I have a dedicated music room in our basement. It has been extensively treated acoustically with bass traps and diffusors in all the right places. This is the best listening room I've ever had. I listen 90+% of the time to classical music. This system does a great job of reproducing acoustic instruments. Violin, cello and piano timbres are rendered very realistically. System dynamics are outstanding. Recently added the Starkrimson class D monoblocks which are undergoing extensive listening trials.
I am looking at either of the following combinations for starters:
Cary SLP 03 and a 2 channel BAT VK6200 (2 channels added later for "surround"), OR the Cary SLP 05 and a Parasound Halo A21 to go with my Martin Logan Summit speakers (Hybrid electrostatic panel with two 10" woofers, going down to 24 Hz). I would love a ARC REF3 but at $10K without any discount, there wouldn't any cash left over to do anything else for a very LONG time!
I too got introduced to surrond along time ago and could never forget that experience. A slight time delay from a pair of cheap rear speakers opened up the front sound stage making the music experience very real. No center channel or extra rear/side speakers necessary to create the effect. You didn't even know the speakers were in the back of the room! The Phasearound sounds like it is NOT a time delay unit, just taking out of phase information and sending it to the rear channel at the same time to create the ambience. Is that correct?
I'd like to recreate that again. I have a few questions for you.
Where exactly have you placed the rear speakers?
Is there placement critical to creating the effect?
How far back, are they outside the space of the front speares? Inside?
Have you tried this with movies ever, with a phantom center channel?
Thanks!
PS: You have a great, clean looking system that I'm sure SOUNDS great too. I'm a less is more fan. Fantastic job of putting your system together!
