Unbalanced blues in a plug and play world
Here’s my experience with the ML blues. I became dissatisfied with certain aspects of the sound from my Quest z’s. So....
1. Cleaned the panels after talking to Jim Power. Big improvement.
2. I upgraded tube power amp. Big improvement.
3. Put amp on Mapleshade 4" maple amp stand with triplepoints, etc. Bass tightened up, smoother highs. Surprise, the discontinuity between the woofer and panels cleared up. The magic started again. Everything was better, lp’s and cd’s.
Up grade fever strikes. I just don’t have the medicine ($$$) handy to treat it. So, I decided to try to treat it in other ways, on the cheap, relatively speaking.
I wondered about power cords. I read lots of forums. Finally I decided on Signal cable because of positive comments, cost and money back trial.
4. Bought the Magic Power Cord from Signal. Again, immediately apparent difference. More woofer discontinuity reduced, greater coherence, and this was before the break in was complete.
5. So, impressed with Signal Cable, I talked to the owner, Frank, and ended up buying the digital power cable and a number of his video cables. He told me that the digital cable wouldn’t make the difference the power cable to the amp did, and he was right — but it still helped, a bit more coherence and resolution. The video cables absolutely made a clear difference with video quality, but I’m not really a videophile.
6. Won a new tube preamp auction at Audiogon. I won’t mention the name because I’m still trying to decide, but I liked everything about it but the bass — way too “tubey” and the woofer discontinuity was back. More break in? Not sure.
7. Decided to try some new cables thru Audiogon auction. I had upgraded the cable between the phono step up and preamp about 6 months before, and did find an improvement — subtle, but there. Still, there are so many cable manufacturers it’s bewildering, and the brand of cable I used from the step-up was pricey. The prices on many high end cables — ouch! I decided to look into about ten at auction and put in a bid for a newly marketed cable, getting it at a decent pricefrom the manufacturer. Out of the box it was awful, except for the bass. I broke it in, a process that continues after about a week, and I can say that I have never heard bass with this much articulation and power from my Quest Z’s. The woofer discontinuity is again gone. The high end is extended without being hot. Cymbals, always disappointing on most recordings, sound like metal with different types sounding distinctly different. There is longer decay than I have previously heard on my system or any other. There are a few areas that I’m still debating, but this is an incredible difference. I also want to try this cable between the CD and pre but want to make sure it is broken in first.
8. Another Audiogon cable auction win is in the mail.
The point of all of this is that it seems as if the stuff that has made the greatest difference has been the things that we might not think would. Getting the panels clean was free. The amp stand is especially important for tube amps (and probably pre's), even on slab floors, quite contrary to what I would have thought. The power cord and cables wrung out stuff I never could have anticipated.
Except for turntables, most of us, I suspect, think of this stuff as plug and play. My experience now tells me it is not. That these things are (or were) all on 30 day approval and that only one has a re-stocking fee, puts them within easy reach and available for home audition, make it especially palatable.
On the Klipsch, I’ve heard the ease and speed with which they go from soft to loud, and it is always impressive, but particularly so with uncompressed, i.e., usually not rock, recordings. That they are very efficient and most often used with lots more power than they need only heightens this effect. Male or female voices, though, sound honky to me. If ML’s don’t work with rock, why does Dave Matthews use Quest Z’s in the studio?
Power and vibration control may be all you need. Why did I ever sell my CLS 2 Z’s?
Rouvin
