GoodSoundClub - Romy the Cat's Audio Site - Another (outdoorsy) sweat spot?

Audio Discussions
Topic: Another (outdoorsy) sweat spot?

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Posted by Romy the Cat on 04-13-2014

It is a mid of April and the weather is turning to be beautiful. The house of ours is kind of outdoorsy facility and we spent a LOT of time on the deck during worm mouths. We have huge deck that covers all 3 sides of house and we have a very cool deck in front of my listening room, right where large French door opens up to the forest.

It was always my “wet dram” to have a second “summer” listening room on the deck. The neighbors are not issues and Amy and I spent a lot of times to listen from deck. As I open the French the opening is large and the sound from the listening room is very good. It is for sure is not even close to what we have in the main sweat spot but it is to say the least acceptable. Still, I wonder if it worthy to run the main system to listen from the deck?
So, I wonder some kind of solution that would run main front end to deck version of playback. I do not want to have outdoor speakers but I want to have some kind of MiniMe that would be firing on demand to the back wall of Mackondo, to the opening of the French door.

Does anybody know of any compact, perhaps Bluetooth solution that would wirelessly send the signal from playback to some kind Bose like mini amp with speakers?

The Cat

Posted by Romy the Cat on 04-14-2014

Hm, I was not kind of informed that Bluetooth in fact implies a digital compression. I was looking for some "High End" Bluetooth transmitter/receiver combos but they shall be all crap if digital compression takes place during Bluetooth transmission. I wonder if it possible to have the Bluetooth-like wireless transmission for let say 100 foot but to escape digital compression. For sure it might be ...FM To have a few watt transmitter sitting at min playback and to have a simple Bose SoundDeck radio with FM receiver plagued into iPad holder. It does sound very elegant and it would allow me to run across the deck/yard with no problems. Sounds interning. I need to teats how Bose SoundDeck sound if not fed by phone's MP3.

Posted by noviygera on 04-14-2014
fiogf49gjkf0d Can you put swivels (like caster wheels or a flat spinning disk) under your main speakers and turn them around so they point to deck? http://blog.exertools.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/swiveldisc.jpg

Posted by Romy the Cat on 04-18-2014

Well, what I have learned after a few experiments and some education is that Bluetooth, regardless quality of implementation is garbage, FM transmission is fine but to do it at more or less acceptable level it will be costly. So, I decided to take advantage of a comfy Bose SoundDeck like input jack. I got 50' of cable, nope, not the PAD cable, and run SoundDeck from headphone exit of my preamp. You know, it was so much better than the SoundDeck running from garbage coming iPhone!

I think for now I will keep that line-driven SoundDeck as my outdoor speaker. The main question would be how good SoundDeck itself, without being degraded by ordinary horrible source. I am not ready at this point to answer this question but for sure I will have an opinion with time. Some things that SoundDeck does are impressive (I think the fine dynamics is largely driven by digital amps that the devise most likely used) and some sonic things are very miserable. Which came from the horror of digitally compressed front end I do not know. I do have feeling that SoundDeck does have some internal signal processing but I did not hear it too much driver my line level signal to say it with certainty.

I do not think that I will find it "good" but it will be at least convenient.

the Cat

Posted by Paul S on 04-18-2014

The trouble with all the really easy stuff is all the digital manipulation it undergoes before we even get a shot at reproduction. One must simply be in the proper mindset when "listening" to such dross.

Here is the latest from our friends at Sony, mainly trying to give another boost to DSD, but also accepting WAV, FLAC, etc., etc.:

http://www.whathifi.com/review/sony-hap-z1es

This player is loaded with features that will amaze and delight deaf technophiles.

As unlistenable as all the alternatives have been to date, the writing has been on the wall long enough for anyone to see.

This may not be "It" but it is definitely part of the WAV of the future. Too bad it costs so much, and too bad most of the cost is due to "features" that have nothing to do with sound quality as GSC would define it, despite Sony's claims to the contrary.

But if you are lucky enough to have good FM, why not a "decent" receiver and self-powered speakers, put them under cover?

Paul S

Posted by Paul S on 04-18-2014
fiogf49gjkf0d I meant to say, tuner with self-powered speakers or receiver with "regular" speakers, supposing Sterling or similar near-field "monitors", but it might be anything comfortable and easy to deal with. Two "parts" plus some cables. You can't beat that. Paul S

Posted by decoud on 04-18-2014
fiogf49gjkf0d This http://www.danleysoundlabs.com/danley/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/OS80-Spec-sheet.pdf has been mentioned before; speaker cable length is soluble, and then you use your main system, remotely controlled by your phone via wifi, no?

Posted by c1ferrari on 04-18-2014
fiogf49gjkf0d Paul, Have you listened to XLNC1 through an FM tuner? If so, how did it sound? KSDS sounded very good through a tuner :-)

Posted by Paul S on 04-18-2014
fiogf49gjkf0d Neither SD station sounds especially good, but the main problem for me is the consistently poor programming, pretty much random snippets from whomever, along with interminable explication/build-ups, almost never anything worthwhile. IMO, the USC (LA) station is no better in terms of programming, really, but maybe better sound. Best regards, Paul S

Posted by c1ferrari on 04-19-2014
fiogf49gjkf0d I was pleasantly surprised with the sound of KSDS through a tuner...it was a good-sounding system/room.

Posted by Paul S on 04-19-2014

As with the "audiophile" recordings, it is often difficult for me to separate the sound, per se, from "the way it sounds to me", in terms of content. Also, IMO, even the best "sound" cannot rescue a poor score/performance/recording/mix/processing/compression/ad nauseum, although I will grant that the "old" analog FM could - somehow - sound good despite massive compression, with amazing "ambience" that might keep things more interesting - provided there was actually something worth listening to in the program. I do sometimes catch a good performance of a worthy piece on KSDS late at night; but then I am listening via my little Kato radio and ridiculously poor headphones, so... I would certainly listen a lot more if I enjoyed the programming, regardless of sound quality. But then, I would probably start bitching about sound quality...

Best regards,
Paul

Posted by steverino on 04-19-2014

I certainly would not listen to much on the radio if I didn't have my Macintosh MR 67 tuner. I might listen to snippets just to see whether I might like a particular recording but extended listening through the computer etc would be very fatiguing. As for your comments about the tuner sonics, it goes back to the audiophile observation/truism/joke that "hi-fi" is all about bass (boom), air (sizzle) and recessed midrange while "musicality" lies with compressed, bandwidth limited, midrange-dominant systems. To combine both seems something reserved for the empyrean.

Posted by c1ferrari on 04-19-2014

steverino wrote:
...reserved for the empyrean.

The...quixotic...quest ;-)

Posted by Romy the Cat on 05-11-2014

This is what I did: got 75 feet of 3.5mm cable and put the Bose SoundDeck radio in this cable, running it from my main system’s preamp. I need to tell that the sound of that Bose radio when it run by line input is not even near the same as running it from iPhone. It is of cause nowhere near the pompous Hi-End standards of main playback but for outdoor listening it is perfectly acceptable. There is very funny thing however. When I met Amy he had her SoundDeck and we used it everywhere we traveled. I think 2 years back we were somewhere with no Bose radio and we bought another one to have some music with us. It was absolutely identical radio to the Amy’s Boss. Still the older Amy’s Boss sound soft, open and kind. The new production of the radio that we got sound much more stiff, controlled and kind of very ruthless. The new radio is well broken in. This is kind of irrelevant comment but it is a nice illustration of “progress” in audio.

Posted by steverino on 05-11-2014
fiogf49gjkf0d That's a lot of cable. Where do you hang it?? And doesn't that roll off the sound? Although maybe the Bose artificially inflates what is rolled off etc. Audio is one of the few places where two wrongs can make it right.

Posted by JJ Triode on 05-12-2014

Steverino, don't forget that Romy's Placette line stage has VERY low output impedance. It might be able to handle even the shunt capacitance of 75 feet of cable with minimal HF losses. If the cable is 100 pF/foot then its reactive impedance is about 1 k-ohm at 20 kHz. He then needs a preamp output impedance less than about 10 times smaller, or 100 ohm. As I recall, Romy said the Placett's impedance is around 10 ohm, so he should have very little rolloff.

By the way, I think it is very seldom that two wrongs make a right in audio.

Regards,
JJ

Posted by steverino on 05-12-2014
fiogf49gjkf0d But didn't Romy say up above that he was running it out of the headphone output not the regular back panel outputs? Or did I misunderstand? He specifically complained about the headphones as lacking low end back in the day.

Posted by Romy the Cat on 05-12-2014
fiogf49gjkf0d The Placett output impedance is 8R and it does helps but it has little relativity. I assure you that the “quality” that I get from this Bose radio is way less critical then what I get after this cable. So, I do not think that the cable has any significance while I am playing outside.

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