By-passing pre and eq

[Ken Pachkowsky]

Hi All

Just a short note about something I tried today. It's not often that I go through the hastle of reconfiguring my system due to the weight of the cabs yada yada.

Today I connected the Benchmark Dac 1 balanced outputs directly into the HRX crossover.

How often do you read "the less electronics the better". This was the first time I have heard my Westlakes sound good without EQ and an analysis of the room. It's enough to make one think twice thats for sure.

Food for thought.

Ken

[Ian Mackenzie]

Hi Ken,

I think I suggested that as a side alternative in your Dac 1 discussion thread.( I am not suggesting I have a caveat on that idea..I am Not an audiophile..muhhahaha)

Your not the first and you certainly won't be the last to make this observation.

Reminds me of the good old days of passive preamps and transformer attenuator preamps that have re surfaced recently...very expensive silver windings.

What (active gain stage) pre amp are you using at the moment? What is the Eq at the moment?

I have never used an equaliser at home on my shabby 43XX hacks but the minimalise theory seems to work for me despite the jaggered response that so many spend so much time on smoothing with their Clio's and Ultracurves.

I know I would never have thought it was better until the day I tried it. As I recall I had a Luxman Brid CD player (valve buffers) and it had a variable output so I bypassed the preamp (a Phase Linear 3300 Series 11 at the time) direct into my Aleph 3.

Marvellous improvement and you are right you tend forget the mind set of how can I make it better...

If you can configure the digital output of the Dac 1 to go into the DEQX it might also prove interesting at some point.

Ian

[Ken Pachkowsky]

Hi Ken,

I think I suggested that as a side alternative in your Dac 1 discussion thread.
Ian

You certainly did suggest it. I meant to try it much sooner but as stated, the damned speaker cabs and rack cabs are well over 500 lbs each and a bear to move. Unfortuantely they require moving to get at the inputs and outputs. Something to be said for patchbays.

I am currently have a choice of my Perreaux SM6 or the Tad Signature 150. The EQ is the BSS 960.

Ken

[Ian Mackenzie]

Well if your using cds/dvds as a source only perhaps a preamp (control centre) is reduntant.

The thing to know however is what is the default volume out of the player after trun off/on the dac 1

Ian

[Robh3606]

This was the first time I have heard my Westlakes sound good without EQ and an analysis of the room. It's enough to make one think twice thats for sure.

Food for thought.

Hello Ken

How much EQ do you use on them???

Rob