Rerurn to Romy the Cat's Site

Audio News
Topic: A Man and His Shovel

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Posted by Paul S on 09-11-2021
Obviously, the header is just for Romy!

Well, it took a while, but with development help and official intro by Michael Fremer, the new OMA DD TT is finally here!

https://oswaldsmillaudio.com/k3

Featuring the Best of Everything, including a bespoke Schroeder tonearm, this puppy is reserved for those who's mantra is, "Cost be damned!"

All this with a design aesthetic that might be described as the  no-love-lost-here-child of Art Deco and Steam Punk.

I actually read Mike's roll-out, and it sounds to me like he was not as comfortable doing this as he was a few years back.

Paul S

Posted by Romy the Cat on 09-12-2021
I do not take seriously what this Moron said about himself. At the time I met him he fancied himself as a great audio interpreter who in response to his fist listening (!!!) to Tchaikovsky Pathetique informed me that “it is too many violins”, I am not kidding!   I partially love his pontification about aesthetic as he made certainly the ugliest TT as I ever seen.  With an absence of natural talent and creatively this character spent a LOT of efforts on construction of a façade. Fortunately there are plenty people who know what level of intellectual and spiritual impotence is behind of that noise.

Posted by N-set on 09-15-2021
...a fantastic PR (a studio in Rome, speakers in MoMA, etc) there is one interesting thing in all their products. The use of cast iron. A material barely explored in audio with a very very good damping characteristics. Much better than all kinds of steels or whats even worse aluminium.  And the cheaper the better. The only problem is a high "entrance cost" of making a mould. We've been planning to explore cast iron for years, hope will come to that soon.

Posted by Romy the Cat on 09-15-2021
I do not think that cast iron is use in there for any damping characteristics or anything to do with sound or common sense.  it is just the style niche that he has: art-deco like, rural Pennsylvania style.  It is not the style that I personally find attractive, but some people bite into it. You see, the PR is this character specialty. All that TV appearance in network news, pretentious demos in Manhattan loft and the rest of the things is how he is buttering up own business. He does not sell anything to audio seasoned people, he has no sound to sell and no option to appeal, even if he sells anything. His clientele is market brokers who would like to put a “kinky audio” as a decoration in their real-estate. A half of them do not even turn the systems up, ever. Ask me how I know about it. It is like Bang & Olufsen years back…. You might see those magazines that are made for people who have a lot of money and who called to buy rare cars, brilliant, loaded watches and the golf equipment reportedly blessed by 3 Pops. That is exactly the space where this creatine operates. I do not feel that anus is wrong with him in the way how he makes his living but what he does has no relation to audio. He deals with commodities that just looks like loudspeakers and turntables.

Posted by Paul S on 09-15-2021
Jarek, perhaps we should continue the discussion of cast iron for TTs in the Ultimate Turntable thread, something like that. In this case, I agree with Romy, this guy is very much about image and impression, and it appears he knows how to develop and sell stuff to his "target market" by sprinkling some "truth", like "salting" a mine claim.  This approach is not original to him, of course; he just happens to do "audio business". Saying this, I know you bring your own knowledge to bear if you look at this stuff, as well you should.


Paul S

Posted by Lazlo Jamf on 09-17-2021
"Something similar happened with the cylinder phonographs that the merry matrons from France brought with them as a substitute for the antiquated hand organs and that for a time had serious effects on the livelihood of the band of musicians.  At first curiosity increased the clientele on the forbidden street and there was even word of respectable ladies who disguised themselves as workers in order to observe the novelty of the phonograph from first hand, but from so much and such close observation they soon reached the conclusion that it was not an enchanted mill as everyone had thought and as the matrons had said, but a mechanical trick that could not be compared with something so moving, so human, and so full of everyday truth as a bond of musicians.  It was such a serious disappointment that when phonographs became so popular that there was one in every house they were not considered objects for amusement for adults but as something good for children to take apart."  Gabriel Garcia Marquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude



"But it's not shiny enough!  It'll never go with my gold plated escalator or my marble toilet seat!"

Does the world really need a cast iron turntable with a tonearm that looks like an Erector Set crane?

The high end audio racket's capacity for self-parody seems limitless, but do they ever get the joke?

Given Romy's penchant for naming things after characters in One Hundred Years of Solitude maybe this should be named for the character who ate dirt or the one with the pig's tail.



Posted by N-set on 09-19-2021
...you write, gentlemen. But after 5+ yrs of trying my luck in high end audio I completely agree that it is a parody of itself. It has long migrated from technology market to the luxury goods one, still keeping that tech disguise. And with luxury goods, marketing is everything. Trying to sell sth that is interesting in audio terms makes little sense (and even less money). 

Posted by wolfy on 12-27-2022
I almost hate to pile on here, but I did see this new and fascinating presentation this morning:

https://youtu.be/F5qMDDHTGsQ

Posted by Paul S on 12-27-2022
Like H. L. Mencken  so aptly said, "No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people."


Paul S

Posted by Romy the Cat on 12-28-2022
It is very interesting to hear this idiot pontificate about turntable able reproduce element of time in music. Some years back when I visited him, I played to him Tchaikovsky 6 symphony that he never heard, and after listening to the 1st movement I asked him what he is thinking about the music. he said it is nice but too many violins. then he insisted that it was not music. I asked him: So what do you listen? he with whole seriousness play to me a recording of some kind of space with a bunch of metal objects and somebody with a hammer walks around them and hit those metal objects. He was listening how those metal objects ring and told me that his favorite music. sorry, I have zero respect to this character and I know very much it's a really cost of all this sudo-intellectual BS that he radiate around himself.  He is a quintessential audio white trash with a good diction.
  
this second part about Michael Fremer is particular interesting. I am following US a high end media approximately since 1994 and to my memory it is probably 10th turntable that Framer “bough” directly from manufacture which suddenly becomes the best turntable in the world. I also personally know a guy who 17 years ago made  additional $70,000 a year sailing online the crap that big time reviewers extort from manufacturers. I know also if you manufacturers who have very big anger to the big time reviewers who for years and years never pay for anything. anyhow this is all charade played for public by highly corrupted, highly unethical and the most important by highly uninformed people. As far as I concerned screw them all, then can dive with their pathetic secret. I did not watched further than he mentioned Framer.
 
There are two other subjects that I would like to bring and to explain something to people besides just insulting the idiots who deserve to be insulted. When's this character from Pennsylvania pontificates about idle role versus belt he indeed makes a point. not the point that he understands because as far as I concerned, he can hear or understand shit from the heard. Somebody told him this stuff and he trying to trade upon it but he is very wrong. Indeed, the idle draft have a lot of advantages over belt, but it is only in context of light platters. The combination of motor, belt or idle roll and platters create second order filter where mass of the platter, torque of the motor, and intensity of the belt moderate the cue of the filter. in case of very light motor torque, loose belt and platter over let's say 30 kilograms the system has Q not distinguishable from first order and advantages of idle roll are completely gone.
 
The last things. yes turntables, turn arms, cables, phone stages and many other aspects make different. Yes different turntable system produce different rhythm and to degree different musical timing, probably Framer told to the idiot. However, the biggest difference between turntable which cost 50,000 and turntable which cost 300,000 is in reproduction of the very low register. no single digital system can properly produce lowest actives and their capacity we have on LP with mechanical recording is very wonderful. I don't know what context of play back of the moron from above but from what I remember him in the past he never had in his arsenal anything which even remotely properly produced lower frequency. to the best of my knowledge Framer used the latest largest Wilson and from point of view of ultimate base reproduction it is severely compromised portal system. so, when people like Framer claims that 500,000 turntable has better base than $100,000 turntable and he claims it in context of playback which pretty much do not produce lower than 35 hearts properly People should take under consideration that it is just marketing verbiage and nothing else. to my personal preferences from a place where I stay I would not even remotely consider to talk seriously about bass with a person who do not use delay channels. 

Posted by Paul S on 12-28-2022
On the one hand, it's hard to believe people would pay this guy for his wares, given he "explains/justifies" it as he does, let alone pay the sums he asks for the goods he sells. On the other hand, this creating and sustaining of a nonsensical fog of irelevant BS has worked for selling time shares, whatever, as well. Whatever. While I have not been able to listen to the whole spiel, I think it would hold my attention if I could see and hear him making this pitch to clients, shoveling his shit, while he closes an actual big sale. Like looking at a serious traffic accident.


Paul S

Posted by Romy the Cat on 12-28-2022
Saying all that I said let do not fool outsells. The concept to have in plater and base hollow spaces to be file with dynamic dumper is very good idea if it is done properly. What is properly? This is very deep subject, and the reference might be only the sensitivity and aesthetics of the designer itself. I do not know the guy who bult it, he might be a sensible person capable of great things. I know that any sensible man who is not a Moron watching the prestation of cast iron toilet that has a motor that juts dropped from space should be vomiting. Jonathan is a typical Robb Report level salesperson.  IF you are one of the Robb Report subscribers then it is good for you. Tomorrow if Jonathan recognized that sale used condoms is more profitable, he will be pitching that they are very special condoms the would protect you dick from solar rays… I have seen those accidental people in audio by hundreds. Do you know what make them all in common? They are very shallow and whatever they say is what they heard but they understand it very narrow. Sit with this creature and ask him2 levels deep the same question “Why” in the idiot will not even understand what you are asking. Was there. Whatever you say to him he will be in time sell as newly translated red sea scrolls

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