Summit tweaks

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tonyc

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I have been trying to revoice my system around Summits now that my beloved Apogees are gone. These things offer enormous amounts of info and are extremely sensitive to minor changes in placement, but what freaks me out most about the Summits is how sensitive they are to listening seat height! I had to put wood blocks under my listening seat to raise it up and the stage snapped into focus. I had previously tried playing with tilt and was not satisfied with the result-the tonal balance became way too thin. A tweak that has been helpful is better power cords. I substituted ESP Essence cords for the stock ones that came with the speakers and noticed better pace and rythm as well as a more coherent transition between woofer and panel. This issue has really bothered me since the change from ribbons to a stat/cone hybrid. Another tweak has been using BDR pucks under the spikes-also helped with coherence, but again I had to raise my listening chair more to compensate-best benefit of the pucks tho' is the ability to quickly adjust placement without scratching my wood floor. I am finding that my preferred cables on the Apogees do not necessarily sound the best on the Summits so this is very much a work in progress.
 
TOny,

It truly is a work in progress... almost 1 year with my Summits and I still have a lot to figure out. I learned about the seat height a few months ago. I'm very particular about the seat height now... but since I use a leather manager computer chair, I can adjust the height to my liking.

The toe in is still aggressive for me, I prefer that after the many months I've worked on my system.

As for the distance from the wall, I'm of limited experience in that arena.... I will tweak once I move out to another apartment.

As for preamps and amps, it seems (atleast, my ears seem to prefer) to prefer tubes at the preamp and either SS or tubes in the amp... I havent heard tubes in the amp section, but I have heard from my dealer that his paticular tube amp was better than the Plinius (that he also carried) when through the Summits.

Those are some of my observations for now. ;)

Joey
 
As far as power cord tweaks go, this is what I have found to improve the sound of my CLS so I am sure it would work on any of the other ML stats and all stats in general.
Because a stat can act like a huge antenna,you need to have some sort of conditioning on it,just as you would with any other component and maybe more so.I use Foundation Research LC 2 power cords that have a built in line conditioner that stops rfi and efi and also prohibits any noise from the panels to get back into the system.Then the power cords run into a Furman balanced power bar which is in turn run on 10 guage wire direct to the 30 amp breaker at the box.So the power is dedicated, balanced and finally filtered.All power and source components are run into the Furman and the power amp and pre are run into a Hydra 2.I plan to try the Hydra into the Furman as well.
ML stats plugged directly into the wall with no filtering and stock cords is not the path to happy listening.
Try some decent cord and power conditioning on them .The difference in sound quality should be quite easy to hear.
 
Like any good audio voyeur I enjoy following the threads which detail fellow site members' disagreements about the relative merits or demerits of particular components. These disagreements convey the emotions listening to music generates and are a good thing since gurgling neurotransmitters are what make us all listen. As a physician who knows that individual variations in hearing acuity are vastly greater than differences in frequency responses of well designed gear I take comfort in the knowledge that both combatants are right, all of the time, since they are probably accurately describing what they hear in the context of their system, room and auditory acuity. Shortly after purchasing my Summits I substituted ESP Essence powercords for the stock ones as I replaced them with Shunyata Pythons on my other components. I thought the ESP sounded better than the stock cords and left them in. I have now managed to acquire enough Python Alpha Helix cords to try them on my Summits and I would like to share my impressions. I frankly am shocked at the degree to which changing power cords on the Summits changed the sound of my system. Only my Rowland amp is more power cord sensitive than the Summits! Compared to the ESP cords the Shunyatas have less of a midbass hump, which psychoacoustically unmasked the low bass, opened up the soundstage in all directions, and increased the midrange and treble ambient cues. This of course is both good and bad depending upon the recording but has the net effect of increasing the differences in sound between recordings. I am not advocating that you get Shunyatas, since your system, room and acuity will determine what works best for you. But for those of you who use MLs with powered woofers this week's pleasure may be a borrowed pair of power cords away!
 
...what freaks me out most about the Summits is how sensitive they are to listening seat height! I had to put wood blocks under my listening seat to raise it up and the stage snapped into focus. I had previously tried playing with tilt and was not satisfied with the result-the tonal balance became way too thin.

So, just out of curiosity, how many, inches did you raise your listening seat?
 
I just slightly increase the forward rake of my Summits to compensate the slight increase in height after installing the Isoclean TT-009 spike bases which I recommend immensely. No need to raise chair.

HIFI_05102009_F.jpg
 
hello Audioseduction, like Chuck Lee I have Eichmann cables running from my Summits into the Furman, huge improvement, but what interests me now are the bases you have under your Summits, what is it that they do.
 
hello Audioseduction, like Chuck Lee I have Eichmann cables running from my Summits into the Furman, huge improvement, but what interests me now are the bases you have under your Summits, what is it that they do.

They reduce booming, provide More detail, Airy and spacious sound stage and Protect floor surface from scratching.

They are constructed of two materials of both hard and soft densities to effectively dampen and absorb micro mechanical vibrations.
 
Power cord, definitely!

I sampled multiple varieties of power cables in my system, and only lastly after having a few left over I decided to see what it would do to my Summits.

I tried Grant Fidelity with a small improvement. I had decided on Nordost power cords for the rest of my system by then, so I next I tried the Shiva: awful! Thin, reedy, sharp. Stock cables much better. Next up was Vishnu: much better. Deeper more defined bass, and a slighly deeper soundstage. This was a noticeable improvement over stock, and over the Grant Fidelity. Lastly was Nordost Brahma. Way too expensive to simplly run a couple of class D amps I thought, but what the heck, I had them so let's try. I'm sure it won't make any appreciable difference, and then I'll sell them I thought.

So now, here I am with Nordost Brahma's to each Summit, and it's a keeper. Very, very nice! Bass went deeper, a bit more punch, plus a more open sound stage. It wasn't the BAM kind of reaction vs the Vishnus, but I tried swapping back and forth several times, and consistently preferred the Brahmas over the Vishnus.
 

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