tkam

I agree with Dusty and Elephas the R10's just aren't bass monsters and IMO aren't particularly good at all with rock music. They may be very good with Vocals and Jazz but I really don't like headphones that are genre-specific hence why I no longer own the RS-1.

I think this is actually a pretty good point and I share a similar opinion. Personally I think the Extreme makes pretty much all the 6sn7/5687 output SP amps completely obsolete. Those using 6bl7/6bx7's are much better off but even those still quite aren't up on the level as the Extreme and other amps using the 6as7/6080/6528/etc.

Yep and honestly he could free up a good bit of the time he spends answering questions by having a useful and informative website.

Thats the way it goes unfortunately custom stuff just takes ages. I really think any custom work he should automatically quote a 1 yr delivery date. Sure he might lose some orders because of that but at least the buyer would have a better idea of what they are getting into.

It's Mikhail he always has a ton of things in the works, though most of them don't see the light of day or take years to

Yeah you can probably count me in too. Dan I might need to crash at your place though if thats alright.

Ok time for a few impressions I suppose. MS-2/MS-2i: I did a bit of listening to the MS-2/MS-2i's as I've been thinking about grabbing a pair for use at work and I was pretty happy that at least at first listen they didn't seem nearly as bright as most Grados. Their treble is still pretty clearly bumped up but overall they had a pretty smooth sound and nice tight bass w/ good impact. SP Extreme: It was good to finally here an Extreme for a decent amount of time, it doesn't have the refinement, extension, impact or soundstage of my amp but at $1k it's a hell of a value. I'd really like to here an Extreme side-by-side w/ a Zana Deux one of these days. Audio Aero Capitole - This is a damn nice cdp, little more weight and warmth than my modded Opus 21 though the Opus might have a little more detail. Either way both very excellent cdp's. I can't forget to mention that the Capitole's balanced outs drove the Senn 650's extremely well, I really doubt you'd get much of an improvement by adding a balanced amp. As usual the best part of the meet was the people and just sitting around shooting the breeze w/ Earl, Jacob and Vern (Jacob's friend)

Thanks guys I'll look forward to your impressions on the RP-21 and RP-22 .

I'm looking to get a pair of closed phones for around $100. I prefer full-sized phones and in terms of importance I'd say sound quality #1, isolation #2 and everything else pretty much irrelevant. Two that have caught my eye so far are the Audio Technica ATH-ES7 and the Equation RP-21. Any other suggestions or thoughts on those two?

No you want my Quad 22L's

Nope nothing wrong with them, they've just been replaced by these: Selah Audio 3D

Congrats Mike the ZD is a really nice amp. It'll be interesting to see how it compares to your SDS over time.

So I get the impression, that other than the completely unbalanced sound that the Ed. 9's biggest problem lies in tonality and timbre.

Also they're great for people w/ speakers that do late night listening when speaker listening isn't very practical.

You could try building an alien dac + diy portable amp of your choice in a single case. Can't think of too many other options in that price range.

I ran into some of that nasty weather as I was leaving, really sucked but I was able to get ahead of it pretty quickly.

Air and soundstage are what speakers are for

Yesterdays meet at Earl's was a good time as usual. Here's the obligatory gear pics:

He's trying to sell some exotic woody DT770s for $750 and thats after a couple price drops I think.

Could be worse: http://www.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=255528

He's European....

You have your priorities straight: TV > Furniture

Yep agreed, I sent them an e-mail about the mods and heres the meat of their reply: Here are the details: Customer needs to supply the unit ~ $2K, unless you can get a deal. Our mod price only is $2K and includes the following: Complete re-design of stock analog stage in Transporter. Volume control in unit is still active, as are all firmware, wireless, Ethernet, SP/DIF, optical ins/outs, etc. Tube stage features internal power supply, based on design technology from our own preamp designs. Tube-rectified power supply using 5U4/5V4/5AR4 compatible rectifiers. There will be room to use 5UV/5V4 'G' and 'GB' types, for the 300B look or the straight bottle look. Signal tubes and rectifiers will be mostly exposed and easily accessible from the top. The fuse block will also be external, so there will be no need to open the unit up to change fuses or swap tubes. The exposed tubes will also keep the box cool inside. Heat producing SS devices in the circuit will be heat-sinked to the AL chassis, so the case may run warm, but the temperature inside the box will be kept at a normal opearting temperature. Tube analog stage featuring balanced outs (differential) to XLR outs and SE outputs to RCA jacks. Tube analog stage designed around 6CG7/6FQ7/6922/7308/6DJ8/6N1-P tube family. Two tubes are used, but only one triode per channel is used in the circuit. The second triode is not used, allowing for 2x the tube life by simply swapping the tube positions. The balanced outputs are achieved by custom wound output transformers from Electraprint (Jack Iliiano) - www.elecraprint-audio.com. Voltage output is approximately 2.5V max, in-line with a typical CD source. This is still plenty of gain to drive most amplifiers to full output level, allowing for the unit to be connected directly to the amplifier. Note: It was designed and voiced, being fed into our LS 36.5 tube linestage. I expect to schedule the first start date within two weeks from Monday, or by Sept. 10th. Turnaround is expected to be approx. 2-weeks and our scheduling of start dates is intended to insure this. We require a $500 non-refundable deposit to insure a start date, with the remainder due upon completion of work.

I wonder how the Transporter w/ the upcoming Modwright mods will stand up against the higher-end cdp's.

Yeah absolutely crazy and to think it was in the first game of a double header. I wonder if the Orioles have enough pitchers to get through game 2.