My stereo kinda "clicked" last night...

halo

Everything looks great Micah! Congrats!

Way to go on the CDP upgrade Drew!!

Micah, I also have the KEF Q150's paired with a NAD integrated (I have the C 316BEE) and, honestly, if I were you I wouldn't change that out in favor of separates from Adcom. Not knocking Adcom, just a suggestion that there is very good synergy between KEF and NAD. If everything "clicked" into place and it sounds even better now with the Marantz CDP in place, leave it be and enjoy the music

mlistens03 wrote: »

It also helped to get rid of a lot of that midbass bloat I had mentioned at the beginning of this thread, which I had started to fix but never cured. Still not quite gone, but I think that the sub may be crossed over a little too high, I'll check on that.

If the sub is in the corner, that could be adding to bloat and cutting back on the x-over may help. I understand it's a bedroom and that placement is limited, we do the best we can with what we've got.

mlistens03

halo wrote: »

Everything looks great Micah! Congrats!

Way to go on the CDP upgrade Drew!!

Micah, I also have the KEF Q150's paired with a NAD integrated (I have the C 316BEE) and, honestly, if I were you I wouldn't change that out in favor of separates from Adcom. Not knocking Adcom, just a suggestion that there is very good synergy between KEF and NAD. If everything "clicked" into place and it sounds even better now with the Marantz CDP in place, leave it be and enjoy the music

mlistens03 wrote: »

It also helped to get rid of a lot of that midbass bloat I had mentioned at the beginning of this thread, which I had started to fix but never cured. Still not quite gone, but I think that the sub may be crossed over a little too high, I'll check on that.

If the sub is in the corner, that could be adding to bloat and cutting back on the x-over may help. I understand it's a bedroom and that placement is limited, we do the best we can with what we've got.

I think that is the cause! I actually have a lot of options, but all the other ones end in the sweet spot being a dead spot, so you can barely hear it even at full. well, I can put it in front of my closet, that's another good spot, but that isn't exactly gonna work for me...

So I take it you're liking the KEFs as well?

halo

mlistens03 wrote: »

So I take it you're liking the KEFs as well?

Yes! Very much so. I'm using a 12" DIY sub with the OE SVS driver from a 20-29 PCi sub I used to own (I upgraded the original driver to an NSD driver from SVS shortly after my original purchase in '06). The sub's box has the same dimensions as an SB2000 sealed sub from SVS. I'm using a BASH plate amp from Parts Express.

I have my speakers almost at ear level for me, which is much higher than yours, I'm sure. My speakers are toed in but my room's acoustics are very different from yours so, of course, the way my speakers interact with my room is far different the way your speakers are interacting with your room.

I am really glad you are enjoying them. I have no desire to change anything in my setup since I got all of this dialed in.

Clipdat

mlistens03 wrote: »

I've gotten a bit more listening in on this guy, now using it as a DAC with my tablet and it sounds really really good!

I don't know if the front USB input uses some kind of smoothing algorithm, but I noticed that every time I played music off thumb drives through it, it sounded excellent.

mlistens03

So this post has been long overdue, but way back in July @DaddyJT recapped and then sent me a NAD 1152 preamp and 4452 tuner. they are awesome! When I first put them in they were a slight improvement over my C352 by itself. Slightly more musical and the bass had a little bit more presence. I left them in the system and used them for probably a month, over which they gradually improved. (Since he recapped them, they had to break in methinks.)

I did not, however, realize just how much things had improved. I shuffled gear around in my rack, but to save time and move onto the next thing, I left it out temporarily. The sound lost a lot of its musicality and became much more 2 dimensional, with the soundstage depth collapsing significantly. I put the pre back, and voila! The magic returned.

Thank you so much @daddyjt for sending me this pre/tuner combo, it really means a lot to me!

dromunds

Awesome gesture by DaddyJT! That refreshed combo will last a long time now. Kudos to everyone involved.

mhardy6647

dromunds wrote: »

I thought from the title that you were having a "clicking" problem, good to know it meant that things were "clicking." If music be the food of love, click on.

Yeah, me, too, when this thread was new!

mhardy6647

daddyjt

Thanks for the kind words @mlistens03 !

I was surprised at how good this pre sounded when I had it in my system after the refresh. It should serve you well for many years to come...

Here is a nudie for anyone interested:

mlistens03

Here are some pics of it.


Looks right at home with the NAD amp below. Sounds right at home too!

Thanks again to daddyjt and Clipdat!

boston1450

Looks very nice Micah