it's refreshing Paul to not hear competition trashing each other. Good answer as you don't really know what he's looking for. Thank you for the great videos and products
Interesting answer. Revealing may need to be fleshed out a bit more. I am one of those people who has been there done that. When I first got into the hobby it was my holy grail. Put systems together that did a great job at being revealing, yet I could not warm up to them. What I had was something that had great inner detail, placement of instruments, and reached deep into the soundstage. Yet it never sounded natural to me. I found myself looking to upgrade not long after. I prefer things that present music the way I hear live at a concert hall. I never got into something that gave me a sense of augmented reality.
@@jaynewhard6189 McIntosh receiver mated with Paradigm Founder speakers. It has a mellow presentation, vocals are flesh on the bone natural, plus high WAF. It is not the absolute sound by any stretch, but with it I am drawn to the recorded performance itself, not the tricks the gear is able to glean out of it.
I had a similar start, was influenced by a sound engineer friend who was adamant that accuracy and detail was all important, but it never got my toes tapping. Ended up swapping out most of the system in a warm tubey rich presentation that’s far less revealing but I’m so much more in love with the system now!
I just spent 8 years investigating -every-single-aspect- of audio performance and it's impact on the overall outcome. My project brief was that no major components can be upgraded, I tried that for decades, much to my immense disappointment. So I'll give a completely different take here. First- Room Acoustics. By far the most important element in the final sound. Second, all of the source related stuff has to be up to par or nothing will be able to get above that level. If you are streaming digital then you MUST look at and assess the stream, you NEED to have a musically good sounding network switch and audio quality cable right before the streamer/DAC. Moist consumer switches deliver a highly compromised signal. I tested many switches side by side and the difference was startling. Third on the list has become the crossover in your speakers. This part of the system is, unless you have very high end speakers, on the same level of harm as the network switch, if the crossover is made with crappy parts, and unless you spent north of 10-15k on your speakers they might be, then you can never get above the limits imposed by the crap parts in the crossover. The part of this video about reveling vs musical is where your crossover has the final word, it all depends on the capacitors used in the crossover. Use something like Mundorf caps and you will get a very reveling result, use something from the copper/oil type like MiFlex caps (super expensive so most people use them as a bypass cap, and while I've seem people use them as a bypass cap for Mundorf caps I didn't like that result)... so the copper or silver-oil caps deliver the on the musical rich lush sound end of the scale. People really have to understand that the major parts of your setup are not any where near as impactful to switch out as the -vastly less expensive- stuff I listed here. Switching one 5k$ amp for another 5k dollar amp isn't going to be 5k$ worth of improvement. !k$ into DIY roam treatment will deliver improvement way past that $ amount. Of course doing the parts I'm talking about here is a lot more effort and requires a great deal of learning in order to get it right. But for me that is way more fun than spending 5k$ on new speakers and being wildly disappointed. Oops, I forgot one, if you are using anything resembling low cost banana plugs, get rid of them. Use either ungodly stupid expensive ones or use bare wire. I was doing a capacitor comparison on a crossover last week and uses banana plugs to connect and swap capacitor units and noticed a very significant drop in performance when the banana plugs were in the food chain. So I removed them from my 2 main systems, bare wire to the amp terminals and all copper (homemade) tube connectors at the speakers. The difference was startling. I had to do serious adjustments to both rigs to accommodate the change, in both systems I would need to adjust the Lpad or... on one system a simple but big change to the acoustic treatment and on the other finding a capacitor combo that works, the Mundorfs were not usable without a 2db change to the Lpad. Both systems now sound very significantly better than with the low cost banana plugs installed.
Danny at GR Research offers tube connectors for speakers. Great connection very similar to that described above, but only works on the speaker end. I believe Danny and Paul both might recommend copper/gold plated spades if you are not doing amp terminal modifications. Goal is to get metal out of the signal path. Bare wire, too, would work, but solder tin it first to avoid oxidation. If you have a good solution for modifying the amp terminal connection that works across brands, there is likely a market for it. Best speaker connection for improving the signal path would be an interesting “Ask Paul” topic for a more in depth review from Paul.
@@steveaiello8025 While not being fancy gold plated copper... I reckon a copper tube, even if it's not OFC, is better than brass and other lesser metals. While on the speaker end I just removed the OEM binding posts and make my own tube connectors, just plain copper tube and sleeve for the insert, The tubing I use for the insert fits my Integra but not some other sockets, so it's not something I can make a blanket recommend on... but I have replaced all of the important speaker wire plugs and sockets with my own poorman's GR Research tube connectors, with a wee bit of copper grease on them. It works and it's huge improvement over all the junk that comes OEM until you hit a very serious price point.
I'm with Paul, a decent DAC upgrade or phono cart/preamp upgrade is what guy is clearly after. I would even go on a limb and recommend a tube buffer stage for that particular rig will be a step up as well. Had a chance to demo new Wilson Sashas on a D'Agostino amp last fall, and I'm still haunted by the experience. I dont think it gets more revealing than that setup.
True, but do you truly know how far upstream to be concerned? Quality of the AC Power is fundamental, quality of ethernet delivery is fundamental, and both of those are pre-source and, if not up to par, will sink the whole ship.
I have a pair of Focal Aria 906 paired with a Luxman L-505Z. I didn't know anything about revealing speakers till I started to replace parts one by one like small cables and speakers isolators. I can definitely say that everytime I upgrade/change a component, something changes as well in the sound. It's not a placebo effect either as I always used the same songs to test my system.
Sure!! You need thousand dollar power cables and thousands of dollars in speaker cables...blah, blah, blah...enjoy the music!! That's what this is about. Get off the merry go round of buying, buying, buying!! Buy new music!!
Heh Paul, just finished reading your book 99% True. Really enjoyed it. I have to commend you on your tenacity to succeed. I hope your other books are as good as this one was. On to reading your next book! Hope to visit you some day. Watching your CZcams videos has been a part of my daily routine also. Keep em coming!
Well.Paul, you said in one sentence some very interesting: there are people which do not want hearing revealing music,or do not care about it. Here is the point, in a live hearing session, you hear everything, why not want to hear this in reproduced music
revealing can be interpreted to enhance extra sounds beyond what you would perceive in a live setting. it is after all not called "life like". it's also the sort of stuff most people would try to master out on purpose.
I struggle with this topic. I want revealing detail, but not be sibilant or fatiguing. Sometimes I think speakers with crazy impedance swings fit the definition of some people for revealing. Widely varying speaker impedances will highlight differences in equipment, but that is because some of the equipment will not be load irrelevent.
It might pay Colin to demo a few different speakers to see if he can get a bead on what revealing is and if he likes it. If he listens to half a dozen hi quality speakers and the revels are still his speaker of choice, then change the source.
First time i heard revealing was in the 80s when i swiped an SME 3009 from my old man and put in on my SL-1510 and it sounded amazing. Sme had silver interconnect rca cables and everytime i tried to 'upgrade the cables' i lost all the openess and went back to the smes. That was when i heard and realized the difference in cables. I only use silver or gold silver alloy now on my tts.
I wish I lived close enough to visit your sound room and actually get to hear systems that are revealing. I bought my system way back in the late 1980's and have made a few changes along the way, but it is essentially the same. Back then, people who listened to my system were always very impressed with the sound. I used to go to audio shows or audiophile stores with listening rooms to listen to other setups. But now, in my area, there are no more audiophile stores or shows. None of my friends have stereos or even care about them .They are happy to stream music off their phones or using cheap Bluetooth ear buds. So, I have no way to test how revealing my system is or how to upgrade my system to improve it. I truly miss the 80's and 90's when people were more into the quality of music over the convenience. So Paul, if you ever find yourself in the Toronto area, and can find a few hours to help me with my system, there is a nice steak dinner in it for you!!!
In the US, we have an audio store called The Cable Company. They specialize in keeping demo units of just about everything they sell. So, for example, if you want a new preamp, they'll send you 2 or 3 demos so you can try them in your own system before you make a purchase. Typically, I wouldn't recommend this option to someone outside the US, but they've started to do business in foreign countries. I can't imagine them not going into Canada.
@@052RC Thanks for the reply! Back in the 80's and 90's I had several places in different cities that would loan out there demo equipment for a weekend so I could test it in my own room with my own equipment. I remember testing out all types of amps, preamps, turntables and especially speakers. That was how I ended up choosing most of my equipment. I am not sure how many of these types of stores still exist, and I know for a fact that there are none within 45 minutes of where I currently live. There were two good stores in my area, but they did not survive COVID. I will keep my eyes open for The Cable Company.
While a well-balanced system is always key (roughly the same $ on the amps as on the source as on the speakers as on the cables and accessories) I agree with the notion of garbage in, garbage out and therefore it's usually best to upgrade the source on an otherwise balanced system.
Hi it's Colin, just to let you know my sources. Origin Live Resolution with multi layer platter, Origin Live Conqueror tonearm with Lyra cartridge. Gold note PH10/PSU10 Classe CDP300 cd/dvd
I really don't care about "revealing" being I "color" the source with an EQ (as does the crossovers). I misunderstood until recently what reveling is. Basically, I take it now its how sensitive the speakers are to wires and other crazy minor changes. Which in my case I listen from everything from the 60 until today. Blues, bluegrass, folk, rock to metal. Needing to change mechanical equipment just to listen to a decade is not practical. I can see in a studio where you want to hear what you are going to record and if a mic or cables would make a change but once the recording is made (imho) its all about tone control because there are few producers I agree with.
@@Retroclassiccarparts Just keep in mind, these are opinions, not absolutes. The next person will tell you to get new amps instead. But it will have to be the next person after me. I agree with the other poster. No question that if it was my system, I would get a preamp first. As long as you didn't make a big mistake matching your amp and speakers, the preamp is the more important component to get right. Also, I think Paul's hearing may be rolled off a bit in his old age. If you get a new preamp, you should easily hear a difference with your Revels.
The first upgrade should always be your power cords. Kidding aside... Our host suggested a phono-amp upgrade. Excellent advice. Other phono related upgrades, that are probably less expensive (depending on the price of the comparative phono amp upgrade), are: 1) Put your turntable on a platform that is designed to virtually eliminate vibrations from reaching your stylus. Townshend Seismic Vibration Isolation Platforms are amazing. 2) Seek out better sounding pressings. Upgrading your pressings can make a huge difference. Most pressings have sub-par sound quality. A fair number have good sound quality. Few have white hot, superb sound quality -- and for only one of the two sides. If you figure out which stampers to avoid, and which ones have the potential for fantastic sound quality, then after purchasing several copies, you have a good shot at landing a gem. And your ears will thank you. 3) Professionally dial in your turntable. That includes: -- the effective length of the tone-arm -- the cartridge's weight -- the vertical tracking alignment / rake angle -- the anti-skating -- the overhang -- the offset -- the zenith angle -- the cartridge's azimuth. If your cartridge came pre-installed by the factory, it is a complete crap shoot whether or not they dialed it in properly. They might have dialed in the anti-skating and cartridge's weight. But the rest? If, perhaps, you purchased a Clearaudio turntable package that included a tone-arm and cartridge, you will have a good shot at them having dialed it in properly, because they are perfectionists with their turntables. But dialing in all of the above, with precision, for their customers? Who knows? And every item on the above list is critical. Get it right, and you will be rewarded with a huge sonic improvement. But you will have to learn the skills, or find someone who has the skills, and it will take probably take them 90 minutes. So there is that labor cost. You will also need the tools to do the job. If you do the above three items, your stereo will sound twice the price or more.
I have just built my own speakers and burnt in a tube amp. Now I go - oo' never head that before, what is needed now is a better room. There would be a slim margin of improvent with any component. Sill going to try but not expecting as great of an improvement. Hey Paul, I am looking for the reverse of a preamp yep. One or two inputs and 3 or more outs for different amp setups. Any suggestions? Great fielding as always.
While so many speaker reviewers like speakers that sound good at any level with any source. Perhaps used more to negatively describe revealing speakers that do show poor recordings and the lack of dynamics in most recordings. I agree in preferring to hear the bad as bad so I can hear the really good as really good.
If your source is a turntable, upgrade to digital. Vinyl is snake-oil. It only has about 60 dB of dynamic range (only the outside track can reach 70 dB) vs. well over 90 dB for digital (slightly greater than the dynamic range of human hearing), vinyl has surface noise, hiss, pops, low frequency feedback from the room and turntable rumble, poor channel separation, and it loses frequency response every time you play a record.
Forget the dynamic range difference. You will never stream anything with more than 25 db dynamic range. Under 10db for most music. I you have heard a proper vinyl system you wouldnt care about the numbers, but ofc vinyl has inconveniences, and could be considered snake oil in some ways.
You are totally missing the point of vinyl. It is about the journey as well as the destination and the inconvenience and imperfections that give it character. It just needs a bit more work, sound is subjective and a good vinyl system can sound fantastic and is far more satisfying than just pressing a button. If you want 'perfection' go digital, if you want an experience you can't beat vinyl.
@@tomturner6792 Yes, satisfaction and just ease of mind is huge with vinyl. Especially when you have your stream randomly stop every now and then even on ethernet. At that moment I just want to break something, its ridiculous.
@@kristofvadnai7468 It's true that there are many digital recordings with low dynamic range, but look at The Unofficial Dynamic Range Database. Of the 7,000+ albums that they've rated, most of the highest dynamic range albums are on digital. There are only a few vinyl albums that even approach vinyl's pathetic limits. I had a proper vinyl system. When I went digital, I compared all of my albums with their digital counterparts. I didn't keep a single vinyl album. Not one. Too noisy.
@@tomturner6792 Some people must like listening to hiss, tics, pops, low dynamic range, room feedback, and no high frequency content. They probably also like to listen to their old 8-track tapes and Edison wax cylinders.
Revealing? Hmm... All engineers in any industry try to make product with consistent performance resistant as much as possible to outside influence except you Paul and your followers in audio industry. Let me compare this to watch manufactures. Mechanic watch movement is sensitive to lots of different factors: temperature, altitude, how much spring is winded, even position of hand. Watch movement designers try to make movement that compensate those factors as much as they can trying to deliver consistent performance. Best movements are those who are more consistent or to make parallel with audio, less revealing. What you are doing looks like some watch enthusiast tries to find the best position, temperature.... all I mentioned and use particular watch only in those conditions because otherwise watch "reveals" any change done. Stupid, isn't it? I can understand that person who designs audio gear like yourself wants to hear changes done, but that should be only for development. For listening music, not gear, I want my system to perform consistent without wondering about power line, cable, source or fly sitting on my preamp. I'm sure vast majority of people want the same. And I care a lot about sound what's by your definition makes me audiophile, even I don't like that. It's all about music!
Audio Obsession is one expensive disease. I hear people around the world who are never satisfied no matter how much money they spend. They are ready to spend more to upgrade to the latest and greatest. I feel sorry for these people. I’m surprised their marriages survive their obsession (time to upgrade the wife?) I pity the poor fools who fall into this trap. I restored a vintage system and spend my time and money buying music to listen to…not trying to achieve audio nirvana. First, you need to have a dedicated room of a large enough size while spending God knows how much money in order to get there. I have only bought one piece of new gear in the past 20 years and that was a better CD Player/DAC so I could enjoy my collection of CDs (they never sounded good before on old players). Relax people. Try to be satisfied. Your spinning your wheels spending money on upgrades and changing everything like you do your underwear. Its a disease- like being an alcoholic or drug addict.
In 2006, I heard Ravel's Studio speakers, and they sounded amazing. I cannot remember everything about them, due to the time that has passed. I do recall that they were dynamic, and produced a wall of sound. I played a ZZ Top song, and a couple of other songs. I never heard ZZ Top sound so good.
it's refreshing Paul to not hear competition trashing each other. Good answer as you don't really know what he's looking for. Thank you for the great videos and products
Interesting answer. Revealing may need to be fleshed out a bit more. I am one of those people who has been there done that. When I first got into the hobby it was my holy grail. Put systems together that did a great job at being revealing, yet I could not warm up to them. What I had was something that had great inner detail, placement of instruments, and reached deep into the soundstage. Yet it never sounded natural to me. I found myself looking to upgrade not long after. I prefer things that present music the way I hear live at a concert hall. I never got into something that gave me a sense of augmented reality.
What do you have now?
@@jaynewhard6189 McIntosh receiver mated with Paradigm Founder speakers. It has a mellow presentation, vocals are flesh on the bone natural, plus high WAF. It is not the absolute sound by any stretch, but with it I am drawn to the recorded performance itself, not the tricks the gear is able to glean out of it.
I had a similar start, was influenced by a sound engineer friend who was adamant that accuracy and detail was all important, but it never got my toes tapping. Ended up swapping out most of the system in a warm tubey rich presentation that’s far less revealing but I’m so much more in love with the system now!
I just spent 8 years investigating -every-single-aspect- of audio performance and it's impact on the overall outcome. My project brief was that no major components can be upgraded, I tried that for decades, much to my immense disappointment.
So I'll give a completely different take here. First- Room Acoustics. By far the most important element in the final sound. Second, all of the source related stuff has to be up to par or nothing will be able to get above that level. If you are streaming digital then you MUST look at and assess the stream, you NEED to have a musically good sounding network switch and audio quality cable right before the streamer/DAC. Moist consumer switches deliver a highly compromised signal. I tested many switches side by side and the difference was startling.
Third on the list has become the crossover in your speakers. This part of the system is, unless you have very high end speakers, on the same level of harm as the network switch, if the crossover is made with crappy parts, and unless you spent north of 10-15k on your speakers they might be, then you can never get above the limits imposed by the crap parts in the crossover. The part of this video about reveling vs musical is where your crossover has the final word, it all depends on the capacitors used in the crossover. Use something like Mundorf caps and you will get a very reveling result, use something from the copper/oil type like MiFlex caps (super expensive so most people use them as a bypass cap, and while I've seem people use them as a bypass cap for Mundorf caps I didn't like that result)... so the copper or silver-oil caps deliver the on the musical rich lush sound end of the scale.
People really have to understand that the major parts of your setup are not any where near as impactful to switch out as the -vastly less expensive- stuff I listed here. Switching one 5k$ amp for another 5k dollar amp isn't going to be 5k$ worth of improvement. !k$ into DIY roam treatment will deliver improvement way past that $ amount.
Of course doing the parts I'm talking about here is a lot more effort and requires a great deal of learning in order to get it right. But for me that is way more fun than spending 5k$ on new speakers and being wildly disappointed.
Oops, I forgot one, if you are using anything resembling low cost banana plugs, get rid of them. Use either ungodly stupid expensive ones or use bare wire. I was doing a capacitor comparison on a crossover last week and uses banana plugs to connect and swap capacitor units and noticed a very significant drop in performance when the banana plugs were in the food chain. So I removed them from my 2 main systems, bare wire to the amp terminals and all copper (homemade) tube connectors at the speakers. The difference was startling. I had to do serious adjustments to both rigs to accommodate the change, in both systems I would need to adjust the Lpad or... on one system a simple but big change to the acoustic treatment and on the other finding a capacitor combo that works, the Mundorfs were not usable without a 2db change to the Lpad. Both systems now sound very significantly better than with the low cost banana plugs installed.
Danny at GR Research offers tube connectors for speakers. Great connection very similar to that described above, but only works on the speaker end.
I believe Danny and Paul both might recommend copper/gold plated spades if you are not doing amp terminal modifications. Goal is to get metal out of the signal path. Bare wire, too, would work, but solder tin it first to avoid oxidation.
If you have a good solution for modifying the amp terminal connection that works across brands, there is likely a market for it.
Best speaker connection for improving the signal path would be an interesting “Ask Paul” topic for a more in depth review from Paul.
@@steveaiello8025 While not being fancy gold plated copper... I reckon a copper tube, even if it's not OFC, is better than brass and other lesser metals. While on the speaker end I just removed the OEM binding posts and make my own tube connectors, just plain copper tube and sleeve for the insert, The tubing I use for the insert fits my Integra but not some other sockets, so it's not something I can make a blanket recommend on... but I have replaced all of the important speaker wire plugs and sockets with my own poorman's GR Research tube connectors, with a wee bit of copper grease on them. It works and it's huge improvement over all the junk that comes OEM until you hit a very serious price point.
I'm with Paul, a decent DAC upgrade or phono cart/preamp upgrade is what guy is clearly after. I would even go on a limb and recommend a tube buffer stage for that particular rig will be a step up as well.
Had a chance to demo new Wilson Sashas on a D'Agostino amp last fall, and I'm still haunted by the experience. I dont think it gets more revealing than that setup.
Better source = better sound
I agree that's where it starts ...as the saying goes "Garbage in=Garbage out"
@@slyspy9819 Exactly!
True, but do you truly know how far upstream to be concerned? Quality of the AC Power is fundamental, quality of ethernet delivery is fundamental, and both of those are pre-source and, if not up to par, will sink the whole ship.
I love source upgrades personally
@@bayard1332 You're correct. A well engineered source has an exceptional power supply. I run a Naim ND555 with 2 555 power supplies.
I have a pair of Focal Aria 906 paired with a Luxman L-505Z. I didn't know anything about revealing speakers till I started to replace parts one by one like small cables and speakers isolators. I can definitely say that everytime I upgrade/change a component, something changes as well in the sound. It's not a placebo effect either as I always used the same songs to test my system.
Have you tried a grounding cable yer?
@connorduke4619 No actually, never heard of that. Do you mean a power cable with grounding?
Sure!! You need thousand dollar power cables and thousands of dollars in speaker cables...blah, blah, blah...enjoy the music!! That's what this is about. Get off the merry go round of buying, buying, buying!! Buy new music!!
My reference speakers that aren’t too revealing-😮- that’s revealing- great salesmanship 😵💫😵💫
Whales are usually wet, also never sidegrade if you can help it. Thanks Paul
Heh Paul, just finished reading your book 99% True. Really enjoyed it. I have to commend you on your tenacity to succeed. I hope your other books are as good as this one was. On to reading your next book! Hope to visit you some day. Watching your CZcams videos has been a part of my daily routine also. Keep em coming!
I've got a big 15" Revel sub, love that thing.
Cables are a component - - - just a thought, especially if Colin wants to stay with the Revels.
Well.Paul, you said in one sentence some very interesting: there are people which do not want hearing revealing music,or do not care about it. Here is the point, in a live hearing session, you hear everything, why not want to hear this in reproduced music
Exactly
Lots of live music is not great and does not want repeating.
revealing can be interpreted to enhance extra sounds beyond what you would perceive in a live setting. it is after all not called "life like".
it's also the sort of stuff most people would try to master out on purpose.
I struggle with this topic. I want revealing detail, but not be sibilant or fatiguing. Sometimes I think speakers with crazy impedance swings fit the definition of some people for revealing. Widely varying speaker impedances will highlight differences in equipment, but that is because some of the equipment will not be load irrelevent.
It might pay Colin to demo a few different speakers to see if he can get a bead on what revealing is and if he likes it. If he listens to half a dozen hi quality speakers and the revels are still his speaker of choice, then change the source.
First time i heard revealing was in the 80s when i swiped an SME 3009 from my old man and put in on my SL-1510 and it sounded amazing. Sme had silver interconnect rca cables and everytime i tried to 'upgrade the cables' i lost all the openess and went back to the smes. That was when i heard and realized the difference in cables. I only use silver or gold silver alloy now on my tts.
I wish I lived close enough to visit your sound room and actually get to hear systems that are revealing. I bought my system way back in the late 1980's and have made a few changes along the way, but it is essentially the same. Back then, people who listened to my system were always very impressed with the sound. I used to go to audio shows or audiophile stores with listening rooms to listen to other setups. But now, in my area, there are no more audiophile stores or shows. None of my friends have stereos or even care about them .They are happy to stream music off their phones or using cheap Bluetooth ear buds. So, I have no way to test how revealing my system is or how to upgrade my system to improve it. I truly miss the 80's and 90's when people were more into the quality of music over the convenience.
So Paul, if you ever find yourself in the Toronto area, and can find a few hours to help me with my system, there is a nice steak dinner in it for you!!!
In the US, we have an audio store called The Cable Company. They specialize in keeping demo units of just about everything they sell. So, for example, if you want a new preamp, they'll send you 2 or 3 demos so you can try them in your own system before you make a purchase.
Typically, I wouldn't recommend this option to someone outside the US, but they've started to do business in foreign countries. I can't imagine them not going into Canada.
@@052RC Thanks for the reply! Back in the 80's and 90's I had several places in different cities that would loan out there demo equipment for a weekend so I could test it in my own room with my own equipment. I remember testing out all types of amps, preamps, turntables and especially speakers. That was how I ended up choosing most of my equipment. I am not sure how many of these types of stores still exist, and I know for a fact that there are none within 45 minutes of where I currently live. There were two good stores in my area, but they did not survive COVID. I will keep my eyes open for The Cable Company.
Revealing is preferred too but not sure it's the source of listening fatigue.
Not wet in Wales at the moment👍
.....are you with the tourist board ?😂
While a well-balanced system is always key (roughly the same $ on the amps as on the source as on the speakers as on the cables and accessories) I agree with the notion of garbage in, garbage out and therefore it's usually best to upgrade the source on an otherwise balanced system.
Hi it's Colin, just to let you know my sources. Origin Live Resolution with multi layer platter, Origin Live Conqueror tonearm with Lyra cartridge. Gold note PH10/PSU10
Classe CDP300 cd/dvd
I really don't care about "revealing" being I "color" the source with an EQ (as does the crossovers). I misunderstood until recently what reveling is. Basically, I take it now its how sensitive the speakers are to wires and other crazy minor changes. Which in my case I listen from everything from the 60 until today. Blues, bluegrass, folk, rock to metal. Needing to change mechanical equipment just to listen to a decade is not practical. I can see in a studio where you want to hear what you are going to record and if a mic or cables would make a change but once the recording is made (imho) its all about tone control because there are few producers I agree with.
My suggestion is: Preamplifier first, after you listening the new setup, you decide if you want to replace the loudspeakers.
Thank you , that's what I wanted to know. Pre or power first as I just want to get to the next level, so far I'm very happy with the Revels
@@Retroclassiccarparts Just keep in mind, these are opinions, not absolutes. The next person will tell you to get new amps instead. But it will have to be the next person after me. I agree with the other poster. No question that if it was my system, I would get a preamp first. As long as you didn't make a big mistake matching your amp and speakers, the preamp is the more important component to get right.
Also, I think Paul's hearing may be rolled off a bit in his old age. If you get a new preamp, you should easily hear a difference with your Revels.
The first upgrade should always be your power cords.
Kidding aside...
Our host suggested a phono-amp upgrade. Excellent advice.
Other phono related upgrades, that are probably less expensive (depending on the price of the comparative phono amp upgrade), are:
1) Put your turntable on a platform that is designed to virtually eliminate vibrations from reaching your stylus.
Townshend Seismic Vibration Isolation Platforms are amazing.
2) Seek out better sounding pressings. Upgrading your pressings can make a huge difference.
Most pressings have sub-par sound quality. A fair number have good sound quality. Few have white hot, superb sound quality -- and for only one of the two sides.
If you figure out which stampers to avoid, and which ones have the potential for fantastic sound quality, then after purchasing several copies, you have a good shot at landing a gem. And your ears will thank you.
3) Professionally dial in your turntable. That includes:
-- the effective length of the tone-arm
-- the cartridge's weight
-- the vertical tracking alignment / rake angle
-- the anti-skating
-- the overhang
-- the offset
-- the zenith angle
-- the cartridge's azimuth.
If your cartridge came pre-installed by the factory, it is a complete crap shoot whether or not they dialed it in properly.
They might have dialed in the anti-skating and cartridge's weight. But the rest?
If, perhaps, you purchased a Clearaudio turntable package that included a tone-arm and cartridge, you will have a good shot at them having dialed it in properly, because they are perfectionists with their turntables. But dialing in all of the above, with precision, for their customers? Who knows? And every item on the above list is critical.
Get it right, and you will be rewarded with a huge sonic improvement. But you will have to learn the skills, or find someone who has the skills, and it will take probably take them 90 minutes. So there is that labor cost. You will also need the tools to do the job.
If you do the above three items, your stereo will sound twice the price or more.
I have just built my own speakers and burnt in a tube amp. Now I go - oo' never head that before, what is needed now is a better room. There would be a slim margin of improvent with any component. Sill going to try but not expecting as great of an improvement. Hey Paul, I am looking for the reverse of a preamp yep. One or two inputs and 3 or more outs for different amp setups. Any suggestions? Great fielding as always.
While so many speaker reviewers like speakers that sound good at any level with any source. Perhaps used more to negatively describe revealing speakers that do show poor recordings and the lack of dynamics in most recordings. I agree in preferring to hear the bad as bad so I can hear the really good as really good.
Here is my example of revealing....some guy tries to sell me $100's of dollars worth of speaker cables!
Paul, do you think FR5 would be good for music production, in a recording studio?
Again? 🎉
If Paul has direct experience with your model of speaker and says your speakers are the problem. They should be replaced.
to hear any difference in what you do nothing better than pro studio monitors. they are designed presicely for that.
If your source is a turntable, upgrade to digital. Vinyl is snake-oil. It only has about 60 dB of dynamic range (only the outside track can reach 70 dB) vs. well over 90 dB for digital (slightly greater than the dynamic range of human hearing), vinyl has surface noise, hiss, pops, low frequency feedback from the room and turntable rumble, poor channel separation, and it loses frequency response every time you play a record.
Forget the dynamic range difference. You will never stream anything with more than 25 db dynamic range. Under 10db for most music. I you have heard a proper vinyl system you wouldnt care about the numbers, but ofc vinyl has inconveniences, and could be considered snake oil in some ways.
You are totally missing the point of vinyl. It is about the journey as well as the destination and the inconvenience and imperfections that give it character. It just needs a bit more work, sound is subjective and a good vinyl system can sound fantastic and is far more satisfying than just pressing a button. If you want 'perfection' go digital, if you want an experience you can't beat vinyl.
@@tomturner6792 Yes, satisfaction and just ease of mind is huge with vinyl. Especially when you have your stream randomly stop every now and then even on ethernet. At that moment I just want to break something, its ridiculous.
@@kristofvadnai7468 It's true that there are many digital recordings with low dynamic range, but look at The Unofficial Dynamic Range Database. Of the 7,000+ albums that they've rated, most of the highest dynamic range albums are on digital. There are only a few vinyl albums that even approach vinyl's pathetic limits.
I had a proper vinyl system. When I went digital, I compared all of my albums with their digital counterparts. I didn't keep a single vinyl album. Not one. Too noisy.
@@tomturner6792 Some people must like listening to hiss, tics, pops, low dynamic range, room feedback, and no high frequency content. They probably also like to listen to their old 8-track tapes and Edison wax cylinders.
Are Genelec The Ones or Neumann KH series revealing enough? 😂
Revealing? Hmm... All engineers in any industry try to make product with consistent performance resistant as much as possible to outside influence except you Paul and your followers in audio industry.
Let me compare this to watch manufactures. Mechanic watch movement is sensitive to lots of different factors: temperature, altitude, how much spring is winded, even position of hand.
Watch movement designers try to make movement that compensate those factors as much as they can trying to deliver consistent performance.
Best movements are those who are more consistent or to make parallel with audio, less revealing.
What you are doing looks like some watch enthusiast tries to find the best position, temperature.... all I mentioned and use particular watch only in those conditions because otherwise watch "reveals" any change done.
Stupid, isn't it?
I can understand that person who designs audio gear like yourself wants to hear changes done, but that should be only for development.
For listening music, not gear, I want my system to perform consistent without wondering about power line, cable, source or fly sitting on my preamp.
I'm sure vast majority of people want the same. And I care a lot about sound what's by your definition makes me audiophile, even I don't like that.
It's all about music!
Blistering Boulder**
Audio Obsession is one expensive disease. I hear people around the world who are never satisfied no matter how much money they spend. They are ready to spend more to upgrade to the latest and greatest. I feel sorry for these people. I’m surprised their marriages survive their obsession (time to upgrade the wife?) I pity the poor fools who fall into this trap. I restored a vintage system and spend my time and money buying music to listen to…not trying to achieve audio nirvana. First, you need to have a dedicated room of a large enough size while spending God knows how much money in order to get there. I have only bought one piece of new gear in the past 20 years and that was a better CD Player/DAC so I could enjoy my collection of CDs (they never sounded good before on old players). Relax people. Try to be satisfied. Your spinning your wheels spending money on upgrades and changing everything like you do your underwear. Its a disease- like being an alcoholic or drug addict.
Revel not revealing 😊
In 2006, I heard Ravel's Studio speakers, and they sounded amazing.
I cannot remember everything about them, due to the time that has passed. I do recall that they were dynamic, and produced a wall of sound.
I played a ZZ Top song, and a couple of other songs. I never heard ZZ Top sound so good.
Revel is not revealing...seems there is some branding issue?
bad background hum
Oh boy now I’m really cornfuzed
just get some PMC speakers and be done. Youll love them.