What audio system do you have, or plan on getting?

[71 dB]

Can you have a DAC with an impressively flat frequency response, but which sounds crap? No magic?

"Impressively flat frequency response" tells less than people think. It's like seeing a black and white photo of a living room and commenting the interior decorating based on that. The colors could be surprisingly bad and you wouldn't know it. Flat frequency responses were relevant in the past, in the days of tube amps when flat response was a challenge. In the digital age you have other things to pay attention to. Jitter, linearity at low signal levels, type of reconstruction filter... Flat response is easy. It's the other stuff that together make difference and give a certain "character" to the sound.

No DAC these days sounds crap, but some people just want a certain "character" to the sound, the same reason people are into vinyl.

I don't know how well I or other people can hear the difference of "character" in the sound in blind listening tests. It's possible the differencies go a way, but for me at least the differences are there when I know what is playing*. Since people tend to know what they are using, that's relevant. It's kind of sad if you have to invest big money on a certain piece of equipment for the Plasebo-effect**, but life is irrational and then we die...

* Every CD/DVD/Blu-ray player I have owned have had a charasteristic sound: "velvet", "glass", "strawberry", "sand"...

** It's possible even the mechanical noises a CD-player makes when loading a disc has an psycological effect on how we perceive the sound not to mention how the player looks (design), the feel of buttons etc...

[Mandryka]

I am not even sure Avalon still has them  in their programming. After church I will see on their site if they are still there. I have  them already for almost 20 years. Be aware however that you have to add a Subwoofer to those speakers.

Thanks Harry -- much appreciated.

[Harry]

Thanks Harry -- much appreciated.

On their website this in wall mounted speakers are not available anymore, at least I could not find them. Neither did I find them second hand. It was a long time ago that I bought them. So no result I am afraid.

[Mandryka]

On their website this in wall mounted speakers are not available anymore, at least I could not find them. Neither did I find them second hand. It was a long time ago that I bought them. So no result I am afraid.

That's what I feared would be the case.

Harry, in your experience have you come across any speakers which sound wonderful shoved right into the corner of a room?

[Harry]

That's what I feared would be the case.

Harry, in your experience have you come across any speakers which sound wonderful shoved right into the corner of a room?

No not really, I had so many speakers in my life I can't even remember how many, but most of them do not benefit from putting them against the wall, thats why I bought the Avalons in the first place.

[Harry]

This Mandryka is the speakers I have, finally found an image.

I threw the fronts away, they were hampering the good sound majorly. Looked up the bill,  bought them in 1999.
Coupled with a KEF Sub R 400B

[Daverz]

Can you have a DAC with an impressively flat frequency response, but which sounds crap? No magic?

Sure, you could still have lots of intermodulation distortion, which I believe is the most audible kind of distortion.  Or lots of high order harmonic distortion, or mains hum.  I don't think jitter is a problem these days.  I think you'd have to have massive amounts of jitter for it to become audible.

Amir at ASR has measured lots of DACs.  Take a look at some of his reviews to see what kind of things are measured.

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/master-index-of-audio-hardware-reviews.8184/

[Irons]

That's what I feared would be the case.

Harry, in your experience have you come across any speakers which sound wonderful shoved right into the corner of a room?

Tannoy designed  duel concentric horn speakers that do just that. The room corner itself is part of the horn. Rare and expensive I would love to own a pair.

[Harry]

Tannoy designed  duel concentric horn speakers that do just that. The room corner itself is part of the horn. Rare and expensive I would love to own a pair.

Awesome, never saw them before......

[drogulus]

     I once owned Ohm Fs

     

     They sounded very good. Never before or after could I stand next to one speaker and hear the other so clearly.

     

[drogulus]

     For the next few decades I weaned myself off of audiophilia to the point of only using "Canadian" speakers which are so boring they force you to listen to the music.

[Harry]

And I ordered these babies, the Sonus Faber Wall speakers.

[Artem]

Guys, your help would be appreciated. Any thoughts on these two options?

https://www.hifistudio.fi/fi/tuotteet/best-buy-tuotteet/best-buy-tuotteet/marantz-m-cr412-b-w-607-stereopaketti/78933411211

https://www.hifistudio.fi/fi/tuotteet/best-buy-tuotteet/best-buy-tuotteet/yamaha-mcrn670d-hi-fi-jarjestelma-dali-oberon-3/40131752279631

[Fëanor]

     I once owned Ohm Fs

     

     They sounded very good. Never before or after could I stand next to one speaker and hear the other so clearly.

Yeah, me too.  I owned a pair years ago and it's one of great audiophile regrets that I sold them in favour of B&W DM7's. 

[The new erato]

The Carlsson OA series of speakers had some of the same and were amazing.

[71 dB]

After 15 years My NAD T762 started having issues. It started going "BANG" on the speakers and then to the protection mode (red LED). I tried to fix the unit myself replacing some nasty looking components and at one point the unit worked for an hour, but the issue came back and the problems started getting worse.

So, after thinking about my options, I ordered today NAD T758 V3 which is an EISA selected product. I pondered the possibility to go "stereo only" (Marantz PM6006), but since I have the 5 speakers, I did this. My idea is to use the surround back amp to drive my headphone adapter (T762 had B-speakers terminal for that), but it looks only analog sources can be directed to "zone 2" so it's difficult, but there really isn't products on the market suitable for me, at least at price I am willing to pay. Even this purchase hurts financially (1299 euros), but what can you do? 

I should get the unit next week. The dealer has to order it from the importer. This AV amp has been selling like ice cream in Sahara after the EISA selection and went "out of stock", but the importer just received a new patch.

[dissily Mordentroge]

Tannoy designed  duel concentric horn speakers that do just that. The room corner itself is part of the horn. Rare and expensive I would love to own a pair.

These were my first ever speakers inherited from my Uncle as an young teenager. Able to blow the roof off but anything but subtle. They don't require much amplifier power so much as a high damping factor. (Google it). They also don't work effectively in the corners of every room and don't necessarily have to be placed in corners unless playing in a large room. The early examples had little or no internal acoustic damping. A range of different drivers were insalled in them over the decades, the best being the 15" Gold or one of the latest.

[Ratliff]

After 15 years My NAD T762 started having issues. It started going "BANG" on the speakers and then to the protection mode (red LED). I tried to fix the unit myself replacing some nasty looking components and at one point the unit worked for an hour, but the issue came back and the problems started getting worse.

So, after thinking about my options, I ordered today NAD T758 V3 which is an EISA selected product. I pondered the possibility to go "stereo only" (Marantz PM6006), but since I have the 5 speakers, I did this. My idea is to use the surround back amp to drive my headphone adapter (T762 had B-speakers terminal for that), but it looks only analog sources can be directed to "zone 2" so it's difficult, but there really isn't products on the market suitable for me, at least at price I am willing to pay. Even this purchase hurts financially (1299 euros), but what can you do? 

I should get the unit next week. The dealer has to order it from the importer. This AV amp has been selling like ice cream in Sahara after the EISA selection and went "out of stock", but the importer just received a new patch.

I was an NAD enthusiast back in the day when they made components which were simple and elegant in design but had high quality circuitry. My respect for NAD ended when I got an A/V receiver, I think a T761, probably the precursor to your model. After a short time it seemed to develop a DC bias in the output stage (when I turned it on I noticed low frequency driver cones suddenly jump to a constant offset from resting position, suggesting a DC current running through them). Then it started throwing thermal faults. By then it was out of warranty and I vaguely remember heaving it into a trash dumpster.

Now I have a Marantz 2 channel power amp and a nice A/V amp from Yamaha, which is way cheaper than anything from NAD, is easy to use and sounds great.

I still run my headphones through my old, old NAD 1130 pre-amp, mostly for sentimental reasons.



Such an elegant piece of iron!. I've been running it since the 80's and it still works like a dream.

[dissily Mordentroge]

I was an NAD enthusiast back in the day when they made components which were simple and elegant in design but had high quality circuitry. My respect for NAD ended when I got an A/V receiver, I think a T761,

Something often neglected by the audiophool press is the frequent change in ownership of particular brands.
Instance Denon. I've lost track of how many holding companies have owned that brand over the decades. One thing I do know from painful experience is if you buy a particular model from such a brand later on expecting it to be serviced you can often be told 'Sorry, we don't hold stock of spare parts used under the previous owner/importer etc'. Luxman is an interesting one. Once the very top of Japanese electronics it was sold to a less honourable company proceeding to sell crappy sounding, unreliable gear until only a few years ago the original owners bought the company back soon returning it to it's glory days. The only Japanese company I know of that's remained under the same ownership for over a century is Yamaha. But even they were seduced by the early home theatre market neglecting 'mere' audio gear for far too long. Praise be they're back in the audio game with a vengeance.
And it's not just Asian audio brands that have been handed around. I've lost track of the number of companies who've owned the 'English' QAUD brand over the years.
Now under German ownership at least they haven't dropped their game.
The trick in all of this is to make a friends of a (retail) audio repair technician and pick their brains about reliability before making any purchase. The audiophool magazines aren't going to tell you much about any model's reliability.

[dissily Mordentroge]

     I once owned Ohm Fs

     
They sounded very good. Never before or after could I stand next to one speaker and hear the other so clearly.

The German Physiks HRS120 Carbon is a development and refinement of the same principal. Not cheap but you'll never have to think about having only one person able to sit in the 'sweet-spot' ever again.
https://zstereo.co.uk/2016/07/19/german-physiks-hrs120-carbon/