Feastrex vs. Fostex Ultimate Showdown

[GM]

You're welcome! Being retired has its perks.

GM

[rjbond3rd]

Hi guys, just to clarify:

I'm saying that the total "Harvey" room / system sounded better to me than the total "Japanese" room. But bear in mind that these rooms are as different as can be.

Tthe Harveys were in the corners of the short end of a shoe-box-shaped room:

http://sfaudio.googlegroups.com/web/SFAS.1.17.09043.jpg

And the Japanese room was an experimental near-field setup, with cabs pulled into the middle of the room away from walls/corners, listening position is on the floor:

http://sfaudio.googlegroups.com/web/SFAS.1.17.09026.jpg

(Harvey room was also a slab of concrete.) So room differences were at least as important as anything else. (Pictures courtesy of forum member Benthos.)

Originally posted by doorman Were you able to compare En vs. untreated? [/B]

Not perfectly but I am posting a different thread of my month-long eNaBLe "research" later today which does encompass the Harvey room in part (but mostly took place in my room).

Originally posted by rcdaniel What type of system were the Harvey's strapped to?

I think you can see from Benthos' picture that there's an Antique Sound Labs amp with Benchmark DAC (brought by an attendee) and CD player the make/model of which I didn't catch. But this is not Phil's high-end stuff -- he swapped in his hand-built stuff a couple days later (even yummier).

Originally posted by rcdaniel how far does a person need to sit from the Harveys for the sound to integrate? Less than the taller Saburo? A double-mouth that could be enjoyed from a minimum 6-ish feet would be sweet.

I would guestimate the chair was 6.5 feet back, presumably the same distance the speakers are from each other, roughly (in the first picture above). eNaBLe plus the double horns seems to make the sweet spot wide enough to walk around in (exact position not so critical).

Thank you again Phil! And thank you forum members Monte Verdi and Benthos for organizing (and Benthos for snapping the pix).

[serenechaos]

Yes, thanks again Phil!

Yes, this was a great demo of how much difference rooms make to sound.
And how different people here the same sound differently...

Another pair of ears reports:
The harvey's had a very nice, useable bottom-end.
The mids & highs I didn't find that nice...
Phil said enabling helped, they were worse...

I liked the mids & highs in the 108s in the TLs better...

The feastrex sounded muffled, is a work in progress, with some problems @ the current point.
Phil said they didn't sound that way in the larger room.
Or in different cabinets.

Sometimes it's fun sorting all this stuff out...
Nice to see someone with so many projects, and so many successful ones at that.

[rjbond3rd]

Serenechaos (Robert), I wish you had heard the Feastrex / Maiko's last fall when Phil had them taking up his entire living room. Far-field, and played at a higher volume, they really came alive and sounded beauteous. I guess they want to get back into the big room.

[mp9]

robert "serenechaos", thanks for your thoughts on the sound, it's so great having another point of view.
p.s. couldn't miss the easel on the left and i like phil's(?) paintings. perhaps one of these days you guys will get to see a few of mine.

[BTW]

Thanks for all the interesting reports

Sounds more like an Ultimate Work In Progress Session to me .......Wish I was there, I always enjoy this type of hands on listening session...

But seriously.. sometimes it really takes lots of time and effort to figure out how to get the sound right... I had a glare problem for my phonostage for quite some time.. and I just discovered that it was due to the glass Mana shelves ... got those glass shelves changed to plywood and the glare vanished... I'm kicking myself for not having tried this earlier

[serenechaos]

more on the "work in progress," I heard from Phil today, that they swaped out sources in the studio, & a lot of the mid-range "nastyness" was from the cd player...

I gotta build a DAC, & transfer CDs to hard drive, learn that system, if it makes that much difference...

[Phil Townsend]

It was wonderful to have you all here... I had a great time as did Christine.
We used her room to listen to the Harvey's It's also her art space.
I few notes about the system driving the Harvey's.
The amp was a Antique Audio Tulip...
It now has the big JJ 2A3 (aka 300b) and 12AX7 drivers in a SRPP config but taking the sig off the plate of the input section instead of the cathode of the top part of the triode stack. Plus the left and right channels use cathode sharing. Mundorf coupling caps. I Removed the input transformers and replaced all resistors with Audio Note 2 watters. New PS based on Duncan Amp sim. Fixed baising and a grid chokes (Mikey) Kept the AA iron and chassis. Not my best amp but nice.
The passive vol control is from Tube CAD.
The CD player we used was not really up to par... its an old ahh tjoeb cd player... rather sad. Sad too cause I can't spell the name of that player but you all know the one I mean.

The Harvey's are simply wonderful, I love them. Maybe in the next few weeks I'll get the stuffing right. That might helpl to get the mids a bit cleaner.

Next job is to remove the Feastrex from the small room (144"x 165") back into the living room. It was a bad idea to put them in the small room. Oh well.
The New Maiko II will be a great addition... Hint Hint

All is well
Good Luck Mr. Obama and good night