A comparative evaluation of 4 "Linn Wars" TTs

[Addicted to music]

Waiting........

Snoozing........

[tesla13BMW]

$10 each way on number 6, I soon wont make much sense of a review even if it does come through today.

[djb]

Young hipsters all gone

Rubbish night tomorrow can get rid of bottles and do some reviewing

[Addicted to music]

Young hipsters all gone

Rubbish night tomorrow can get rid of bottles and do some reviewing

Won't be long now......into the 3rd page.......and still no review!

Still waiting.......

[ThirdDrawerDown]

My money's on page 5 before any action.

 

Rumour has it that the test LP has been decided on:

 

 

Given that the Linn is allegedly a dream machine, what better?

[Addicted to music]

Anyone 4 page 6?

[Addicted to music]

Actually,

How about I post here every hr and it should get us to page 5 by tomorrow.

[Telecine]

I suspect that the review will go like this on about page 10:

"Is Don, is good".

[Addicted to music]

I suspect that the review will go like this on about page 10:

"Is Don, is good".

 

I think by page 11

 

I will go bold

travelling on Melb public transport like djb

have a walking stick

And be referred to as great granddad........

[djb]

I will not be threatened thus

I hope to have 2 reviews up tomorrow

I have drunk no alcohol

Placed no bets

consoled young women of 30k who wonder why they couldn't keep up with their male partners at 90ks consumption<buddyeve would not approve this sentence!

Watched geek make a profit on the day

His mate put $10 on winner of last and left happy

Fridge empty of food

And empty of booze

If only I'd known they were coming I'd have run away to buddyeves

[andyr]

consoled young women of 30k who wonder why they couldn't keep up with their male partners at 90ks consumption

 

Que???  You had some young wimmin of 30kg weight in your house?  (That, shirley, is anorexia territory?  )  Or were they 30 years young?

 

I can comprehend delicate young fillys weighing 30kg accompanying beer-gut males of 90kgs (although I can't understand WTF they would wish to do this) but the other interpretation of what you wrote, that comes to mind, is that ... you had some young ladies in your house in their 30s, with male partners in their 90s? :eek:

 

Andy

Edited November 5, 2013 by andyr

[caddisgeek]

My money's on page 5 before any action.

 

 

You've all been trolled

 

I suspect we'll get to page eight, djb will post a clip of Rick Astley, tell us we've been Rick Rolled

 

 

and that will be that

Edited November 5, 2013 by caddisgeek

[Telecine]

Que???  You had some young wimmin of 30kg weight in your house?  (That, shirley, is anorexia territory?  )  Or were they 30 years young?

 

I can comprehend delicate young fillys weighing 30kg accompanying beer-gut males of 90kgs (although I can't understand WTF they would wish to do this) but the other interpretation of what you wrote, that comes to mind, is that ... you had some young ladies in your house in their 30s, with male partners in their 90s? :eek:

 

Andy

Don't try to comprehend it Andy, it is incomprehensible whatever way you look at it.

[Addicted to music]

Que???  You had some young wimmin of 30kg weight in your house?  (That, shirley, is anorexia territory?  )  Or were they 30 years young?

 

I can comprehend delicate young fillys weighing 30kg accompanying beer-gut males of 90kgs (although I can't understand WTF they would wish to do this) but the other interpretation of what you wrote, that comes to mind, is that ... you had some young ladies in your house in their 30s, with male partners in their 90s? :eek:

 

Andy

 

Don't try to comprehend it Andy, it is incomprehensible whatever way you look at it.

 

Definately Nursing home.

[evil c]

Looking forward to some meaningful insight on the decks involved in the evaluation process commencing on page 3 

[djb]

Two of the four "reviews" will be in the following post

Unfortunately the others will have to wait until I return from meetings interstate

A couple of observations/admissions

1 I have been putting this off for a couple of days

What seemed like a good idea looks more and more complex when you get to the fine detail.

2 the astute observation of Newman and others that I'd be reviewing carts (all 4 are different) seems to be being verified

Does this mean as Jake got caned for recently that the spinner is a minor part of TT SQ? I think not .

[djb]

THE MUSIC

I've used 5 selections

1 Trinity Revisited Cowboy Junkies track 1 We are Hard Rock Miners> female vocal

2 Anastasis Dead Can Dance track 1>rock

3 Bach Goldberg Variations Variations 1 & 2>Piano

4 Ray Brown bass L Almeida guitar track 1Mondscheinsonata> "Jazz"

5 Sebelius Symphony # 5 BBC Sympony> Orchestral

A deliberately eclectic mix of recording styles new and aged labels

( now I have to pack u might not get reviews till at gate in morning!)

[ThirdDrawerDown]

We are appalled at the lack of Diana Krall.

 

I thought you of all people would be aware that Diana Krall is compulsory for anyone who considers themselves an audiophile.

[Addicted to music]

We are appalled at the lack of Diana Krall.

 

I thought you of all people would be aware that Diana Krall is compulsory for anyone who considers themselves an audiophile.

And no Spice girls,

And you class yourself as an audiophile?

[warrengday]

Aah, now Gordon ... can you enlighten me as to what is the "follow the tune" method of listening which Linn Forum folk keep harping on about?  (I understand this is the same as what you called "tune dem".)

 

Linn on the Tune-Dem

 

An overview - http://blogs.linn.co.uk/music/fiona-mcmichael/tune-dem-if-it-sounds-better-it-is-better.php

 

More detail - read post 110 & 112 by David Williamson, Senior Mechanical Design Engineer - http://forums.linn.co.uk/bb/showthread.php?tid=24332&pid=284699#pid284699

[andyr]

Linn on the Tune-Dem

 

An overview - http://blogs.linn.co.uk/music/fiona-mcmichael/tune-dem-if-it-sounds-better-it-is-better.php

 

More detail - read post 110 & 112 by David Williamson, Senior Mechanical Design Engineer - http://forums.linn.co.uk/bb/showthread.php?tid=24332&pid=284699#pid284699

 

Thanks very much Warren.  I note that the Linn blurb starts off with the words: 'The philosophy at Linn is very simple: if it sounds better, it is better.'!!

 

That's the rule I follow, too.

 

I do have slight reservation that I'm pondering on, though - that tune dem is the start, not the be all and end all, of comparative listening.  To give you some idea of what I'm thinking, let's take the example of listening to a brass band that's performing in the next street from where you are standing.  If you're not too far away (or there's little ambient noise from the street), you'll be able to "follow the tune" that they're playing.  But the sound will be much better when you're standing 5m in front of them - you'll have a vastly increased resolution re. the sound coming from each instrument and you'll probably pick up better high frequencies (which were being attenuated before).

 

So, yes, 'tune dem' is a good method for comparative listening ... but it seems to me it's quite possible for both components you are listening to, to score well on this - so you then need to switch to additional comparators (for a music system) like clarity, HF extension etc.

 

 

Regards,

 

Andy

Edited November 8, 2013 by andyr

[caddisgeek]

[warrengday]

Thanks very much Warren.  I note that the Linn blurb starts off with the words: 'The philosophy at Linn is very simple: if it sounds better, it is better.'!! 

 

I don't like this use of the word better, sometimes what some call better is less accurate.

 

3 examples spring to mind.

 

Many prefer the sound of an LP12 with the lid off.  When I did the comparison, with the lid off I found it exciting, but with the lid on my Maeve O'Boyle LP immediately reminded me of when I heard her live a year before, due to no reverb created by cartridge picking up speaker output.

 

Then there's speaker wiring, I went down the usual route of bi-wiring, and tri-wiring etc.  After a couple of recommendations, I compared fully-wired, single-wired and bi-wired.  Fully-wired has the most hifi detail especially in the bass and treble.  With Bi-wiring (as used by Peter at Cymbiosis for my Khan Skale dems), this sounded better, more dynamic and more alive when compared with single-wiring, but this was using rock recordings I'd not heard live.  As soon as I switched to recordings of my favourite singer, her voice had a realism, a visceral coherency about it, just as her voice does live, that I've never heard at home before, and her voice was no longer separated from the guitar.  Overall with single-wiring I enjoyed the music more, all the music I listened to.  Also drum and cymbal attacks were much more pronounced, vastly more dynamic and much louder.

 

I recently heard a track from a CD on the car radio, loved it.  So I paid attention to find what piece of music it was and who was playing it.  I then heard the same artists/track a few days later, and was expecting it to sound better, but my initial impression was that it sounded thin.  So isn't the car radio better?  No.  Because this was the ensemble playing the concerto live.  And it was the car radio that was smudging the sound.

 

 

I do have slight reservation that I'm pondering on, though - that tune dem is the start, not the be all and end all, of comparative listening.  To give you some idea of what I'm thinking, let's take the example of listening to a brass band that's performing in the next street from where you are standing.  If you're not too far away (or there's little ambient noise from the street), you'll be able to "follow the tune" that they're playing.  But the sound will be much better when you're standing 5m in front of them - you'll have a vastly increased resolution re. the sound coming from each instrument and you'll probably pick up better high frequencies (which were being attenuated before).

 

So, yes, 'tune dem' is a good method for comparative listening ... but it seems to me it's quite possible for both components you are listening to, to score well on this - so you then need to switch to additional comparators (for a music system) like clarity, HF extension etc.

 

In listening I currently do 4 things (in no particular order):

 

* active listening - silently repeating what you hear, this makes the tunes you repeat very obvious, and also how the tunes interact with one another.

 

* comparing with live performances - by playing recordings of things I've heard live, primarily my favourite violinist and opera singer, both of whom I've heard acoustically several times from as little as a few feet away.  A fortnight ago when I most recently heard Rachel Podger in concert (number 56) she talked about the three bowing choices: which part of the bow is used, the amount of pressure applied and the direction the bow is moved (up or down), as these all affect the sound one gets from the violin (though of course the pitch, and the resulting tune will be the same).  For me, comparing with live all started when Linn, at a consumer electronics show, compared their top hifi to a rock band they'd brought along --- a revelatory experience.

 

* timing - using Rachel again.  The 'recommended' top Linn system uses the 350A speaker, internally active with their 2nd best range of amps, however given the same budget I prefer passive with their top amp, the only power amp I've heard that reproduces her approach to phrasing correctly.

 

* emotionally engaging - how the performance moves you emotionally, also inspired by 2 experiences.

 

When I got my LP12, it was brought round by a friend who I'd introduced to the shop a year before and he'd got a job there.  I played tracks on my Linn Axis, then on my LP12, which didn't sound much better for a TT that was 4 times the price.  Matt asked "How do you feel?"  I immediately realised I felt amazing, whereas minutes before I didn't.  The greater precision was moving me emotionally in a way the Axis couldn't.  Music isn't just about sound, sound is just the communication medium, music is ultimately about moving one emotionally.

 

After several hours of attending a class (where student classical musicians played the same few minutes of music many times while receiving coaching from Rachel) I went home and compared 24 bit vs vinyl.  Findings?  Digital is the best at getting the sound of the instruments correct especially across the whole frequency spectrum, but isn't moving emotionally compared with live.  Vinyl sounds more viscerally real in the midband, and more importantly, is able to move me emotionally in a similar way to the way live musicians do.

Edited November 9, 2013 by warrengday

[andyr]

I agree with you 100%, Warren - the bottom line is ... it comes down to how it affects you emotionally.

 

 

Regards,

 

Andy

[Telecine]

Sooo djb, how are the reviews going?

Thought/hoped that we had forgotten didn't you?