User review thread

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

In many ways I would love to be just a user again or a DIY enthusiast, being *in* the industry makes you see more of the crap than the benefits at times, which is why I am so outspoken at times (well, most of the time I suppose).

Though when I look at what we have now, like here, with forums with members loving and talking about their systems and their music it is so much better than what we used to have, a boring flat earth reviewer / magazine and dealer polluted industry playing virtually nothing but Dire Straights, living in a musical straight jacket. It is still there but sooo much less and more and more people are laughing at them and their stupidity.

[Ronin]

A LIGHT HEARTED REVIEW THAT MAY OR MAY NOT BE A BIT DIFFERENT......
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Nice "rant" sorry , review Jammy

Been there,done that,and regretted spending so much money for "very little" return.Still got a "wobbly" TT but hoping to sort that out in the new year.

Can't give a review of my system,still in the process of putting one together

I should have added-even after some 30 yrs of swapping and changing.

It's so refreshing to read "honest" (even if we are condemning ourselves ) and transparent views of Hi-Fi on this forum and I can relate to most that's been written.

I give up on Hi-Fi rags quite some a time ago.Same old ramblings over and over again .

this reading is way more interesting

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

We have made a really good start with this, and I see it very much work in progress, and just because you have done one, don't stop, do another from another perspective. If the first was a history then how about a musical evolution one, how your tastes have changed in time and if that changes your choice of equipment, or opposingly has choice of equipment widened and developed your musical taste.

So this is a prod to bring it to the top of the current threads, lets not let it drift down the list to obscurity.

[terrybooth]

I'm current 3000 miles away from my system but I'll have a go when I get back.

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

Tell us where, tell us where - is it warm

[terrybooth]

Goa, and yes.
Kaju Feni (a local concoction) slipping down a treat. Staying about 400 metres away from the World Heritage Site of Old Goa. Probably going to see St. Francis Xavier ( the incorruptible body of) tomorrow.
Any one interested see http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Goa

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

Stayed at Cidade de Goa http://www.cidadedegoa.com/ about 5 years ago, which is a couple of miles from there. Nice hotel but not 5 star as they claim, best thing was the food, murdered in the room by mosquitos, and don't believe the pictures of the beach, it is in a river estuary and you wouldn't believe what comes down that river and is deposited on the beach in the morning. On morning part of a human torso I didn't swim in it after that

[Lindsayt]

...Hanging Around my local specialist Popular Hi-fi magazine recommended dealer in the summer of 1983 with an £800 budget for my 1st system.

Big girl in the red dress she's just trying to impress us. Over the course of 2 demos I found that the LP12 sounded much more dynamic than the Rega Planar 3. I found myself drawing a mental oscilloscope of what I was listening to. With the LP12 there were a lot of jagged spikey peaks. The Rega smoothed these off. Like a sectional map of the Himalayas compared to the Chilterns.

There's a million of them selling and the buyers can be found. Next up was the NAD 3020 against the Creek CAS4040. Similar thing again to the LP12 with the Rega. The NAD smoothed off the peaks in the music. The Creek was tonally a touch on the bright side, but just had more spark, more life about it. I was disappointed in the NAD after reading so many glowing reviews and recommendations of it.

One of 'em comes over got a monkey on his shoulder. AR 18's vs Heybrook HB1's. Bit of back and forthing here. It was the Stranglers track that decided it for me. I prefered this track on the HB1's. Kef Codas were dismissed quickly: boring speakers.

This left cartridge choice. I plumped for a Rega R100 with its rich tonal balance as the more tonally neutral P77 was less suited to the tonally bright Creek CAS4040 / HB1 combination.

Arm choice was a Linn Basik LVX by default. The Ittok sounded better: tighter, more detailed, more foot tapping but would have been over my budget.

I also bought a pair of Linn Sara stands and the dealer chucked in a 5m pair of Naim NAC A4 speaker cable. My 2nd oldest brother thought I should have gotten more of a discount. He was right.

2 months later I bought a Sound Organisation turntable table, which added to the bass extension of my system.

In some ways this my best ever hi-fi purchase and in some ways my worst. My LP12, Creek, HB1 combination formed the basis of my system for 20 years. During which it got a lot of use. But if I had known then what I know now, for the same money I should have bought a 2nd hand Garrard or Japanese direct drive, a 2nd hand Japanese battleship amp and large 2nd hand US speakers from Klipsch / Bozak / JBL / Altec / EV.

When I went to pay for my system, the owner of the dealer confidently declared that the LP12 was "the best turntable in the world". This was mis-selling on a par with my bank automatically making me pay for income protection insurance when I took a loan out with them...

[Lindsayt]

...I used to think that studio recordings on vinyl were unable to capture the sound of bass guitars when the rest of the band were playing.

When I went to gigs I could always hear each instrument clearly. So clearly that I could pick out and follow each instrument at will. Incuding the bass guitar.

With almost all of my records on my 1st hi-fi bass guitars got buried in the mix. I was convinced that this was some deliberate production ploy. Or some limitation in the recording technique.

After all, I had the best turntable in the world, and a pretty good amp and speakers. It couldn't be down to them, could it?

And my brother's systems and my friends systems. They were the same. Impossible to easily follow the bass guitar on the majority of tracks...

[Dr Bunsen Honeydew]

I am afraid it was all one massive con job, perpetrated by dealers, reviewers and magazines. There were a few of us shouting out at the time but we were shouted down and labelled mad.

And it was all perpetrated by one sick little conman, who with enormous selling skills managed to hi-jack an industry - name - Ivor Tiefenbrun (MBE ).