It’s a little bittersweet posting here before stuff actually gets to you. The audio industry has a long lead time. lol
That said, I’m pretty happy that I’m closing in on my completed system. About two days ago now I ordered a custom set of Omega speakers. Louis is a great guy to work with. He stayed on the phone with me for about a half hour and we talked about my listening preferences, volume, types of music, the dimensions of my room, whether I had room treatment and finally what I was looking for cosmetically, oh yeah we talked budget as well! lol
Given the size of my room and the fact that I wasn’t seeking concert level volumes due to apartment dwelling, I wound up ordering something completely custom. A combination of their Alnico 6.5 driver in what would normally be an enclosure for their usual 8" ferrite magnet driver, the Junior 8 XRS.
Everything in audio is a tradeoff, so I’ll be giving up a bit of bass extention with the smaller driver, but I’ll be gaining a tighter faster driver overall, and since I’ll also be coupling them to a sub, the bass extension isn’t necessary. A nice gain with the smaller driver in that enclosure is that I’ll be picking up improved stage width and imagine since the baffle becomes effectively wider.
I’m very happy with the purchase, and look very much forward to having a completed system. In the mean time the only eye candy I’ll leave you guys with is below. I am getting this exact finish which becomes mesmerizing the more I look at it, it’s as if you’re looking into a pool of water. Both the speakers and the matching sub will have the same finish.
Ended the year with some power supply moves: a ZeroSurge 8R15W power strip / surge protector and a handful of Pangea AC14SE cables. Nothing magical, just some confidence they my power side isn’t lagging too far behind the rest of my gear.
Got some tubes. An ECC99 and 6X5GT for my Amber 3 for when I need to replace its tubes. Also got a matched pair of Philips tubes for my SW51+ to try. Currently enjoying them, but can’t come draw any conclusions quite yet. Anyways, here are some tube pics.
Luxman P1u just arrived. I won’t get into any detailed impressions just yet. But I will say that so far the impressions are extremely positive. Also, this amp is HUGE. I had to remove my risers to fit it on my desk, but I made it work.
This beautiful yamamoto ha02 amp arrived broken as seen in chipped wood on the left corner, most likely dropped by UPS workers from a very tall height, as it had more than enough layers of bubble wrap, airbags and even foam all around.
it turns on and sounds but is currently unusable
Right channel has a constant loud buzz sound at every volume including pot off position
Channel imbalance that goes pans the sound from right to left as the volume increases
Im already dealing with UPS and emailed yamamoto for help
do you guys think sound can be fixed? It may not be, but im left thinking maybe just by replacing the tubes or the jack it could work
