System #124 (Prodigy)

[Bruce Weiland]

1. Member Name: Bruce Weiland (age 66, in 2013)

2. Location: Whittier, California (greater Los Angeles area), USA

3. ML Model(s): Current – Prodigy & 2 Depth's added 2007

4. Year Purchased: June 2006, Scripts purchased early 2005

5. Mods/Changes: Nothing, YET. At least crossover capacitors to come, who knows what else.

6. Associated Electronics:

Front ends
Digital – HP One Touch as server USB or S/PDIF to coax to Behringer SRC 24/96, W4S DAC2, Aural Thrills ACS DAC to Jadis JP-200 clone - Aural Thrills ACS to Manleys

Vinyl – Grado M8, Audiocraft unipivot w/ VTAF, damped Linn LP12, Conrad Johnson PV5

AMPs – 2 Manley NeoClassic 250's in triode, NOS US input tubes, RTF NOS output tubes to stats only

Speaker wire – Goertz MI 3 to reversed Zero Autoformer to 1 M Audioquest Volcano 144v

AMPs - 2 Behringer modified EP4000 bridged fed from DAC2 through Phase Linear 1000 to woofer sections of Prodigy

Speaker wire – 1 M Cardas Hexlink Golden 5-C.

Power conditioning – three Tice Power Block – three Titan line conditioners all wired in parallel with a dedicated 30 amp circuit.

Four Virtual Dynamics like 6 awg power cords, two Tice power cords, more power cords to come.

Blue Circle BC68 on the Prodigy - worth every penny.

Picture needs updating. Doesn't show lots of changes.

Relatively current pictures here.

http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?vevol&1317958032

Audio furniture - custom built-in for vinyl (800), CD drawers (450, now empty - it is all on the hard drive) and space for all equipment. Drawer facing staining yet to do.

Acoustic treatment - lots of DIY tube traps and sound flags.

7. Comments and/or stories about your Martin Logan experience:

Have wanted stats since I first heard quads in the late 70's, but needed more volume. Stacked Quads, two or three pair was out of the question back then. After decades of dynamic drivers ML solved my need for volume. Started with “near field” Script i’s for about a year and a half. My old Moscode did not sound that good driving them. Went to VTL mono blocks that were only marginally better. Finally tired some Zero Autoformers. Didn’t make much difference with the VTL’s, but brought the Moscode back in all its’ glory. Since then have had the Moscode modified and added a pair of Depth subs. Autoformers no longer needed.

1100 watt mono block per side.

I am always tweaking and will update this occasionally.

I have a small room (10' wide, 7' 8" tall, 21' long with "L" at the back) that Prodigy’s should not work in, but they do!

8. An image of your system.

Pctures of all of the system 4-14-08, larger than can be posted here.

http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?vevol&1317958032

 

[twich54]

Hello Bruce, welome ! Glad to have another two channel vinylphile amongest us !!

 

[Bruce Weiland]

HI twich,

I am just getting the vinyl spinning again. Have not begun to optimize that source yet. I have been working on improving CD play back. Currently CD sounds "slightly" better than vinyl.

A friend just turned me on to Memorex "BLACK" CD-R copies and 6moons.com to EAC Exact Audio Copy. What a great sound improvement for almost no $ (about 40 cents per CD)

Bruce

 

[Joey_V]

Bruce... now that's is definitely near-field! Glad you love it though... that's the most important aspect of all, bar none.

 

[Robin]

Musical Prodigy System...

Bruce,

What a beautiful Prodigy set-up... I was wondering what you used for your bass traps in the corners, behind your Prodigy's? Your listening room dimentions aren't as small as my HT room 12'x11', I'll bet? I am glad they sound great.

Wonderful system!

It is great to have you here!

 

[twich54]

HI twich,

I am just getting the vinyl spinning again. Have not begun to optimize that source yet. I have been working on improving CD play back. Currently CD sounds "slightly" better than vinyl.
Bruce

Hello Bruce, No doubt CD and SACD have made great strides in the last couple of years, I too listen to more Cd's now than ever before, but when the mood strikes their is still something "special" about good analog.

 

[DTB300]

A friend just turned me on to Memorex "BLACK" CD-R copies and 6moons.com to EAC Exact Audio Copy. What a great sound improvement for almost no $ (about 40 cents per CD)

So you making copies of your Redbook CD to the Black CD-R and you are hearing an improvement in sound?

I have a copy of the Burmester test CD on Black CD-R and it does sound very good - especially when compared to a copy of it on normal CD-R.

Dan

 

[Bruce Weiland]

Bruce,

What a beautiful Prodigy set-up... I was wondering what you used for your bass traps in the corners, behind your Prodigy's? Your listening room dimentions aren't as small as my HT room 12'x11', I'll bet? I am glad they sound great.

Wonderful system!

It is great to have you here!

Robin,

Sorry it took me so long to get back. My room is L shaped. It is a portion of my three (now only 2 1/2) car garage. The room is exactly 8 feet tall. Wall board and frame contruction. Concrete floor with travertine flooring. The room is approximately 10'6" wide and about 20 feet long. The right wall is about 13 feet long then goes off to the right about 5 feet for the "foot" of the "L".

Because I listen nearfield, I only use about 8 or 9 feet of the room including the built in equipment and software cabinet.

The bass traps that are in the room are 11" in diameter and full round. There are two sections on each side of the room that go from floor to ceiling.

I have many more that are not in the room now. They are DIY.

I cut 3/4" MDF into circles, one for the top and one for the bottom of each trap. I stapled 1/2" hardware cloth around 3/4 of the diameter then lined it with fiberglass insulation (I pulled of the paper backing). Then I cut mylar window film to cover 1/2 the circumference of the trap. I finished wrapping the hardware cloth around and stapling. I used a little wire to close the gap in the hardware cloth along the edge from top to bottom. Of course the trap is hollow on the inside. That is part of what makes it work. I also have several 16" 1/2 rounds. The back side of the 1/2 round is made of 1/2" MDF and screw through the 3/4" thick 16" half circles that make up the top and bottom. The fiberglass lining is the same but I put mylar over the entire surface of the 1/2 rounds. I also build some 9" full rounds.

Have fun.

Bruce

 

[Bruce Weiland]

Bruce... now that's is definitely near-field! Glad you love it though... that's the most important aspect of all, bar none.

Joey,

Your are correct. Near field is about 3' stats to ears.

If I want to "share" the experience I toe them out a bit more and have a sofa about 7' stats to ears that allows about 3 people to enjoy at one time.

There are several advantages to near field. 1) Considerably less room interaction. 2) Much easier to hear inner detail 3) More amp headroom and more easily obtained dynamics.

The detail, timber, resolution, and image (pinpoint) are amazing.

Thanks for the communication.

Bruce

 

[Bruce Weiland]

So you making copies of your Redbook CD to the Black CD-R and you are hearing an improvement in sound?

I have a copy of the Burmester test CD on Black CD-R and it does sound very good - especially when compared to a copy of it on normal CD-R.

Dan

Yes Dan, a really cheap tweak. Get the Exact Audio Copy software (freeware) in is better than Nero, sonically.

Most CDs are read within 12 minutes, but I had one that took an hour and 15 minutes to get the error free copy to the hard drive.

Only took 6 minutes to write, typical result.

Bruce

 

[rtagle]

Bruce,

How do you like the anti cables? What did you use before?

 

[philox]

Bruce, we have a small Martin Logan fan club in the Los Angeles area with meetings between the 605 and 15 freeway. We experiment with equipment, spacing, and interconnects while eating pizza. Most are 5.1 systems while I am the only stereo with turntable. If your interested write me an e-mail for more information

 

[Joey_V]

JD,

I'm not too far from there. Maybe I can join you guys one of these days. Do you meet regularly?

Rudy

You guys are lucky to have a local ML club.

 

[Bruce Weiland]

rtagle,

I am quite pleased with the anticables! Very, very inexpensive and sonically amazing. I believe that they even offer a money back trial period.

For many years I used some home brew cables, made of two seperate cables. It consisted of 4 short (about 1 meter) runs of Polk Cobra cable and two runs of a cable made of 9 individually insulated (polypopylene) 20 ga. (as I recall). Eventually, I doubled that to 8 Cobra and 4 no name.

In recent years I had only compared that wire to Audioquest. I don't currently recall the model. It wasn't the silver, but I believe the next model down and there was no contest. The Audioquest was " the high price spread" that one could easily tell was NOT butter.

The Anticable is head and shoulder above anything I have used.

Don't forget the disclaimer, your mileage may vary.

I think that it is certainly worth the effort to try Anti-cables.

Bruce

 

[Bruce Weiland]

JD,

Yes, that sounds like fun, and I may be able to help others to optimize their systems in such away as to substantially improve their sound for, in some cases, little more investment, other than time.

Bruce

 

[philox]

Bruce, yes for I am looking for a new DAC. I love my Sony XA7-ES, it has a weight that is placed on the CD and the lazer beam moves rather than the CD...I heard it skip only twice and the CD had a cat hair on them...yes I have 2 cats, you got to love them. What I am getting at is that I have an unique transport but it is 10 years old...maybe a DAC will update the sound. I see some other things you have that are rather unique but I will ask later

 

[Bruce Weiland]

OK John,

How many times have you heard this one? "Have you seen the Kinston trio lately?"

Since you are not that far from me you might want to bring a few of your favorite disc over and your XA7-ES. I think you will be amazed!

In my opinion and that of many others, for some where between $2000 and $3500 you could have a digital front end that would rival the $20,000 to $40,000 "spread" (as in butter). I have about $2300 in my digital front end. I have over 375 CD's ripped to the hard drive, uncompressed. I have recorded a couple of my 700 LP's to the hard drive at 24/96.

If she likes you, you can pet our stray cat. She has been with us a couple of years now. She is an outside cat (because my wife is allergic and my dogs would smell their noses back to their eye balls if a cat had been in the house). I can tell from her behavior that she was someone's in door cat before she came to us.

Bruce

 

[philox]

Bruce, I go to church in Rose Hills and know Whitter very well... please e-mail me

Hand down your head Tom Dooley. Hand down your head and cry...

:sad:

 

[Bruce Weiland]

John,

You got mail, I think. If I got the email correct.

 

[philox]

Got it, thanks. Let me talk to the others and convince my wife to let a few people over...1st let us get past Easter (Pass Over). By the way...if you down load your LP's to CD format 24/96, do you still listen to your record player? I prefer jazz LPs then CD's...something about the LP makes them smooth, while Classical music I prefer CD because I can hear the background instruments.