[jrebman]

Yes, it finally happened... late yesterday afternoon, and with the amazing help of local AC membber DaveC113, the monster Mapleshade rack got leveled and tightened, the Cayin A-70T placed on top, and all the ACI boxes opened, everything connected, and... music poured forth.  The original, pre-RMAF system had been dismantled sometime in September for some renovations to the listening (read - living) room, which of course took longer, but weren't as expensive or messy as originally expected.  Then came RMAF, the totally unexpected purchase of the Sapphire XLs, the Force XL, and the SCS stands, which have been sitting in a neighbors garage until a couple of days ago, and driving me insane because they weren't playing.

So, after all the pieces were in place we hooked up the cabling to the Sapphires only, just placed the speakers in the general area where they will be -- no particular attention to good or correct placement, and put a Richard Thompson CD in the player and let it rip.  It sounded pretty good, considering it was thrown together and the amp was stone cold (this amp doesn't sound right until it's been on for 45 minutes or more)  Dave left, Linda and I had dinner, and then it was time for some more music.  I did some very rough adjustments to the speaker positions, pulled the grilles off, and sat back to listen to some Nora Jones, Mary Gothier, David Russell and more.  I said to Linda that I think this is probably better than anything I've ever heard in this house, and just so nice, and easy to listen to.  She would occasionally interject (Sounds really good" and "wow!" and all we both could do was smile a lot.

Now consider that this amp barely has 40 hours on it, all the stock tubes, the speakers are brand new, the cables are brand new, I have a $25 pair of interconnects, no isolation treatments on either the amp or Denon multiplayer, and the speaker stands are sitting in plastic and rubber carpet sliders so they can be positioned easily.  In short, far less than ideal conditions, and it still sounded very, very good (and no, no sub at this point either.)

This afternoon I've got Led Zep "Mothership"  Yo-yo Ma's Silk Road CD, and a stack of new CDs of every kind from hard rock to solo classical guitar sitting on the rack and begging to be played.

There is obviously a lot more tuning and tweaking to happen in the next days and weeks as everything settles in, as the media server and Bolder Statement SB3 and Ultimate Nirvana PSU come online, my Grover Silver-Carbon ICs get returned to me, and so on, but seeing that there was a noticeable improvement in the two hours or so that I played the system yesterday, I can't even imagine where it is going to go from here.  Then comes room treatments .

So Dave, if you're reading, thanks again as I'd never have been able to get it going without you doing all the heavy lifting and tightening of the rack.  Thanks also to Mike and his team for great products, great support and cheering us on as we got underway, and from all the AC members who did likewise.

Time for Led Zep!

-- Jim

[Mike Dzurko]

Jim:

Simply awesome    I know you've been waiting for this day and I do know how much fun it is. For both of us, the fun is just really starting.  Here's to great music, great audio, and great friends who help us pull it all together and enjoy it 

[richidoo]

Wooopee!! Congrats Jim and Linda! Time to enjoy the fruits of your labor! A long time coming...
Rich

[Bigfish]

Jim:

Congratulations!  I know that this makes it a very special, happy new year for you.  I look forward to hearing more of your impressions as everything settles in!

Ken

[DaveC113]

Jim,

It was fun setting up that system, and after the amp warmed up I was very impressed that it sounded as good as it did. In my initial impression, the mids and highs reminded me of the Avalon system I heard at PS Audio, which are $22k speakers. It had the same sort of sound that is honest and not overdone, with no peculularities or obvious faults. Good find!... and I'm sure it'll get even better.

Dave

[lonewolfny42]

Jim....

Nice to see your up and running....aren't you glad you went to RMAF.
Happy listening....and turn it up...it only gets better....rock on...

                               Chris

[jrebman]

Thanks guys -- I appreciate the support.  Well, as luck would have it the Denon 3910 just about stopped being able to play audio CDs at all yesterday -- it was flakey the other day, but now seems completely uncooperative   So I grabbed the 2910 from the bedroom and it plays fine but sounds terrible in comparison to it's bigger brother. Arrgghh!  If it's not one thing, it's another.  Well, just more motivation to get the media server finished and the SB playing -- which will completely outclass both of the Denons by a huge margin.  I hope the SCs get here today too.  Even with all these compromises, I again really loved my listening last night even if it was a bit veiled and rolled off at the extremes -- very noticeable difference between the two CD players.

I also took some time to pull both speakers out much further into the room and get them placed better, and today I'll try swapping them so the tweeters are on the outsides.

For some reason the soundstage width seems to be "breaking-in" as it were.  Even in last night's session I could hear a distinctly wider presentation by the end of the evening -- and with the same recordings as earlier in the evening.  I can tell that when all of this is dialed in right the soundstage is going to be immense.

Linda also offered this interesting observation last night -- she said that it sounded like the music was "everywhere" and that you weren't drawn to listening to the speakers.

I'm also starting to think that this system is, in the long term, probably going to need an 100 watt or better SS amp to sound it's best, and I'm looking into a couple of options there -- AKSA 100 Nirvana + is a top candidate at the moment, and with an Aikido tube pre in front of it.  But it's all just a hunch right now -- lots more to do before that.

One more observation for now -- I am still quite amazed at the amount of bass satisfaction these are giving on their own with no sub reinforcement.j  If anything they sound a bit bass heavy, but my experience tells me that this is probably a break-in issue, as the ones at the show sounded superbly balanced across the entire spectrum.

It's all fun though (except for the flakey 3910).  Oh, and I really can't wait until my new Audio Note TT and Minimax Phono stage enter the mix, but that is looking like it won't be for quite a while as AN U.K. is having some major production problems at the moment -- too much demand for too little floor space (which I'm sure you can relate to, Mike.)

Thanks again, everybody!

-- Jim
 

[arthurs]

Congrats Jim!  Sounds like you have some terrific listening sessions ahead.  Wrangling Denon's aside, enjoy your new setup and keep us posted on how the sound evolves...

Art

[TomS]

Jim,

Good to hear things are working out there at last.  I know it's hard to be patient while renovating.  Those ACI's are among my favorite stand mounts and have been fantastically satisfying every time I've heard them.  They are destined to become a classic.  Since I also have the Bolder SB2/Nirvana and ACI Titan II LE's, I know you're in for an even better treat in the days ahead.  Enjoy!

Tom

[jrebman]

Tom,

Yes, satisfying -- that's the word.  Evenm though they don't sound nearly as good as they did at the show (which will come) they are still so very satisfying to listen to.  Maybe that's part of their universal charm -- it seems as if they're going to sound nice whatever level of refinement of the gear in front of them -- nicer as you go up the scale, of course, but still rather "satisfying" at the other end as well.

I'm working on my server today, and hope to have the cables run before the weekend is out.

-- Jim

[jrebman]

Well Mike, you're going to love this... even without the Force XL in the system, my neighbor just called to complain an d is taking me to mediation because of the "boom-boom-boom".  Mind you that I was listening at a very reasonable level <80 dB, the ports are plugged, and the speakers facing away from her wall -- one of thoriginal reasons for the renovations and rearranging of the room.)  Oy!

I guess she's going to be a little surprised at how much noise she doesn't know she makes .  Hey, if you live in an attached dwelling, there's just some compromises you have to make (and BTW, I never play earlier than 10:00 am, or after 8:00 pm, and never crank it when she's home.)

Maybe I'll clip out that little piece of text that's somewhere either on your web site, or in this forum that says these are good speakers for people with cranky neighbors (or something like that.)

-- Jim

[Eric]

Welcome to ACI. They are the best speakers I have ever owned

[DR]

jrebman,

Congratulations on the Sapphires! I think I might have been the "easy on the neighbor's" person. I did manage to get a very balanced sound from the Emeralds and Force XL. The Sapphires are a whole different thing. I am using the 85HZ cross overs and slowly but surely dialing in a beautiful balance of sound that will not bother the next condo.

Remember, if I put the 85's in and DID NOT turn on the Force XL, I would only miss about the left 16 keys on a piano! The lowest note on a piano is 27HZ or something like that. So getting the boom out is key. I experiment using warble tone frequency sweeps (that takes the room effect out) to get a base line.

Then adjust things to get that same type of balance with a lot of listening to classical and well recorded Jazz (not smooth Jazz which in my opinion is not Jazz at all). The goal is to use recordings that are as natural as possible. Pop, rock and other forms of music are highly distorted in the upper bass regions - causing the dreaded boom, boom.

After I get that right, then it is pretty easy to manipulate the Force XL when you want to Rock Out. In my case I will slip the Emeralds in for that. Yes you do have to compromise but not that much.

For what it's worth.  aa

DR

[jrebman]

DR,

Smooth what?

At the time of my transgression I was listening to a collection of ethinic musics from a variety of countries around southern Europe and Northern Africa.  Nothing more aggressive than an acoustic bass and some percussion instruments, and the Force is still sitting by unconnected to anything.  One of the things that I liked so much about this system is that the Sapphires alone are wonderful to listen to as they are, and when I really want that bottom end -- for rocking out or whatever, then the sub will be turned on.  Well, when I'm building my new preamp, I'll build in an 80 Hz high pass for the outputs to the Sapphires but I doubt that it will have much effect on the neighbor situation as it is still down only 6 db at 40 Hz.

The amplifier question is settled though -- the order is in for an Aspen AKSA 100 Nirvana Plus.

As for the neighbor situation, I think most here would be pretty shocked at the level I was playing these at when the complaint came in -- conversational, is how I would describe it.  In other words, very easy to have a normal conversation 10 feet away.

-- Jim