My
main system has remained pretty constant for over 20 years, except for a
couple of
milestones. However, the same can't be said about my audio playground which sits beside my home office, in which the only thing constant is
change. 😉
At the end of summer, the boss decided that it was time to mitigate the flooding problem during heavy rain and snow in the lower level of our home.
Since this entailed removing the drywall in the
hifi man cave, everything had to be stored or relocated and dust-proofed.
It's been over a month since the retaining wall was sealed with waterproof coating. We've had a couple of strong rains and it's been dry so far. But we're in no hurry to replace the drywall. We want to make sure that it'll stay dry through the worst precipitation Mother Nature sends our way.
Meanwhile, even if I have a nice mono hi-fi in the
living room, I miss stereophonic sound.
The boss was kind enough to allow the re-commissioning of the near-field system. To make unpacking simpler, I minimized the use of tube electronics.
A Realistic 32-1100A Stereo Mixer I found at a flea market for 10 bucks is doing preamp duty. It has provisions for three line level inputs or 2 x magnetic phono + 1 line level. I thought the magnetic phono inputs were pretty decent on this discrete transistorized unit (no op-amps) until I got another discrete solid-state Radio Shack product, the 42-2109 phono preamp. This unit produced a warmer, more vivid midrange with even better extension in the frequency extremes.
Judicious mixing and matching of yesteryears' solid-state audio components employing discrete circuitry with the line transformers and a cable tweak inserted in between, mimicked the musical experience I typically enjoy only from an all vacuum tube set up. It's akin to the
Fuji Acros film simulation setting in my
Fuji X-E3 camera. But there's still no substitute for the
real thing. 😉
