NX-Oticas in new listening room

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Jaytor

Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #20 on: 13 Jan 2020, 12:57 am »
I trust your opinion Danny. It could very well be something upstream that is contributing to what I am hearing. Or it could be that these speakers are just letting a lot more of what is on the recording come through. On my previous speakers which are no where near as revealing, these female vocals (such as Show Biz Kids by Ricky Lee Jones and Birds by Dominique Fils-Aime) sounded somewhat smoother, although as I said I'm hearing a lot more other details in these recordings that I haven't heard before. This is a pretty subtle issue though.

Deep male vocals (such as These Bones by The Fairfield Four) sound absolutely amazing. The power that comes through is breathtaking.

I'm not a real fan of tube amps - I've just had too many issues with the tube amps and preamps I've owned over the years. I like the sound when they are working well, but don't want to deal with the hassles. Perhaps I've been unlucky with reliability, but that's where I'm at. I tried a number of solid state amps that I have owned or was able to borrow and the JC-5's sounded best to me within my budget (although I was using different speakers to test them).

I have found that these speakers are more revealing of cable changes than has been the case with previous speakers I've owned recently. So I will continue to play around with cable swaps to see if I can find some combination that takes the system to the next level.

I should make it clear that I am not in the least dissatisfied with this system. These speakers are amazing and easily the best I've ever owned (including some that cost many times more).

Jaytor

Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #21 on: 13 Jan 2020, 02:06 am »
@ryno - I haven't tried them with my primary listening position quite that close, but I can say that these speakers are by far the best "party" speakers I've owned, meaning that the sound throughout the room sounds great if you are standing and walking around.

I had a party a few weeks ago where there were at least 20 people in the room, mostly standing, and everyone was blown away by how good they sounded. Even standing a couple feet in front of them sounds good, although you're not really getting the stereo image without being closer to the sweet spot.

So I would think they'd do just fine with a closer listening position. The only issue is that the sweet spot might be a bit narrower as you move closer. With the speakers a bit more than 9' apart and about 10' from the center of the couch, the sound and imaging is quite good across the full width of my full size couch.

Tyson

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Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #22 on: 13 Jan 2020, 02:25 am »
I'm familiar with that amp - it's a good match for speakers that are a difficult load (like Maggies) and it's a good match for speakers that are not super high resolution like anything from Dynaudio, Wilson, Sonus Faber, etc... ie, pretty much anything that uses scandinavian drivers like Scan Speak.  It matches well with those drivers because they are imparting a softness to the sound that's part of their basic design.

But the NX-Otticas are very high resolution and any glare in your partnering amp will show up now.  Because they are such an easy load, you don't need a big bruiser of an amp to drive them, you can focus on something with lower watts but higher quality.  Things like the Pass X30 or the First Watt Aleph or BA3 (but not, not, not the F5!). 

Of course tubes will get you there easier and cheaper.  I understand not wanting to mess with them but if you do, I'll 2nd the rec Danny made for the Elekit Japan 300b, it was a great match and is current production.  If you feel like 8 watts is not enough, my 2nd rec would be the VTA ST70 with octal driver board (6SN7 tubes) from tubes4hifi.com - they are made in america by people similar to Danny, IMO.  They make very high performance amps for very little money (relatively).  The amps don't look sexy but they produce just about the best 35 watts per channel around. 

Jaytor

Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #23 on: 13 Jan 2020, 02:41 am »
At some point I might consider a Pass XA25 or similar (I am a fan of Pass amps and have owned a couple in the past), but since I've only owned the JC5 for less than 6 months, my wife would not appreciate me buying something different so soon.

Tyson

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Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #24 on: 13 Jan 2020, 02:56 am »
At some point I might consider a Pass XA25 or similar (I am a fan of Pass amps and have owned a couple in the past), but since I've only owned the JC5 for less than 6 months, my wife would not appreciate me buying something different so soon.

A couple other things to try in the meantime - bypass the Soniccaps with some Miflex copper caps.  You only need the .1uf value and they are cheap (like less than $20).  They make a pretty marked improvement in mid/high smoothness.  For speaker cables, check out the Duelund replica of the Western Electric wire.  Also very inexpensive and it will ameliorate any crispies that pop up. 

Jaytor

Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #25 on: 13 Jan 2020, 03:05 am »
Already have the Miflex cap. I am thinking of trying some of Danny's Electra Cable SCs. Currently I'm using DH Labs Q-10 which are silver plated copper which could be contributing to the slight aggressiveness in the upper midrange.

I'll check out the Duelund cables though. Thanks.

Tyson

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Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #26 on: 13 Jan 2020, 03:10 am »
Silver plated copper - oh yeah that's going to light things up a bit.  Heck you might not even need something as mellow as the Duelund cable, just some neutral pure copper will be a better match most likely.

Danny Richie

Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #27 on: 13 Jan 2020, 01:53 pm »
Already have the Miflex cap. I am thinking of trying some of Danny's Electra Cable SCs. Currently I'm using DH Labs Q-10 which are silver plated copper which could be contributing to the slight aggressiveness in the upper midrange.

I'll check out the Duelund cables though. Thanks.

Ah, that could be part of the problem. Silver coated Copper will cause a phase shift that is very audible.

RonP

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Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #28 on: 13 Jan 2020, 03:23 pm »
But male vocals are much more authoritative on the NX-Oticas. You can hear more of the guttural sounds you'd expect from a deep male voice.


If you get  a chance, check out "Somewhere down the crazy river" by Robbie Robertson

https://www.discogs.com/Robbie-Robertson-Robbie-Robertson/master/60200

An underrated album


Jaytor

Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #29 on: 14 Jan 2020, 04:59 am »
@RonP - nice song. I liked it. Thanks for the pointer.

Well, I ordered a set of Electra Cables from Danny. Looking forward to seeing how these change the sound.

Captainhemo

Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #30 on: 15 Jan 2020, 06:58 pm »
@RonP - nice song. I liked it. Thanks for the pointer.

Well, I ordered a set of Electra Cables from Danny. Looking forward to seeing how these change the sound.

Jay,   I used  the  Electra Cables quite a bit with the  NX-Otica's,  I think  you will like the match.   Might not be quite as detailed as what  you're using ( will be interesting  to know) but the overall sound is really    welcoming and   pleasing to listen to.   

jay

Jaytor

Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #31 on: 15 Jan 2020, 07:20 pm »
Thanks Jay.

A friend came over last evening with his Border Patrol DAC to try in my system and compare with my Schiit Yggdrasil (v2 Analog board). The BP DAC was softer and more laid back and lacked the clarity, dynamics and deep bass of the Yggy, but the roughness I was hearing in the female vocals was completely gone. But even with my current setup, this issue seems to be fading so I could still be dealing with break-in issues.

At any rate, this gives me some confidence that I'm a few tweaks away from reaching nirvana.

Tyson

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Re: NX-Oticas in new listening room
« Reply #32 on: 15 Jan 2020, 07:27 pm »
Thanks Jay.

A friend came over last evening with his Border Patrol DAC to try in my system and compare with my Schiit Yggdrasil (v2 Analog board). The BP DAC was softer and more laid back and lacked the clarity, dynamics and deep bass of the Yggy, but the roughness I was hearing in the female vocals was completely gone. But even with my current setup, this issue seems to be fading so I could still be dealing with break-in issues.

At any rate, this gives me some confidence that I'm a few tweaks away from reaching nirvana.

Yeah man, it sounds like you'd just tuned your system to sound good with your prior speakers and now you just need to adjust a few things to optimize for the new speakers.  I'm going through the exact same process in my living room system right now.  But I gotta say, dialing things in like this is pretty fun.