Michael-
When you get a chance I would love to receive some feedback from your latest order.
Jen, be glad to... my Labor Day sale order was for your Infinity CBF, Infinity Shield, PE v3 and power cords. These were added to the Quantum Studio and Ref IIs I already had that had quite a positive impact in my system (posted here:
http://www.audionervosa.com/index.php?topic=1582.0).
The first thing I did was to duct tape the Infinity CBF on my dedicated circuit breaker. While I can't say I heard the substantial improvements claimed by others (likely because I'm already using the QS), I do feel there was an incremental improvement in air and definition. Definitely worth the small investment!
The addition of the new AM components and power cords had an immediate detrimental impact!
but not surprising because, as you warned, things would need to break-in for several weeks. I decided not to attempt to optimize the placement of the PE & Ref IIs until after breakin. So for the first couple weeks, things had been ... less than ideal. I heard a loss of soundstage depth, bass, air and extension. But, just as the Quantum Studio had done, after about 3 weeks things started to come together again.
At present, I'm extremely happy with the sound I'm getting
I have taken an initial stab at optimally placing the PE v3 and Ref IIs throughout the house and, yes, it did make a big difference! At present, I've got the PE v3 on the frig circuit, a Ref II on my computer circuit, another on my TV circuit and a 3rd on my dedicated audio circuit. Large 3D soundstage, excellent black background with gobs of detail and space between voices and instruments. Perhaps the most noticable is a wonderfully deep yet tight and well defined bass. It takes a good recording to really show it off, but, my, it does show well! And if I set my left-brain aside, what I love most is that it is just so much more musically engaging!
I'm still scratching my head a bit about the Infinity Shield... To be honest, I didn't find much of an improvement using it on the dedicated audio circuit (which already has the QS and a Ref II) but it does seem to improve the tightness of the bass when I place it on an adjacent circuit. I'm still playing with this and any further advice is appreciated.
The one thing I can say without hesitation is that the Mahers have made a believer out of me when it comes to the impact of whole house power quality on audio. While placement of the individual AM components is not nearly as scientific as my left-brained, engineering mind would like (just trust my ears... are you kidding me?
), there is no question that the overall improvement is substantial!
