Audio endeavors

Since music is such a big part of me,equipment to reproduce same is of vital importance. I guess you could say it's in my blood (see below). Anyhow,I fight a never ending struggle between the contrary goals of flawless high fidelity in the living room,and a positive balance in the checking account. Here's a couple of resources that have been invaluable in reconciling what I hear with what I want to hear:

Parts Express

Source for parts,components,tools,books,test tapes,and just about everything else the electronics-oriented hobbyist or professional might want or need

Madisound Speaker Components

Supreme source of all things speaker-related. Thanks for the tweeters!

AudioXpress Magazine

AudioXpress combines the former Audio Electronics,Glass Audio and Speaker Builder magazines into one publication. Essential to the audio do-it-yourselfer.

With the move to the new house and the acquisition of the mostrous new TV and DVD player came some hard decisions about the system makeup,and a good bit of woodworking. The cassette deck and VCR are gone,as is the old DVD player. The stereo cabinets made of Ray's old Karlson speaker enclosures have also been supplanted; a sort of Craftsman-style (well, sort of) low enclosure supports the set and holds the components. I've got photos up around here somewhere... ah,here we go...

This is a reasonably recent photo of the new cabinet. As mentioned above,the cassette deck and VCR have been removed from the system. Any further recordings and mixings of music on LP will be handled by the MythTV box. On the "to do" list is to build a shelf on heavy duty full extension drawer slides,with a rubber damping mat on it for the turntable. I'm constantly rethinking exactly how to arrange things,as I want to leave space for an additional pair of amplifiers against the day that 5.1 becomes unavoidable. I was initially thinking that a center channel would have to go in the middle hole; now I think it's liklier that it'd get mounted to the wall above/behind the TV. We'll see what Sue says about that. I supsect she'll warm to the idea shortly after the first time we watch a movie in glorious surround sound.

I still cling somewhat tenaciously to my musty crusty old Stereotech 3 speakers,mostly because I don't think Sue would let me survive the expenditure to scoop up that pair of XR-1051s up at Audio Classics. They have been heavily modified,first by my cats,who stropped their claws on the woofers one day and shredded their surrounds. Then they were modified by my firstborn,who one day long ago decided that empirical testing was required to determine whether or not tweeters were thumb-proof. They weren't. Sigh. Anyhow,Parts Express sold me a new set of foam surrounds for the woofers. Once the woofers were woofing again,I bought a pair of Vifa D25AG-05-06 tweeters from Madisound. Serendipitously,they dropped right into the holes in the boxes vacated by the old tweeters; even more serendipitously,they didn't require any crossover mods to produce something moderately close to flat response! As an added bonus,the old tweeters rolled off like crazy about about 12,000Hz; the Vifas are nice and smooth out to about 18,000 or so (which is beyond where my tattered, abused ears can hear anyhow).

At some point I'm going to get into building speakers. I'm very intrigued by the work that Dan Brown has done. He's put together a bunch of neat,inexpensive systems that would make for a wonderful entry point into speaker system construction. I'm particularly keen on building his db515 and db616 transmission line MTMs.

Here can be found the saga of how the stereo used to be,when we lived at our old house.

Here is the Holy Grail of vintage audio gear,a McIntosh MC-275 stereo amplifier. My grandfather,Frank H. McIntosh,was founder and longtime president of McIntosh Laboratory,Inc.,one of the oldest producers of high-end audio equipment. McIntosh was one of the pioneers in the industry,and still holds a very high reputation for well-engineered,marvelous-sounding gear that lasts forever.