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Got a Leo Kottke CD in yesterday. I have only listened to a few tunes as I was also testing my work on a headphone cable that I completed this morning. He has always had an open sound to his tuning/playing that has been captivating from the beginning.

Rides were so smooth back then, that they used to cut diamonds in the back seat. I had an idea for a helicopter based TT but it never got off the ground.

You know, with the right headers, they get pretty decent bass.

I actually had to tell my own brother to stop acting guilty about something that he did not do. OTOH all you have to do is be accused.

Let neither your successes nor failures ever be due to a lack of effort Made this one up myself when raising kids.

Maybe I can breathe now. Rarely have I ever done anything that fine. And the aluminum wire. As if the task isn't delicate enough.

Yikes. This looks to be a challenge before I even see the rest. Maybe these were near saltwater or something?

I gave my SMS-1 to a good friend as I had no need for it, and I miss it already! Of course, he loves the thing, since he has never really had good bass to begin with. This is a very valuable audio tool.

FWIW, I can tell you at least two different phono preamps that I had issues with. First is the Vincent PHO8. Has a separate power supply and everything. Quiet as a mouse, but not engaging or musical. I kind of had the same experience with one of their preamps too. Then there is the famous Jolida JD9 which has great sound, but the unit that I got used had a slight hum problem. Ok, let's just skip to the end. Don't do it. I lost my ass on this whole deal. Now I don't recommend going expensive like I did (expensive for me anyway). I ended up with a Glass ware Audio product that I built that was more of PITA than anyone can imagine. Again, not to tell the whole story over again, but a bad bad idea for me! To do over again, the Pete Millett phono pre and yes, power it with battery. Oops, there is one catch though. I don't recall the PM phono to have much in the way of adjustment. Dammit. See? I thought that I had you covered, sorry. I will sleep on it. FWIW, if you are a builder, that sort of thing can be accomplished with extra effort. OTD had it right in the first place. There are multiple listings for the Musical Surrounding Nova II phono preamp at eBay. $480 and up.

That is exactly the beauty of such an animal. Some will want to discuss battery noise, but I never had any such issue. Especially in a phono preamp where the gain is high and the AC line current is a cat and mouse thing in some cases. Even the Pete Millett phono pre has a way to be battery operated. Not a new idea but a damned good one.

Battery powered too! My favorite kind of phono set up.

Good point on flexibility. What is your budget?

God, have I ever been through the ninth circle of phono preamp hell. I could be a tour guide. One choice that is not a deal breaker money wise is a Pete Millett design. I tried maybe 4 different preamps, all good names, and that would be my first choice for maybe $500. I built two of them just they are kind of fun. Unlike the other beasts that I had to whip.

Kind of the same experience when I bought a pair of large JBL 4343 back in the 80's. Right to the point, the seller had not wired them correctly. I knew something was very wrong, but took them anyway. Got them home and discovered the error. Yah, they sound way different after that.

Crap, this is just like the good old days when Quad was king.

Welcome and buyer beware is not saying that you should shy away from a good deal, but that you need to be aware of the downside to buying anything used. Anyone who has owned a car gets this. It is great that the unit is fully functional if the seller's description of fully functional is the same as yours. Many of us here buy used noting that it will be rebuilt at least to some degree, making it worthwhile if the price is right. When I buy a C-9 to restore, I don't care if it works or not, but that is different than what you are needing here for condition of product.

Yes, matching/synergy/luck. Before it was explained to me in better detail, I took shots at getting the best match between amp and speaker. Usually the result was too much of one thing and note enough of another. Unfortunately, there is more to the equation in that the listening environment applies at a level maybe even higher than speaker amp combo. Back to impedance, I wait for the day that there could be a real advance in dealing with all of this. Probably will come in the form of a new design that doesn't use the usual voice coil to begin with. I know, this has already been done with electrostatics and some other different designs. In the publication called Voice Coil, I read about new or revised patents that are compelling but for one reason or another, fall short of what we already have. years ago, I talked with a designer who said that he thought that it was theoretically possible to aim two or more lasers adjacent to each other and the resulting focal point could be made into sound. hmmmm. It is that type of thinking that may lead us ahead many fields, audio included. I hope that I live long enough to see something successfully produce sound in a whole different way.

My thinking is that we work with what we are given. Low impedance means a call for more current. It isn't really something that you can 'plan' so much about a certain part of the spectrum of the reproduced frequencies. Especially with drivers measured right around the 50 HZ spot, you will see a high impedance peak in every one that I have ever looked at. Just turns out that way. I mean, you are asking the driver to produce a certain range of frequencies and are hoping for an average that isn't too offensive to the amp driving it. So many times when looking at the frequency sweep you will see a steady rise in impedance as the frequency is increased. So this applies to cone type speakers with a voice coil as opposed to say a planar driver such as a Magnepan speaker which will read a steady 8 ohms or something across most of the frequency range. As you might guess, there are other troubles produced the planar design that are no inherent in the cone design.

Hey-Hey, get off my cloud.

Admittedly, there is some glossing over to through the basic points being discussed, but I find it invaluable for me to use this video to explain impedance to my son who had asked about AC in general. The more that I said, the harder it probably was to understand. I am not a teacher. This guy makes it clear enough to someone that has a basic concept of electrical knowledge (and I hope that the teacher of such subjects do as well, though it makes me wonder sometimes), to actually be able to discern the difference for a better understanding and possible application of this in 'their world'. As it applies to home electrical, what AC is or how we get 220VAC at the breaker box is right out the window and even a point of argument for some, much less the load needed for the home itself.

Reply to this thread to help out in your post count.

Between Klipsch and Polk, there is a difference as to what each company is trying to achieve. I have never heard Polk speakers, and many years ago, I owned a set of Klipsch Cornwalls. I cannot say which that I would prefer, but I agree with the owner being happy with the product. In a lot of ways, I still like the quickness and 'you are there' sound of horns.

I appreciate your writing this. There are some real showstoppers in life if you will just notice them. Trouble is many people just walk by. It was very rare that I heard good audio in an audio shop. It became a chore for them to set up multiple systems in different rooms to try and encourage potential buyers. In fact most stores ended up by just trying to produce more bass. Yah, that led many right to the front. I like that you were simply taking a break and heard something that made you stop. A distraction (usually women) can change your life.

On a rare Sunday, I will try and listen to something that ranks with the worst. It might be like watching a really bad movie to the end. But even in that attempt, I will find something that I can't really hate because it came out the way that the artist intended. This leads me to wonder who/what possessed them to write the way that they did. It is an opposing view which I may learn from if I give it a chance. In my case it was the Mahavishnu Orchestra's album Apocalypse. Really difficult to hear such tension in music, yet it has a message. Is this akin to Beefheart?