by Michael

AUDIO AERO PRESTIGE NOW UP ON HRS 'NIMBUS' FEET

Before we get to the comparisons…

We put the Prestige up on the HRS Nimbus ”feet’ which helped dial in the Prestige as it was sitting on the HRS M3 Isolation Base.

Audio Aero Prestige up on Nibuses
Here is the Prestige up with the 3 black diamond racing cones that come with the Prestige as their standard feet lying in front of the Prestige.

Audio Aero Prestige up on Nibuses
More pictures of the Prestige and the HRS Nimbuses, which in this picture were put under the place where the Black Diamond Racing cones usually go, abd you can see that the screws that stick out and screw into the cones are now sticking into the Nimbuses.

We changed this in the current configuration to put the Nimbuses in a configuration so that they would not get stuck… But we haven’t done a sonic comparison to determine any differences besides the aesthetic.

Audio Aero Prestige up on Nibuses

Audio Aero Prestige up on Nibuses

Audio Note Kegons also up on Nibuses
The Audio Note Kegons are also up on Nimbuses…

Audio Areo Prestige panel left side
Just an FYI, here are the controls on the left side control panel of the Prestige

Audio Areo Prestige panel right side
And on the right side…

Sonically, this improved the clarity, lowered the noise floor tremendously, and made the Prestige competitive with the Meitner, albeit with an entirely different sonic flavor. More on the comparison next, and as we moved the Prestige downstairs in preperation for the weekend’s (and Monday’s (today)) guests, replacing the Audio Aero Capitole with the Prestige in the SoundLab U1 / EDGE system, we can now also report at some length on the differences we hear between the Capitole and the Prestige.

in Audio Aero / High-end Audio HiFi and Stereo / HRS 2 comments
 by Michael

PUTTING HRS 'FEET' UNDER THE EDGE REFERENCE AMPS

OK, we could / should really get some custom HRS (Harmonic Resolution Systems… now you know why everybody abbreviates their name :-)) amp stands for the big 220(!) lb EDGE NL Reference ‘pyramid’ amplifiers… But we got these really cool Rix Rax Outpost amp stands and we want to use them. The problem is the Outputs do not have all that much intrinsic vibration control (none except for spikes and the nearly 2 inch think maple tops).

What to do, what to do.

Kind of by accident, we tried putting HRS Nimbus Coupler’s underneath the Ref’s feet at the RMAF 2005 show – and lo and behold it helped even out the frequency response in the hotel room very nicely. In that situation the Ref’s were on the carpet because we did not bring down the big amp stands to the show – there is only so much room, you know, in a minivan and station wagon – when you’re full, your’re full.

So, the inspiration struck once more and we decided to try them again, only this time with the Nimbus Spacers too (we did not bring the Spacers with us to the show… why, because at the time we couldn’t find them.

OK, OK, everybody raise their hand who has so much audio… equipment and tweaks… that half the time they can’t find what they are looking for when they need it. Thought so.

HRS Nimbus
Here we see two Nimbus Coupler’s and one (double height) Nimbus Spacer

HRS Nimbus
Here they are in context to a standard (good) CD.

HRS Nimbus
Here is the big EDGE amp

HRS Nimbus
Here is a Nimbus (Spacer plus two Couplers) under one of the feet. No it isn’t exactly centered. You want to liff this 220lb thing to try to get that last 1/32 of an inch? Not me either.

HRS Nimbus
Here is another picture of the HRS Nimbus’es under the feet. Notice the dust under the amp that the added height now reveals. Everyone knows half the fun of having all this beautiful equipment is dusting and keeping it clean, right? Right?

Hurrumph. And it is not as if we can trust anyone else to clean it either. What a predicament. What a predicament.

Next … the Effect of Dust Bunnies on Soundstaging….

Oh, and the sound here with the Nimbus’ under the EDGE NL Reference feet is the same we experienced at the show – a more even treatment of the frequency spectrum, removing some of the edge and glare we were experiencing with bad recordings, especially DVD video.

in Edge / High-end Audio HiFi and Stereo / HRS 0 comments
 by Michael

THE PRESTIGE PLAYER…. STILL BREAKING IN (SIGH)

Yeah, yeah, everyone wants to know how it sounds and how it compares to the Meitner…

So do we!

You can really tell it is still breaking in because everyday it sounds… different from the day before. One day is is bright. The next it is over-damped. Tomorrow… ?

And, like everyone else, there is some trepedation on our part that it will get ‘stuck’ with of these abnormal personailities and be done breaking in, stuck in a less-than-optimal ‘gear’.

But the Capitole takes about 6 weeks before it settles down (usually, but sometimes it seems to break in much more quickly (!?)) so we are trying to be patient.

And the sound is converging towards something very… I would say analog. It doesn’t have the detail of an LP, of course (nothing digital has that much resolution, …so far, anyway), but there is this feeling, this kind of warmth that is not like tubes and not like anything else but vinyl. I know, it is kind of weird – but the Capitole was somewhat like this, at least dynamicaly, and the Prestige seems like it is following in its footsteps – but more so…

At least today it does.

in Audio Aero / High-end Audio HiFi and Stereo 0 comments