[Ace Deprave]

I also agree with room treatments if it appears the room is the problem.  Although, looking at your room, you may want to try moving the speakers in and putting the subs on the outside if you haven't already tried it.

It's hard to tell what your exact speaker placement is (how far from rear and side walls, etc.) Have you experimented with moving the speakers further away from the rear and side walls to see if that improves the deficiencies you mentioned?

I'm not the OP who is having upgradeitis, I was just showing him my room treatments. I appreciate the suggestions, though!   

[rollo]

  You have wonderful speakers. Digital front end would be my suggestion. DAC and music server. Remember garbage IN garbage OUT. The room is important however sometimes just common sense changes not full room treatment will help.

charles

[Rocket]

Hi,

I've been pretty impressed with a Peachtree Audio 150 nova.  it utilises ICE Edge modules and has a built in phono stage and Dac.  My main system at the moment uses Salk Sound Song 3's which are pretty impressive speakers.

My divorce system was Salk Sound HT3's, spread spectrum technologies Ampzilla monoblocks, Red Wine Audio Isabella preamplifier.  Dac was Eastern Electric Dac Plus and Perpetual Technologies Dac.  Phonostage was a gold note and turnable is gold note piccolo.

I also previously had Salk Sound HT2's and I currently have one  of Jim's subwoofers as well.

Good luck with your decision.

Cheers Rod

[The baron]

To the original poster, I listened to the Bohemian Rhapsody soundtrack on tidal and then the same song from the album version. Rest assured it's not your equipment. The soundtrack was butchered by the mastering engineer, probably to appeal to the earbud crowd. All the songs dynamic ranges have been compressed with some brickwall limiting, to smash the dynamic range and make everything appear louder, but of course all this does it make it sound worse on hifi systems. It's done to make it sound louder on earbuds and bluetooth speakers. Look up loudness wars in the music industry.

Just buy the original albums of Queen and it should sound alot better, no need to buy an expensive DAC. Garbage in, Garbage out.

[Paul K.]

I listen almost exclusively to classical music, but I do have a CD here and there that's faaaar different.  One of them is essentially "The Best of Queen" and includes the Bohemian Rhapsody.  That piece and every single piece on this CD has excellent quality.
Paul

To the original poster, I listened to the Bohemian Rhapsody soundtrack on tidal and then the same song from the album version. Rest assured it's not your equipment. The soundtrack was butchered by the mastering engineer, probably to appeal to the earbud crowd. All the songs dynamic ranges have been compressed with some brickwall limiting, to smash the dynamic range and make everything appear louder, but of course all this does it make it sound worse on hifi systems. It's done to make it sound louder on earbuds and bluetooth speakers. Look up loudness wars in the music industry.

Just buy the original albums of Queen and it should sound alot better, no need to buy an expensive DAC. Garbage in, Garbage out.

[rollo]

To the original poster, I listened to the Bohemian Rhapsody soundtrack on tidal and then the same song from the album version. Rest assured it's not your equipment. The soundtrack was butchered by the mastering engineer, probably to appeal to the earbud crowd. All the songs dynamic ranges have been compressed with some brickwall limiting, to smash the dynamic range and make everything appear louder, but of course all this does it make it sound worse on hifi systems. It's done to make it sound louder on earbuds and bluetooth speakers. Look up loudness wars in the music industry.

Just buy the original albums of Queen and it should sound alot better, no need to buy an expensive DAC. Garbage in, Garbage out.

   Good to know about the recording thanks. GIGO for sure.


charles

[richidoo]

The best improvement for the $ in hifi is positioning the speakers correctly.
Positioning affects the largest potential distortion and has the lowest price.

[DFpritchard]

First, thanks to everyone who responded.  Very helpful and got me thinking about stuff I hadn't before.  Agreed that speaker placement is important.  I found the Song3s to be particularly sensitive in this regard, whether the parameter was distance from back wall or left-right distance, listening distance and height or toe-in.  Get it right and the soundstage takes on a nice 3D image with voices and instruments where they should be. 

In the aggregate, suggestions were about evenly divided between DAC upgrade and room treatments.  I was mildly surprised that neither upgrading the integrated nor improving speaker isolation (e.g., Isoacoustic Gaia 3) was mentioned.  Several folks reminded me of the GIGO phenomenon.  Systems reveal recording flaws rather than covering them up.  First principle, but I dis-remembered it.

Again, thanks to all.  Happy listening.

[abd1]

First, thanks to everyone who responded.  Very helpful and got me thinking about stuff I hadn't before.  Agreed that speaker placement is important.  I found the Song3s to be particularly sensitive in this regard, whether the parameter was distance from back wall or left-right distance, listening distance and height or toe-in.  Get it right and the soundstage takes on a nice 3D image with voices and instruments where they should be. 

In the aggregate, suggestions were about evenly divided between DAC upgrade and room treatments.  I was mildly surprised that neither upgrading the integrated nor improving speaker isolation (e.g., Isoacoustic Gaia 3) was mentioned.  Several folks reminded me of the GIGO phenomenon.  Systems reveal recording flaws rather than covering them up.  First principle, but I dis-remembered it.

Again, thanks to all.  Happy listening.

putting on Gaia 3's made a big improvement with my Song3's but I didn't think about that because you hadn't mentioned that as an option and I think it's room specific. In my case my floors and soft and squeaky and they helped focus the sound, bring out more detail and have much better bass definition. I was honestly shocked by the improvement, but again it might depend on your room. Good luck with whatever direction you go in.