Greeting From Northampton, England

bach_king

Member
Mar 10, 2018
39
5
8
Northampton , England
Hello Everybody

My name is David King and I live in Northampton, England which is about 65 miles north of London in what we call the Rose of the Shires (Northamptonshire)

I am a retired Management Consultant and I have been a lifelong music lover and audio enthusiast. This month I celebrate 50 years since I assembled my first system. It was very basic and consisted of the ubiquitous Garrard SP 25 Mk 2, a Tripletone 15wpc valve amplifier, and a pair of home made Rex Baldock designed Paraline horn loudspeakers which my Dad helped me to build in his garage. The standard version of these speakers used a single cone Elac 8 inch driver. I suped mine up by using an Eagle twin cone 8 inch long throw driver with a wizzer cone in the centre.

Since then there have been many iterations of my system.Nowadays I am very fortunate to have a dedicated music room which is 23ft x 20 ft x 10ft - 4500 cubic feet of heaven.

The present system consists of the following

SME Model 20/3A record deck with Denon DL-S1 moving coil cartridge and Furutech AG12 tonearm cable
Quad Platinum DMP Media Player
Music First Audio Classic 632 MM Phono Preamp with Trichord ‘Never Connected’ power supply
Music First Audio Classic V2 Step up Transformer
Music First Audio Baby Reference V2 Passive Preamp
Music First Audio Senlac SLE MOSFET Power Amplifiers
Howes Accoustics Quad II Valve Power Amplifiers
Tannoy Prestige Canterbury Gold Reference Loudspeakers
The stands are HI FI Racks Podium Reference

The system had a dedicated ring man in power supply. All sockets are Furutech switchless units. There are no mains power blocks. All powered units connect directly to the mains supply. The mains cables are all Nimrod HP Mk 2 power cords and all interconnects are VdH D102 III and are a mix of balanced and singled ended

I am in the process of simplifying and rationalising the system largely because I am getting on a bit and need to make it easier to maintain. I started 2 years ago by selling my Tannoy Westminster Royal HE speakers which I had owned for 11 years. I loved the Westminster’s but they are so large and heavy (138kg) I was finding it increasingly hard to move them hard to move them particularly now I have a few health issues. Before the Westminsters I had Klipschorns for 10 years. They were fabulous but I never quite managed to tame the treble which could be a bit fierce. I was concerned about losing the Westminsters fearing that sound quality might suffer. I needn’t have worried. The Canterbury’s are beautiful and I now have better performance than I had from the Westminsters. I think that the reason for this is threefold. Firstly the Canterburys use a completely new driver and crossover which is better than the HE version and is also cryogenically treated. Secondly I think that the Canterburys work more effectively in my room which was probably too small or the Westminsters. Thirdly I found it much easier to optimise the positioning of the Canterburys. (I found Jim Smith’s book and dvd’s ‘Get Better Sound’ very useful for this.

I am a huge fan of live music which has always been my benchmark against which to judge hifi system performance

In the next few months I am planning to simplify the amplification and cabling by adding a high quality integrated unit probably from Luxman (L590AX Mk II or L509X) and adding an sacd player also likely to be from Luxman. (L-06u) This will enable me to have the amplifier on the top of the rack with most connectors in easy reach.

The little Howes accoustics valve amplifiers will stay. They are delightful and give me the best sound I have ever had.

I am not a techie but I do like to work to optimise the performance of my kit. I have published a few pieces of work on this which have been published. I you are interested Google my name - David King and Tannoy Westminster Royal and you will find some of my pieces I have written, on Jeff Day’s site which is a little ‘Mecca’ for us Tannoy owners.

I love church music and am fortunate enough to live only 50 miles from Cambridge so Kings College Chapel is a regular visiting place for me. This stems from the fact that as a child I was a choir school boy in Beaconsfield and lived music for many years. The organ there was refurbished in 2016 and is sounding sublime as of course is the choir. To hear the Festival of 9 Lesson & Carols is unforgettable and should certainly feature on the bucket list of any lover of this type of music. I have been lucky enough to 12 times so far. In one of the services I sat next to Professor Stephen Hawking.

I am also a great jazz fan and a once again am fortunate to live 20 miles from The Stables which is a small concert venue in Milton Keynes in Buckinghamshire. It was set up by the famous jazz musician John Dankworth and his wife Cleo Laine and it sits in the grounds of their Rectory home. They get superb acts there and next Friday (16th March) a great clarinetist called Pete Long with his Goodmen Band will be recreating the seminal 1938 Carnegie Hall Concert of Benny Goodman. My wife Gillian and I will be going and it should be a great evening.

I hope I haven’t bored you too much. I look forward to posting many more items in the future and contributing something to your posting. Thank you for reading.

All the best

David
 
Last edited:

jfrech

VIP/Donor
Sep 3, 2012
2,152
749
1,160
Austin
Hi David, great to read about your system ! I am curious why you want a integrated amp but plan to keep the Howes valve amps...
 

bach_king

Member
Mar 10, 2018
39
5
8
Northampton , England
Sorry I was not clear in my post. Currently the Howes amplifiers are driven by my passive transformer preamp (MFA Baby Reference V2) The plan is that the MFA preamp which is a stunner, and one of the best you can buy at any price, will remain. This will still give me exactly what I have now in terms of sounds quality. The Luxman models have a ‘pre out’ facility and my hope is that the Luxman pre will be good enough to facilitate the departure of the MFA. The MFA is great but a bit ‘hair shirt’ as it has no remote control. If the Luxman pre is not as good I will keep the MFA and use it from time to time.

The Luxman’s main job in the change is to provide superb class A solid state amplification. I am not a fit as I was and I want to reduce or eliminate the need for reaching and stretching behind the racks by reducing the amount of cabling and getting the remaining cables and connectors easily accessible from a standing position on the top of the racks.

I hope this makes it a bit clearer

All the best

David
 
Last edited:

treitz3

Super Moderator
Staff member
Dec 25, 2011
5,459
961
1,290
The tube lair in beautiful Rock Hill, SC
Hello David from across the big pond. Please allow me to offer you a very warm welcome to the What's Best Forum! Cool read.

Tom
 

Ron Resnick

Site Co-Owner, Administrator
Jan 24, 2015
16,017
13,347
2,665
Beverly Hills, CA
Welcome to WBF, David!
 

spiritofmusic

Well-Known Member
Jun 13, 2013
14,605
5,413
1,278
E. England
David, greetings from the Norfolk/Cambridgeshire border. Always good to hear about a fellow traveller’s journey. Congrats on finding a more manageable spkr that builds upon yr previous behemoths.
Me and my GF Ra are trying to do more live music in Norfolk and Cambs, your thread has convinced me even more. Maybe I could bend yr ear on ideas/venues. Always up for a meet, you’re v welcome here at the chapel.
 

bach_king

Member
Mar 10, 2018
39
5
8
Northampton , England
Sorry for the delay in responding. I have been out of circulation today auditioning some Luxman kit.

Yes I was very pleased to get it sorted. The Westmonsters are not easy to accommodate. I managed to do a very good deal on the Canterbury’s Thanks for the invitation. Likewise if you are passing by Northampton do let me know. I would be pleased to buy you a cup of tea

Kind regards

David
 

spiritofmusic

Well-Known Member
Jun 13, 2013
14,605
5,413
1,278
E. England
Sure David, mutual visits could be fun. I’ll PM you.
 

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