new member from England

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sistersadie
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new member from England

Post by sistersadie »

admin - thank you for the welcome! its great that you're prepared to put in the hours for this website [ive just found it]

I became a CJ owner as of may2017, after years of lukewarm and ultimately mistaken engagement with solid state [devialet, M-F, etc].

I truly am a happy bunny now that my system is valve-based. I'm using ACTs2 + ARTsa amps with TAD player and speakers.

what an incredible feeling it is to relax into the music and know I never need to upgrade again.

the upgrade mania may be a fun hobby for many of us, but personally I find it terribly distracting and often a waste of time.

needless to say my wife wholeheartedly agree!!
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Re: new member from England

Post by admin »

Glad to hear that your enjoying your new system. It's great to have you with us!
-admin
Home Theater in Member Gallery
Main stereo: ART Amplifier and ET7s2. 2nd stereo: PV-14L and MV-55. Previously Owned: PF2 preamp, Evolution 2000 Amp, PV-12AL preamp, D/A-2b Vacuum-Tube Digital Processor.
Big Dog RJ
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Re: new member from England

Post by Big Dog RJ »

G'day mate,

Certainly nice to know someone is around from the UK, afterall I think that's where we developed the term "mate..."

Missed those days of rough sport; rugby in division 4 against the London Welsh, and later played division 1 for Kingsbury and New England under 24 as an import... felt like a honor to play for such clubs, even not being a UK citizen! Couple of pints after a good social huddle was all that was required after a rough battle on the field.
Definitely hear you on that one, no need to upgrade after you own CJ and even better when the wifey agrees!

Over the decades, what I've learned along the way is generally for me, that is, it wasn't just a case of upgrading, rather trying to get to that special kind of sound you're after... too many systems have come and gone, across various countries, and now residing down unda- finally settled for that special sound. True by all means you could certainly "upgrade" and go beyond that, and achieve an even greater system but to what point may I ask? How long do we have to really sit back and enjoy what we've got? Are we looking after our priorities? House, Family, children's education etc. These are the things I should have attended to before heading into high-end disaster on unnecessary purchases in the past. Anyway, better to learn from our mistakes in't it mate?

Nice one with the ACT2- superb preamp indeed! and the ARTsa, fantastic amp. BTW, does your ARTsa have the EL34's or the KT120's?

I have brought in the ARTsa with the EL34's for a spin when I had my ACT2 and the Quads, it was a very special amp I must say. The KT120's do provide that fuller sound but the midrange and level of musicality on the EL34 is highly addictive, and so I have stuck to that.

Perhaps with your TAD's you would probably find a different experience and enjoy one type of output tube over the other, glad to hear your thoughts...
Cheers mate,
RJ
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Re: new member from England

Post by sistersadie »

Hi Big Dog RJ!
It's been an age.I thought I'd wait until we properly thrashed you at cricket. The moment duly came!! No that's a lie, I just haven't checked my CJ mailbox what with my daughter's wedding etc..and I agree family IS a big deal. Anyway good to hear about your good self and my apologies for not replying before....
Re tubes, I haven't tried swapping the KT120s supplied with my ex-demo ARTsa. Call me cautious, but I haven't yet found the need to make changes to the sound, with so many things elsewhere screaming for attention. Don't know about you - I guess the quality of the electric supply would be quite clean outside urban areas Down-Unda - but [here] in Lincoln UK, getting clean power and grounding that works is a bloody nightmare. That's what has been keeping me busy the last year. Not really upgrading. Just giving good gear a chance to perform as it was designed to. One reason for slow progress is my chronic lack of physics understanding. Schooling, or lack of, catches up with you when your'e trying to steer clear of sharks waiting for your hard-earned cash! Do you ever hit a brick wall trying get advice from hifi dealers? I do. Lately I discovered a company called Russ Andrews who do seem able to give balanced advice - I'll see how their advice works out in practice; what I've found is grounding is a far bigger subject than I thought. Apparently there's no 'one size fits all' solution; so you can pay anything between £30 for a DIY effort and £3000 for a magical box o' tricks. I'm going for the RA solution for £300 - I'll report back when I've got it up and running.
Have a great winter!! Anthony
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Re: new member from England

Post by Big Dog RJ »

G'day Anthony Matie,
How's it looking...

Received your reply on another thread in the amplifiers section, thought I'd send you a response from this one since this is your own thread.

Cricket, not too sure where we're at with that considering the past Fiasco's we've had...
Soccer seems to be going well, I was watching the game with Eng vs Swe, went really well I must say. It's looking very different compared to the teams 4 years ago, the favourites are gone!

Getting back to audio... I came across the issues you are /were having with clean AC mains.

Over here down unda, it's not too bad but still some sort of decent power conditioning is required.

A big note ***do not spend unnecessary money on AC conditioning gadgets! ***

Just a good solid voltage stabilizer is all you require, plus a well designed power strip with critical grounding layout, such as the Nordost QBase 8 or 4. They also make individual units called Qone's which just plug straight in to any AC outlet. The Nordost products are not cheap but fairly affordable compared to the costly snake oil out there...

Before you do all of this, there is a very simple solution that you must do for perfect AC mains current to your system. You need to get a sparkie (electrician) to wire a dedicated 13amp line directly to your systems AC mains outlet and to your electrical main board. This must be placed on a separate switch with a dedicated CB (circuit breaker) or separate mains fuse.

Since you're based in the UK, I think the general AC mains for domestic use over there is 13amps 220v, just double check this with your sparkie.

By installing a dedicated AC line to your system, you will not only hear a vast improvement but also a very quiet reproduction of sound, mainly because this is a dedicated line not sharing A Star circuit, which is the same dam circuit your kettle and fridge are plugged into!

Goodness knows what else is sharing this circuit, could also be a heater somewhere around the house, unless it's a gas heater. Ideally when a house is designed, there are three main areas of three different circuits.
1. The main living area, which will include the dinning and lounge.
2. The kitchen area which includes a few heavy duty wiring for fridges and kettles, microwaves etc..
3. The rest of the house, which is mostly bedrooms and toilets plus the garage and whatever else requires lighting.

So as you can see, there is no dedicated line for an audio system, rather this is shared with one of those main 3 circuits. When it is low end hi-fi or those simpler systems we had back in the hey day, simply plug in and press play and enjoy the music, whiles the kettle is boiling...

Now, with our high end systems, when the kettle is boiling or better still, when the neighbor is running his air conditioning or welding machine in the garage, there goes your voltage swing plus high end sound doesn't quite sound highend...

And when you go running with this problem to your dealer, all he can see is desperation in your eyes, plus the willingness to fork out the extra dollars just to get decent sound and stable current. Their famous phrases, "Oh my, yes we do have the solution to all your AC mains needs but it will cost you 10 grand mate! " and the card is slowly reluctantly pulled out and swiped with much grief...
Wifey definitely not too pleased...

If you've already done this, that's great!
If you haven't, by all means get to it, and when it's all done, post us a note and tell us how exactly your system sounds after that, especially the ARTsa! You will be very pleasantly surprised!

Cheers mate and have a good one,
From down unda, RJ
sistersadie
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Re: new member from England

Post by sistersadie »

G'day Big Dog
Good to receive your suggestions for reducing the deleterious effects of interference suffered by audiophiles...
Separated AC mains. Done, with bog-standard heavy-duty cooker cable [in parallel with earth/ground cable] as spur, not as a ring circuit, to dedicated wall outlet. Vastly improved weight to sound, but did not noticeably improve break-up of voices at higher frequencies.
Power conditioning. I was a sceptic over the reduced dynamics issue, but finally fell into line deciding to throw the kitchen sink and all at the problem. I guess a power conditioner does the voltage stabilisation you mentioned aswell as everything else? Anyway the mix of top Shunyata power cables [some little-shielded] and their Denali 6000S conditioner I invested in has bought me a system almost totally devoid of hash with a calm demeanour. So I am pleased with that.
But d'you know? I'm not completely free of those interfering high-frequency effects. Even now. The quest for better grounding - that's both chassis and signal plane grounding - is on at present. I have my components daisy-chained together [using chassis bolts as connectors] ending up in a so-called RF Router plugged to mains earth, without power connection. An improvement was noticed, but not eradicated. I'll let you know how I get on in due course.
Cheers mate,
A
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Re: new member from England

Post by joeinid »

Wonderful system sistersadie. I’m happy you are loving what you hear.
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Re: new member from England

Post by XCop5089 »

Sistersadie,

As a fellow UK CJ user, I thought I would pass on some timely advice I recently received from Jeff Fischel, regarding a similar question posed about chassis grounding, using Russ Andrews RF Router! (Jeff's response is first and my question appears below).

Hello Steve,

1. The GAT input impedance is 25,000 ohms.
2. I would highly recommend NOT tinkering with your equipment , adding ground wires to the case work. The ground symbol on the rear of the chassis is to indicate that the chassis is already internally grounded. SORRY , BUT I NEED TO PUT MY REPLY IN CAPS TO EXPRESS MY VIEW. DO NOT LOOSEN THE GROUND SCREWS !! DO NOT ADD EXTERNAL GROUND WIRES !! THE GROUND SCHEME ON THESE PRODUCTS IS COMPLEX , TO PROVIDE SAFETY TO THE USER AND TO PREVENT ZERO GROUND LOOP HUM IN THE SYSTEM !! ALL THE COMPONENTS IN YOUR SYSTEM ARE GRONDED VIA AUDIO INTERCONNECT , THEN GROUNDED TO EARTH VIA THE THIRD PRONG IN THE AC LINE CORD !! TINKERING WITH THE GROUND SCHEME COULD RESULT IN PRODUCT FAILURE OR SERIOUS INJURY OR DEATH !!

Best regards,

Jeff Fischel
Owner/President
conrad-johnson design inc.
703-698-8581
http://www.conradjohnson.com/

From: Stephen Paul Coward [mailto:s.coward101@btinternet.com]
Sent: Tuesday, July 31, 2018 2:16 PM
To: jeff fischel <jeff@conradjohnson.com>
Subject: Re: Premier 350SA power amp & connection of REL G2 Subwoofer

Hi Jeff

Belated congratulations on taking the helm of the company!

As a UK Conrad Johnson user of some fourteen years standing, this is great news for the continuity of excellence.

A couple of questions, if I could please trouble you with if I may?

1. What is the INPUT impedance of the CJ GAT2? I ask, because I use MIT Oracle MA interconnects between my source components and preamp . The MIT cables have selectable impedance and I was wondering which value to choose for optimum performance?

2. I would like to experiment with the current fashion for system GROUNDING and a UK business, Russ Andrews Accessories, suggests connecting low impedance wire between the casework of each source component (I use a 4-box dCS Vivaldi digital system, as well as a Melco N1ZH/2 music server and a turntable and phono preamp) and the preamp and then connecting a wire between the preamp casework and the casework of the power amp. The final connection would be from the power amp to either an external copper spike, buried in the ground, or the earth connection on a mains power socket. On the rear of my CJ 350SA is a screw/bolt, underneath the power socket, labelled GROUND (please see attached photo).

I undid the side panel of the amp and connected on the inside of the casework are cables attached to the securing nut (please see attached photo).

Is it safe to connect a wire to this casework bolt on the exterior of the casework and route it to an exterior copper spike as I have previously described?

Similarly, is it safe to connect my source components with wires to the identically labelled bolt on the rear panel casework of the GAT2?

I would be extremely grateful for your advice before experimenting, to see whether or not an improvement in system noise floor results.

If you advise against the whole exercise, I will abandon my experiment.

Thank you, in anticipation.

Kind Regards,

Steve
CJ GAT2/Premier 350SA, dCS Vivaldi full stack, TAD CR1 MKII, Melco NIZH/60/2, TW Raven One/Graham Phantom II/Transfiguration Orpheus L, Whest PS.30 RDT 'SE' phono stage, MIT Oracle MAX/MA cabling, DAAD room tuning, Stillponts racks, balanced PSU.
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Re: new member from England

Post by Big Dog RJ »

Well there you go! Straight from the horses mouth and the designer himself.

Although the norm is to pretty much follow what the owners manual states, and how to connect your equipment, which is quite straight forward, yet still there are many who want to tinker with unnecessary elements resulting in disaster...

I'm not pointing at anyone on this forum but I've seen some terrible disasters with others and the extent to what they go through to achieve this so called zero noise floor, and end up a total scrabble eggs...

As I have previously mentioned numerous times, just a simple dedicated AC mains with a separate circuit breaker switch is all that is required. Matching the mains to your local current limits is obviously a must, therefore either 10amp, 15amp or even 20amp would be fine. Further to this adding other devices such as a Voltage stabilizer / regulator or even a magnetic field stabilizer can yield superb results but can also be system dependent. With these devices along with a very well built power distribution board with A class grounding circuit, is all that's needed.

I would highly recommend Nordost accessories and to add further to what the Jeff man stated, yes it is the interconnects and speaker cables that make the difference. I noticed a massive difference in noise floor when upgrading cables & interconnects, plus matching these to the power conditioning elements, adds that final touch to absolute quietness in the wiring loom for the whole system.

It took me nearly 25 years to realize that! Only now everything is dead quite and you can feel more of the music unhindered.
Brilliant advice from Jeff, cheers to all
RJ
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