy without ever being bright, harsh or brash. Just as composed, controlled and effortless as one would want out of their system. And I had the system running for nearly four hours straight like this, so if the amp was going to shut down due to heat or over-current or some other thing that electrostats like to punish amps with, it was going to do it now. I'm glad to report that it never did. It just kept truckin' along like it was nothing. And system tonality remained the same whether the passages were quiet or loud. It simply got quieter or louder, never becoming hard or brittle sounding, compressed or congested.

Another trait of this amp is it's ability to pull out inner details and space/depth. These are very familiar albums that I have listened many times over the years, and most of them within the past couple of months/weeks as I use some of them as test tracks. Last night, I heard new things that I never knew were in these recordings before, such as soft voices way off to one side (that sound like they probably shouldn't be there), very light, distant triangles ringing, two guitars playing in unison when I always thought it was only one, more apparent rattling of the wires on snare drums when the snares aren't even being used, something somewhere in the recording venue rattling way off to the far left, well outside the boundaries of my room.

Oh, one last thing to mention... With The Rolling Stones, Bridges to Babylon... On the last track, "How Can I Stop", the last 20 seconds or so of that song, there's a bunch of cymbals crashing and smashing all over the place for an extended period of time, about 10 or 12 seconds straight. With all of the amps and all of the speakers I have played this song on, I always had to turn the volume down considerably when this part came up because it is just way too loud and way to bright, shrilly and downright painful, not to mention the concern of blowing tweeters or amps. Even with these Martin Logan's, this passage would be way to bright and shrilly.

Well I am extremely happy to say that last night, with this amp, none of that happened. I never touched the volume once, and this was the very first time ever that I was able to hear this part in all its glory. Not once did it become brash or harsh or painful or the like. I was so shocked at this I played the last two tracks over again. Completely amazed that this section of the recording was so tamed, controlled and detailed without any of the nasty side effects.

I know it seems that I'm blowing this amp to some kind of giant killer bargain amp, but that's not the case at all. I've had plenty of different, a lot more expensive, just as powerful if not more powerful amps in the past, some of which paired with these very speakers. But in this system combination, I have never heard these speakers sound better. And the best part, this amp barely cost me $700! I figured I didn't have anything to lose at such a low price. This time around, it paid off.

I know there are much more capable amplifiers out there, but I would have to shell out a whole heck of a lot more money (probably close to 10x as much) to get anything worth the improvement.

They're walnut.

Removed those trim pieces on either side of the face. I think it looks much better.

Charles, I had a pair of ML SL3 just like yours. In that same trim and approximately 22-20 years ago. McCormack DNA.05 amp and Audible Illusions Modulus 3 tubed preamp. Don’t recall exactly what I had for a front end at the time. Great speakers

Originally Posted by TheOctopus

Charles, I had a pair of ML SL3 just like yours. In that same trim and approximately 22-20 years ago. McCormack DNA.05 amp and Audible Illusions Modulus 3 tubed preamp. Don’t recall exactly what I had for a front end at the time. Great speakers

I love the SL3's. They're a good "all-rounder" speaker, and surprisingly dynamic for a stat. I almost purchased a DNA.05 a few weeks back for the SL3's, but figured I might need more power than the 200 watts it puts out into 4 ohms, and was a little concerned about its age, not to mention a decent sized dent it had on the right rear corner that happened while he was taking the pics of it. That's the main reason why I passed on it.

Originally Posted by Spock

Yes, you did right!

Thank you. I think it gives it a more serious, more traditional look.

I have never heard emotiva gear, but have snickered at folk that would buy a $22k pair of speakers and then drive them with emotiva. dang, I'm one of those types

Originally Posted by steve59

I have never heard emotiva gear, but have snickered at folk that would buy a $22k pair of speakers and then drive them with emotiva. dang, I'm one of those types

To be honest, I was like that as well. And my systems were never exotic enough to be snobby about, but they have always sounded better and better the more they've changed over the years.

The more I listened to my brother's system with his different Emotiva amps over the past few years, I decided to give one a try. Did a little research and read multiple times that the Gen 2 is one of the best sounding that Emotiva ever made. I have to say, I'm not unimpressed. And with weight aside (75 lbs), this amp is built like a tank.

On Christmas Eve, one of my brothers came over with his Emotiva XPA DR-2 amp for me to try out in my system for a while, being able to directly compare it to my Emotiva XPA-2 Gen 2. He just purchased an integrated tube amp and also just ordered a Doge Audio tube preamp that he's waiting on to be built. So in the meantime, he's letting me run the DR-2 in my system. Plus this is a comparison I wanted to do anyway, just for fun.

And with either amp in the system, my kitties still enjoy hanging out in here chilling to old jazz, classical and old rock. Well, any music really. LOL

The cat would find itself outside if it thought my amps were a good place to sit.

Well I'm glad I'm not you.

I also have a music listening buddy who crawls all over my chair to find "his spot" when we listen to music together. He doesn't go near my system though .

Mine don't either, except on the subs. The amp was sitting on the floor for 10 minutes, and was still warm, which is the only reason he got on it. Shortly after the pic was taken, he hopped off and went about his business.

How do the Carver monoblocks sound with the Sopras?

Originally Posted by ozzy

To me they sound great!
I have owned a few amps, some solid state Pass Labs X350.5 etc., and now a couple of tube amps, Atmasphere and the Carvers. The Carvers have the power and the impedance to match very well with the Sopra 2's

BTW, I am running my Lumin X1 direct to the Bob Carver amps. (no preamp).

ozzy

Can you please start your own thread for your own system, instead of posting your system in my thread?

Originally Posted by chops

Can you please start your own thread for your own system, instead of posting your system in my thread?

Thread title changed ...

Noted!

Originally Posted by ozzy

To me they sound great!
I have owned a few amps, some solid state Pass Labs X350.5 etc., and now a couple of tube amps, Atmasphere and the Carvers. The Carvers have the power and the impedance to match very well with the Sopra 2's

BTW, I am running my Lumin X1 direct to the Bob Carver amps. (no preamp).

ozzy

You have been chopped by Chops!

Chop-a-doodle-doo. Any Chop will do.

I chopped my finger last night with my new ultra sharp kitchen knife. Blood pouring out all over the kitchen bench. Any chop will do, except that one

So much immaturity around here, and obviously zero respect.

Seriously... this is Charles thread. I really want to see Ozzy's system, but he should do it in his own thread, not jump into someone else's. This entire section is for people to start a thread about their system changes and updates. It really is kind of rude to post your system into someone else's system thread.... well unless your name is Chop...

Other's having a little fun about it is ok, but sorry Ozzy, kinda of rude dude.

Playing around with some "new" NOS tubes that just showed up, as well as the 6SN7 tube adapters to use them in the Freya+...

Raytheon/Baldwin 12AU7's on the left, GE 6CG7 on the right. I also have a pair of GE 6FQ7's, which are identical to the 6CG7, but the 6CG7 utilizes a shield between the two plates.

Nice... Tube rolling can be fun. When I got the tube active stage for my pre the first thing I did was grab some extra tubes, both NOS and new! Sounds like you are having fun with it Charles.

Originally Posted by kzhtoo

I don’t think ozzy knew he was posting in chop’s thread. The thread was titled “my current system pics” before. After ozzy’s mistake, Joe changed it to “chops’ current system pics”.

I think a similar incident had happened before due to the same misleading title.

I will certainly give you that as a possibility, although I thought it was pretty obvious. Anyway, this is Charles thread so I am not gonna go down that road 😊.