Equipment Recommendations - The Home For New System and Upgrade Advice

Lee Newman said:
Cool. If I were pulling the trigger today, which I'm not. I would add the Leak CDT10 transport, the Black Ice F159, The Vertere DG-1S and Klipsch Forte IVs. Table will probably be the last upgrade. After that, I may or may not buy speakers for digital/classical listening and a preamp to run the phono through. We'll see what happens after I do all of this.
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With Forte IVs you won’t need an alternate pair of speakers. They do all genres extremely well and don’t really have any weaknesses.

There’s only one thing I would wish for- a Forte “Plus”. Imagine a Forte twice the height- everything doubled- that would give you a larger (taller) stereo image. Impedance would drop to 4 ohms, but any amplifier that would likely to be paired with them wouldn’t have any issues.
 
HiFi Guy said:
With Forte IVs you won’t need an alternate pair of speakers. They do all genres extremely well and don’t really have any weaknesses.

There’s only one thing I would wish for- a Forte “Plus”. Imagine a Forte twice the height- everything doubled- that would give you a larger (taller) stereo image. Impedance would drop to 4 ohms, but any amplifier that would likely to be paired with them wouldn’t have any issues.
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JUBES

I was also really impressed by the Cornwall IVs I listened to in Richmond. My eventual purchase decision is going to be a tough one.
 
Lee Newman said:
If I go verteré, I will probably get a Sabre to start out with just to leave the grado ecosystem for a bit. Plus everything I’ve read says it takes an hour to set one up, so maybe having the cart preinstalled will shave some time.
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I know it's not an easy thing for most, but trying different things is the only way to really find out what you're looking for...............I've run my course to basically end up where I started............not that there weren't other great carts along the way.
 
AnthonyI said:
I know it's not an easy thing for most, but trying different things is the only way to really find out what you're looking for...............I've run my course to basically end up where I started............not that there weren't other great carts along the way.
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It's a double edged sword though, right? I mean I knew I wanted to upgrade my system, but auditioning that phono stage really made me realize where my weaknesses really were and changed what my path was. This is ultimately a good thing, but I was real happy with what I had until I was like, wait... everyone else swears by this thing and I am not hearing a difference from my pluto...

There is also the fact that having quality streaming now has provided a whole new playground, but also exposes the reality of the whole quality over quantity side of things with vinyl (which I already knew but when I had crappy/no streaming over the hifi, it was less of a concern)
 
@AnthonyI's point about trying things is kind of why I am thinking about having another set of speakers after I have the "dream" system set up. First of all, I have ab connections so why not? The other thing is I want horns for lots of reasons and I currently have traditional bookshelf speakers... I want to know what concentric speakers sound like in my space. I have a feeling that their detail and soundstage tendencies will be great for classical music, which to date, I am not super happy with in my vinyl set up given my preferences for other types of music. While I am sure the Fortes do a good job with all kinds of music, I also know that my classical music listening on vinyl has seen a downturn since I left the orts behind. While i disliked the ort for jazz and rock, it was GREAT for classical. So I know that with that type of music, I prefer a more analytical and detailed sound. It will be interesting to see what I think about them and to contrast how I feel about them with other types of music. I actually envision my perfect system bypassing the digital for my vinyl/analogue set up and fully embracing it for the streaming and other digital sources. Knowing that I prefer different things for various types of music is what leads me to think I might like to actually use those features on my amp.
 
I mean even when I change carts with the grados, there is a period of time during break in where I just don't enjoy the acoustic music that I listen to primarily these days because until they open up, it's just... stiff. Trying things is what makes me think this way. (And absorbing as much knowledge as I can from you guys and youtube and hifi mags.... etc.)
 
Lee Newman said:
It's a double edged sword though, right? I mean I knew I wanted to upgrade my system, but auditioning that phono stage really made me realize where my weaknesses really were and changed what my path was. This is ultimately a good thing, but I was real happy with what I had until I was like, wait... everyone else swears by this thing and I am not hearing a difference from my pluto...

There is also the fact that having quality streaming now has provided a whole new playground, but also exposes the reality of the whole quality over quantity side of things with vinyl (which I already knew but when I had crappy/no streaming over the hifi, it was less of a concern)
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Of course it is, you change one thing and it uncovers something else, then you change another and you throw off the symmetry you had, then you start to feel like you're chasing your tail. I think once I consolidated and made a short list of what I wanted, really, not just a stop gap, things started to come together. I also knew that only once I had everything else done would I even start comparing a few carts, because I wanted all the other components to stay the same.

In the end, all of my pieces tend to lean to the warm side, the Grado fits in perfectly and everything sounds "musical" and enjoyable. But again, the shitty part is that you either say "I'm good with this", or you need to crack some eggs and see where it leads you. I was a little concerned that the Sonata was going to show up and not be what I wanted or expected, just making this linger on in the most annoying way, thankfully, after talking to Rich a bit about the carts, gear and so on, it seemed the right fit.................happy it is.

It's true that some pieces in this puzzle just won't play nice together.
 
MikeH said:
If I looked at and researched gear like I do with pressings of records, I’d be screwed.
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Lee Newman said:
Yeah, don't start. (I spend way more time researching and looking at gear). For the most part, with records I'm like I want that. BOOM! Done. SHIT WHY DID THEY ALL COME AT ONCE!!!
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I'm telling you, when you stop looking at gear, you breath a sigh of relief 😮‍💨
 
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