What's the most sensible HiFi purchase you've recently made or likely to make in the near future; Or, the most pointless HiFi purchase you've made?

[Gray]

Move along now, nothing to see,,,,
Have you taken your anxiety pills?
Good grief there's always one.

But you can see what he's saying Jason, I know you can.
Others have stated that Eversolo beats Wiim for sound. Based on price we would expect them to say nothing else right?

I too think you may have already pre-judged the outcome of the comparison.
All Dave is saying and I agree, is that if you were to truly, blindly compare the two.....there's much more chance of you getting a meaningful comparison.

(Cable disciples always dismiss blind tests because, according to them "blind tests prove nothing".
But everyone (including them) knows that blind tests prove everything).

 

[plastic penguin]

Or any opinion for that matter, but especially when it is not based on actual experience.

Can't argue with that. My limited knowledge tends to refer people to demo (I know it's a well trodden chestnut) whether I'm familiar with a piece of kit or not.

 

[Jasonovich]

But you can see what he's saying Jason, I know you can.
Others have stated that Eversolo beats Wiim for sound. Based on price we would expect them to say nothing else right?

I too think you may have already pre-judged the outcome of the comparison.
All Dave is saying and I agree, is that if you were to truly, blindly compare the two.....there's much more chance of you getting a meaningful comparison.

(Cable disciples always dismiss blind tests because, according to them "blind tests prove nothing".
But everyone (including them) knows that blind tests prove everything).

I hear you Gray and I appreciate your sense of empathy but first, let's just take a step back.

I'm not a professional reviewer, I leave this to the paid up journalist on WHF.
Feedback of a product from a poster is not a review, and we shouldn't be adhering to any protocols or good practice. That just defeats the whole purpose of forums.

If you're the tooting hooting Marshalls of the forum, you know. By the law decreed upon me, I hereby issue the commandments of the Holy Forum, henceforth there should be...........

No speak of the sonic merits of USB cables,
No mention of the same product over and: over again and anything you say, is the law.
Then if I'm being perfectly frank, I have no place here, nor the great majority of the people, sitting quiet behind the keyboard, in fear of being ridiculed because they said something that might upset the Marshalls.
Forums should be a safe place where anyone can exchange ideas freely and we're certainly not setting the right tone.

My feed back is my opinion and normal caveats apply. Why the 3rd degree, why is this so difficult to grasp?

 

[Dom]

Content deleted by moderation.

 

[Deleted member 201267]

The forum seems to be heating up !

 

[Jasonovich]

🤣🤣🤣🤣
I love your bottle Dom!!
Peace Man 😇😇😇

 

[Gray]

The forum seems to be heating up !

And unnecessarily so.

 

[Dom]

🤣🤣🤣🤣
I love your bottle Dom!!
Peace Man 😇😇😇

Thanks man, I guess I was letting off a little steam myself.

 

[WayneKerr]

There not marshals, they are people and this is free speech. You can say anything you want as long as its within the law.
Why not respond to the posters, you could call them w*nk bags for all I care, it would be fine.

Let me try: daveh75 you scum bag, shut your pathetic pie hole and let me review this component without your crap.

As you can see i'm not very good at this, but it does feel fun.

I applaud you Dom for taking the risk However, once the mods see this I can see it being severely edited

 

[record_spot]

Bought the Cambridge Audio Alva ST turntable. Great choice, great deck - then added a separate phono stage (Musical Fidelity X-LP), new cartridge (AT-VM540ML) and tried out a 1.5mm cork platter mat to give a little more clearance for the cartridge (£10 from Amazon) and it does indeed lighten the bass a tad, making it less thumpy.

You can get a refurbished Alva ST from Cambridge for about £370 just now, or the Open Box model I picked up for about £529 (time it right and snag an Ebay bonus discount to add to the bargain). Full price is £850 and you wouldn't be short changed at that. All in all, a terrific buy. Get one and laugh in the face of the WHF review.

 

[Dom]

I applaud you Dom for taking the risk However, once the mods see this I can see it being severely edited

I guess so. Well, I don't mind. It could probably could do with an edit, anyway.

 

[Jasonovich]

Thanks man, I guess I was letting off a little steam myself.

No worries buddy, things kind of got a little crazy. 👍

 

[record_spot]

I think you're being a wee-bit pedantic, its a £600 v £200 DAC, we're not comparing apples to apples.

I hooked up my Kenwood DP-990SG (a near TOTL CD player from 1988, only the DP-1100SG was its senior) - £600 back in the day - to my Cambridge DACMagic 200M. £549 at full RRP today, with twin ESS Sabre DACs.

And? It's a closer run thing than Cambridge (and I imagine a fair few other companies) would care to admit. The Kenwood is the louder player, but when you up the gain for the Cambridge, it's pretty close.

The Kenwood, has a slightly fuller and bloomier sound, not warm by any means (thankfully), while the Cambridge is a tad clearer on the top end, but it's really minor stuff. Both are an excellent listen and the kind of listen you can go for hours with, but the Kenwood stands out, not least for its age, now a healthy 35 years old, but with a real pedigree in its presentation. I can pretty safely say I hadn't heard another CD player like it. In today's money, £600 in 1988 comes in at around £1500 today.

 

[Gray]

I'm not a professional reviewer, I leave this to the paid up journalist on WHF.

Nothing special about professional reviewers.
Next time WHF do a review on this site, checkout the associated forum comments (if anyone has bothered to comment at all).

When controversial 'reviews' of cables and accessories feature superlative descriptions of performance, strangers register with the forum just to comment.
Often, post after post will ridicule the review.

When making performance statements, especially about cables, anyone should expect to at least be challenged - but mockery and ridicule should not come as a surprise.

True, controversial comments may only be somebody's personal opinion....but newbies come here looking for advice. Some take all opinions as gospel - so it's essential that there is a balance of opinions.
If that balance tips toward ridicule - that should tell the newbie something - and likely save them some money and disappointment.

 

[WayneKerr]

Getting back on topic. Sensible and pointless are interchangeable over time, it's the nature of this hobby. What seemed a sensible purchase can quickly become a pointless one.

Recently bought some HD800S headphones, initial impressions were wow. Over time this has dwindled to what did I see in these? Converted them to balanced and purchased a Topping A90D amp to pair with the headphones, initially yeah, over time it didn't really add much and I would be perfectly happy with the sockets in my stereo (These are currently out on loan to a mate, he's come to the same conclusion about the headphones but rates the Topping. Different people different ears and expectations).

Korg DS DAC 10R - bought to digitise my LPs. Wonderful box of tricks with a smashing ADC/DAC, but the faff of digitising LPs and the de-click&pop is just too time consuming. Thought this would be a nice project for retirement, now I'm retired I have have better ways of wasting my time Korg is now relegated to DAC/headphone duties on my main PC.

Going from Marantz 6000 series to 8000 series, gotta be a significant upgrade innit? No, I was totally underwhelmed, but they did stay in my system for 6 years so must have sounded decent.

 

[Gray]

The Raspberry Pi must qualify as sensible purchases for me ( I bought two, one for main hi-fi, another for a headphone rig).

A big contender for most pointless was a Rotel RE-700 graphic equaliser.
Nice enough looking thing.
Had a play changing sound........🤷

Lesson not learned - as I subsequently bought a Behringer FX-800.
Just as pointless, but fun - especially putting live TV newsreaders through the pitch changer:

 

[jonboywalton75]

I recall, when I was young (not so long ago!), the original Kef Coda's I purchased was my first glimpse into HiFi. These were absolutely amazing. Everything that was published in WHF was bang on, these budget speakers were a steal.
After a few years, saving up my pennies and working part time in Ali's greasy kebab shop, I decided it was time for an upgrade.

Well, the Mordaunt-Short £300 speakers was the flavour of the month, even the name sounded great, double-barrelled that only the gentry would buy, had to be good, got to be sound, right?
My student cash, nope my parents upkeep money was going to be offloaded into a worthwhile investment. I was so relieved to finally unload all this shiny copper and notes from my wallet.

These were much bigger, they looked really good and they had the Harmon-Kardon's pumping out the juice.

When you're a kid, you're always constantly seeking self-validation and you want to impress upon your peers.
Friends ask what you're playing at home, Oh I have Pioneer record player, Sansui twin cassette deck, take a breath, save the best to last, Oh my amp is Harmon-Kardon (that's one hyphen) and this is Gold (second hyphen) and Mordant-Shorts wired to Monster cable. Home run......Yes.

Oh how I rue the day. These were the biggest garbage money can buy. There was no sound stage, they were flat two dimensional and I couldn't ask for the Kefs back, as these were already part exchanged.

Though in fairness to MS, the HK's were a total mismatch. In a different setting, these probably would have sounded half decent.

I still feel sad about the day I auditioned my Coda's for the lad that bought them and took the cash and watched them go out of my life 😔

 

[Jasonovich]

I still feel sad about the day I auditioned my Coda's for the lad that bought them and took the cash and watched them go out of my life 😔

Look at Kef today, back in the day they use to make excellent budget speakers and little sad really they've turned their back on the low end of the market.

 

[Jasonovich]

Nothing special about professional reviewers.
Next time WHF do a review on this site, checkout the associated forum comments (if anyone has bothered to comment at all).

When controversial 'reviews' of cables and accessories feature superlative descriptions of performance, strangers register with the forum just to comment.
Often, post after post will ridicule the review.

When making performance statements, especially about cables, anyone should expect to at least be challenged - but mockery and ridicule should not come as a surprise.

True, controversial comments may only be somebody's personal opinion....but newbies come here looking for advice. Some take all opinions as gospel - so it's essential that there is a balance of opinions.
If that balance tips toward ridicule - that should tell the newbie something - and likely save them some money and disappointment.

Nothing special about professional reviewers.
Sure, I concur but this really is for another debate.

I beg to differ, 'mockery and ridicule should not come as a surprise'
No, this should never be a facet or the outcome, when someone says stupid things. I'm from the premises that everyone has value and you're at liberty to agree or disagree but when it becomes entrenched in some ideological warfare, it becomes unsavoury.

I suspect you're all a bunch of nice guys but let's just take a stock of things, this is just a forum, people can say anything they want as long as it is within the guideline boundaries. Take everything that's said with a pinch of salt and do your own investigation.

 

[Jasonovich]

I hooked up my Kenwood DP-990SG (a near TOTL CD player from 1988, only the DP-1100SG was its senior) - £600 back in the day - to my Cambridge DACMagic 200M. £549 at full RRP today, with twin ESS Sabre DACs.

And? It's a closer run thing than Cambridge (and I imagine a fair few other companies) would care to admit. The Kenwood is the louder player, but when you up the gain for the Cambridge, it's pretty close.

The Kenwood, has a slightly fuller and bloomier sound, not warm by any means (thankfully), while the Cambridge is a tad clearer on the top end, but it's really minor stuff. Both are an excellent listen and the kind of listen you can go for hours with, but the Kenwood stands out, not least for its age, now a healthy 35 years old, but with a real pedigree in its presentation. I can pretty safely say I hadn't heard another CD player like it. In today's money, £600 in 1988 comes in at around £1500 today.

Not surprising, the quality of construction of first or second generation CD's were better, mostly made from metal but when the market opened up, they compromised rigidity for plastic.

I have fond memories of my Marantz CD-73, my first CD Player, just look at the construction, how much do you think this Full Metal beast will cost today?



Something I read,

When CDs first came out in the 1980's, there were 2 kinds of drives: CD-ROM drives and CD-audio drives. CD-audio drives were specifically designed and engineered for music players. CD-ROM drives were the standard for computers.
It is alleged that CD-Audio had superior mechanism than the PC equivalent but more costly to produce.

CD-ROM drives became cheaper than CD-audio drives around the nineties or early noughties.
So it wasn't surprising many electronics companies ditched the CD-Audio format and started to use CD-ROM format instead.
This might explain why your old Kenwood still sounds great. There was something about the 16 bit digital conversion process also, unfortunately, I can't find the source on Google.

 

[daveh75]

I beg to differ, 'mockery and ridicule should not come as a surprise'
No, this should never be a facet or the outcome, when someone says stupid things. I'm from the premises that everyone has value and you're at liberty to agree or disagree but when it becomes entrenched in some ideological warfare, it becomes unsavoury.

A bit rich don't you think when you've just thanked and even congratulated Dom's post calling me a scum bag?

I might've of actually been offended (and hit the report button) if i actually cared or even respected either of your opinions in the slightest.

I suspect you're all a bunch of nice guys but let's just take a stock of things, this is just a forum, people can say anything they want as long as it is within the guideline boundaries. Take everything that's said with a pinch of salt and do your own investigation.

What you really mean is you want an echo chamber where everyone agrees, or anyone can post any old nonsense without any pushback or alternative viewpoint being offered.

I suspect the internet really isnt for you!

(or that hifi wigwam is)

 

[Jasonovich]

A bit rich don't you think when you've just thanked and even congratulated Dom's post calling me a scum bag?

I might've of actually been offended (and hit the report button) if i actually cared or even respected either of your opinions in the slightest.




What you really mean is you want an echo chamber where everyone agrees, or anyone can post any old nonsense without any pushback or alternative viewpoint being offered.

I suspect the internet really isnt for you!

(or that hifi wigwam is)

I wasn't condoning DOM, just showing my appreciation for his support.

You would observe, I have never been rude to you. Yes, we can't seem to reconcile and I'm still trying to figure out, the catalyst that started all this, was it the USB cables or you just don't like how I come across, I don't know, life is too short.

All I know, is two grumpy old men having a dig at each other. We've both been on this planet too long, so let's just put this aside and shake hands virtually.
I'm fine with moving on, if that is OK with you?

 

[daveh75]

The Raspberry Pi must qualify as sensible purchases for me ( I bought two, one for main hi-fi, another for a headphone rig).

Indeed.

I've been playing with RasPis since they launched 11.5 years ago* and have owned every generation and iteration of board, but my favourite in the context of HiFi is still the RasPi Zero + Pimoroni pHAT DAC.

The combo of Zero, DAC and case was £25 all in and i would confidentally pit it against your EverSolo's, BlueSounds CXNs etc (blind obviously)

*not just for HiFi duties either - I have a rack full of them at home.

 

[Dom]

A bit rich don't you think when you've just thanked and even congratulated Dom's post calling me a scum bag?

I might've of actually been offended (and hit the report button) if i actually cared or even respected either of your opinions in the slightest.




What you really mean is you want an echo chamber where everyone agrees, or anyone can post any old nonsense without any pushback or alternative viewpoint being offered.

I suspect the internet really isnt for you!

(or that hifi wigwam is)

So, its ok to call jasonovich a lost cause, maybe the internet isn't for you in reality.

daveh75 I have already reported you. Ok?

 

[daveh75]

I wasn't condoning DOM, just showing my appreciation for his support.

You would observe, I have never been rude to you. Yes, we can't seem to reconcile and I'm still trying to figure out, the catalyst that started all this, was it the USB cables or you just don't like how I come across, I don't know, life is too short.

All I know, is two grumpy old men having a dig at each other. We've both been on this planet too long, so let's just put this aside and shake hands virtually.
I'm fine with moving on, if that is OK with you?

We're never gonna agree on anything, and I have an ever decreasing tolerance for audiophile bs, so I respectfully suggest you put me on ignore and I'll do the same!