New copies and the "right to comment"

Back with a post kind of linked to the previous but in some respects a little different in the week the Donald was told he lacked the Authority on many but all his tariffs by a court, clearly acting out of the constitution. What a naughty little boy!

There often is lovely discourse in music and especially audiophile circles about what constitutes "the best" version of an album and if you read through page after page it's obvious there can be a major difference in what people or prioritizing or perhaps the copy that works best on their stereo systems.

Take this the 2017 half speed mastered version of Roxy Music's classic 1982 Avalon album that beyond the title track included the top ten single More Than This which some feel is a bit bland but many others like.

I have an American Warner Bros original that I was able get in great shape and yes I am happy with it, but having heard this edition I'd say it was a very decent copy obviously lacks wear and can be replaced by the shop if there's any issue.

One person suggested the only comments that should be accepted about how it sounds are by those who have compared at least another edition and ideally several.

If you were talking about a review then that kind of approach would make sense being able contrast and compare any difference you observe but a casual reflection on how having talked about the new version coming out a person posts there thoughts having just received their copy really you don't.

Naturally the kind of super fan with multiple copies is into the comparison, the "is this worth picking up?" aspect but really so long as you're upfront about it being your only copy it's crazy to deny it.

We don't all have multiple copies - storage issues would increase if you took that approach - and many of us can recall just going into a shop and getting the version that was available even for older titles and provided we felt it was great sounding and we obviously loved the music we were satisfied with that.

Many people are getting into (or back to) vinyl and "more than good enough" new copies are well worth picking up when they can be had for modest prices.

In the end it's only an opinion and the one that matters most is yours.

Warm playing

 Well Agnes came over Wednesday night and into Thursday but while there was some damage further north such as a tree coming down at Greenbank near Hartford, Cheshire on the Crewe-Chester rail line, it was really a damp squid here with just a bit of a breeze.

Overall this month has been quite pleasant, not quite "Indian Summer" so you've been able to be out in short sleeves and bare legs gently exploring areas, losing sense of time as you become engaged in what is around you.

There are signs that Fall is due if you look closely in the woods and green spaces that thankfully we have around this area as built up as it is even though I saw Ladybirds this week about and his nutkins was spotted about.

On thing that did happen that wasn't expected was the stylus on my record deck met with a disaster where I went to pick the whole cartridge up to change as (you just screw in others) where somehow the plastic protective cap fell off and got caught in a soft towel that resulted in it becoming bent and probably chipped.

Thus the credit card had to come out to buy a replacement which wasn't cheap and then slot it on the cartridge to restore record playing of modern records in great shape while I has a another for older discs not least vintage singles.

The return of the pre-recorded tape

 What did we talk about last week?

The stereo and music, sure but you know when I mentioned the cassette deck did you realize that actually that is so so on trend right now as while people find streaming convenient on say your smartphone, tablet or maybe Chromebook actually there is a resurgence going on in physically owning things like music.

We've heard for a good while about the vinyl comeback  from people thinking after 1992 it would be gone and many majors dropping vinyl editions unless artists pushed for it in the late 90's at least in Europe - it had been pretty dead from about 1990 in the States - to getting to the point that not only chart albums being issued again as a matter of course on vinyl to even older albums being re-issued on vinyl and many of the Universal groups "Completed" and Now That's What I Call Music themed releases coming out on vinyl too.

Something like this also has started to comeback in a big way too, the pre-recorded compact cassette which I must admit I am biased about as I was a major cassette user owning cassette walkmans, home decks, a radio cassette recorder and buying a  good number of pre-recorded tapes which by the 80's when that tape came out did sound pretty good.

Many people had car players and it must be said cassettes were easy to use in the car with a single hand movement to slot it in the mechanism and it started playing and each side clearly labelled apart from being fairly durable compared to compact discs if you're the solo driver.

Although people pushed Mp3's stored on memory sticks in cars, often there were issues with folder structures, finding the album you wanted and even when you did with it playing it in its proper order without a gap so mobile internet permitting streaming was a better option.

That said like most in car things today it's all big screens to look at and menu structures to navigate .

You can get new cassette equipment although much isn't on a par with the best from the 80's and 90's, something people are working on as new manufacture of better mechanisms is beginning and I would feel comfortable in recommending the Tascam home decks as good reliable new decks for those who just want to start all over again without at least a bit of tlc and a belt change on older units.

New tapes have been issued and sales are up.

Taylor Swift's current album, Midnights is one of several chart albums available on cassette as well as numerous vinyl and cd versions and like most modern releases doesn't use Dolby noise reduction as you can no longer license it from Dolby Labs.

That said on good tape, you have little hiss and less chance of the sound being a bit off if there were any difference between what it was duplicated on and your own machine.

Certainly I no longer use it on my own recordings for those reasons.

Some people have been collecting pre-recorded tapes for like ages and it's still happening with for example with this collection of all Taylor's cassettes apart from Folklore which is another reason why people buy releases.

Like have you ever tried "collecting" downloaded albums, having to back them up lest the SD card they're on gets corrupted and refuses to play and the lack of even a box with unique art is a turn off?

If you're a fan of an artist you want to own and handle things buy them, magazines, posters, concert programs and the albums and tape is small convenient carrier for their music you too can collect without taking up much space. 

It may seem crazy in 2023 but the humble cassette is back with us with youngsters embracing it as much as their parents generation thought they'd seen the end of tapes in their lives.

Just fast forward on to the future!

Adding extra quality to regular cds

Over the years we've had features around audio on this blog and this week we return to the topic of cd reproduction

After replacing the Rotel unit I had for a Marantz super audio cd player that does regular discs I thought I had pretty much got this sorted as after all its reproduction of super audio cds was amazing and the regular discs sounded less muddy and frankly boring than the NAD C541i I had until it blew up.

One annoyance is the classical world Chandos have been issuing less super audio cds and with little rhyme or reason to what was a regular cd with a HD download being available from sites like Presto, the Warwickshire classical music store and what in it's physical form is a sacd.

Popular music remains mainly regular cd too outside of specialty re-issues as much as they are welcome.

The though arose, "is it possible to improve on what the internal regular digital to analogue converter offers on regular cds?"

These convertors that turn the naughts and ones into sound have come on a lot since the early nineteen eighties and even in the last fifteen years better sound can be had often for a good third or more of the price before we even consider inflation.

Enter the SMSL SU9 which comes from China, which personal political issues with their government apart has been producing in the last eight or so years some really good value for money hifi products

It is a fairly small unit, unlike many American offerings plain but attractively presented with a variety of inputs such as Toslink optical, Coaxial, USB which is common for computer based music replay (for which you'll need an up to date driver) and Bluetooth which tends not to be as good but does work without wires which some do feel matters.

The inputs are selected using a input button in conjunction with an up/down key, conformed by pressing the knob in which when configured also acts as a volume control.

This means in the context of a wholly digital system you could use this as a preamp sending an analogue output to a power amplifier.

The outputs are balanced XLR used in professional applications for lower noise and interference and traditional RCA or Cinch unbalanced used on nearly all hifi equipment these days with a now standard 2.3 volt peak output.

The mains input is a IEC Kettle type three pin connector that automatically adjusts from 100 through 240 volts.
 

Playing Sibelius's The Tempest on a 1992 Bis recording on regular cd, a pioneering recording it did bring out more depth and improved midrange  coupled with more detailed sound which l thought was more akin to great analogue source. 

While a dsd sourced super audio cd would of been better, this was more believable on fine regular discs although there are some "filters" that allow you alter the sound slightly if you prefer things warmer or more contrasty which generally I don't.

Overall I feel this has been an upgrade for the bigger proportion of my 5 cm disc collection.

Stylus options

Strangely enough there hasn't been much mention on this blog about records as in playing them apart from one from around 2013 which mentioned my then current turntable and the device that takes  the low output of your cartridge which tracks the groove to convert that to something that comes out of your amplifier and speakers.

These days a Marantz direct drive turntable used used with Ortofon Concorde SME bayonet twist and lock cartridges for all record playing duties being easy to replace the stylus - the bit that goes in the groove wall - when they wear out.

 

Basically it's the same internally as the regular screw in the headshell version and you would adjust the height so it sits correctly for the best sound.

Like a few people I tend to have a number about because the sharp bit that goes in the groove comes with a variety of different options such as models for mono lps made before the late nineteen sixties when stereo lathes were used to cut all regular records because the groove wall was wider.

You can get less noise on such a record if well played by using a wider tip.

Ever since the advent of stereo discs hifi as a hobby had taken off the battle was always about getting the most information from  from the groove so we moved from broadly speaking rounded tips to tips of an elliptical nature to go further down into the groove and more closely follow what was cut.

Generally that means the highest notes can be better reproduced because the stylus is more able to trace them which is fed into the generator system of the cartridge  and often this is a great thing on newer, well cared for discs.

Because it does go that much into it, it requires more care in keeping your records clean to avoid hearing any pops and ticks.

 

That is one reason perversely I did get a traditional spherical stylus for playing records that while not be scratched had been played on less exacting equipment such as the record player I had when I was young.

The Ortofon 5S is a high quality spherical stylus that tracks at a lower weight around 1.75 grams so it won't wear records but because it sits up in the groove a bit more tends to play those singles better for not seeing the slight wear.

It is offered in starter turntables with a cartridge because it does offer much better sound than many disco type models and causes little wear for little expense while allowing if a person chooses to fit more exacting styli just by pushing off the fitted one and adding a replacement.

Mr Hifi Bore apart from having issues with normal type I tapes and Mp3's often railed at such stylus's but actually not a few very high quality moving coil cartridges did come with spherical tips and were highly regarded.

I feel provided the stylus is well made, the balance between different types properties is a personal one and some may be prepared to trade a slight loss of the highest notes for quieter surface noise especially on singles and longer albums where the cutting levels tend to be low.

Making a tape or too returned

We kind of mentioned this machine way back in October 2019 after writing a bit about the week before in connection with making some new tapes on the Technics cassette deck, it had died.

The Panasonic RQ-JA63 is a personal cassette player from around 1985/6 that has an all metal single direction tape transport mechanism with switching for playing type I and type II+IV tapes and a switchable dolby B circuit for playing tapes made with it.

The problem with it was the main drive belt had gone soft and broke and it took a while to find the correct length, width and finish belt to replace it with. 

After lubricating the mechanism and fitting a new belt, it sounded as good as it did new. 

I haven't mentioned pre-recorded tapes much either but this edition of The Principal of Moments by Robert Plant better know as the lead singer of Led Zeppelin is one I've had from release in 1983.

Technically it is a very high quality tape using lower noise and much better sounding genuine chromedioxide tape made by BASF and played on the tape player it sounded superb

I first bought a cassette of Foreigner 4, their 1981 hit album home to Juke Box Hero, Urgent and Waiting For a Girl Like You in early March of 1982 while at school and until cassette editions were discontinued it had been reissued in different forms.

The first significantly different one was in late 1982 when like the Robert Plant tape it was duplicated on Chromedioxide tape rather than regular brown ferric oxide tape.

I came by recent a edition from the late 80's which while using ferric tape but a very good sort used the Dolby Hx Pro system to maximize the high frequency performance on more demanding parts of the music.

The Best of Rainbow originated from a Japan only release which was later issued in the UK and Europe in late 1981 adding single versions and the otherwise unavailable on album Jealous Lover.

This was a discounted Double play tape of around 86 minutes which was useful as I bought the lp version at the time making my own tape but recently bought a used but in nice condition copy of the official UK duplicated version with the red paper labels 

These tapes do sound pretty good showing before cds and Mp3 players entered the scene just how good a compact music source the cassette could be.

Tapes

While all the mad stuff was happening in Parliament,  I was making a few recordings one of which was to replace two pre-recorded cassettes that no long playback right using the small system's cd player and obviously the cassette deck.

 That was the cheapest tape you could buy from TDK, the then leading tape manufacturer usually in packs of three, five or ten a piece being typically used in stereo radio cassette recorders or all in one "Shoebox" shaped mono recorders that run on batteries.
A few might use them for making tapes up for the car as they were dirt cheap new but most people who had separate cassette decks used with their hifi systems wouldn't touch them thinking they'd moved on from all that.
One consequence of this is many people associate the tape with relatively poor sound.

 This is the back of the cellophane wrapper of the sixty minute version and the thing was actually if you used the adjuster (or an automatic tape calibration device) in the recorder these were a lot better than you'd think with crisp high notes and good clean bass with just a little more hiss than a more expensive type 1 "normal" tape.
Its been years since I last used one of these, I did use the D series in the early eighties before I had a brand new deck of my own but the 1991 D did an excellent job remaking that album on tape and even now they are cheap to find.
The reason people associate the tape with less than stellar sound is just what they were used with that's all.

People in the tape world argue a lot about type types-which is the best- but my experience suggested that it was about the individual tape than whither or not it was a type I "Normal tape" or a type 2 "Chrome position" or type 4 metal oxide tapes which were wasted on but the most expensive equipment.

 This is one I used a heck of a lot in the late eighties and up to the point I bought my first MiniDisc deck in 1997.
It is a type 1 which tended to be look down on by hifi types - Mr Hifi Bore  at the  pub would always talk about type 2's being where hifi cassettes started - but this was extremely good because it would take a lot of signal meaning it could capture more with less hiss than most type I's and had the ability to record the most bass of any tape without sounding distorted.
It also tended to be  very reliable which helped as I used a walkman tape player on the bus and train a lot. It helped they were sold in value packs of three or five in places like record stores or Boots the Chemists here in England.
I soon found this was at least the equal of type II tapes ditching most of TDK's type II's completely  but such was the prejudice on the part of hifi people many didn't buy them.

I won't talk too technical as that would come over as "mumbo jumbo" to you but on the wrapper it shows how good it was at capturing sound and why it was it had a better ability to keep the difference between the quietest and loudest sounds than some type II tapes.
It also meant it would play properly on any player without sounding too bright.
I managed to track down some new old stock ones to go with my three shoeboxes of TDK AD type I's living next to my recorder.

Giving Nipper new teeth

Between Donald Tusk insulting UK politicians which could just be the kerosene to be poured on Brexit with a free match as if we didn't need any more animosity, some good news did emerge on Tuesday regarding one of stories late 2018.

 Canadian record retailer, Sunrise agreed to pay for 100 of HMV UK's stores with closures of 27 least profitable, planning to stock a higher amount of vinyl records which generally have a higher mark up than cds and less at risk from people streaming instead of buying which has been the case with dvd and blu-ray's as much as some such as myself do buy titles that wish to own.
Sunrise in 2017 bought out HMV Canada that was failing and has managed to turn the store group around although like the proposals here, a number were shut in what was a black period for music retail in that country with Sam The Record Man being shut a couple of years before with reduced sales and higher rent charges in places like downtown Toronto.
Great Britain is the second biggest player in popular music and a major one in English language arts in general home of course not just to the vast expanse of London Theatreland but to Pinewood, the UK's Hollywood often use by American owned film companies.
To that extent we absolutely need a shop front for our creative arts where artists can do signings, 'pop up' short performances and places where staff do know and share knowledge about music.
I am and strongly support independent music retailers as until the arrival of HMV in 1992 in this district we had a good number of our own such as the much missed Mike Lloyd Megastores in Stoke City centre, Newcastle under Lyme, Stafford and  Wolverhampton and their encouragement in exploring music set my passion off buying albums.
Most went when firstly supermarkets started selling top sellers off cheaply and then Amazon were selling back catalogue titles for less than they could manage but HMV survived until 2013 and after then  our two branches in Stoke and Wolverhampton still did good business until the recent administration and were where I bought new vinyl albums by bands I liked. 
The staff when I went in twice recently were very friendly, there is something about handling and looking through a rack that's just not the same as going on a web site so I hope this is successful.

R.I.P Audio Fidelity cds

On May 18th in answer to much speculation on the Steve Hoffman Audiophile Forum, an open letter from Audio Fidelity's president Marshall Blonstein was published where upon he outlined the closure of his re-issue label Audio Fidelity originally famed for its gold plated discs and lately its hybrid super audio discs.
The company was formed in 2005 from ashes of DCC which he also had an involvement in which ceased operations in 2001 and utilized the services of mastering engineers Steve Hoffman, Kevin Gray and Steven Marsh who owned a mastering facility.
To be honest this didn't surprise me too much as they had not new titles out nor announcements for over a year which is never a good sign especially as members of Mr Hoffman's forums are very much the prime target for the discs, people who are looking for best sounding cds (or records) of certain 'classic' albums.
Another reason was to do with the hit and miss nature of a number of their titles some sounding little better than original cds from the 80's, others having in explicable errors such as clicks or having mysteriously the highest and lowest volume passages reduced which is the opposite a person spending around $29.99 wants.
Moreover even the presentation suffered from poor quality scans from 'borrowed' lps with no posters with the disc itself in a blurry looking templated slipcase which when compared to budget regular cds looked embarrassing and cheap.
Compared to people like Mobile Fidelity who used sharp images on a mini lp form with booklets that you'd feel proud to own and whose work is often to a high standard, they looked poor so it was hardly surprising I bought more Mobile Fidelity titles because I felt confident placing a pre-order.
In truth I feel they were uncompetitive being pitched at the premium cd market who understandably are also interesting in how something looks as its absolute sound quality so while I enjoyed a number I bought such as the Styx, Rush, Phil Collins, EWF and certain Billy Joel titles I don't feel mournful.
They just lack the quality of the DCC discs from 1992-1999 a number of us bought.

Sound changes

There's been a few changes in the 'spare room' system recently with finding using a combination of small boxes was awkward  having to hold down one to adjust anything and then find as one wire moved, the other bit moved  too.
It seemed I was needing less wires and a more solid single unit which wasn't appreciably longer so it would fit on same space

The other thing was although it could play loud at times it would sound 'soft' and beyond which it would start sounding harsh because it's power is fairly low.
Enter a used oldie from the 1980's that had a fair bit more power (25 watts per channel RMS), not too long and relatively short height so the overall form factor was still small being well way from the sort with big front panels loaded with features and flashing lights.

The Rotel RA 820B has inputs for a radio (or portable device), a cd player (designed specifically for their higher output) and circuit for  turntable that uses a Moving Magnet cartridge that can just plugged into it.
Outside of that it has full tape recording and monitoring (see later), a button to put anything in mono,  a volume control and headphone socket, that is just it.

On the rear you have the sockets including a grounding tag for turntables and the + and - left and right outputs that you push your loudspeaker leads into although I found I needed too extend mine a little.

I did mention 'tape monitoring' because some cassette (and open reel) decks actual allow you to hear what is coming off the tape you may well be recording so you know it's recording okay.
One thing the switching box couldn't do is just that and that comes into play with the entry of a circa 1991 three headed direct drive cassette deck by Technics of Japan, the Rs Bx 707.
First off on the record side it has a tape tuning system to make the best possible recordings on whatever tape you have rather than relaying whatever it was set to at the factory enabling you to set it yourself.
The record level meters have a wide scale which can switched to the portion that you use most of the time for greater accuracy.
On the playback side it has the monitoring button so when recording you can compare what you are recording with what it sounds off the tape and can use Dolby B or C noise reduction for playback (and record) which was typical of the period. 
I tended to use either B or if the tape was fairly quiet none as sometimes you can hear the noise reduction especially on tapes made on other machines typically as a either a dulling of the sound or sounding as if the noise reduction circuit wasn't quite keeping up with fluctuations in the tone.
The tapes are loaded by a motorized draw and the tape types are set between types I ("Normal"), II (High Bias aka "Chrome") and IV ("Metal") automatically using sensors.
The motor speed is set by a quartz crystal and adjusted in real time and featuring no belts is extremely steady.

A double helping of Art Garfunkel

Just after Easter here and after last weeks 'golly gosh Caro actually posted about cycling!!!' post, we're back on firmer territory albeit with a bit of a twist.

The last time I posted anything around Simon and Garfunkel was way back in April 2010 when after living with reissue lps and the odd tape I finally sorted out my recordings by them but that left the period after they split off.
Fast forward on to January 2018 and the small British company Vocalion announces it is to the release the first two Art Garfunkel albums recorded for Columbia/CBS in 1973 and 1975 which of itself wasn't so unusual as both got their UK cd debut in 1992 in the short lived Collectors Choice budget choice.
What was is that they were being issued on hybrid Super Audio cds like a few others I've commented on in the recent past on this blog that play on regular players and for improved quality on Super Audio cd players like my current one.
The twist being they included the original Quadraphonic four speaker surround sound mixes too that came out on SQ Quad record and Q8 discrete Quad 8 track tape for the first time ever.
This means those mixes much acclaimed are now available while tracks such as "Mary Was a Only Child", "I Shall Sing", "I Believe (when I fall in love it will be forever)", "Disney Girls" originally recorded by the Beach Boys and featuring BB member Bruce Johnston on this recording, "My Little Town", a Paul Simon Song where they duet and the British smash "I Only Have Eyes For You" have never sounded better being carefully remastered from the original mid 1970's analogue tapes.
If you lived through this period and liked more soothing performances you won't want to miss this as they sound the best ever in any format. Recommended especially as they're just £11.99 each delivered less than U.S. speciality companies charge.

Past entry:
Simon and Garfunkel: Simon and Garfunkel on cd

Going back to the Seventies

While I'm preparing to be off having packed my case, tote bags and lord knows what else you take and find you really didn't need as much here's this weeks main post, a day earlier.
There are times not least with the more middles life I have I feel that we over complicate things not least compared to how things were in the past where we may of had less options but we just got on with it.
Like today we download things or stream them but there are different places, different formats and you're never quite sure if even an album will playback in the right order as different software works different sometimes having things playing in alphabetical order before now.

It was so much easier when this and it's ilk ruled the home entertainment roost as you just put a record  on and it just played it and if you wanted to hear the latest sounds you just spun the tuning dial and that was it no need for software upgrades and the like.Need to make a personalized selection then the cassette unit would let you do that from any source and play it on the 'Walkman'.
There are times when there's something to be said for keeping it simple.

Project X, Part VI, Adding the sound from compact disc

In August of 2015 I started a mini series of posts around a rather novel small inexpensive amplifier that tied into my love of experimenting and building things that had been sadly curtailed due to industrial injuries and severe disabilities.
It was called Project X, the standing for mystery as I put together a mini system based around it looking at what a person on say a limited income might be able to do and just how good these units actually are. 
We covered topics like how to add input selection, the issue of dealing with its high sensitivity input and how we might ration it, the sort of speakers best suited to a small low power amplifier and in the last entry on March First, 2016 I looked at reproduction from cassette tapes.

There recently has been some rationalization of equipment  such as outmoded VHS video tape players and also upgrades on my main stereo system and I felt like adding cd replay so I repurposed the Rotel RCD 965 LE Discrete from the main system to this because in the intervening two years, I have found the amplifier to be capable of high quality reproduction and certainly shows the benefit of good quality sources.
While its replacement is better, non the less for regular cd this remains a lovely sounding player and so an ideal candidate for  adding cd replay using a high quality lead and using another Rothwell attenuator to bring its 2 volt maximum output down to that it can handle without distortion. 

On Tuesday I listened to a program of American Classics from composers such as Copland, Bernstein and Barber that I grew up on through it and it sounded really impressive, clear capturing both the tonality and also the vibrancy of the music well.


Previous Project X Posts:
Part one - The SA 36a pro ampifier
Part two - Adding multiple inputs
Part three - Adding the loudspeaker
Part four - Attenuating inputs
Part five - Adding tape replay

Project X, Part V, playing tapes

Project X is alive and well playing music in Lossy and Lossless forms from my Fiio music players line output from one of Eight micro sd cards as well as from a elderly Toshiba cd player.
I like quite a few people have a good number of cassettes not least pre-recorded ones I bought from the mid 1970's to mid 1990's I moved from cassette based portable listening to MiniDisc and had been thinking of how to play them back on this mini system.

Enter a unused Sony TX 313 mini sized fully functional cassette deck from a MiniDisc system I got from someone who never ever used it so it was still boxed and shrinkwrapped from the late 1990's.
Oddly enough it uses a car type side slot way of loading the tapes into it but unlike car units this does record and has auto tape type sensing to read the extra tabs for type II ('Chrome') and IV (Metal) tapes although the latter are no longer available new plus I seriously doubt it's tape heads really are up to making full advantage of such tapes electrically

The rear has RCA line in and outs, with the out going via a expensive Cambridge Pacific interconnect to the input selector with a maximum of 0.5 volts out depending on the program loudness and the AV bus for Sony mini systems it was sold with for synchronized cd to tape copying.
The unit is blessed with switchable Dolby B noise reduction for proper replay and recording of such tapes plus auto reverse so it can play one  side of the tape and switch by itself to the other. 
According to the specifications it reproduces up to 14khz for type I tapes and 15khz for types II and IV which is decent if not as wide as most full sized hifi cassette decks so the high frequencies will be clear but not quite as extended as the best units can achieve.
It is making an excellent job of replaying my 1980's EMI UK dolbyized Beatles pre-recorded cassettes which were amongst the best sounded tapes manufactured and part of reason I held out so long against the cd as portable listening was and remains a big part of my life and why my Fiio is my 'to go' digital playing device on headphones or connected to this system.
I like high quality portable formats more

Project X

I've been interested in how things work for quite sometime which in the old days was fairly straight forward in that often you could see just by looking at all the key bits and that often was connected with audio equipment as getting good sound has always mattered to me.
Sometimes I'd buy either a full kit to assemble or boards with all the main components mounted on to just wire up and a few bits to make say a radio unit or an amplifier for not much money.
Sometimes it was worth it just for the learning experience alone.
As a good number of you know in recent years because of my acquired difficulties with my hands, that whole avenue has been denied me simply cos I can't solder and screw things together anymore. That really hacks me off big time.
I've bought something more or less ready done to experiment a bit with though and it is this.
It's a SA 36A Pro 'amplifier' ready assembled from board similar to what can be bought part done with a power unit.
The first and in many ways intriguing aspect to it is it uses a special low power integrated circuit to produce approximately 25 watts per channel made by TI Instruments, the TPA3118D2DAP, which is a Class D high efficiency one that a number of people are raving about for its sound..
I won't bore the pants off of you by explain all about Class D as there's a good entry on Wikipedia explaining all but it's why such a small cheap board can equal the output of a more conventional amplifier of a similar power using less electricity and getting less hot.

The front panel shows just how small it is and  also why  I put parenthesise around the word amplifier as while it has a volume control, it does lack an input selector which at a later stage of this project I intend to tackle.

This is the actual board as fitted with the integrated circuit the small black object in the centre and you'll also see how careful design has removed the need for trailing wiring from back to front.

This is the back panel of the SA 36, original version which only accepted 12 volts dc input, the 36A Pro accepts up to 24 volts for higher output via black switched mode (transformerless) power unit that is supplied.

There are binding posts to connect 4 to 8 ohm loud speakers to, left and right line input and that 2.5mm inner, 5.5 outer socket for the power unit.

The supplied power unit is 12 volts but only 2 amp maximum which I feel is a bit restricting so I've ordered a 60 watt max, 5 amp one to use with it as if the amplifier draw more than the supplied power unit can give it's protection circuits are more likely to need to kick in and some have found the quality of these units is compromised  by the rather basic supplied units, that are not the manufacturers own. 

That unit also has a fused UK mains lead where as the supplied unit is a unfused continental 2 pin one with a basic unfused adapter which I wasn't happy about on safety grounds as serious conditions could develop before your mains circuit tripped, knocking off the power.

I'm interested in two things, the first being just how good is this chip? and secondly as advocate of getting good sound into peoples lives, can budget hifi equipment by non mainstream manufactures provide a way in for people who end up with so-so all in one music systems to enjoy more of their music.

Enjoying ones music

Every so often on one site I frequent there remains a lingering thought that a substantial number of its more active users appear obsessed with the pursuit of high fidelity to the point they are no longer enjoying the music.
It's hardly an original observation as Flanders and Swann wrote the great musical satirical piece "A Song of Reproduction" very much around that in the early 1960's  where the tinkering around buildings ones own 'rig' and habitual bashing of commercial equipment was all the range.
In my experience   many people fail to get as good a sound as possible from modest equipment simply because they have not invested the time to set it up properly, using good quality leads, determining the best spot and support for their loudspeakers that move the air within the room used and so on.
Those steps that need not cost much, saving many an audio fan from spending a never ending amount on upgrading when often they've not heard all their existing equipment is capable of.
One often feels like saying, go treat yourself to a new great recording be it on record, cd or high quality download instead of spending hundreds of pounds on what turn out to be sideways changes in hardware.
One thing you soon learn with good equipment regardless of price is, recordings vary wildly in terms of their own quality to which the best good equipment can do is not make reproducing them any worse than they really are and where available, look for the best sounding recordings of your favourite artists and music. 
Unfortunately much new popular music is made much louder with less difference between the softest and loudest passages and some classical recordings have had whole passages seriously edited to perfection losing any real sense of a conductor's own character showing in how a note is performed compared to recordings in the analogue (generally pre-1980's) era so much so that many musicians seek out these older recordings because they sound more like performances with their own character.
In many ways what is sad is it's  that while the wanting to hear music well reproduced that gets people into better sound, they get locked into obsessing over hardware and their specifications so they feel obliged to spend more time thinking about that than simply playing a recording and enjoying it.
When I'm happy with my equipment, as a rule I stick with it until either I become less satisfied or it needs replacing.

Revolving discs

In what might be the final post in the current series I recently changed another part of my stereo system recently.
I'll save the long story of how this system got put together but as far as amplification went I was having problems going loud with my loud speakers with a Tubed power amplifier and control unit (the bit that selects what you play from) so it was replaced by a much powerful solid state integrated one (in plain speak the control unit bit and power amplifier in one unit)  made by Rotel. The thing about this unit was it didn't have an input designed for a record deck to plugged straight in.

Currently it has a Stanton 681EEE cartridge in it and it need something to make its output much bigger and adjust the sound from the cartridge so it matches that the record was cut with (when you cut a record you reduce the low notes and increase the high ones to reduce surface noise and increase playing time). I had such a unit by Hart Electronics but the output was too high causing distortion and even putting reducers in the output leads didn't quite cure it all as I think it was getting a little distorted in its internal circuits.
As it happened Rotel made a unit specifically for my integrated amplifier and a few similar products whose output matched exactly the sort it's input stage was designed for.

 It needless to say is a perfect visual match for my integrated amplifier.

The unit can handle standard Moving magnet as well as dearer Moving Coil cartridges selected using a switch at the rear. Its previous owner was only selling it cos he had another similar unit so it was spare.
After quickly plugging the wires in and connecting the grounding tag on the record deck to a special connector on the unit, I tried a few records I know well. The obvious thing was the loss of a niggling feeling of harshness in the louder passages where the other unit was close to overloading, sweeter high notes and a better sense of where in a stereo mix the different instruments are located in space.
To be honest, had I of planned to have gotten this amplifier first I'd of gotten this unit straightaway.
It makes listening to records old or new ones such as David Bowie's recent The Next Day that I have on vinyl so much more enjoyable.
I did notice a little hum but that's due to a lead in my head-shell being a bit worn having swapped it out for another one so I've ordered a new headshell and will get cartridge remounted to it.

No sound!

Just as the going was good with a couple of 24kt Gold Searchers cd reissues that were part of a series of two discs containing their first four UK albums remastered arriving here, disaster struck.
I went to put the disc in the player and it made a few noises , said "No Disc" and stopped. Cleaning the lens that reads the disc didn't do nothing so my I thought the laser unit has gone upon a brief check by a service man was proved correct plus a display board low voltage rail issue causing overheating and the display to take ages to come on.
You see, the last time I bought a cd player for my stereo - a set of Hifi separates - was apparently March 13th 2003 which is ten years and  two weeks ago and apart from a celebrate instance when the drawer you place your cd on jammed once, this £350 NAD player had performed extremely well on regular and HDCD encoded discs, for once sounding close to my record playing systems quality on a decent disc (a rare thing to find on mainstream releases today but that's a whole other issue).
It had been a fit and forget feature of my stereo not being subject to irritating software upgrades of the sort you find with computers and blu-ray players. You just powered up, shoved a disc in and pressed play.
In the mean time I plugged an ancient cd player I had since the middle of 1986 that although getting rather long in the tooth, sounds rather sweet in to spin discs with while I consider looking for either a nice sounding used player or taking some money out of my savings for a new one. I'm also experimenting with a co-axial digital lead between the digital output of a dvd player and the digital input of my MiniDisc recorder using that to convert the naught and ones to analogue sound.

Tapes away!

In that period before I bought into compact disc, one medium I did use a lot was the compact cassette not just for recording from either records or broadcasts but also pre-recorded cassettes whose technical quality  was improving during the early nineteen-eighties.

That deck was the one I had from 1985 through 1991 which had the very handy auto reverse option which meant you didn't need to turn the tape over although you did lose around  six seconds or so as t went past any leader tape and the mechanism changed direction.
It also had the in vogue Dolby C in addition to B noise reduction to reduce tape hiss considerable.

This sort of cube for storing tapes was a hanger on from the nineteen-seventies where I had one with my portable recorder at the time and first stereo machine to keep my tapes safe.
I tended to have case of 32 tape capacity labelled for my home recordings with paper based catalogue to aid finding them.