Computer Speakers on Steroids – Slight Overkill Maybe?
 

I am sure that I am not alone. I have always had a decent stereo. In fact they have ranged from modest to sick audiophile range over the years. Since I am in the business, it was a natural. But lifestyle & the need for a home theater has gradually eroded my need for a good 2-channel hi-fi. I just don’t sit listening to music the way I used to in the past.

So I decided to step up to a real computer-based system since that’s where I seem to do all of my listening now.

Computer speakers are usually cheapo plastic boxes with a single driver. And they sound like crap. There are exceptions that sound decent if you spend a bit more – B&W’s Zeppelin & our (Focal’s) XS 2.1 – but the vast majority are crap. Or the other option many use is to plug into an existing hi-fi, but that often puts your speakers in a strange position relative to the screen.

Well, I dipped into our Pro catalogue & got a pair of Focal Solo 6BE to try. These are an amplified studio monitor used in mixing & mastering labs. A built-in 100W AB amp on the tweeter & a 150W Bash amp on the woofer. Balanced XLR input only with level controls. (As an aside, Dave Kutch used a pair of these to master Alicia Keys’ ‘No One’ which earned him a Grammy nomination. His pair are mounted on motorized stands in front of his console).

I drive it spdif out from my PC to an outboard DAC (Cambridge Audio DacMagic – and yes, I sell it too) & then balanced XLR to the monitors. I use the wave control as a volume since the normal volume control is disabled in spdif. The iTunes volume now works as a fine tune so to speak.

I rigidly mounted the speakers at ear level on metal stands that are planted in the floor & bolted to the desk.

Wow. That’s all I can say. The system is near field listening only. That’s what monitors are for. But wow. I have heard hi-fi systems (some I sell) that retail for 5 times the price that don’t sound as good.

Just thought I would share my experience. I don’t mean this to be a sale’s spiel but I am completely floored by the sound . . .

Ian

PS: Please excuse my messy home office with the funky paint color . . . but if you look closely you can see Porsche content & even Pelican content.

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are those 50 bucks each?

No. A wee bit more. ;) Have you priced pure Beryllium lately?

Ian

Sure, picked up a coupla pounds at Walmart the other day. Regular price $19.99, on sale for $18.49!

Damn, and I thought Bose were spendy. Too rich for my blood. I bet they sound great, enjoy.

I think you have inspired me........naaaaaaa

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I like my setup.

M-Audio Revolution 7.1 sound card -> coax digital out -> M-Audio C02 coax/optical converter ->optical input to Sharp NX-10 1 bit amp -> Energy Connoisseur C3 speakers (which I want to upgrade to Axiom M3s and possibly add a sub)

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That's one of the keys to good sound using a computer as a source. Get the DAC out of the computer & all of the noise it produces. Sound card DACs are very mediocre.

We have a new product this month that acts like an audiophile AirPort Express. You can stream from your iTunes & use this as a source in your hi-fi. It has a great DAC, real clocking & a real power supply. Very trick.

Ian

I bought a small USB-audio adapter off Newegg for about 7$.. It's a little headphone amp thing, but I bought it because it has a certain audio chip in it that I found a spec sheet with pinouts for. I got it, cracked it open, and found the two pins on the chipset that were for the SPDIF digital out and ground...

wired up a coax cable to them, ran it out the little casing, glued it back together...

Then I run the coax out to my stereo amp. Digital all the way there. The raw output gets sent there unamplified, unprocessed- there's no noise that way. I use this with my laptop, and stream my subscription Pandora over it.

I used to use the internal sound card but there was too much noise and loss. Laptops are horrible environments for audio, too many components too close together. And running a long analog signal was resulting in probably around 10db of level loss.

I currently have two JBL LX500's and a Yamaha powered sub that comprises my budget system.

I have two giant Sansui speakers in storage awaiting a larger apartment to be busted out.

fwiw - Here is some REAL overkill. In Paul Stubblebine's mastering studio in SF:

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Bob Hodas, Paul Stubblebine, Michael Romanowski pictured with our $180K Grande Utopia EM speakers

Ian

more info?

approx. price?

model #?

It will be called the WM-10 AirStream from MicroMega. The AirStream name was cleared by their trademark lawyers - strangely. $1500 Retail. It uses a 24 bit/192 kHz DAC with clocking (to reduce jitter) & a power supply with an R-core transformer (acts like a mains filter). iTunes currently uses the 16-bit/44.1 kHz standard & their software dumbs down all content to this. They are working to upgrade it to over-sampling to keep pace with the curve.

On a related but separate note, we recently sold Apple a 9.2 Focal system for their Cupertino lab. Dolby Labs & DTS also bought systems in Sept - on the same day!

That's enough selling . . . sorry guys but this is exciting stuff for us . . .

Ian

I use monitors that are way better than my sound card. But the hissing from the card sounds great.

Overkill
 

HP Pavillion
65" Hitachi HD
7.1 Denon
NHT towers x4 200 watt
NHT powered subs x2 100/200 watt
NHT center 200 watt
NHT rear backs 150 watt

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i have a Klipsch 5.1 surround system with a powered 12"sub on my PC and it ROCKS! playing video games is so real, it's unreal... lol..