February 2010 Meeting.

[Lizard_king]

Hey Gang,

Paul here, you favorite Prez! Our meeting will be this upcoming Saturday at Tom M's place on Long Island.

[rollo]

   We will have Pangea cords, Herbies TT matt, alan maher CBFs and more. New Theil speakers, boulder modified power supply for the Art DIO. Food and more food. A good time should be had by all. See ya all then.


charles

[tmazz]

  We will have Pangea cords, Herbies TT matt, alan maher CBFs and more. New Theil speakers, boulder modified power supply for the Art DIO. .......

In addition to all of these audio goodies the main audio topic of the evening will be the auditioning of the new Oppo BDP-83SE Blu-Ray/Universal audio disc player, which features the ESS Sabre 32 Dac. This player has been optimized for audio and has been causing quite a buzz in the audio press.

http://www.oppodigital.com/blu-ray-bdp-83SE/

Former Syndrome and all Audio Nervosa members are welcome (and encouraged) to attend. 

Dinner starting at 6:30 PM, meeting at 7:30 PM.

PM me for details and/or directions.

Tom

[rollo]

  Lookin forward to the food in and music fest 2010. The election is over time to party. See ya all there.


charles

[richidoo]

Thanks for the invite Tom, and Audio Syndrome!  Wish I could make it.  I will enjoy reading the detailed reports. And don't forget the pictures!!! We need pictures!!

[BobM]

It was great to see all the old faces again, and a few new ones too. I sure hope someone took some pictures and will post them. There was a lot of food and a really good turnout to try and eat it all (impossible).

The new Thiel's sounded really good Tom, even with that crowd in your room. I'm sure it sounds great when there's fewer people. As for the Oppo vs DI/O shootout, from what I heard the Oppo sounded more detailed but somewhat hard with less weight on the bottom. The DI/O was just more organic and analogue overall. I'm sure the Oppo could be modified to soften it a bit, but why would you want to do that to a $900 player. I would have expected it to sound a bit better overall for that price. I'm glad I missed all the power cord swapping (I already know they make a difference so there's no convincing for me).

Thanks again,
Bob

[rollo]

Bob and Pete it was great to see you guys again. A large turnout to boot. To all our new members hope you had a good time as there were some stimulating conversations about. Especially the blind test offer of $1000 for anyone who could 10 out of 10 times pick out or identify any tweak, tube, powercord , speaker cable or IC. It was lively. Tom and family thank you for your hospitality and great time. Tom will be posting some pictures if they came out. A great time had by all.
   The Oppo was a bit hard on top and the bass was not as focused as the modified Art DIO. The sound of the Oppo IMO was one of break in itus. I heard a similar sound when the original Oppo was auditioned with low hours. I would like to hear it again with 500 hours on it. The original Oppo improved dramatically over that time. No I did not get used to the sound as itis NOT in my system.
   Another audition is warranted after 500 hours.

charles

[Triode Pete]

Thanks, Sir Charles...Bob & I had a nice time @ TomMazz's!!! Thanks Tom for having so many audio loonies over at one time!

Wasn't impressed with the Oppo at all. When almost everyone went upstairs for cake, I put on 2 CD's that I was very familiar with on my 2 systems... with the Oppo, it sounded somewhat "shrillish" to me...

Didn't try them on the modded Art D/O...

Everything played on Tom's VPI vinyl system sounded great! Nice system, Tom!!!

[ltr317]

I want to thank Tom and his family for hosting a terrific meeting.  We've had two large turnouts to start the year.  This is very encouraging and I think the club is going in the right direction.  It was great to see Bob M, several new faces and to meet Pete.  I think Tom has really improved the sound of his system with the new additions of the Thiel 3.6 and Boulder modded ART DI/O (I'm biased on this one).  I have now heard the OppO 32 bit Blu-ray player in two different systems the past month and thought the sound was not as good as the transport/ART DI/O combo either time.   

[tmazz]

......... new additions of the Thiel 3.6 and Boulder modded ART DI/O (I'm biased on this one).  I have now heard the Oppo 32 bit Blu-ray player in two different systems the past month and thought the sound was not as good as the transport/ART DI/O combo either time.   

Paul,
Just for the record, the new Thiels are CS-6s, the big brother of the 3.6.  As for the Oppo vs the DI/O lets remember that by the time you bought the stock DI/O, sent ti to Boulder for the Mensa Mod and bought even a reasonably priced digital cable to connect it to your transport you had already met or possably exceeded the price of the Oppo and you didn't even have a transport yet. It is not too tough to find a way to get better sound by spending more money. What I thought was interesting was not that my Denon. Mensa combo sounded better than the Oppo but that the Oppo while not as good came somewhat close. As for a similar price to what you paid for the Mensa alone you got not only a transport for CD playback, but also the ability to play SACD, DVD-a, DVD-v and Blu-ray discs. No it is not the best sound that you can get from red-book CDs, but considering everything else you can do with it (if you are so inclined) it is not a bad deal for the money.

[StereoNut]

I'd like to "second" a lot of the comments here re: our February meeting at Tom & Betsy's.

To our host & hostess: Thanks for opening your house up to all of us "crazies" for the evening.

To Tom: Great idea to have an earlier than normal start time to accommodate your suggestion of an Olympic themed "pot-luck" buffett.  It was also nice to hear your system again, regardless of your new "room treatment" of 27 extra bodies! 

To everyone (including our host & hostess) who brought lots of great food, drink & dessert: Yum! 

To Bob & Pete: It was great to see two of the guys we've missed at our meetings for too long.  I hope to see you both attending Syndrome meetings more often from here on out. 


To our newly elected club officers: Congratulations! 

In general, it's been nice to see the larger than normal number of members attend the last two of our meetings.  Hopefully this is a sign of an ongoing trend for the future of the Syndrome.  It's not only great to see all of the "usual suspects" at this meeting at Tom's, but also some of our newest members, a couple of our long standing members who have been "MIA" for a while and a few completely new faces. 

As far as the Oppo CDP goes, I agree with what has already been said in this thread.  I too preferred Tom's Denon/DAC front end as compared to the Oppo, but I'd be interested in how things would've sounded with the Oppo replacing the Denon and run through the Boulder/Mensa ART DI/O...???  FWIW - I was really impressed with the Pangea power cord; especially for the $$$.  A lot of "bang-for-the-buck" from what I could hear with it being used on the Oppo.  The Pangea seemed to "balance out" the Oppo by adding some very needed "bottom end", so it wasn't so "top-heavy".  Pete's Western Electric (?) cord also sounded pretty good and definitely seemed worth spending more time with it after it's broken in a bit more.

Ciao for now
SN

[mfsoa]

So where is the center of gravity for the Syndrome? Is it more of a LI thing?
Thanks
-Mike

And why don't us Ravers ever vote on anything? Anarchist Audiophiles?

[StereoNut]

So where is the center of gravity for the Syndrome? Is it more of a LI thing?
Thanks
-Mike

Hi Mike

The Syndrome's "center of gravity" as you put it, is Long Island.  Primarily, Queens, Nassau & Suffolk.  If you're "local enough" to visit, we always welcome guests and potential new members.  Feel free to inquire via PM if you want more details.

SN

[lonewolfny42]

A slight correction....

...Boulder modded ART DI/O...

It's Bolder......always some nice work done by Wayne.

[rollo]

So where is the center of gravity for the Syndrome? Is it more of a LI thing?
Thanks
-Mike

And why don't us Ravers ever vote on anything? Anarchist Audiophiles?

  NYC and LI. Why not come to our March meeting ? An agenda has not been set yet, but we will have some new stuff to play with by then. Maybe Bill would be open to a SET or tubed amp to run the Von S. We wanna "Pimp" his system could be fun.
   The Rave is unique, no dues no voting no headaches and some great guys to boot.Made some good friends there. The only problem, if a problem I see is that the same people keep having the meetings which can cost some dough. God bless them . Then there are the ones who NEVER have a meeting but are at each event eating and drinking  away. 
   I will be having a Rave in July to pay back all the generosity given to me. 


charles