Issue with Sequel II's Woofer (TORN)

[Chippieboy]

Mentorron, Sounds like you are doing OK, ears and everything. I do suffer the Tinnitus thing as well, been working in manufacturing since my late teens. Amazing you can hear up to 10K. I'm only 63 so I am a few years behind you. No pics of my first system. Harmon Kardon 330 receiver with machine speakers purchased from Fedco in Southern California. Your post made me smile... Thanks

 

[msimanyi]

*Both* of these last two posts made me smile. Thanks for sharing, gents!

 

[mentorron]

Mentorron, Sounds like you are doing OK, ears and everything. I do suffer the Tinnitus thing as well, been working in manufacturing since my late teens. Amazing you can hear up to 10K. I'm only 63 so I am a few years behind you. No pics of my first system. Harmon Kardon 330 receiver with machine speakers purchased from Fedco in Southern California. Your post made me smile... Thanks

My first "system" that I tried to build from kits (after the RCA my dad gifted me didn't live up to my needs), were an Eico preamp and power amp (tube-based) with a Stromberg-Carlson 1/4 wavelength bass reflex speaker, a Garrard turntable/changer and Goldring magnetic cartridge. My soldering skills were non-existant and the preamp leaked power onto the casing somewhere (you got a buzz when touching it). But it sounded quite good after the small 6" speaker in the RCA. Gave the kits to my girlfriend when we split up. Have been through a few "systems" since then (see photos), trying different brands of equipment, most importantly speakers: Acoustic Research AR2ax, then B&W speakers (forget the model) before I learned about electrostatics from hearing the original Quads at my favourite hi-fi shop (still in monaural days, just entering stereo era). Many decades later I finally had the luck to find my Aerius on sale used for $1549, being run by a small Denon desktop amp/tuner, just lined up against an entry wall in the used equipment row at the store !!! Sounded good even under those unfavourable conditions, so I went to an authorized M-L dealer and heard them set up correctly with high end equipment and went back and bought the used ones. The original owner only sold them because we was downgrading to a small condo and needed to switch to bookshelf speakers.

The Garrard I bought to retrofit into my original tabletop RCA photograph. Mounting holes and size were a perfect match.

Goldring cartridge/Grado tone arm/Thorens TD124 tt/ Dynakit stereo preamp (tube). Note my 1st (cheap, so unused) electrostatic tweeter under the preamp.

Acoustic Research AR-2AX speaker. The 1st highly rated speaker I owned.

My current front end (circa 1980s-90s) : Sony CDP-950 with TDA1541 DAC/Onkyo T-401 tuner/ Rotel RSP-960AX preamp-processor.

Philips TDA-1541 DAC in the Sony (awesome). Reviews said Sony did a better job of the electronics surrounding this DAC than Philips did in their machines. :

Adcom GFA6000 power amp run in 2 channel mode to get 150Wpc @ 4 ohms for the M-Ls.

One of my M-L "babies" with it's bear audience.

 

[Chippieboy]

Now I'm smiling even more.... I love the Garrard Turntable. 4 speeds even, I'm guessing 16, 33, 45, 78. All these years I have never heard or seen a 16 RPM record. Those turntables with the changer were convenient but the record skidding along after dropping trying to get to speed. OUCH. I always wanted a Zero 100 turntable. Great pics. I had a similar CD player in the early 90's, It had 1 Bit printed somewhere on the unit. I remember Sony was bragging about 1 Bit. Also, love the turntable with the dust-removing tonearm. I almost went with Adcom back in the day.

 

[mentorron]

Now I'm smiling even more.... I love the Garrard Turntable. 4 speeds even, I'm guessing 16, 33, 45, 78. All these years I have never heard or seen a 16 RPM record. Those turntables with the changer were convenient but the record skidding along after dropping trying to get to speed. OUCH. I always wanted a Zero 100 turntable. Great pics. I had a similar CD player in the early 90's, It had 1 Bit printed somewhere on the unit. I remember Sony was bragging about 1 Bit. Also, love the turntable with the dust-removing tonearm. I almost went with Adcom back in the day.

I bought the Garrard because you could remove the tall changer spindle and use it's other short single disk spindle. I never used it as a changer: just bought it because it was an exact fit into that original cabinet where my cheap white-metal manual turntable sat, mounting holes correctly oriented and all. The 16 2/3 speed was for "spoken word" disks (i.e. books), which I never bought. I have tried several 1-bit CD players over the last decade. I hated all the Sonys, (High Density Linear Converter) but was undecided for quite a while about a Marantz with the Philips "BitStream" DAC, but dumped it eventually. I cannot see why I would replace my Sony with the TDA1541, as I haven't really had a chance (or the $$$) to buy something that might surpass it. My Sony with the Burr-Brown PCM56 DACs (they use 2 parallel mono DACs) is sufficient for my "man cave" system in the garage. It replaced a Philips player with it's 2 TDA1543 parallel DACs and CDM-4 transport, which I have kept in a box. My conclusions about these players I've listened to is that all the components in the player's circuit board must be of high quality, not just the DAC itself, in order to get listenable results. Sony seems to have done that in the 2 players I have. The high-end shop where I got my Aerius said the Adcom was a good match for them, and I believed them. Have had no regrets so far (20+ years now).

CDP-950 interior:

CDP-950 exterior:

CDP-490 interior:

CDP-490 front panel :

 

[Zwick]

I have a pair of used (bought in 1999) original Aerius. The outputs were strapped when I got them, but thought I'd try bi-wiring (12 gauge) soon afterwards (to the same amp posts). Although I cannot prove there is any difference, I tried reinstalling the straps again at one time, and seemed to be less impressed by the sound output, so went back to the bi-wire. So to me it's psychological: as long as I know the bi-wiring is in place my brain seems to be happier with what I hear. However, my hearing is now on the decline as I'll be 80 years soon: my upper hearing limit at about 10Khz and tinnitus to boot. Luckily I have had no issues with the Aerius at all, so being in a smoke free, no grease-cooking environment and living in the NorthWest away from humidity and heat probably plays a big roll in their longevity. My components are just above "middle-of-the-road" and of late 1980s-90s vintage, so I can't compete with some of the systems you lads own ;-) Hope you all are enjoying your audio journeys ! I have, over the last 6 or so decades since my 1st tabletop RCA hi-fi !!

My Aragon 8008ST has dual speaker outputs that facilitate separate biwire channels from the amp to speaker inputs. I have played with changing the phase on the panel and woofers with noticeable difference in bass performance. Maybe the woofers were out of phase with the sub or possibly the replacement panels were installed out of phase with the woofers? Quest Z speakers.

 

[mentorron]

My Aragon 8008ST has dual speaker outputs that facilitate separate biwire channels from the amp to speaker inputs. I have played with changing the phase on the panel and woofers with noticeable difference in bass performance. Maybe the woofers were out of phase with the sub or possibly the replacement panels were installed out of phase with the woofers? Quest Z speakers.

My Aerius are wired out of phase as M-L believes that gives a more linear response at the crossover point. See Audio Ideas Guide test results from 1993, excerpt attached:

 

[Zwick]

Thanks for conjuring up some Andrew Marshall AIG. Miss that publication.

 

[JonFo]

Maybe the woofers were out of phase with the sub or possibly the replacement panels were installed out of phase with the woofers? Quest Z speakers.

IIRC, it's been mentioned here that the Quest does indeed have the woofer out of phase relative to the panel. Do a search on the site to confirm.

 

[Chippieboy]

I did try changing the woofer polarity/phasing. Not much different. It did lose some stage depth. Just for fun, I changed one speaker phasing, listened then changed the other. It's funny, how the sound differs moving around the room with one speaker out of phase. But I understand.

 

[mentorron]

IIRC, it's been mentioned here that the Quest does indeed have the woofer out of phase relative to the panel. Do a search on the site to confirm.

Yes, the Quest Z's came out the year after my Aerius did, which have reverse polarity on the woofers (1993 vs 1992), so they most likely had the same approach to both speaker designs. Would make a lot of sense. Never got to hear the CLS IIz's, sadly.