System #91 (CLS IIz, Stylos)

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lugano

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 18, 2005
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Location
+46° 1' 26.41", +8° 57' 5.40" (Switzerland)
System #91 (CLS II)

1. Member Name: Radu-Dan Sabau

2. Location: Savosa (TI), Switzerland

3. ML Model(s): CLS II
3a. Other ML's I had: ML Stylos (sold)

4. Year Purchased: 2006 (used).

5. Mods/Changes: none

6. Associated Electronics:

** hifi ****************************************
Schroers & Schroers Alphastatic rack with light system
Pro-Ject RPM 4 turntable with Speedbox and Ortofon OM 20 Super cartridge
Moth phono preamp
Denon DP 47F turntable with high output Denon MC cartridge
Rega Apollo CD Player + Benchmark DAC1 D to A converter
PSAudio GCC-250 Power amp
Accuphase T-103 Digital Display FM Tuner
dbx 3bx dynamic range expander used for the Accuphase tuner
Technics SH-8066 Equalizer with microphone
Einstein the octopus surge filter/protector
Audio Agile Clear 3F surge filter
Martin Logan CLS II loudspeakers on Viablue spikes and $1 tennis balls
REL Storm III Subwoofer
Kimber Cable 8TC between GCC-250 & CLS II
AKG K 701 headphones for after midnight music enjoyment

---

Interconnects:
Mogami absolute pure, Straightwire Virtuoso R, Stereovox XV2, Ecosse The Conductor - CA1, Nordost Blue Heaven XLR, Kimber Hero, self-made power cords with Lapp Olflex.

---

Other voodoo:
Ceraball isolation feet under Rega and GCC-250
Empirical Audio Image Clarifiers
Audio Aglie 3F current filter

---

Main signal path:
Rega Apollo -> Stereovox -> Benchmark DAC -> Straightwire -> Technics 8066 -> Straightwire -> GCC-250 -> Kimber 8 TC -> CLS II (cables are in italics)

** home AV ****************************************

Schroers & Schroers Lambda rack with light system
Yamaha RX-V2700 Receiver
Panasonic PT-AX100 LCD Projector
Sony video recorder SLV-T2000 dual
Philips DVD recorder (used as tuner for TV)
Aurex PC-X88AD tape deck
Humax IRCI 5400-Z Satellite receiver
Philips Cineos DVP 9000S DVD/Sacd player
Oppo DV-981HD DVD Player
B&W Loudspeakers: CDM CNT center, 2 x Tannoy P600 on Soundstyle sand-filled stands used as front speakers, 2 x CDM 1NT used as rears
Teufel A-2500 active subwoofer
AudioQuest speaker cables


** office ******************************************

Dual 2.7 Ghz PowerPC G5 Mac with 2.5 GB RAM and 3 TB total HD storage
M-Audio Audiophile 192 sound card -> Van den Hul The Bay C5 -> Heed CanAmp -> AKG K701
Denon DRA-735R receiver -> Lanzar BX548 speakers


7. Comments and/or stories about your Martin Logan experience:
simply addicted...the best for my kind of music (Smooth Jazz, New Age, World music, Classical)...

8. An image of your system.
 

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Nice system! I like the rack to the right, all lit up. I also like how you have that nice little artwork/glasswork on top of the sub. Not to mention the way you lit up the area behind the MLs is a nice touch, I should do that, too.

You should post pics of your rack and of behind your room... I'd like to see more of your system. :)
 
Wow,

That’s a nice looking system you have there, a lot of gear crammed into a small place, but nice never the less.
 
Joey_V said:
Nice system! I like the rack to the right, all lit up. I also like how you have that nice little artwork/glasswork on top of the sub. Not to mention the way you lit up the area behind the MLs is a nice touch, I should do that, too.

You should post pics of your rack and of behind your room... I'd like to see more of your system. :)

Thank you, and everybody for the warm welcome !

The lit-up rack comes from Germany, it's called Alphastatic and if you Google for this term you'll find it. Schroers & Schroers are great at design, IMHO. The lights behind the ML's are part of my effort to increase the WAF (Wife acceptance factor) and can be bought for peanuts at ikea or similar.
Other things I did not mention are a Philips projector, ceiling mounted, and a line doubler from Silicon Image to go with it. The room is quite large (by european standards...about 8 m long and 5 wide - 26 x 16 feet). I will post some more pictures soon.
 
Lugano, Welcome !! Very Nice, I see the mention of "turntable" in system list. It's good to know vinyl is still alive and kicking !! I notice that your pull-down screen is a 4:3 aspect, does your projector convert or letter box to 16:9 ?
 
twich54 said:
Lugano, Welcome !! Very Nice, I see the mention of "turntable" in system list. It's good to know vinyl is still alive and kicking !! I notice that your pull-down screen is a 4:3 aspect, does your projector convert or letter box to 16:9 ?

I've got some 600 LP's, gathered over a period of 20 years, so the turntable is a must, at least until I get the time to rip them... The 4:3 screen is ok because 80% of what we get to watch is in that format. 16:9 DVDs play with 2 black stripes, one above and one under. The projector would allow me to stretch the image but it looks like a Modigliani painting... here's another picture from the whole room, taken from halfway upstairs, with the screen rolled up.
 

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Lights, Camera, Action...

lugano,

Very cheque system. the lights bring out your CLSiiz's and accentuate your system components very well. I too like all the wonderful art work around your listening area... :D I am curious are you considering adding other ML speakers in the future? Your projector set-up is very complimentary in your HT room.

Your HT system looks very beautiful... ;)

Thank you for sharing it with us... :D
 
Robin said:
lugano,

Very cheque system. the lights bring out your CLSiiz's and accentuate your system components very well. I too like all the wonderful art work around your listening area... :D I am curious are you considering adding other ML speakers in the future?

Thank you - I'm quite addicted to good design, too, and we try to combine things in such a manner that they play together, creating a pleasant atmosphere. As of adding other ML's... I might consider a center, instead of the B&W CDM CNT I have (my wife thinks it looks terrible, I think it sounds great, it's still an open debate) and also swapping my sub, but in this area ML is not the only candidate, I am very tempted by the B&W PV1...
 
Very Pleasant Atmosphere...

lugano said:
Thank you - I'm quite addicted to good design, too, and we try to combine things in such a manner that they play together, creating a pleasant atmosphere. As of adding other ML's... I might consider a center, instead of the B&W CDM CNT I have (my wife thinks it looks terrible, I think it sounds great, it's still an open debate) and also swapping my sub, but in this area ML is not the only candidate, I am very tempted by the B&W PV1...
lugano,

Thank you for the kind words.
IMHO, You and your wife have excellent design tastes... :D Your living / listening environment looks outstanding, really... :D Your future ML plans, though still under discussion, sound good. I must put in a plug for ML's Theater i and Descent subwoofer, they are excellent speakers, I highly recommend them... :D
 
Robin said:
Your future ML plans, though still under discussion, sound good. I must put in a plug for ML's Theater i and Descent subwoofer, they are excellent speakers, I highly recommend them... :D

Thank you... you're bashing at an open door, actually. But there is a problem, nowadays. Even 2 of them. First of all, we live in a small town, and if I mention this, it's also because it's a common problem around here. This translates into (very) reduced availability of gear - no way to test before buying, you have to order things and wait weeks before they come, and also pay premium price for them. So I read tons of reviews and opinions expressed in various forums, but don't have the opportunity of a dealer bringing/lending stuff for a test-before-u-buy. I'm sick and tired of seeing only plastic crap all over the place, in shops that 10 years ago used to carry Luxman and Revox. 10-20 years ago JBL was somebody, now... same applies to many. It's more and more difficult to get an interesting deal, video killed the radio star etc. One can still find bargains on ebay, but times have changed, at least here. Don't get me started... :eek:
 
Finding a Great deal...

lugano,

Sorry, you will have to forgive me, I forgot about it being much harder to acquire higher quality - high end speakers / gear in your area. Well, I wish you the best of luck in finding quality deals in the future. :D

You have a marvelous system... :D

Thanks again for sharing your beautiful system with me (us). I really appreciate it :D
 
Robin said:
Thanks again for sharing your beautiful system with me (us). I really appreciate it :D

Well, a picture is indeed worh 1000 words, and I think we can all get interesting ideas by actually seeing how different members integrated MLs in their living space. Especially when the implementation is not hard or expensive, like lighting solutions. I'm happy to be here, to share thoughts and ideas, and to read those expressed by other members :)
 
Welcome. As a fellow CLSIIz owner (bought new!) I strongly urge you purchase the Sound Anchor stands ($500/pr.). I waited FAR TOO LONG! If you want to see what I mean without spending any money, try setting the speakers on concrete blocks temporarily (2 blocks high or 12-16 inches) You'll never go back!
 
nsgarch said:
Welcome. As a fellow CLSIIz owner (bought new!) I strongly urge you purchase the Sound Anchor stands ($500/pr.). I waited FAR TOO LONG! If you want to see what I mean without spending any money, try setting the speakers on concrete blocks temporarily (2 blocks high or 12-16 inches) You'll never go back!
When you raised them up, where did the center spar sit in relation to your ear level? I raised my CLSIIz's up, but only needed 4" to have the center spar at ear level. For me and my room, I found that if the center spar was too high or too low in relation to my ear level, the sound was not as good. Would be interested in your findings...

Dan
 
Thank you for your suggestions !

My sitting position is very low and my ears are at about 5/8 from the pavement, related to the total CLS height - I'm not a tall guy :) I think it's ideal this way, not mentioning the difficulty of finding such a product in this small swiss town where I live... My next investment will be a Benchmark DAC1 - hopefully it will be a sensible improvement over the stock DAC built into my Sony XA50ES. Wife permitting, of course - in the last 30 days I brought home a REL Storm III subwoofer, 2 B&W speakers for the HT and some cables, one of which is particularly weird - my better half is getting quite nervous.
 
details..

some more close-ups of this mess supposed to lift me from the ground and make me float... you bet...when I look at this I dream of a clear blue sky, no clouds allowed...
 

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