This kind of Stentorians are like your main speakers, or there are more versions? They look able to go very loud as their name suggests. How sensitive they are?
Wow! Great listening room. And how much peak power can they take? Interestingly their name is from Homer's Iliad. Literate people here sometimes used to say about big loud guys the phrase having a Stentorian voice.
I bi amped the system and am driving them with a Aleph J . The low end is done with a set of 160 watt mono blocks ( class AB of course ) driving a pair of Audio Concepts Saturn sub woofers , a pair of 12 inch woofers , compound push pull. The system will rock the house. The Saturns are 30 years old and have been kept in good condition. I can find no reason to replace them.
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Must be very satisfying for symphonic and stadium rock. So the DCG3 is tasked to drive long cables from where the turntable rack is all the way to the back where the amps are?
The DCG3 drives those cables with ease. Very glad I went with that preamp. I can reach the controls from my listening chair.
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Nice comfortable listening layout. Are the long cables one stereo run that goes to an active crossover unit? Or more runs are involved in parallel directly to the amps and increasing the driven capacitance? Are they normal spec coax or special lower pF per foot type like some Mogami and Belden?
The coax is terminated with BNC connectors to match the preamp outputs. I hate RCA connectors, too may failures.
You are a practical man. And evidently experienced as you gave priority to what really matters first. Acoustics, big sensitive speakers, basic electrical spec, secure connections. All DIY. Congrats and enjoy. 
Thanks. I have been playing wit this stuff since the early 70's when I started to Subscribe to Audio Amateur magazine. check out the Nelson Pass A40 in the 4/78 edition of AA.
I have two of these nice tables from the end of 1970’s . Both fully restored. One is with SME III and the second one with Mayware Formula IV.
About my FSP test against UslFSP... FSP was set to 40dB and it is too low for my MC. It was previously used with my Grace-F9 Ruby. Then, I set it to 62dB last weekend (impacted by maximalism) and it is definitely too high for 1mV MC cart. I started to hear some harsh on top and mid highs. Also, it is way too loud now and it’s concentrated on ton of
loud dirt related clicks.
So, I’ll go to 56dB during next couple of days and will be ready to make something close to apple2apple comparison.
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Your experience brings to mind a short discussion recently in this thread with LATB about gain tactics and when more may become too much
Out of our thread course...
I learn as a child what is too much from Rudyard Kipling book and based on it animated movie.
Try to see short part of it presented from 28:30 min: The golden antelope 1954 Zolotaya antilopa English hardsubbed Russian animation - YouTube
Zolotaya antilopa (1954) - IMDb
Even gold, if it is too much, can become a broken pieces of pottery. 🙂
I learn as a child what is too much from Rudyard Kipling book and based on it animated movie.
Try to see short part of it presented from 28:30 min: The golden antelope 1954 Zolotaya antilopa English hardsubbed Russian animation - YouTube
Zolotaya antilopa (1954) - IMDb
Even gold, if it is too much, can become a broken pieces of pottery. 🙂
Hello to all
Following this thread before beginning the build the beast is great, as entertaining as informative on many aspects, and oftentimes its just a riddle to me (nevermind, that’s cool too).
Now, as I still haven’t begun my build, I have some questions in front of me:
the ultraFSP is my entry-point to boutique capacitors. What is your recommendation for making a choice (how do I find out which one could be a better match?)—beside spending a fortune for a collection of every matching cap...? Anything more or less objective? is there a common opinion on certain brands/types?
Chassis: I‘ll settle on modushop (maybe a takachi, but nevermind the brand), with separate chassis for usfp and psu. Spacewise, are 230 x 280 and a 124 x 280 both 2U good to go?
Following this thread before beginning the build the beast is great, as entertaining as informative on many aspects, and oftentimes its just a riddle to me (nevermind, that’s cool too).
Now, as I still haven’t begun my build, I have some questions in front of me:
the ultraFSP is my entry-point to boutique capacitors. What is your recommendation for making a choice (how do I find out which one could be a better match?)—beside spending a fortune for a collection of every matching cap...? Anything more or less objective? is there a common opinion on certain brands/types?
Chassis: I‘ll settle on modushop (maybe a takachi, but nevermind the brand), with separate chassis for usfp and psu. Spacewise, are 230 x 280 and a 124 x 280 both 2U good to go?
If you see the pics I posted of my build, I used Modushop Galaxy 2U 330 x 230 for the main boards and 124 x 230 for the PSU. The PSU was pfarrell's layout that he had shared earlier in the thread. I think the 330 x 230 is a nice size -- plenty of breathing room to get everything laid out nicely.
I have listened to the Mundorf Supreme Silver Gold Oil, Clarity CSA, Clarity CMR and Jupiter Copper Foil as C3, the most influential cap.
I like the CMR and copper foil the best, then Supreme then CSA from memory.
I have three sets of Mundorf EVO's to test latter on, but I have not gotten to it. I have way too many projects that have more immediate timelines to complete, and I had to give up my office listening room to the wife.
If anyone in US wants to test these, keeping leads long and desoldering, let me know. I would do internationally, but shipping costs and times are not in our favor here. If I had to currently recommend - it would be CMRs for C3-C4, I have spent the most time with it and it's neutral, detailed and not sharp in any way. The CSA are a bit bolder sounding. The Copper Foil has a little more body to it, but cost is prohibitive. It adds tone that may not seem natural.
I swapped the signal cap in my M2 clone to a EVO Oil, and it provided lots of detail by comparison to a .50 elna silimic capacitor. I was hoping that these would be a good cost effective recommendation here, but without listening time, I won't do that.
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Thank you very very much, Tea!
I appreciate that you implicitly even offered to borrow some parts for testing. Since I’m in switzerland: Sigh!
I’m sifting through the vast collection of capacitors @ Hifi collective and, according to Salas, will end more or less there: https://www.diyaudio.com/forums/analogue-source/129126-simplistic-njfet-riaa-1780.html#post6213329 [emoji23]
But before this, I try to find some information to help make a selection about those magic parts...