S-Trax Super Tweeter

[hornetstinger]

So you’d rather trust a 3rd party than prove it to yourself from first hand experience?

In my home, in addition to main system, my son has a Kenwood stereo integrated that would probably cost around £200 if it was currently sold.
Do you think that I would still own the amps that I do if they were no better than my son’s amp? I can assure you that I plenty of other interests that I’d happily spend the money on if there were no differences.

Objective versus subjective.

ASR and similar places have repeatable tests. Personal experience does not. I could get 100 people all with dodgy hearing, and they will say a supertweeter makes no difference. Does that mean the test is valid or invalid? Or throw in confirmation bias in too?

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

I’ve read plenty on ASR.
Subjective testing is great, but only if we assume that it’s measuring the right things.
For example, CD/digital sources.
We know that digital sources are bit perfect. If they weren’t, our current IT kit wouldn’t work.
The current claim is that all DACs are jitter resilient. Doesn’t that mean that all digital transport sources sound the same?
I have absolutely no idea how they could sound different, if we assume those claims are both accurate and valid. I’m sure that ASR would argue for that.

Do I believe it? Nope. I’m skeptical until proven otherwise.
In the case of audio, I’ll definitely look at the specs, but then choose based upon what I hear.

Above all, this is a personal choice.
If you think that I’m nuts and want to disbelieve your own experience, that’s your call, but don’t expect me to do the same.

 

[arknor]

Kenwood stereo integrated that would probably cost around £200 if it was currently sold.

The current claim is that all DACs are jitter resilient. Doesn’t that mean that all digital transport sources sound the same?

no one said they sound the same, they all have different sounds, same as cameras have different colours...

outsdide of digital testing with actual scientific methods it's just personal preference

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

no one said they sound the same, they all have different sounds, same as cameras have different colours...

outsdide of digital testing with actual scientific methods it's just personal preference

Say what?
On the previous page you very much suggested that they’d sound the same.
Make up your mind.

 

[hornetstinger]

Say what?
On the previous page you very much suggested that they’d sound the same.
Make up your mind.

Totally mad to spend so much money on something that just goes tssh tsssh

But fine for really cool and awesome people that spend so much money on things that goes boom boom

 

[Admetos]

@Admetos what cabling are you using for the SuperTrax?

Had another music night recently and the Chord rep came over, initially to bring their subwoofer cables to test out (can't say many of us noticed much difference tbh) but he had also got the factory to knock up some bespoke SuperTrax cables as well, in EpicXL and SignatureXL

So we started the night with just some bog standard Chord rumour cable on the ST's John had quickly knocked up in his shop (say £30). We listened and it was fine.

Then we tried the Fyne Audio cables they make for the ST (£300) and the difference was immediately noticable, just so much sweeter all round. I've got to say I was surprised, and impressed, that it made such a noticable difference.

Then we tried the Chord EpicXL. And as much as John and the Chord rep gushed about the improvement, to me, I didn't like them as much as the Fyne Cables, things just seemed to have a bit more of an edge.

Then came the Chord SignatureXL and immediately things were back to sweet again and I'd say they were on par, if not a little better, than the Fyne ones. There were no prices for the Chord cables, as that was the first they had ever made (in the Signature) but the rep just said they would make some up on demand, at any length required.

What cable were they using to connect to the main speakers from the amp?

 

[Freakbro]

What cable were they using to connect to the main speakers from the amp?

Chord Sarum t.

I've pulled the trigger on a pair of S-trax's, hopefully they were delivered yesterday and I'll pick them up at Sundays music night

 

[Admetos]

Chord Sarum t.

I've pulled the trigger on a pair of S-trax's, hopefully they were delivered yesterday and I'll pick them up at Sundays music night

Yes once you hear a Fyne Audio Super-Tweeter you have to buy them .

Have you tried grounding your Fyne F700's? You ground them back to the amplifier it's called star grounding. I'm using dedicated Kimber Technical weave ground cable, but you can just use any spare regular speaker cable. You have less distortion and a little tighter bass. Have they talked about grounding at your club?

The 5th Terminal - FYNE AUDIO

Fyne speakers from the F500SP to the flagship F1 Series have “5th terminal”, sometimes called the grounding or earth terminal. What is it and how does it help?

www.fyneaudio.com

 

[Freakbro]

Yep, I'm just using some spare cable and have earthed it the the Denon AV chassis, which has a specific grounding terminal for turntables.

 

[Admetos]

Yep, I'm just using some spare cable and have earthed it the the Denon AV chassis, which has a specific grounding terminal for turntables.

Yes the grounding terminal for turntables is correct.

 

[Admetos]

same as the difference between most 200£ amps and ones that cost a few K

More expensive amps normally sound better. In the case of Yamaha as you go from A-S1200, A-S2200, A-S3200 then into the flagship M-5000 and C-5000 they incrementally have more weight in the sound, plus more reliving as the pre-amps are better quality. Even the A-S1200 is a nice jump over the A-S801.

And it's not just HiFi amps, I'm running Adam Audio S2X's monitors. The amplification and the pre-amps built into those monitors it's easily above typical consumer monitors. Even compared to a Yamaha HS7 studio monitor the electronics on the Adam S series are better.

With all audio, as you go higher up your chasing more and more diminishing returns. This is the same with most everything, look at performance sports cars.

 

[Admetos]

Yep, I'm just using some spare cable and have earthed it the the Denon AV chassis, which has a specific grounding terminal for turntables.

Freakbro, I have the correct Fyne Audio SC1 cable now. It's better than the Kimber 4VS that I hooked up, the Super Tweeter is more transparent and more integrated, I expect the main difference is the SC1 cable is very low capacitance compared to the Kimber. It's quite amazing how much difference it's made, the 502SP's + SuperTrax sounding very good indeed.

 

[Freakbro]

@Admetos I picked up my S-Trax last week and John made me up some basic cable for free and lent me those Fyne cables and a Chord Epic set. Which was the same setup as he used at the demo night and unsurprisingly I had the same results at home!

ie : the basic cable worked but the Fyne ones were a significant improvement. I didn't even bother with the Epic as at the demo I found them to be worse than Fynes anyway, so I've just ordered a set of the above too

As an aside, have you tried any of those equipment isolation feet, like the Isoaccoustics Orea? Something else I was quite sceptical about, until I tried them at home..... and now I have them under my streamer and amp!

 

[Admetos]

@Admetos I picked up my S-Trax last week and John made me up some basic cable for free and lent me those Fyne cables and a Chord Epic set. Which was the same setup as he used at the demo night and unsurprisingly I had the same results at home!

ie : the basic cable worked but the Fyne ones were a significant improvement. I didn't even bother with the Epic as at the demo I found them to be worse than Fynes anyway, so I've just ordered a set of the above too

As an aside, have you tried any of those equipment isolation feet, like the Isoaccoustics Orea? Something else I was quite sceptical about, until I tried them at home..... and now I have them under my streamer and amp!

It's good you confirm the SC1 cable best also. Compared to the Kimber 4VS I re-used, there is more space and the SuperTrax is more transparent. I suspect it's the very low capacitance of the SC1 cable and it's keeping better the relationship between the main speaker and the super tweeter.

I've not used IsoAcoustics Orea's, but I have 2 IsoAcoustics Delos's platforms in maple. One under my turntable, and the other under the SACD player / DAC. I was surprised but it helped even the SACD player in DAC mode very slightly. And I'm already running Atacama Eris 5 racks that are already providing isolation, so the improvement from the Delos platforms is after those. Under my Delos platforms there are feet that look very similar in design to the Orea's.

At some point I'm going to fit IsoAcoustics Gaia's under my F502SP's, there was a discussion on the Fyne Audio Facebook group about them, and the overall consensus was people liked the improvement from them.

Back to speaker grounding. How much difference do you find it makes? For example if you were to ground only one speaker then adjust left / right balance would it be obvious, or are you finding the difference very subtle.

Cheers
Jason

 

[Freakbro]

I've not used IsoAcoustics Orea's, but I have 2 IsoAcoustics Delos's platforms in maple. One under my turntable, and the other under the SACD player / DAC. I was surprised but it helped even the SACD player in DAC mode very slightly. And I'm already running Atacama Eris 5 racks that are already providing isolation, so the improvement from the Delos platforms is after those. Under my Delos platforms there are feet that look very similar in design to the Orea's.

Yea, I've got the Atacama rack and still found the Orea's under the streamer and amp tightened the bass and improved clarity.

Back to speaker grounding. How much difference do you find it makes? For example if you were to ground only one speaker then adjust left / right balance would it be obvious, or are you finding the difference very subtle.

Cheers
Jason

The speaker grounding of the F700's? I've not actually done any A/B testing tbh, it was a simple thing to do so I just did it, I didn't think it would have any negative effects so didn't really check to see if there were any positives, though I'm just using a bit of earth wire atm

Just to give @200sols another laugh another thing I borrowed for this weekend was a mains conditioner, an Isol 8 powerline ultra, and I guessed it would make a difference, I just didn't think it would make that much difference!

 

[Admetos]

The speaker grounding of the F700's? I've not actually done any A/B testing tbh, it was a simple thing to do so I just did it, I didn't think it would have any negative effects so didn't really check to see if there were any positives, though I'm just using a bit of earth wire atm

Just to give @200sols another laugh another thing I borrowed for this weekend was a mains conditioner, an Isol 8 powerline ultra, and I guessed it would make a difference, I just didn't think it would make that much difference!

Over the speaker grounding cable, you can just use basic earth or speaker wire, at least to see if there is any difference at first. I'm using Kimber Technical Weave that uses a counter opposed helix geometry, so it's mechanically shielded but you don't have to go this far.

Over the mains conditioning, I've spent 4 years on this now. The difference can be quite significant as I assume you've just found .

What you’ll probably notice is more consistent sound quality during busy mains activity, not just that it sounds better late at night. Before I used mains conditioning my audio was always better at night time, but now it sounds consistent at all times.

I’m using two Russ Andrews power blocks (one per system), both double-wired with Kimber TCX. The double internal wiring helps prevent the amp-draw from effecting more sensitive source components. I’m also running passive mains conditioning to reduce transients and clamp voltage spikes.

 

[200sols]

Just to give @200sols another laugh another thing I borrowed for this weekend was a mains conditioner, an Isol 8 powerline ultra, and I guessed it would make a difference, I just didn't think it would make that much difference!

Thread certainly taken a more amusing turn in the last 2 posts