ktm

The price of old 70's receivers is unbelievable. i had a couple of old Marantz units I paid $5 and $20 for. When I got tired of looking at them, I put them up on craigslist And almost got run over by a stampede. There are old units worth the Big $$$, and then there's just old stuff. When did "vintage" replace "tired old crap"? There's some really great old gear out there, but much of this stuff isn't it. At minimum, it's going to need re-capping. The sr40 setup does sound good, with no balance issues at all. The earpads are flat, and it doesn't look like I'll be replacing them anytime soon. I use the extension cord(5 or 6 pin style) and sometimes use the sr40 for testing.

I don't get it. I bought a sr40/srd4 with a 15' extension for about $72 shipped a couple years ago. As of late, I keep seeing these set up go for more and more money. This one doesn't even have the extension. http://cgi.ebay.com/Stax-SR40-headphones-excellent-condition-/200576773266?pt=AU_Hi_Fi_Speakers&hash=item2eb34eac92 Did somebody start stuffing gold into them, or what? Not a bad starter set up at $72, but $243 US?

There's a lot of old Stax still out there. I've got a cheap pair of sr-40's that sound just fine. That's what got me going on the Stax sound. Comfort isn't so great, but 35 year old ear cushions certainly don't help. I was in a lot better shape 35 years ago myself.

I ran it through Proacs with the Audio research amp. Then through headphones. I'd say the whole album is a good example of how not to engineer sound. But it is much worse on speakers than cans. I guess that's why it doesn't get much play time here.

You've got my interest. My speaker system is all tubes, I can go full SS or hybrid on the Stax. If I can avoid working again Monday night, I'll give it a whirl. I believe there was quite of bit of Sabbath that never sounded right on sand amps.

I can see why it's well though of. It nails the proper sound of many instruments dead on, and does a pretty good job with female vocals. The Stax kills it in soundstage and separation. But it is a fun headphone to listen to. And I'm all about budget!

I recently fell into a deal on Grado sr-100's that I couldn't pass up. No, not the HP drivers. They appear to be pink,white lettering plastic grill. Either way, they seem to sound better than other Grado's I've had around here. Not up to the Stax sound, but pretty good with a Millet minimax. Either way, $30 well spent.

This is good news. Hopefully the whole new product series follows the pattern. I hope Stax sells a bunch of them. Now if they just would open back up U.S. distribution a bit. I know many dealers, including the local one, no longer carry Stax.

If this does come out at the $300 mark and performs at all well, it would kill of the DACMAgic. Unless their marketing department is asleep at the wheel, I bet there's either a new offering and/or a price drop on the current model. The DACMagic has been out a couple of years now. Given how the HD-800 caused a rash of new headphone offerings, the DAC market may go the same way. Win/Win. Better cheaper DACS.

They'll be a NEW DACMagic before these guys can be the new DACMAgic.

Not to worry. It doesn't look like they'll be shipping out any anytime soon. Looking back through online chatter, the dates have slipped time and time again. You have to wonder at this price goal if it's really do-able. And if it is, if the quality will be all they say it is. A good $300 DAC with these features would sell like hotcakes. IF it ever comes out, I'll wait for the FOTM to fade and some real reviews to come to surface. It's 2010. Where's all the jetpacks they promised us back in the 60's?

There isn't much in the way of reviews on it out there. My experiences with older wireless makes me not trust them to be reliable. Digital just means instead of hiss/noise it will just drop in and out of service. The 2.4ghz spectrum is already chock full of toys out there.

I am a fan of the AN-E sound. As a former Snell type "e" owner, I always liked the sound. But I can't say I've heard them with anything but the whole Audionote set up. Harbeths sound like a brand I need to give a listen to..

I've always been an album listener. It's a habit that also includes getting up and moving around every 20 minutes(side flip). But going to cd, then to a pc source changes things. You find yourself listening more, and searching less, as well as reading less. Remember looking at cover art, inside goodies, etc.? Part of the problem is there's nowhere to listen to a DAC other than a meet. It all becomes a leap of faith. And most people don't have the time or money to sort through them, so they buy one and stick with it. There's the few that flip through them one after another. That's where the product knowledge comes from, but it's neither cheap or easy. By the time a DAC shows up used so you can try and re-sell it without taking a beating, there's 20 more to try.

The 404le pad mod has been pretty popular. I found that putting the double sticky on the pad to be a PITA. I did the second one by putting the tape on the can, then pressing the pad on the cans. The mesh holds in place with no need to adhere it. Do you suppose Stax will notice the sales of the 404le pads will far exceed the number of 404le's out there? Let's hope they just keep selling them.

$31 million over five years is almost $1700 a day. Given she started out slow and built up, that's a lot of shopping. Don't tell me her husband didn't know something was up.

Wow. How could the other people in charge NOT notice that. Taking 60 million at Fry's could go unnoticed given how large they are, but almost 30 million from Koss?

I am beginning to suspect that there was other mischief going on, and all she did was exploit it. I find it hard to believe all the other execs could miss this, unless others were in on the skim. All she did was get too greedy and exposed the whole thing to the light of day.

That's the real problem is many of us only have listened to a few DACs and that makes for poor A vs. B judgements. I can't think of many places to go audition DACS, other than Head Fi meets. The other choice is to blindly drop a wad of cash on one of those big name units. I was frozen in place for about a year mulling over what DAC to upgrade to. The Pico on sale was a no brainer.

I've used a Monica USB for a while. Better a good NOS DAC than a poorly designed oversampling one. But NOS can be bettered. I bought one of the on sale Pico's and it takes off some of those rough edges. And of course 20 other great DACS come up for sale used. FS: TwistedPearAudio OPUS dac modules and power supply. - Head-Fi: Covering Headphones, Earphones and Portable Audio And here's another good one [For Sale] Cambridge DacMagic - Club Polk New with good reviews HIGH RESOLUTION TECHNOLOGIES - MUSICSTREAMER+ - CD/DVD PLAYERS The last year has seen a lot of these come down to near NOS DAC prices. And Quality has improved to pretty good levels. Not high end. But pretty damn good bang for the buck.

I just suddenly had a 30+ year flashback of being a Marine in the far East. And four very painful penicillin shots. It always bothers me how they can let white collar crooks right back out of jail. Matoff spent his time before trial sneaking off millions of dollars of assets to friends and family.

I feel for the employees on this one. Working hard and in the end one person destroys all their efforts. I can only hope they pull through this ok. I'd hate to see some investment group snatch them up and kill off what's left of them. The stats will be the first thing to go.

That would be the last custom clothing she would ever want or need.

That's a lot of money to hide. But still, how does one continue to do that over and over? You'd think after skating off with a million or two they would slow down a bit. The CEO and CFO of the company I worked for were caught cooking the books a few years back. It was a blow that they never recovered from. They went chapter 11 and my division was sold last week. I hope this doesn't kill them off.

The Pico DAC was $268 shipped to my door thanks to the black Friday deal. But yes, DIY is cheaper.