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Conrad-Johnson It just sounds right

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  #11  
Old 09-07-2011, 04:58 AM
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turntable turntable is offline
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This was exactly the point that Bill, the person who sold me my CT-5 and then bought the ET-5, said to me in his email. Believe me, he was going WTF? with the CT-5, and then subsequently with the ET-5. The only reason he hung on was his friend with a GAT pressed him to be patient.

And I was going WTF? when I first got the CT-5, too...
I experienced the same thing when I bought the ACT2 when the CT5 had just been released. I gave it 3-400 hours and it was not a patch on my then sold prem 16. The dealer even gave me a CT5 and that was not any better.

I paid the dealer $800 to give it back to him and refund the rest. Both of us were not happy - he just thought I was a complaining difficult customer ( no universal agreement please
I never really got a handle on what the ACT2 would have ended up sounding like.
That said, after listening to the ARC LS27 ( which is very nice) I just prefer the 6922 based cj pre amps.

live and learn right.
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  #12  
Old 09-07-2011, 05:26 AM
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Bottom line, it's going to get even better, Joe!
YES!

I'm not going anywhere and enjoying the ride.

Thanks!
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  #13  
Old 09-07-2011, 10:08 AM
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Originally Posted by turntable View Post
I experienced the same thing when I bought the ACT2 when the CT5 had just been released. I gave it 3-400 hours and it was not a patch on my then sold prem 16. The dealer even gave me a CT5 and that was not any better.

I paid the dealer $800 to give it back to him and refund the rest. Both of us were not happy - he just thought I was a complaining difficult customer ( no universal agreement please
I never really got a handle on what the ACT2 would have ended up sounding like.
That said, after listening to the ARC LS27 ( which is very nice) I just prefer the 6922 based cj pre amps.

live and learn right.
Yes, I prefer 6922 based CJ preamps, too.
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  #14  
Old 09-07-2011, 10:19 AM
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Yes, I prefer 6922 based CJ preamps, too.
I understand the 6922's are a little sweeter and the 6N30P's are a little cooler. I think that is why I gravitated towards the ET5.


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  #15  
Old 09-07-2011, 03:44 PM
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For my part I liked the CT5
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  #16  
Old 09-07-2011, 04:25 PM
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I understand the 6922's are a little sweeter and the 6N30P's are a little cooler. I think that is why I gravitated towards the ET5.


I think that's an accurate assessment, and very much in line with what I observe with my Premier 17 (6922 based) and my CT-5 (6N30 based) when comparing head to head, and believe me, I've done that a lot.
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Last edited by Puma Cat; 09-07-2011 at 04:43 PM.
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  #17  
Old 09-07-2011, 04:30 PM
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Originally Posted by Rafale View Post
For my part I liked the CT5
As did Jeff Whitlock when he heard mine. OTOH, my friend Gregory really prefers the Premier 17.

There are qualities that I like about both.

The CT-5 is more neutral, detailed, transparent, faster, and quieter, but the Premier 17 is more musical, warmer, weightier, and fuller sounding, and has more fully fleshed out images. I'd love to have a pre that combined the qualities of both, but that's probably a GAT.

At the end of the day, I probably prefer the Premier 17 as I find it more musically engaging than the CT-5 and it pulls me into the music more.

The midrange of the Premier 17 is to die for.

Here are some quotes from the Stereophile review (Stereophile, May 8, 2001)

"This is not to say that the 17LS wasn't luscious and sweet. It most certainly was, but in the captivating ways that a live instrument is or a wonderful acoustic space can be, with rich, dense tones and exquisitely, intricately layered harmonic structures."


and

"I just knew that it would have a glorious midrange, and boy oh boy, did it ever. Sweet, luscious, clean, defined, detailed, coherent, clear—my notes are full of page after page of audiophile superlatives, hoping, I guess, to achieve amplification through repetition. The Premier's midrange proved to be one of those standard-setting entities that makes a reviewer regret having used up all his or her superlatives on lesser components. The C-J's midrange was so sweet, so detailed, so...everything, that every other preamp I threw in my system sounded a bit crude, or pale, or confused in comparison."

I find these observations to be quite accurate. If there one word I would use to describe the Premier 17LS, it's sweetness.
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Last edited by Puma Cat; 09-07-2011 at 04:43 PM.
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  #18  
Old 09-07-2011, 04:41 PM
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Did you try the 6H30 reflektor on the CT5?
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  #19  
Old 09-07-2011, 04:44 PM
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Nope...I could, I guess. I don't know that it would change the overall "flavor" that much. It's still a 6N30.
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  #20  
Old 09-07-2011, 05:05 PM
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I just came to receive a pair of reflektor when I sold my CT5+LP70s, I had no leisure to listen to them but the buyer of the CT5/LP70s pluged them and his conclusion is that they bring to the message more presence, more transparency and improve the bottom of the spectre, its speakers are SF CREMONA AUDITOR M and his front-end a tubed CDP LECTOR
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