K6BUK

Thank you! I owe it to my wife. She civilized me🙂

Thanks! She is slowly improving but has a back issue that she had to delay for her knee surgery. I'm hoping by spring things will be better!

Hi! I received the message last night that my stylus would be here on Wednesday. I also received a message from Joseph, the technician who did the repair. He said that the suspension in my insert was shot and he usually sends back units like that because they are too difficult to repair. However, he wanted to see if he could keep an original unit working and he said he succeeded with it meeting full specs and tracking at one gram! I can't wait! I understand sharing the living room. At age 93 my mother developed ALS (Lou Gehrig's Disease) and she lived with us for a year. Because ALS is totally debilitating she required 24/7 care from us. She had a terrible time sleeping and so we would watch MASH reruns in the middle of the night. I spent a lot of time listening to my Sony noise cancelling headphones! However, I wouldn't begrudge her a second of the time she needed. As hard as it was, we would never have sent her to a nursing home and my wife was an absolute angel taking care of her with me. Enjoy your mother-in-law while you can. Also, I won't be able to test the cartridge for a few days because my wife just had a total knee replacement and it did not go well. She needs a lot of care right now. She will recover but it will be a few more weeks. Regards, Michael

Greetings: My V15 isn't back yet - I don't expect it for another week or so. I am pretty excited about being able to use it again. The Rabco arm just snapped the cantilever like it was a tooth pick. The arm was a little erratic but never misbehaved like that before. I didn't trust tangential arms after that but I picked up a Sony about 20 years ago that works very well. Of course, the V15 won't work in it. The V15 is definitely an easy cartridge to listen to compared to most. What a loss that Shure doesn't make high end cartridges any more. Regards, Michael

Oh, I have the disease. Bad. And I'm proud of it! I caught it way back when I was 11 and got my first crystal radio. It became full blown when I was 14 (a long time ago) and got my first Koss headphones. Rapture!

Thanks for the welcome! I just received my first upgraded M 1.0t back from Greg but haven't had time to put it in my system yet. My wife just had knee replacement surgery and she is taking all my attention. None the less, I can't wait to try it. It will bi-amp a Paradigm Monitor 9 for the left channel and the right channel will be stock so I can do an "ear to ear" comparison. When the next one comes back it will go for the right channel. I picked up a fifth M 1.0t to use while I sent the others out for repair so I have to decide where to use it eventually. It won't go to waste! Regards, Michael

Hi Rob, Thanks for the welcome. Nice to see another B&O turntable in someone's inventory. I bought my 3000 new in 1973 and I just love it. It is such a beautiful piece of kit. I have had a new diamond installed in the cantilever a couple of times over the years and the guy did excellent work. He is retired now but I just sent my Shure V15 Mark V out for a new one. I'll let everybody know how it turns out. Michael Buck

Hi! Thanks for the welcome. Nice to join a new community. I would be interested to know how you like the Shure V15 Mark IV. I have a Mark V that is out for repair right now. I bought it new in 1982 and used it on a Rabco arm for a couple of years. The Rabco was not too reliable and one day it went crazy and broke the cantilever clean off. Never did find it. I was pretty sick (or disgusted, I can't remember which) about it and put the cartridge in a drawer. I saw an ad in Stereophile for a place that could put a new cantilever and diamond on it so I sent it off after checking references. It will be back in a couple of weeks and I am looking forward to trying it out again. I have had the diamond replaced on a few styluses on my B&O 3000 and they are excellent but that guy retired. Michael Buck

Hi Charlie, Thanks for the hi tech welcome. I hope I will be an asset to the site. Michael Buck

Thanks for the welcome! Wow! You have a lot of nice equipment. That is a serious inventory. Michael Buck

Woops! I mixed you with someone else with Infinitys. My wife just had a knee replaced and has me jumping. I am only able to type about 10 words between jumps!

Hi! Thanks for the greeting. I do enjoy seeing photos of peoples equipment, especially when it is modded. I really like the technical side of our hobby but I am always listening to music. I have lots of headphones for when my wife is watching TV or if I am in the yard. I did neglect to mention that I installed in wall speakers in 8 rooms in my house. There is something fun about crawling through the rafters and insulation dragging a pair of speaker wires! It is a little warm in the attic in July in CA but I love the heat. Michael Buck

Hi! Thanks for the welcome. I screwed up on my first reply - I hit the + instead of Quote.

Greetings! I lived in Davis for many years and traveled to the bay area a lot for work when I was at MCI. We had a big Oracle database center there. I participate in the Sacramento Audio Group by Zoom. They are going through a speaker building phase right now and woodworking is one of my least favorite activities. I also went to northern IL and Mich. a lot because the engine analyzer mfgs were there. I grew up in upstate New York and hate the cold weather! Every once in a while my wife tries to convince me to move to MD to be near her sister but I get sick at the thought of leaving CA. I am in Sun City Lincoln Hills and we are in the foothills of the Sierras. Just too beautiful here. I see you have some Infinity speakers. I love my QSL3s. I don't understand why other mfgs don't use something like the Watkins dual drive woofer. Thanks for the welcome! Michael Buck

Hi Jim, Thanks for the welcome. Nice to know that the Dynaco experience has carried on with other listeners! I look forward to finding out more about other Carver fanatics and their music experiences. I have heard lots about Bob Carver over the years and I really liked it a long time ago when he said, "I do it because I can." Michael Buck

Greetings: I have been a Carver devotee since the C4000 was released. Well, before that actually, the C4000 was my first piece of Carver equipment and I purchased it from Reed Brothers in Charleston, SC for $960. That was 4/20/1982 and it was shipping to California. I remember waiting anxiously for it and reading and rereading the reviews in Audio and Stereo Review. I kept waiting and it was late! Oh, no! Well, it turned out it was delivered to my neighbors' house and he sat on it for 4 days. Boy, was I pissed! I had Infinity QLS3 speakers at the time and hooked it up as fast as I could. The sound was enchanting! I ran it through the power amp side of my Pioneer SX-1980 (270 watts/channel). The unit came with a stapled "Preliminary Manual" and the official manual arrived in the mail a few months later. The serial number on this unit is 6717C. It started having problems the summer of 1998 and I sent it to Carver Factory Service on 10/2/1998. There were several problems including the mute not working, the delay circuit was broken, another circuit was having problems but I don't remember which right now, and the biggest problem was the RCA jacks were falling apart causing no or intermittent problems. They did an excellent job on it and the bill was $196 which I felt was reasonable for the amount of work they did. My next Carver purchase was major. I bought a TX-11a and two M 1.0t amps. By the way, when I purchase a piece of equipment it is usually a permanent part of my collection. I have added 3 more M 1.0t amps over time and two have developed bad caps. One is on its way back from Nelion Audio (that is what led me to this site) with a full MKII opt 002 plus IEC socket upgrade. I have another one ready to go to him. Eventually all 5 will be upgraded. Four of them are in my home theater system. I have a Yamaha RX-A6A feeding an M 1.0t to biamp a Paradigm Monitor 9 on each side. I have an additional M 1.0t on each side running in mono. One feeds a Miller & Kreisel 12" sub and the other feeds a Paradigm LCR 350 Center Channel speaker. The fifth M 1.0t is connected to the C4000 and the Infinity QSL 3s in my ham shack. My ham shack is actually my average no car garage. I spend a lot of time there not only on the air but building electronics. I am very technical and have all the good test equipment including a Tektronix 100 MHz scope and a Rigol 3015E-TG. A lot of this stuff I picked up for work with ham radio, antennas, and repeaters. I have been heavily into audio and music since my youth and played in the high school band and sang in the choir. After high school I was in some local theater plays/musicals which is where I met my wife, Saralee, more than 50 years ago. In 1968 I built my first kit, a Dynaco PAT-4 preamp shortly followed by a Stereo 120. The Stereo 120 was an early transistor amp and the audio was on the harsh side. I eventually acquired a Dynaco ST-70 which is just a wonderful tube amp. I now have 5 of those and I am in the process of rebuilding them with new, updated boards from Tubes for HiFi, also known as Vacuum Tube Audio. When I finish those rebuilds there is now an update kit for the Stereo 120 which takes the harshness out of the amp. I also have a Dynaco AF-6 AM/FM tuner. That tuner and my TX-11a are pretty idle now. FM is pretty dead in northern California now whereas when I purchased them (1973 for the Dynaco, 1988 for the Carver) the bands were full of rock and jazz. KJAZ in SF was excellent and many rock stations (KZAP and others in Sacramento) were playing great tunes. In fact, the FM scene here is so bad I haven't even tried the tuner in my new Yamaha RX-A6A. In addition to my other Carver gear I have a Sunfire True Subwoofer Signature MKII that I purchased from Paradyme in Sacramento for $1,400 in July 1999. The owner of Paradyme was a friend and gave me a good price. About a year and a half ago a cap went out and it started humming. I didn't have the time right then to service it so I sent it to Bill Flannery in July of 2021. His work is immaculate! He replaced all the caps and a bunch of other parts and it works and sounds great now. I have a good record collection and I have a few turntables. I have an AR XA, AR XB, 2 Bang & Olufsen Beogram 3000, a Sony PS-X7, Sony PS-LX55 II, Pioneer PL-115D, and a bunch of others. I also have a lot of CDs, DVDs, and Bluray discs. My system includes a Sony 400 disc DVD player, 2 Sony 300 disc CD players, a Sony 5 disc DVD changer, a BD player, a few cassette players, an SAE 5000a Impulse Noise Reducer, and tons of other goodies. Like I said, once something comes in the door it rarely goes out unless it is junk or I hate it. So beyond the music - I am a graduate of the University of California and I retired from there (early) as Project Director for the campus computing system 17 years ago. After college I held a variety of other jobs including Training Manager for Snap-On Tools, Network Engineer at MCI Telecom and then Project Manager for smog check programs for 17 states (MCI ran the network for the smog check machines and communications to state DMV agencies). I am now the boy in the bubble. I have incurable lymphoma (blood cancer) and the chemo I was on for several years destroyed my immune system. I now can't make antibodies from vaccines or from exposure to a bug. If I pick up something it is immediately to the hospital. Last year I had an infection in my ankle and I was in the hospital for 2 months and on IV antibiotics for 6 months. If I do go out of the house I always have an N95 on. I don't let cancer slow me down! I go all day every day either working on my hifi equipment, my ham radios, antennas, or listening to music. Oh yeah, I had a heart attack 2 months ago. I was surprised by an email from Greg yesterday saying he had finished the complete upgrade of the first M 1.0t. I read just a few hours before that his wife is in the hospital. His email implied that they have her illness diagnosed so let's all pull for good health for her! Well, I'm sure that is a lot more about me than any of you want to know but sometimes when I start typing my fingers just seem to have a life of their own. It was pretty useful in college! Thanks for reading and sharing all your knowledge on the site! Michael Buck K6BUK