cruz123

Responses from cruz123

What time do you wear?
My jeweler sent my Seamaster (Titanium and Rose Gold) back to Omega for clean and refinish. I received the estimate by phone last night, nearly $2000.00 including tax. I requested they return with no work done.I'm considering selling and going to ... 
Vibration Theory - Isolate or Drain?
Its as if your gear in a mechanical sense is all cap coupled from the inside to the outside environment and back again. In some worlds cap coupled is the color of the day. So called isolation devices are indeed crayons from some kids tool box. Tom... 
Vibration Theory - Isolate or Drain?
Using rigid devices to "drain" vibration is mostly audiophile voodoo, IMHO, and mainly espoused by those that sell products designed to "drain". Honestly, as someone who has tweaked ad nauseum with all kinds of isolation devices over the years, I ... 
Valvet A3.5 Block with Merlin VSM ?
When I last owned a EL34 based amp, the SED's were also my favorite. I've also heard good things about the Treasure tubes. Jim McShane is an excellent resource and all the tubes I have purchased through him have been very good and very durable, wh... 
Valvet A3.5 Block with Merlin VSM ?
So, you've concluded that tube amps only sound good with NOS tubes? My VAC amps and pre sound great with new production tubes. If you like your current amp, find a good dealer that can properly test and match tubes for you and keep experimenting w... 
Front port vs Rear port
Also, consider sealed designs, such as Merlin monitors. Prior to my current setup, I was using Tyler acoustic monitors that were front ported. They were very good, but I could never elimnate a degree of "bloom" in the lower frequencies in my 11 x ... 
Dodd preamp vs. McCormack RLD-1 preamp
Dawg, congrats on the Dodd, but I would suggest going to the Dodd website and reading Gary's latest notes on battery charging in order to get the best results. I ended up getting rid of my Dodd because of battery reliabiity and charging issues, bu... 
High Powered Wireless Network for Audio
I have ATT DSL and run nine different wireless devices without issue. I have a Linksys "N" router located in one corner of my 2800 sq ft house, but I am fortunate not to have any immediate neighbors (I can detect two other networks, but they are v... 
Real Music vs Audiophile Mumbo Jumbo
I've been disappointed at the "sound" of most concerts I've attended in my lifetime, whether it is rock, country, jazz, bluegrass, etc. Now, in most cases, I've been entertained and enjoyed the "show", but not the sound per se. For listening in my... 
$3500 to spend on a tube preamp....ideas?
VAC pre's (and amps) are superb. 
does a subwoofer kill stereo sound?
I use two small sealed subs in my setup, equalized with the Velodyne SMS1. Both subs are situated between the speakers. I love the results. Lot's of technical info in prior posts, but one key for me was to cross over the subs to kick in BELOW the ... 
Sonos analog out vs onkyo 805 pre-out
You probably just need to try it both ways and see which you prefer. It's generally best to keep the chain as short as possible, but I don't know how good the RCA's out from the Sonos are supposed to be. My gut feel is that option two may be best.... 
Squeezebox Touch: jitter thru wi-fi?
I use a Touch in my system wirelessly and never have dropouts, but I gnerally have a 90-95% signal strength at my listening position. By comparison, I also have a prior generation squeezebox (SB3) that has been heavily modified to improve the digi... 
I have three digital sources
don't think it was the tubes, more likely the dampers just weren't the right thing for my dacMore likely the tubes. I have herbies dampers on all my tubes, but have experimented with and without them and, frankly, have noticed no discernable diffe... 
Best free Apps for music....
I use the IPeng app to control by Squeezebox devices. It's a bit quirky sometimes, but overall I like it.