This holiday break was particularly enjoyable in that i upgraded two very important parts of my sound system: 1) Power amp 2) Acoustic room treatments
I.
One Sunday afternoon a few weeks before Christmas I saw the listing for the used OmegaStar 440EXH on the ava website. I didn't really expect to get anyone on the phone that day, but, Frank picked up and less than 3 minutes later the deal was done.
The unit arrived a day before UPS said it would but it was a couple days before I was able to install it in the system. The unit looked like new and was packed as new. It replaced another AVA unit, a venerable, long-term favorite, OmegaStar III 260 hc (in Hafler XL280 shell), which was then pressed into service for the rear channels.
I have long been impressed with my high current OmegaStar III, particularly the muscle it provides in dynamic passages. But the 440EXH is something else again. This amp excels at both micro and macro dynamics while providing more resolution with just a touch of sweetness. This new resolving power also provided a brief "uh-oh" moment: On one of the recordings I played that first night, I heard a very low level buzzing and thought there might be a problem with the amp. Nope, it was in the recording, and had not been evident with the older amp. I did note that the 440EXH bass did not quite have the "b*lls-to-the-wall" authority of the omegastar III but I think it is a better balanced amp. Without a doubt adding the 440EXH to the system is a major upgrade.
II.
This past week I began a project to build bass traps and absorption panels for my dedicated listening room. It is only 12 x 15 x 9 so it is a busy space acoustically. I finished the traps saturday and put them in place. I placed raw OC 703 fiber glass panels at estimated reflection points and on front and back walls.
Net result - a stunning improvement. A wonderful complement to the 440EXH upgrade. Acoustically treating your room provides astounding results. It is well worth the effort to do this, i can't believe it took me this long to get to it. No treatments is like sailing without a spinnaker !
So, with these two wonderful additions to my system I spent many hours revisiting my music library over the holiday break..... Nirvana!
ge
ps - the power cable is fine: it reached the outlet (hospital grade on 20 amp dedicated circuit) and the plug's prongs are polarized.
