My first Shindo experience...

[Jerome W]

Originally Posted by kev313

Agree on the positioning. That said, the idea that anyone would listen to a entire system composed of hand selected components through an app on a piece of consumer electronics is absurd. I mean, yeah, check and see if it's broken, but don't let it inform your listening. It's like going to an art museum and spending your time reading the Wikipedia for every piece.

If you're listening for effects, yes, Burmester might do you "better". Full disclosure, I tend to agree with Peter Q of ANUK...German hifi sounds evil. If you're listening to your Shindo that way, you are kind of missing the beauty of Shindo. I recommend that the new owner read Jules's review of that Monbrison in 6moons.

Highly agreed on the general post, but I do not think that Stephen in particular missed the beauty of Shindo at all....
My belief : he would just need to live with such a system and after a week he would probably not be concerned at all by what happens below 50Hz....

[kev313]

Originally Posted by C220MC275

Highly agreed on the general post, but I do not think that Stephen in particular missed the beauty of Shindo at all....
My belief : he would just need to live with such a system and after a week he would probably not be concerned at all by what happens below 50Hz....

Agreed. I meant a general "you".

[Puma Cat]

Originally Posted by C220MC275

Thanks Stephen. Nice write up !
I would have loved to see a pic of the whole system.
I am not sure if I agree with the lack of extreme bass and light inability to deliver very heavy dynamics of SET amps. I have heard 5W SET amps which were sounding incredible on the adequate speakers ( Audio Note and Verdier 300B ).
Shindo's more powerful PP amps allow pairing with much more speakers of various impedances / sensitivity but of course choice is more limited than with big tube or SS amps. And yes, they sound magic too.
The connection with the music with Shindo gear is unique.
It would be very interesting to try this Monbrison in your home and see what it does compared to your CJ preamp.
My belief : conventional companies cannot spend the time and efforts Shindo did while selecting components by ear. Most of the time, the big companies select products based on tech spec and reliability. Not sound.
So the difference in sound that you get between Shindo and most brands is not small. It is huge.
Shindo does not sound like anything else and yet, it is not "warm" or colored in any way.
Wether you like it or not is an other story.
But my guess was that you would feel this "magic".

Sent from my iPhone using A.Aficionado

Hi Jerome,
I certainly would love to hear the system with other speakers efficient enough to be used with a Shindo SET based system, As mentioned, DeVore or Zu speakers would be interesting to listen to on the system.

[Whart]

In re-reading Puma's original post, i see that he did fiddle with speaker position to achieve the best balance between mid/highs and bass. I tend to focus on the mids first; if they are not right, I could care less how much 'bandwidth' the system has; as to amp/speaker combo, if the speaker was voiced for a 300B WE, that may be part of the answer too, but I have no idea how the particular amps being used would compare.
There is something absolutely effortless about high efficiency speaker and tube amps. It's not just the dynamics in a 'macro' sense. Way before you start hearing noticeable distortion or 'compression' the amp and speakers may already be pushed beyond their limits. So, the advantage of using a super efficient speaker is obvious. But Puma may be right that more bass control could result from a more powerful/different amp. Although I use SETs on my horns (which are in the neighborhood of 104db efficiency) and have an active woofer system (which creates a whole other set of issues in terms of integration), I have known people that used very powerful (tube) amps on these horns with great results.
Still like to know if you guys listened to vinyl on this system, though.
Best,

[Puma Cat]

Originally Posted by Wino

Hi all, I'd like to clear up a few points about my system under review, by my friend Stephen-

The Lingolab 'the Bench', in case an expert might be confused by the pic, is a custom, one-off- Basically, the usual, + custom doors to contrast the speakers-

The speakers are custom one-off Shindo Latours- They have Altec Valencia grills, 416-8A & 806-8A drivers- The cabinets, wiring and the crossover, are all made by Shindo- The crossover is made ready for field coil (w/ a power plug in the rear, in Shindo green) (same as the current Latour/Lafite), however is not at this time- The Altecs were procured by and approved by 'the Master'-

The Speaker cables as stated, are Auditorium 23 (A23 LS), however all interconnects are Shindo silver & the PCs are all Shindo upgrade models (black) (only made for a short time)-

As far as the dynamics, I'll leave the comments to personal thoughts, however if there are shortcomings, it's not because of 8 watts (the speakers are 100db efficient)- + The volume on the Monbrison is only at about 8:00, AKA, barely turned up- Sunday we will be messing w/ the set up a bit more, fwiw, + one of Stephen's TTs-

My Wavac will be arriving on Tue to compare, however we're concerned it might be too powerful w/ 55w !

DonBattles/Cellindo- The Monbrison was just on 'holiday' at 'home' in Japan, and received whatever groovy stuff the 'Dr' ordered, to bring it up to date, so all systems are a-ok, including the tubes- + I have tons of NOS tubes in case, including back up NOS WE 300Bs for the Lafons-

Also, FWIW, the not yet specifically mentioned Lafons (in the review), are the earlier models that originally came w/ and were voiced w/ WE 300Bs, not the Cetrons, that were used a little later-

Ok, that's it for now, the boys will be here in 11 hrs !

I'm sure there will be excellent follow ups coming-

David

David, thanks for jumping in with your comments and additional information.

The rest of the gang here at AA: I'll be bringing my Rega P5 over to David's place today and Gregory, David, and I are going to do some additional listening for the better part of the afternoon. I'll be bringing a wide selection of classical music and we'll really give the system a workout and see what it's capable of.

Jerome, I'll get some pictures of the entire system for you...


Stay tuned, gang!

[Puma Cat]

Originally Posted by kev313

Agree on the positioning. That said, the idea that anyone would listen to a entire system composed of hand selected components through an app on a piece of consumer electronics is absurd. I mean, yeah, check and see if it's broken, but don't let it inform your listening. It's like going to an art museum and spending your time reading the Wikipedia for every piece.

Just be clear here, there was no listening to anything through an app on a consumer-electronics device. My friend Gregory had simply downloaded a spectrum analyzer on his iPhone and showed me what the system was doing in the room. I'll bring my real test equipment over today and we will get a real in room frequency response assessment with the precision of plus +/- 0.2 of a decibel to check speaker set up and positioning. Test equipment or no, that's not going to stop us listening to a wide selection real music with our ears. And none of that audiophile-y crap you hear at audio shows.

And, most importantly, we'll be enjoying the music.

[bakerman]

Originally Posted by Puma Cat

Stay tuned, gang!

[kev313]

Originally Posted by Puma Cat

Just be clear here, there was no listening to anything through an app on a consumer-electronics device. My friend Gregory had simply downloaded a spectrum analyzer on his iPhone and showed me what the system was doing in the room. I'll bring my real test equipment over today and we will get a real in room frequency response assessment with the precision of plus +/- 0.2 of a decibel to check speaker set up and positioning. Test equipment or no, that's not going to stop us listening to a wide selection real music with our ears. And none of that audiophile-y crap you hear at audio shows.

And, most importantly, enjoying the music.

I predict that the measurement will be..."All life is suffering." Fortunately you have the path right in front of you. As you said, all you have go do is sit back and listen to enjoy. Most importantly, have fun and enjoy the company.

[Puma Cat]

Originally Posted by C220MC275

Highly agreed on the general post, but I do not think that Stephen in particular missed the beauty of Shindo at all....
My belief : he would just need to live with such a system and after a week he would probably not be concerned at all by what happens below 50Hz....

Hi Jerome,
No, I did not miss it at all. And I wouldn't need to live with it for a week to be not concerned by what happens below 50 Hz....

[Puma Cat]

Originally Posted by kev313

I predict that the measurement will be..."All life is suffering." Fortunately you have the path right in front of you. As you said, all you have go do is sit back and listen to enjoy. Most importantly, have fun and enjoy the company.

If recall correctly, I spent the majority of my time sitting on David's nice leather couch and reveling in the music...

When I wasn't sitting on the couch (my favorite listening position), I was enjoying his million-dollar view off his deck of the Bay....





(taken with the Fuji X-10, of course!)

We had a wonderful time at David's place last weekend, and that's why were going back this weekend.

PS: Jerome, I'll see if David has some Bourgogne around.