RMAF 2015 - JRiver Media Center/JTR Speakers Room

mojave · « **on:** 8 Sep 2015, 06:41 pm »

Last year I volunteered to help JRiver host a room at RMAF 2014. I asked Jeff Permanian of JTR Speakers to bring his new Noesis 215RT (Reference Tower) speakers. This year I am helping with the room again, but we are doing things a little different.

This year we will have a 5.1 surround system with 5 identical JTR Speakers 210RT and two JTR Speakers Captivator 1400 subwoofers.

I'm bringing most of the other gear for the room which I use daily in my own system. I own two Cherry Mono PLUS's which are about the same as the current Cherry Mono ULTRA. I also have another Cherry Mono with a smaller transformer. These three amplifiers will be used for the mains. For the surrounds I am bringing my Cherry Jr. I think Tommy is going to send some of the new Mint amps or Maraschino hanging amps.

Other gear in the room include:
Speakers: Five JTR Speakers 210RT (Reference Tower), two JTR Speakers Captivator 1400 subwoofers
Media Server: Custom built with Thunderbolt output and using JRiver Media Center 21, "zero fan speed" power supply and graphics card
DAC: MOTU 1248
Room Treatments: GIK Acoustics - 6 Tri-Traps, two Monster Bass Traps, two 244 Bass Trap panels, 3 ATS Acoustics 4" panels
Power: Torus Power RM2.5 and RM20
Screen: 126" Diagonal Seymour Screen Excellence with Enlightor-4K fabric
Premium ultra fine-weave, ISF-certified material for smaller screens, or where seating is 11 feet or closer. The only woven material in the world designed and certified for perfect color and 4K resolutions. This is also the only acoustically transparent screen available that has no frequency effect. A -2dB flat level change is automatically corrected for via standard level calibrations.
Projector: JVC DLA-RS67U

We are going to be primarily playing Blu-ray concerts, but will also have a large library of 2 channel music. We can also play music from CD's or USB sticks brought by attendees. Below is a list of concerts we are bringing.

Code: [Select]

Metallica – Through the Never
Elton John – The Million Dollar Piano
Eagles – Farewell I Tour Live From Melbourne
A John Williams Celebration
Legends – Live at Montreux (Eric Clapton & others)
Dream Theater – Live at Budokan
Norah Jones 
Blue Man Group
25th Anniversary Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
Nine Inch Nails - Beside you in Time
Legends of Jazz
Dave Matthews - Live at Radio City
Eric Clapton – Crossroads
Cream – Live at the Royal Albert Hall
Chris Botti in Boston
Jethro Tull – Live at Montreux 
Scorpions Unplugged 
Michael Jackson – This is It
Saint-Saëns – Symphony No. 3 'Organ Symphony', Danse Macabre, Cyprès et Lauriers 
Within Temptation Black Symphony 
Enrique Iglesias – Bailando from Atmos Demo Blu-ray
Mahler Symphonies 1-7 conducted by Claudio Abbado
Adele – Live at the Royal Albert Hall 
Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 5/Korsakov: Scheherazade conducted by Andris Nelsons
Led Zeppelin – The Song Remains The Same
Woodstock: 3 Days of Peace and Music (40th Anniversary Edition)
Foo Fighters: Sonic Highways
Foo Fighters - Live At Wembley Stadium
Kings of Leon Live At The O2 London,England
Jeff Beck: Performing This Week... Live at Ronnie Scott's
AC/DC: Live At Donington
B.B. King: The Life of Riley
It Might Get Loud
The Beatles – Yellow Submarine
Joe Bonamassa – An Acoustic Evening at the Vienna Opera House

On Friday and Saturday evening we will be hosting a movie in the room at 7:45 pm. Food and drinks will be provided. PM me if you are planning to attend.

If you want to do any extended listing to any of the Digital Amp Company amps, let me know and we can try to work something out.

Link to Digital Amp Company Exhibitor page at RMAF: https://www.audiofest.net/attending/exhibitors/?keyword=D

Tomy2Tone · « **Reply #1 on:** 8 Sep 2015, 06:44 pm »

Very cool! Any idea what size room all these speakers will be in?

mojave · « **Reply #2 on:** 8 Sep 2015, 07:52 pm »

The room is a standard room which is 13' x 19'. It is almost the same as my living room which is 12.5' x 19'. I also use a 126" diagonal 16:9 acoustically transparent screen at home. With the banquet chairs, we probably only have seating for 10-12 people. With the JVC E-shift projector and 4K screen, there won't be any pixels or screen weave visible from any seat.

https://www.audiofest.net/exhibiting/room-diagrams/

Charles Calkins · « **Reply #3 on:** 8 Sep 2015, 09:09 pm »

I have heard of JRiver and from what I've read about it seems to be the best. I'd like to give it a try BUT!!! I'm such a dnderhead using a PC that I better stay away from it. I use iTunes for my music storage. I'm used to it and starting all over with JRiver would probably put me back into the coocoo bin.

Cheers
Charlie

AmpDesigner333 · « **Reply #4 on:** 9 Sep 2015, 01:11 am »

Quote from: mojave on 8 Sep 2015, 06:41 pm

.... I think Tommy is going to send some of the new Mint amps or Maraschino hanging amps. ....

Hanging Maraschinos! Yes, indeed. Just sent you an email.... Thanks as always.

mojave · « **Reply #5 on:** 29 Sep 2015, 03:15 pm »

Tommy decided that a full Maraschino room would be nice so we will have the following in Rm 2016 at RMAF:

2 King Desktop Maraschino's
3 King In-Line Maraschino's with 6" (yes, 6 inch

) Speaker Snakes with locking banana plugs

During setup on Thursday (Oct 1) I will be connecting our signal chain directly to a BMS 4550 compression driver (113 dB sensitivity 1W/1m) to test for any noise or hiss.

Saturday evening is pretty well filled up for movie night, but we still have room on Friday night. The movie will start at around 7:45 and there will be food and drinks available.

I leave tomorrow morning for the drive to Denver.

Phil A · « **Reply #6 on:** 29 Sep 2015, 03:34 pm »

Quote from: Charles Calkins on 8 Sep 2015, 09:09 pm

I have heard of JRiver and from what I've read about it seems to be the best. I'd like to give it a try BUT!!! I'm such a dnderhead using a PC that I better stay away from it. I use iTunes for my music storage. I'm used to it and starting all over with JRiver would probably put me back into the coocoo bin.

Cheers
Charlie

It really isn't terribly difficult and doesn't take much in the way of PC skills. If you already have your library all you have to do is import it which is not a difficult process - http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Import

I don't really use iTunes but do have a small iTunes library on the PC (basically when I used an iPod and have a bunch of MP3s from CD purchases at Amazon) and these get imported too. I don't use my main PC for primary music playback (just to burn or extract files before transferring them to music servers).

There are forums on AC where there are proprietary (non-JRiver) systems for really nice equipment but on some of them there is page after page of problems or difficulties that people have.

AmpDesigner333 · « **Reply #7 on:** 2 Oct 2015, 05:21 pm »

Here we go! Looking forward to some photos. I'll post the new Maraschino brochure on here soon. Thanks so much, Michael!

AmpDesigner333 · « **Reply #8 on:** 3 Oct 2015, 09:09 pm »

Pez and Tyson do show coverage right!

Here's the day 2 thread, constantly being updated:
http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=137704.msg1464989#new

Nothing on room 2016 just yet (or did I miss it? looked through day 1 coverage too). Lots of great photos, and the usual suspects seem to be spreading their poop on the "farewell thread" (!) as opposed to the daily coverage threads. ....Yes, you read correctly, Pez and Tyson say this is their LAST YEAR of RMAF coverage!!!! Join me in thanking them while trying to coerce them from stepping down as the coolest show cover-ers ever.

Have a great day!

-Tommy O

AmpDesigner333 · « **Reply #9 on:** 3 Oct 2015, 09:23 pm »

New Maraschino one-pagers located here:
http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=137707.0

I guess the cat's out of the bag now

AmpDesigner333 · « **Reply #10 on:** 3 Oct 2015, 09:47 pm »

These are the JTR speakers in Room 2016:
http://jtrspeakers.com/home-audio/noesis-210rt/

"The Noesis 210RT (reference tower) is a 3 way loudspeaker equipped with two 10” woofers in a vented enclosure, combined with a coaxial compression driver fitted on a large, wooden horn with a 60 x 60 coverage pattern."

Frequency +/-3db    38hz-24khz
Sensitivity*    95db (2.0 volts, free air)
Useable Output **    130db (calculated peak 133 – 3db compression)
Recommended Amplification    up to 2000 watts RMS (program)
Impedance    4 ohm
Dimensions    43″x12.25″x16.5″
Weight    125lbs
Exterior Finish    Matte Black Paint
Connectors    Binding Post
Construction    24mm, 18ply, void free, Baltic Birch (Costs 4 times than MDF)
Warranty    5 year Manufacturer defect
MSRP (each)    $4998
Manufacture Direct    $2299

AmpDesigner333 · « **Reply #11 on:** 3 Oct 2015, 10:11 pm »

First photos....

Jeff P (left) and David B (right):

Hanging Maraschino Cherry:

AmpDesigner333 · « **Reply #12 on:** 4 Oct 2015, 08:29 pm »

Wow! They LOVED the room! Thanks very much, Michael!

Tyson:
"....had Tool CRANKED and it was absolutely better than being at the concert. Just incredible dynamics, punch, and power. This room also has the DAC Cherry amps that impressed me so much last year. Hearing them again this year I’ll say flat out that they have the best control, slam, dynamics and clarity, without being sterile or cold."
"I always have poo-pooh’d surround sound, being a 2 channel guy at heart, but this is phenomenal and might make me have to change my mind."

Jason:
"....huge soundstage incredible control."
"Mahler are you kidding me????? Easily and by a wide margin the best I have heard this track at the show. Possibly EVER! No joke, this is next level I'm talking about"
"This system is top notch in every way. Staggering stuff here. I am certain that all of their neighbors HATE these guys. We are listening at at least 120 db right now and it sounds f**king amazing not shitty loud like JBL but beautiful loud that is hard to describe."

Link:
http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=137722.msg1465233#msg1465233

AmpDesigner333 · « **Reply #13 on:** 4 Oct 2015, 11:49 pm »

The room was also mentioned by HTS:
http://www.hometheatershack.com/forums/gtg-clubs-associations-audio-fests/133138-rocky-mountain-audio-fest-rmaf-show-report-2015-a.html#post1305874

I heard they came back twice!

FullRangeMan · « **Reply #14 on:** 5 Oct 2015, 12:03 am »

The JTR coaxial 2way is very interesting at $899.
The 80Hz bass would be deeper in a bigger box.
http://jtrspeakers.com/home-audio/single-8ht/

Tomy2Tone · « **Reply #15 on:** 5 Oct 2015, 12:52 am »

I sat in this room for about 30 minutes...it was really fun and exciting! The only room to give me goose bumps because it was such a total immersion into the music.

One of the few rooms that sounded better and better the louder it got. Jeff at JTR is doing something special with that tweeter as it sounds unlike anything you would think. I'm sure the Cherry amps had something to do with it too...

Great room!

Odal3 · « **Reply #16 on:** 5 Oct 2015, 01:34 am »

That looks like a great system. Congratulations on the great feedback!

Can you please clarify the setup a bit: If I understand it correctly, JRiver outputs the multichannel output via thunderbolt to the Motu, which outputs it via 1/4 TRS balanced line-out to the Cherry amps. Is there any audio processing done and if so, is it in Jriver or via the Motu? Does the amps take the 1/4 TRS as input or did you have to use use some special cables for the connection to the amps?

mojave · « **Reply #17 on:** 5 Oct 2015, 02:23 am »

I'm still packing up the room, but am sitting down for a 5 minute break. Had a great show and I'll make more comments later.

The media server is connected to the MOTU via USB. The MOTU is connected to the amps with a 12 channel 1/4 TRS to XLR snake made with a Mogami cable.

JRiver has 64-bit DSP that is used to provide the crossovers to the subs for multi-channel output and two EQ filters to smooth out the bass. It also automatically switched between a multi-channel setup and a stereo setup with fullrange mains.

Odal3 · « **Reply #18 on:** 5 Oct 2015, 03:25 am »

Thanks for the info!

AmpDesigner333 · « **Reply #19 on:** 5 Oct 2015, 10:19 am »

Quote from: mojave on 5 Oct 2015, 02:23 am

I'm still packing up the room, but am sitting down for a 5 minute break. Had a great show and I'll make more comments later.

The media server is connected to the MOTU via USB. The MOTU is connected to the amps with a 12 channel 1/4 TRS to XLR snake made with a Mogami cable.

JRiver has 64-bit DSP that is used to provide the crossovers to the subs for multi-channel output and two EQ filters to smooth out the bass. It also automatically switched between a multi-channel setup and a stereo setup with fullrange mains.

Amazing setup! Thanks again, Michael!