postjack

yeah the AH is great. just don't waste too much money on gear early on, since it becomes outdated so quickly. if you can find a decent enough guild or some good people to group with start running instances at 20 and up to get gear. what race/class did you roll?

just got back from seeing the symphony at an outdoor amphitheater down at the beach. lots of crowd pleasing type americana and scottish/irish riverdance type music. and fireworks! it was a lot of fun. also fred thompson was there. which was really weird. they showed one of his campaign ads or whatever on the big screen, then he stood up and they shined a spotlight on him. i was like, JUST watching him on the tnt law & order marathon before I left for the concert. weird.

i'm certainly no guru, but the thorens td 166 does get praise in the vintage turntable world. straight tonearms also typically get more respect then curved tonearms (says the guy with the curved tonearm having turntable). The Ariston is a snazzy looking 'table, but I've never heard of it. Lucky for you, you get to listen to them first! i'm sure you'll let us know what you decide.

happy birthday!

yeah, get your feet wet first and see if the game is for you. 10-15 levels can usually tell you if you like a class enough to stick with it. just do lots of quests and go where the quests take you. don't buy gear at first, just equip whatever you earn from quests.

Check out Neverwhere if you haven't read it, its one of my favs.

one of the reasons I can't really get into another mmorpg is because I spend most of my free "me" time listening to music now.

join kirin tor and apply to a guild called "unbroken". your contacts are Lilboo, Jyxi, Tharger, or Anyawe. tell 'em akka sent ya.

cool, gg kay is great. i've only read "lions of al-rassan", but I'm looking forward to reading more.

i'll just reiterate what I've already said before in other threads: first one, classic. second one, they had a big hollywood budget for the first time and didn't know what the hell they were doing. fun to watch, and especially fun to really get to see a lot of jigsaw, who has an amazing screen presence. the actor who played the lead cop is a fucking hack, ruined the whole movie for me. him and his bimbo partner. the third movie is at least on par with the first. big budget, and they had a better idea of what they were doing. sure, the story was predictable, and NO WAY could it have all worked out exactly the way jigsaw wanted it to, but the same could be said for all the movies, though admittedly the third was a bit more of a stretch. but hell, its a horror flick. if I can't suspend my imagination a bit, i'd never enjoy a horror movie again.

you should try the supersonic breakfast burrito!

I could use a backup. I'll trade you a NEAR MINT grado gs1k WITH GRADO EXTENSION HEADPHONE CABLE.

Done! Now bring me a shrubbery!

This is truly the worst forum on the internet web. Not setup for non-ascii characters? Puh-leeze! My new headphone forum is going to be sooooooo cool. And I make a firm & solemn promise that all of the non-ascii characters will be represented in full force.

I've noticed this happening with a lot of different characters.

Saw III was awesome. venti caramel frap. mmmm summer tasty.

A Lamy Safari is indeed a great pen, if you don't mind the bauhaus plasticky looks (I don't, I have one in my pen cup at work at all times). The Lamy does have a molded grip that encourages a proper, or tripod, pen grip. This can be annoying if you have an irregular grip. A regular "round" nib may not necessarily make your handwriting all of the sudden better, but using a fountain pen in general requires more concentration, and as a result of this you might get better writing. To learn more about nibs, check out Richard Binder's indispensable articles on the subject: http://www.richardspens.com/?page=ref_info/nib_primer.htm Lamy's steel nibs are tough as nails and about as hard. They won't give you that soft touch you get from a gold nib, but there is nothing wrong with that. Another pen to consider is a Pelikan M200, runs about $60.

Cool! My 51 is one of my favorite writers. Dinged up sterling cap (I'm a sucker for sterling, so much better then gold, imo), vac filler, and a true F Binderized nib. Very nice.

I want to buy one. WTB PLZ

The GS-1000 is completely inappropriate for both classical and jazz. Large orchestral works go to shit in the highs, and jazz horns are shrill (this on an MFSL Miles Davis SACD, which while a tad on the bright side, is certainly not an overly bright recording). So far, the GS-1000 has done well with slower folkier rock, a la Wilco & Ryan Adams. It also did well with old Grateful Dead two-channel soundboards. All of this is good because I do listen to a lot of this kind of music. It performed exceptionally well with bass beat heavy dreamy house music. It also did very well with the straight industrial I threw at it, but I'm going to be honest with you, I have yet to hear a headphone that doesn't sound amazing when playing old Skinny Puppy LPs. So basically I'm still waffling on whether or not to let this one go. Still need to do some more listening. I just did an interesting test. I put on a copy of Public Image Ltd's first record, which, for those who don't know, is basically a pulsing bass guitar pushed to the front of the mix, with a bunch of out of control electric guitar and John "Rotten" Lydon screaming nonsense amongst this sea of bass. Its badass as all hell. But really I wanted to do a bass test, but ended up doing an instrument coherence test, meaning how well do the vocals, guitars, and drums make themselves felt against such an intense bass background? First, I did the GS-1000, and I was surprised to find I wasn't getting my bass fix. I kept cranking the volume, but this made the highs to shrill. The vocals and the guitars got all confused and sibilant when the volume rose. It was a decent enough listening experience, but it was seriously lacking in presence. Next, the RS-1 (flats). Actually, the bass here was a lot better, more prominent and "up front", which is more appropriate to this album. The vocals actually sounded surprisingly like the GS-1000, only not sibilant! This was interesting, it was the first parallel I've drawn between the two Grados. The missing presence I spoke about with the GS-1k was back. However, unlike the GS-1k, all the instruments and vocals were a bit crammed together, not to the point of muddiness, but just a bit crammy. Just for kicks I threw on the HP-2. Right at the first bass note, I was very surprised to find the HP-2 was hands down the bass winner! I guess I shouldn't be surprised, since the HP-2 always seems to deliver just what the recording wants it to. Here, the bass is prominent in the mix, so the HP-2 gives it that way. This, along with of course none of the treble issues of the GS-1k, and none of the soundstage issues of the RS-1, make the HP-2 my favorite headphone to listen to PiL on. Its almost disorienting how easy it is to focus on one instrument with the HP-2 and just follow it. If I just listen to the drums, my brain tells me that there is no way the drums can have their own nice space in the soundstage, yet still seem so intimate. Surely intimacy comes at the cost of soundstage smooshing? Apparently not the case with the HP-2.

Just for fun, I ran ICs from the preamp out to the dynahi, then the tape out to the dynahi. The line out definitely sounded different, and was run through the Melos volume pot, i.e. I could still control the volume from the Melos. With the tape out, the volume pot on the Melos does nothing, and the sound is unaltered. Looks like the tape out solved my wiring problem, thanks to hungrych and kg for the help.

So I was writing a review of a new pen I bought over at the Fountain Pen Network, and the wood colored ebonite inspired me to take some pics of it in juxtaposition to my RS-1. I thought I'd share. Kind of a pipe dream, but it would be cool to see ebonite used in a headphone design, even though it would be both pointless and impractical. The pen is a Bexley Deluxe II in Antique Cream.

I appreciate everyone sharing their thoughts. I think that "I don't care, I want to listen now" is a healthy attitude to have. However, I can't share the cynicism that all manufacturers only appeal to the lowest common denominator, and that all the great cans have been made. I still expect Sennheiser to create something truly remarkable, a la the mythical HD700. And though it is not to everyone's taste, the HD650 is a marvelous headphone that does so many things well, and at an incredible price. The W5000 may not be perfect, but I think it is a very good headphone, and I see no reason why Audio-Technica won't continue to innovate in the high end can market. But then of course we have the GS-1000... don't get me wrong, this is a fun headphone for some music, and the bass is wonderful (its the only can I've used where I can actually feel SPL, or at least it does a damn good job of faking it), but it ain't an HP-2 or an RS-1. But John did make the PS-1, which I've never heard but folks seem to enjoy. k, gotta do homework, more thoughts later.

fuck ass!! i keep putting img frames around links: http://www.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=248367 i just found out about the stupid clicky buttons a few weeks ago (instead of just typing url or img) and they have ruined my link posting abilities.

So what is a good price on some K340s? I'm selling a few pens and looking at this ad: i dunno about all that bass heavy/bass light malarkey. if i liked the sound I'd send them to larry anyway. also j-pizzle how about an update?