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   Home » Horn-Loaded Speakers» SPUnisation of Macondo: how to catch own testicals. (2 posts, 1 page)
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  »  New  Tell me about more about Ortofone SPU Sound...  Earthy matters...  Analog Playback Forum     54  508058  12-01-2004
  »  New  How to USE “Resonating Oops” in loudspeakers..  Injection?...  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     184  1470061  02-28-2007
02-01-2007 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Romy the Cat


Boston, MA
Posts 10,049
Joined on 05-27-2004

Post #: 1
Post ID: 3630
Reply to: 3630
SPUnisation of Macondo: how to catch own testicals.

It is amassing what kind of tricks the Fundamentals Channel allows to play. Since my high-frequency Vitavox S2 driver “clicked” recently:

http://www.goodsoundclub.com/TreeItem.aspx?PostID=3592

my “Fundamental Channel”  with my LF Vitavox S2 also begins to act differently. More at:

http://www.goodsoundclub.com/TreeItem.aspx?PostID=2433

The Fundamentals Channel balance allays was hyper-sensitive. Putting 1R resistor in series with 15R driver does affect sound quite dramatically. However, instead of juts adding the lower MF as it did before nowadays the LF Vitavox S2 begging to soften Sound making it pleasantly-plumpy and SPU-like elastic. By tuning the volume of Macondo’s Fundamentals Channel it is possible to EQ the system (this time it is the properly done, REAL EQ) and to fix some “strategic” imperfections of poor recordings.

For instance many string quartets recorded insultingly up-closed. With the “SPUnisation of Macondo” it is possible to inject some “smoke” to the background and to converting the sound of the string group from a technical “frequency pushing” to ….  almost Romantic sound. The EQ is not necessary just chance the balance between the string instruments but rather  a way to make Sound “slower”, inject some  harmonist and some softness…. Very-very positive effect for many contemporary chamber recordings!

Another phenomenal result with Macondo SPUnisation that I was playing last nigh Celebidache with Stuttgart Radio. Their Buckner is phenomenal but those live recordings (that sound more like studio recordings) are overly sterile, too microphoned and  sound almost unlistenable. Here is where the Fundamentals Channel kicks ass! By dialing my lower S2 slightly forward it is possible to “flood” the Stuttgart Radio Orchestra with that “Buckner’s Accordion Blanket”, making it very-very interesting. The “flooded Stuttgart” has less screamy details and it sounds more like Buckner instead of sounding like Stravinsky played by a Gypsies band.

Her is another, atypical on my site example. I love some Rock-&-Roll lyrics and I like some Rock-&-Roll personalities. I like for instance Rogers Waters, however it is imposable to combine my interest two Rogers Waters lyrists/music with my interest in Hi-Fi. Any person who has any more or less capable playback knows how horrendous all those Rock-&-Roll bands recorded and how in most of the cases primitive their level of performing and musicianship. I always am laughing when I see the Morons building up complicated systems and play Rock-&-Roll. It is one of absolutely undeniable evidences that when reproduced pop music begin to sound “good” while it being played with a high-end insulation then it means that ether the playback in fact is garbage or the person who “loved the sound” is not “there yet”….

So, I took, Rogers Waters “Amused to Death”. That album, when it being played at my “big”  playback, under normal circumstances with all its digital equipment nose and screaming with wrong voices women usually makes my testicals to run out my body. So, played it and begun to tune the Fundamentals Channel up. Then I added a little less then 1dB at upper pass horns… To my pleasure that “bubbled of upper bass” cocooned the Rogers Waters’ band and made it almost listenable. Those semi-mechanical Rock-&-Roll accents at each even line of lyrics become less annoying and those “Pentium Musicians” become to sound less irritating… It was almost good, way softer and way less bothersome....

I think how to capitalize on that “dynamic Fundamentals Channel tuning” making this functionally as my Macondo’s permanent feature…

Rgs,
Romy the Cat


"I wish I could score everything for horns." - Richard Wagner. "Our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts." - Friedrich Nietzsche
02-01-2007 Post does not mapped to Knowledge Tree
Paul S
San Diego, California, USA
Posts 2,570
Joined on 10-12-2006

Post #: 2
Post ID: 3633
Reply to: 3630
Who? (shades of the old "musical" vs. "accurate" debate)
I must have missed out on how you regulate gain to or from each or any of several "channels"/pass bands, Romy.  I can remember years ago trying lots of EQ things to get "Flat Frequency Response" and finally giving up on all of it, including the so-called "transparent" commercial EQ options then available.  Ironically, by the time I got it pretty flat it sounded just totally dead.  I still use (passive fixed-value/gain) notch filters for the Lowthers, however, and I did use simple  pots on the silk domes in my previous speaker system, and I pretty much tuned that slope from album to album, this to pretty good if ADDH/OCD advantage.  But I guess in the end I don't really miss the edge-of-the-seat listening that having the opiton afforded/inflicted on me.

My present (last several years) method involves nothing more than tuning the whole system to get my 50-60s jazz as correct as I can while allowing (or even encouraging) me to remain a musical omnivore.  One test of the system for me has long been that I am able to get "music" from certain rock albums, even if they are not at the pinnacle of either musical or technical excellence.  Perhaps it has been just a happy coincidences that as my system clarity and resolution have improved, many albums I though were just noise have turned out to have artistic/musical content, and some have even revealed measures of genius and "good sound" despite obvious technical problems.  By this I mean that the system now makes music from stuff that previous systems rendered as noise, and I consider this a very good thing, indeed.  Oddly enough, this has turned out to work equally well with certain Angel, Everest, and old Red Seal recordings, etc., that used to sound like dirt, not to mention straightening out certain DGGs and newer Red Seals that previously sounded like wailing banshees.  Is there anything worse than massed violins poorly rendered?

Anyway, I have to say that I am not aware of any radical change(s) I have made to the system's balance in order to effect the "omnivore" characteristic, unless it was a diminishing of system self-noise, including plain old disotrtion.  One thing that is now clear is that a good portion of the noise I was hearing before came from "hot" recordings, some of which "heat" I had taken for bad mic-ing, mistracking or poor quality vinyl, etc., but now the "heat" has been "resolved into music".  Quite a surprise, and in some cases quite a nice surprise.

Lastly, I also enjoy CD now, and I think I even have the CD tonal balance pretty well matched to LPs, at least in cases where I have both the CD and the LP version of the same session to compare.

Although we are not taliking about the same sound-shaping process, are we not both finding what is good in a recording?

Best regards,
Paul S
Page 1 of 1 (2 items) Select Pages: 
   Target    Threads for related reading   Most recent post in related threads   Forum  Replies   Views   Started 
  »  New  Tell me about more about Ortofone SPU Sound...  Earthy matters...  Analog Playback Forum     54  508058  12-01-2004
  »  New  How to USE “Resonating Oops” in loudspeakers..  Injection?...  Horn-Loaded Speakers Forum     184  1470061  02-28-2007
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