Topic: tweaks

[Daryan]

Let's talk tweaks that everyone has tried and if you ACTUALLY heard a differnce.  I am just curious as to what everyone has tried, liked, hated, thought they should have just taken xx dollars and flushed it down the toilet instead etc.  My favorite tweak I was reading about the other day was some kind of strategically placed rocks, yes freaking rocks, that supposedly limit fri/emi and blah blah blah.  UHH, yeah, sure

[scervin]

Unplugging everything (power, interconnects, etc.) and plugging it back in to "reset" the system and clean out all the power.  I hear it works   

[BCostigan]

Not a tweak but more general housekeeping:

keep your power and interconnects separate and if they do cross each other do it at a right angle.  We all know this but doing it has made a marked improvment in my system!

Brass speaker spikes- They look great but I really can't tell if they make anything sound better.


My favorite tweak is the "cable lifters" 



That my friends is a 7.2kv poletop porcelin insulator.  Why would we need a 7,200 volt rated insulator for carpet static?    At $50+ each I'd bet the farm that using a few blocks of wood, some plastic cups, ceramic coffe mugs, etc would work just as well.

[Daryan]

There is definately a lot of voodoo bs outthere imho.  Cable lifters are one of them.  My next thing I am going to try is silver contact enhancer.  Some people swear it works wonders, we shall see.  Spikes on speaker stands was definately an improvement.  Question for you Brian...I got a shit ton of cables to isolate coming out of the rear of my rack.  In my case I am talking about 5.5 feet high or so where everything connects.  Do they make sticky cable holders or something of that nature?

I am going to dig up some of my favorite voodoo tweaks and post them here for everyone's enjoyment.  It's a good laugh!

D

[MattD]

Use velcro ties for those cables, D.

[BCostigan]

  Question for you Brian...I got a shit ton of cables to isolate coming out of the rear of my rack.  In my case I am talking about 5.5 feet high or so where everything connects.  Do they make sticky cable holders or something of that nature?

Yea they do but I've found the adhesive won't support any weight at all.  The best thing IMHO is something electricians call a "mini".  It's for supporting conduit but will also do a nice job supporting and managing cable.

http://www.erico.com/products/CADDYcfcConduitClampswBolts.asp

[Lil Kim Jong-Il]

My favorite tweak is the "cable lifters" 
That my friends is a 7.2kv poletop porcelin insulator.  Why would we need a 7,200 volt rated insulator for carpet static?    At $50+ each I'd bet the farm that using a few blocks of wood, some plastic cups, ceramic coffe mugs, etc would work just as well.

A lot of people swear by cable lifters.  Most of the DIY guys use chopsticks or other cheap thing to fashion a riser.  Those porcelin lifters can be had on agon for a lot less than $50 each.   I was looking at those thinking I would get some if I got any audible result from a cheap diy attempt.  Initially I tried upside down ceremic mugs as lifters.  I did get an audible effect - that was my girlfriend saying "wtf are those things doing? You aren't leaving those there are you?".  I have no doubt that in a blind A/B comparison, you'd hear the same thing in your system.   Other than that, I didn't percieve any benefit in the sound from my system using the ceremic cups.  I also tried paper tubes (toilet paper rolls) and that did nothing.  But many people report good results, so I don't know what to think.

I did hear a benefit when I installed cones/spikes under my speakers.

I heard a negative influence using BDR cones under my amp and under my CDP but they were just set under there, not afixed.  So maybe not a fair test.

I also have heard benefit of routing my cables ot keep them as far from each other/crossing and 90 degrees.

I heard a small benefit from putting a 10lb iron plate on top of my CDP.   (standard black iron plate used on dumbbells)  I heard a much more significant improvement in sound by leaving the CDP powered on all the time.

I think I heard an improvement with the Herbies tube dampeners - but the result of those depends on how microphic the tubes are to start with.

Tried the caig pro-gold to treat connectors.  I reseated the connectors a few times to get a mechanical wipe and tried that before trying the pro-gold, just to try and isolate the effects of progold from the effects of mechanical wiping.  Heard a mild improvement in clarity.  Silclear is supposed to be even better.

I'm sure a combination of the effective tweeks can amount to a nice improvement in any system.  But for my money, upgraded main components and speaker placement have yielded the most audible sonic improvements ahead of room treatments (panels and room lenses) with tweaks being far behind.

[Daryan]

I am surprised you didn't hear anything with cones under your components.  Try this one.  It is cheap, and best of all, works.  Go to suckmart and get a mountain bike innertube, whatever is cheapest.  Drop by the local gas station and fill them up, but not totally full.   Fold them so that they fit under whatever you are trying to isolate.  You now have yourself an "air-isolation" platform.  I suppose you could dress it up too, but where's the fun in that   For smaller comps. like transports, dac's etc, get the kids big wheel size!

Another big one in my opinion is bybee's.  I know that the technology sounds like voodoo nonsense, but trust me on this one.  I have a bybee rca adapter I can loan out if anyone wants to give it a try on the digital input of something.  I also really want to tery a zsleeve by zcable as well.

D

[Lil Kim Jong-Il]

I didn't say that I didn't hear anything.  I said I heard a negative influence.

With the BDR cones just slid between the component and the wood shelve, the sound became sort of harsh and unfocused.  As soon as I pulled the cones away, the system smoothed out again.  I think that the combination of the hard point on the wood shelve and the light weight of the component was not a good thing.  I think a better solution would have been to bolt the cones to the component or use some sorbathane between the base of the cone and the component.   At this point I'm more inclined to try vibrapods.

I know about the innertube isolation platforms.  I was planning to build one with a finished base/skirt and use a flagstone or granite platform.  I just haven't gotten time for that yet.  When I do try it, I'm building the containment base so that I can also try sand instead of the tube.  Another thing I've heard people is a similar design with the isolation material being some number of those stress reliever bags that people squeeze to prevent carpel tunnel syndrome.  The nice thing about building a base and skirt is that you can try different types of material in there without them spilling off the rack.

[Daryan]

Those stress reliever things would probably work.  Other items to try for isolation on the cheap would be raquetballs, tennisballs, pummice stones, dr. scholls stones, etc.

[nickgregory]

I did get an audible effect - that was my girlfriend saying "wtf are those things doing? You aren't leaving those there are you?". I have no doubt that in a blind A/B comparison, you'd hear the same thing in your system.

glad I am not the only one who gets the "eye rolling" and wtf are you doing when trying things that make complete sense to me, but no sense to anyone else

[macdaddy]

what are the pros and cons of leaving a cd player on 24/7..?

tia

[BCostigan]

what are the pros and cons of leaving a cd player on 24/7..?

I leave my amp on 24/7....if I don't it takes about 30 minutes to "warm up".  From a cold start my system sounds brittle (Sony STR-DE897) with very little low end.  I have several guesses as to why this is but maybe one of our in house EEs can help explain. 

The only cons I can think of are:

waste of electricity (extra $1-2 month on the elec. bill)
Deacreased life of gear (?)

[macdaddy]

well leaving a tube amp on 24.7 is out of the question, but i have head that leaving the solid state components on is not a bad idea...

i am referring to my scd-c2000es... the dat and cassette decks get used infrequently, so they are powered-on only when needed...

i leave my DAC components on 24/7

[Daryan]

I tried a different tweak today, and it works, and it works WELL!  Go to mapleshaderecords.com, and order some silclear contact enhancer.  Sort of like caig pro gold, but supposedly better.  I just finished my power connections, both iec and inlet ends, and wow, bigger soundstage, slightly more detailed highs, transients into the realm of unhearable, and better tighter bass.  Give it a try!

[Brian Skalinder]

order some silclear contact enhancer

The secret is microscopically thin silver platelets (a millionth inch thin; 8 square feet of surface per gram!) to enhance beneficial skin effect. The unique binder for these platelets is an ultra-pure, low dielectric absorption, food-grade grease to minimize signal loss/smearing.

Break outthe Crisco, everyone!  Mmmmmm...food grade...taaastyyyy...

On a more serious note, D - seems like you're constantly trying different tweaks and swapping out gear.  How do you keep straight what component or tweak or combination of components / tweaks provides improvement?  What doesn't?  How long do you allow yourself to become accustomed to your new baseline post-mod before trying a new one?  Do you perform blind tests?  Have you ever performed a tweak or swapped out a component and not noticed an improvement or preferred the baseline pre-mod or component-swap?

[BobW]

what are the pros and cons of leaving a cd player on 24/7..?

tia

You waste electricity and the laser fails early ?   

[macdaddy]

what are the pros and cons of leaving a cd player on 24/7..?

tia

You waste electricity and the laser fails early ?   

the laser can really fail early..? good to know...

[Daryan]

On a more serious note, D - seems like you're constantly trying different tweaks and swapping out gear.  How do you keep straight what component or tweak or combination of components / tweaks provides improvement?  What doesn't?  How long do you allow yourself to become accustomed to your new baseline post-mod before trying a new one?  Do you perform blind tests?  Have you ever performed a tweak or swapped out a component and not noticed an improvement or preferred the baseline pre-mod or component-swap?

Kind of early, but I wil give all of this a shot.  To keep everything straight, I write it all down.  Combination of compnents and signal path, and then all of my observations, because I would surely forget otherwise. 

I will be honest, most of the tweaks I have tried have provided some level of improvement, but, that said, some are pure bullshit too.  They work to one degree or another, but often have negatives to them as well.  Bybee's for instance are overhyped.  They work, producing a blacker background, slightly warmer tone etc, but not nearly to the extent some people believe they do.  Maybe that will change now that I have changed speakers, who knows.

As far as modded components, the mods to the panasonic were night and day.  Not even comparable when listening to the stock unit.  The stock unit was bright, overly clinical, and slightly fatiguing over an hour long listening session.  Not any more. 

The modded 4960 took at least 100 hours to burn in.  At first I was initially disappointed, but after that 100 hour mark, whoa, very comparable to some of the >1000 cd players I have heard for a fraction of the cost.  I have no interest in even hearing 10k dollar players, so who knows.

Tweaks that work:

isolation pads under critical components and speakers
contact enhancer (progold, silclear, several others)
bybees
power conditioning
better power cables

Tweaks that are possibly good

bike tire isolation, honestly couldn't hear much of a difference on this one
getting cables off the floor, not so much here
rfi/emi black things, didn't work at all and limited dynamics'

Tweaks that are worldly, new speakers

[scervin]

Think you could send the modded 4960 up for our gathering?  I'd like to put it up against the SP1000 since everyone is really touting this player as a giant killer.  We will perform BLIND tests!

sc

[Daryan]

If I can get the new one done by then sure.  When is this gathering and where do I send it?  I should have all of the parts relitively soon.  Blackgate was bought by rubycon, so I think I am going to use mostly rubycon parts in this one, which should be a giant leap forward from the panasonic caps the mod suggests.  While the panny mod unit was good, I expect this one to be great.  I plan on further implementing a superclock 3 in it when and if I feel the 200 bucks is warranted once hearing the new one.