ML's With Audio Prism Ground Control

JMAUSGP said:

Bernard,

"What is there to be charged ? "


You mean besides your credit card.........just kidding Bud.

These things are kind of interesting. It seems that the Ground Control is charged with electrons as the current goes through it.

Click to expand...

Joe, on this one my credit card is firmly taped to my body, so it cannot be swiped anywhere

As far as the electrons doing the Charge of the Light Brigade is concerned, I'm wondering what they are doing to those "dielectric additions".

As for your hearing stuff (do those voices ever stop?), you mentioned that your wife told you to turn it down. Is that your normal listening volume? I suspect not, as you were listening for stuff (I like that word "stuff"). How does it sound at normal (Joe Blow) levels? Did you try removing the things and listening again for more air?

BudP said:

There is a small triboelectric effect that helps to accumulate the electrons that jitter into these things. Causes more of the vacant orbits to become useful for the support of ever smaller signal events. The charge buildup between wire and dielectric additions are what needs to be charged.

The GC are there only for the back half of the wave form, what has already passed through the load and thereby becomes susceptible to all of the dielectrics and metal to metal contacts between your system and wherever lowest ground potential happens to be in your system. Thus GC acts as a very low RAC and RDC unterminated wave guide, with significant momentary storage and because of this provides signal with a choice of wave guides.

At least, this is the current postulate.

For tonepup, just look again at the six moons review. They have already cut one apart, to see what spills out. What you see there is all there is, no beryllia, no crystals, no dirt. If you want to read a huge argument about their usefulness go here. A pretty excellent peer review.
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=1213239#post1213239

Bud

Click to expand...

I just ran this past a good friend who has a masters degree in electrical engineering and a PhD in physics and he said this was , "the worst piece of bullshit" he's run across in a long time.

A 4 inch long piece of wire can't act as a "wave guide" at audio frequencies, nor can it have "significant momentary storage."

There is zero science behind this product.

tonepub said:

I just ran this past a good friend who has a masters degree in electrical engineering and a PhD in physics and he said this was , "the worst piece of bullshit" he's run across in a long time.

Click to expand...

Retro-Encabulator.

tone pub,

I agree though I find the "bullshit" term a bit offensive. However please read this review, where a disinterested listener appears to have the same opinion.

http://www.stereotimes.com/comm071910.shtml

I think your friend might find a read of Ralph Morrison's book "Grounding and Shielding Techniques" interesting. Mr Morrison provides some very clear depictions of the relationship between signal components and their grounds, most especially those relationships directly affected by static moments.

I take it you're the one that makes these little gizmos, and that's why you're so offended?

And the explanation behind the "technology" in this device is beyond ludicrous on their website. Most vintage tube amplifiers didn't sound great because of a ground plane, many of them sounded good because of the care that went into winding the transformers, the purity of the copper used in those transformers and the much higher quality of the vacuum tubes used.

Ask anyone at CJ, ARC, or McIntosh and they will tell you the same thing.

As for the ground plane, almost no one in contemporary audio design uses a buss bar anymore because it acts like an RF antenna. Science has caught up with things a bit in 75 years and there's a lot more RF in the air.

This really is one of the poorest excuses for science I've seen in a long time.

BudP said:

There is a small triboelectric effect that helps to accumulate the electrons that jitter into these things.

Click to expand...

This one sentence shows a complete lack of understanding of the terms "triboelectric effect" and "jitter." The rest of the explanation goes south from there. I have to agree with Jeff. Complete Snake Oil.

without having any experience or opinion of this particular product, I would like to remind that there seems to be many unexplained attributes of sonic quality concerning all audio equipment. Manufacturer's or their marketing division's comments leave often a lot to hope for, how ever lack of verified explanation does not change the functioning of their product(s).

MPS said:

without having any experience or opinion of this particular product, I would like to remind that there seems to be many unexplained attributes of sonic quality concerning all audio equipment. Manufacturer's or their marketing division's comments leave often a lot to hope for, how ever lack of verified explanation does not change the functioning of their product(s).

Click to expand...

I am not in the "we can measure everything" camp, and I think I would find it more acceptable if instead of the Sci-Fi explanation they just said that it works, but they don't know why.

Bernard said:

I would find it more acceptable if instead of the Sci-Fi explanation they just said that it works, but they don't know why.

Click to expand...

:bowdown:

Agreed, but might be slight problem as a "marketing suicide".

Nothing like a tweaks thread to liven things up.

After my last thread regarding same, I've decided to no longer tread in these waters.

Having said that, it appears that those who do hear a difference seem to be saying that it makes the musical presentation more organic (that god awful, current audiophile term) along with improvements in individual image size and localization.

I do have a couple of install questions for the Summit should I choose to audition.

I have my speaker cables (lug terminated) connected to the upper set of binding posts. I have a pair of 6" long Analysis Audio (lug terminated) attached to Monster Cable expandable banana plugs, which are inserted into the "holes" of the upper and lower binding posts. I assume I would need two of these items per speaker.

I assume that I need to attach the GC lug to the upper negative speaker post (therefore having two lugs on this post) and another lug attached to the lower negative post.

Seems to me that I would be compromising the integrity of the speaker wire connection on the upper post therefore negating any positive effects of this device.

Any thoughts from those who are familiar with the product?

As an aside and I've mentioned this in previous posts, use of the three step Mapleshade CD cleaning treatment along with vibration attenuation for all hardware (including speakers) does yield results similar to the claimed benefits of this product.

GG

MPS said:

:bowdown:

Agreed, but might be slight problem as a "marketing suicide".

Click to expand...

Yes, but the current situation is that they have put their credibility into question. Which is better? Neither obviously. Perhaps a simple explanation would have been best.

Gordon Gray said:

Nothing like a tweaks thread to liven things up.

After my last thread regarding same, I've decided to no longer tread in these waters.

Click to expand...

Come on, Gordon! Don't tell me you've given up having fun!:devil:

Bernard,

As the old guy said in the opening scene of the Holy Grail, "I'm not quite dead yet".

Gordon

Jeffm Bernard, et al,

Seems the answer is pretty simple, Music Direct will let you try them for 30days and if the effects don't sound good to you, you can return them for a refund. That seems more fun and frankly more logical than arguing about something that you don't have first hand knowledge of and instead have to rely on others who have no first hand knowledge. But hey maybe that is the point, if so, it doesn't bother me.

Right now I am keeping mine, I still have more listening to do but for me tweaks are one of the neat things about our hobby. In fact I do tweaks with all my hobbies, including F-cars.

Joe, I am not arguing about whether it works or not. Despite my skepticism I have to give credence to what you and Greg (Moon) are hearing; I am not about to even suggest that you cannot hear what you are saying you do hear; if I did, that would be just plain stupid. We have had enough of that in the past in cable discussions.

What I am objecting to is the obvious bafflegab in the explanation as to how it works.

Aw, what the hell, it's only a hobby!

JMAUSGP said:

Jeffm Bernard, et al,

Seems the answer is pretty simple, Music Direct will let you try them for 30days and if the effects don't sound good to you, you can return them for a refund. That seems more fun and frankly more logical than arguing about something that you don't have first hand knowledge of and instead have to rely on others who have no first hand knowledge. But hey maybe that is the point, if so, it doesn't bother me.

Right now I am keeping mine, I still have more listening to do but for me tweaks are one of the neat things about our hobby. In fact I do tweaks with all my hobbies, including F-cars.

Click to expand...

Joe, you are taking the smart path. That way if it does not make a meaningful difference, you aren't out any $$...

MOON said:

I take the system down every 3 months and clean everything with Gaig pro gold,speaker cable spades, also on the ML's where the speaker spades go, power cord prongs, xlr prongs. You would be surprised the first time you clean the prongs on your ML's where the power cord plugs in.

Click to expand...

every three months ??????? :eek1: I can't imagine keeping my equipment in an enviroment that necesitates that.

Twitch, you took that out of context . I wote that to Bernard after he posted this paragraph below just to let Bernard know that all contacts were already clean and he could rule that out. I was just trying to be helpful to a fellow ML member.

Greg, I remember reading somewhere recently that what people hear as an improvement is really a result of contacts effectively being cleaned when you disconnect an old cable and connect a new one. So I was wondering if you have tried removing the ground control and listening again. It seems strange to me that something like that can make a difference.
__________________

On the contrary Twitch. The room is a dedicated sealed,soundproof room which is clean as a whistle, probably a cleaner enviroment than the majority system rooms in the members systems section.The door to the soundroom is an exterior house door which is sealed.

I find the Caig pro gold makes a better conductor of the electrical signal, it's that simple. I am very meticulous about my room and system.www.caig.com After the initial 1st cleaning with the Caig , it is just for conductivity after that.It adds to a better musical experience, just as the topic of this forum does.


Dave, nice turntable in your systems pictures.

Cheers, Greg

This is an excellent point. Even if you aren't meticulous about cleaning contacts, even just plugging and unplugging your gear now and then will help.