Carlito55
Minor Hero
"I know what that is... That's music!"
Posts: 20
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Post by Carlito55 on Jan 29, 2015 6:29:23 GMT -5
"Hello Darlin'. Yes it's me again." (ZZ Top-Heaven Hell or Houston) Ok, here goes Episode 2-Attack of The Sherbourn! I can't believe I forgot to mention in my other post that I bought a really nice Technics RS-B78R cassette deck early on in my quest for auditory zen. That thing had cool VFD meters, auto-reverse, auto tape-type, Dolby B, Dolby C and dbx noise reduction! They claimed 92 dB SN with dbx which was on par with my CD player. It did sound indistinguishable from cd, which is to say very good to me at the time. Anyway, not long after I got the 7-150 I had my brother-from-another-mother over who happens to enjoy being an audio snob like myself. He's the only friend I have (except all my new friends here!) that knows and can appreciate the science behind the magic. I mean music. The house I'm in now has vaulted ceilings and beveled wall corners and an open concept so there's lots of space to pressurize plus a relatively fast decay time so I knew it would sound good in here before I bought it. My old Paradigm 9se's were rated for 100 watts and 6 ohms if I recall and each box had 2 8" drivers. My Yammy was rated at 85 W @ 8 ohms and 100 W @ 6 ohms. So that combination worked very well together, I was able to make my ears bleed many times thanks to Uriah Heep. Those speakers worked very well right up till that fateful evening. My BFF and I were imbibing generously and I was being generous with the Attenuator because Kyuss was spinning (distortion-laden heavy prog) so it had to be cranked. (One can't listen to Kyuss quietly because a lack of gain is itself a form of distortion!) It was at that point when we noticed an additional form of distortion, mechanical electrical-transducer distortion. We dropped the air guitars and I turned down the volume but that scraping noise didn't go away. I hit pause on the player and examined the drivers. I gently pushed on a bass cone and heard a scrape. I pushed on the other bass cone and it stayed pushed in! "Oh the humanity!" Talk about a buzz-kill.  We couldn't smell anything like burnt windings, it was strictly mechanical. 3 of my 4 woofers were shot just like that! I took them out of the cabinets and could see nice bright copper voice coils so we deduced that with being fed twice the power they've ever seen, the cone excursions were so great that the formers were bottoming out at the back of the magnets causing them to knurl over. They then begun to scrape the sides of the narrow magnetic gap they are supposed to operate in. Game over. Well now, isn't that special! Time to upgrade. I had been looking for an excuse for years already because those vinyl black ash covered speakers were looking dated but still sounded nice. No choice now so that fit in with my plans perfectly. I tell you, it's hard to shed a tear and rub your hands together joyfully at the same time. Now I got to experience something I rarely get to do, audition speakers. And if you want to read about that, tune in next time when you'll hear Miss Piggy say, "Oh Kermie!" Thanks for listening. Keep your stick on the ice. Carl |
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Post by geebo on Jan 29, 2015 7:53:40 GMT -5
Sorry to hear of the speakers' demise. But enjoy your quest for new!
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Post by teaman on Jan 29, 2015 10:13:50 GMT -5
Hey Carlito, if there is anything on your shopping list this is a great time to join the Emotiva E-Club. They have a big list of factory refreshed and B Stock offered up at some very, very good prices. The $49 club membership may even pay for itself in a single purchase.
By the way, thanks for the entertainment....sorry about your speakers!
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Carlito55
Minor Hero
"I know what that is... That's music!"
Posts: 20
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Post by Carlito55 on Jan 30, 2015 0:23:56 GMT -5
Hi Teaman, thanks but don't worry. I'm in the club. I think I've gotten 3 pieces since joining.
Just in case clarification is helpful, this point in my story happened around 2 years ago.
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Post by teaman on Jan 30, 2015 1:47:29 GMT -5
Hi Teaman, thanks but don't worry. I'm in the club. I think I've gotten 3 pieces since joining. Just in case clarification is helpful, this point in my story happened around 2 years ago. Gotcha! |
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Jan 30, 2015 4:36:39 GMT -5
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Carlito55
Minor Hero
"I know what that is... That's music!"
Posts: 20
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Post by Carlito55 on Jan 30, 2015 6:33:33 GMT -5
Sorry this is taking so long everybody. Didn't think I would be this wordy when I started. It was in me and had to get out!  Episode 3 - Revenge of the Blue Koolaid My speaker auditions started with what I knew best - Paradigm. I was always envious of my buddy's Reference Studio 40's but never thought I would get there. That's where I started. I brought my own discs with me and listened to Studio 20's and 60's, Boston's and Focal's and Monitor Audio Silver's and Gold's. I tried to find some nice PSB's but only saw bottom end stuff. For my ears, the Monitor Gold's sounded most like the Studio 20's which seemed to be the sound I prefer. The Silver's didn't have the bottom end the others did. The Gold's and the 20's had more and better-defined bass (for a bookshelf model). From there it wasn't a hard choice for me. The Golds were pretty close to Studio 60 money but had nowhere near the bass (bookshelf vs floor stander so not a fair fight), the 20's had curved cabinets plus more going on when the grills were off. I just felt like I was getting more tech for less money plus fantastic detailed imaging with the 20's. Once that was settled, I added the CC-490 center and a pair of ADP-590 surrounds and was done. The matching Paradigm sub was too much $$ for me so I made do with my car DIY sub which I built sealed with a 12" Eclipse driver and a Q of 0.707. In my search for a pre/pro, I had heard a wee bit about Emotiva; an up and coming ID audio company. I decided to check out the website and liked what I saw and read. Their text appealed to my SQ aspirations; no flashy, in-your-face lights and graphics that kids with bandpass subs like. I had also been considering Onkyo and Integra but read mixed reviews. My experience with the AV7005 taught me it wasn't going to be as easy or straight forward as I thought. I kept coming back to you guys here in these pages. I was apprehensive because Emotiva was an unknown quantity to me and the UMC-1 had its trials and tribulations. But... I did read lots of examples of a company that cared, that fixed their mistakes and built tanks that sounded like Stradivarius's! It was hard to argue with that. I also really liked the 40% off the next gen scheme which amounted to saving $100 off the impending XMC-1 and getting another SSP while you wait. The fishing lure got pretty enough for me to bite! I bought the UMC-1 with the end goal being the XMC-1. Without calibrating speaker level trims and all that nonsense (since I had never done that in my life before and I was over 40!), I needed to hear what it did with Stereo. I threw on my favourite demo discs (numbered MoFi SACDs of SRV-Couldn't Stand The Weather and Santana - Caravanserai) and my speakers just disappeared!! They simply became lovely pieces of furniture in the room. I could be looking right at them from my chair but all the instruments and vocals were located elsewhere! I kept having to get up and put my ear against the center channel to make sure it wasn't on. That right there was my ticket to ride. Emotiva won another loyal customer. Even though in my grand scheme of things the UMC is "temporary" (I use that word loosely since the XMC refused to be rushed), it's SQ and features caused high levels of forgiveness for its quirks and patience for its successor. Once again I apologize for rambling. I can only take solace in the knowledge that it's easy to change the channel if your bored and if you're still reading then I've succeeded and know that you are as passionate about music and the components that reproduce it as I am. I really want to swear that I will be done next time!  Carl |
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Carlito55
Minor Hero
"I know what that is... That's music!"
Posts: 20
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Post by Carlito55 on Jan 30, 2015 6:54:25 GMT -5
Chuckienut! Hi, it's a pleasure to meet you. I've enjoyed your brand of witty nuthouse for years now. Thanks for lifting the ban while I crawl underneath it. As usual, you've hit the nail on the head. I wasn't actually familiar with the source of that phrase. That video solidified my memory that I was on the right track. It was The Mask I was thinking of. The Schwab commercial is pretty good actually. Thanks for givin' me some lernin'! I better go study for the test. |
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Carlito55
Minor Hero
"I know what that is... That's music!"
Posts: 20
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Post by Carlito55 on Jan 31, 2015 4:26:57 GMT -5
Just in case you've got nothing better to do, I'm not done... Episode 4 - A New Pair of Monoblocks I just looked it up and found that I bought the UMC-1 in June 2012 so I've been hanging around here since a couple months before that. I've never been so interested in what's going on in a forum before this one. It's great here! The hardest I laughed was over a typo. It was late at night after work, I was very tired and wasting time in the reading room. It was some XMC thread and someone was asking about the automatic room erection.  I literally had tears coming out of my eyeballs and trying my hardest to be quiet because the wife was sleeping a few feet away! My laughter had a hair trigger for quite awhile because it was mentioned a couple more times. I didn't get much read after that. My abs felt like I had done 50 fast sit-ups. So I was running all 6 channels (5.1) off the Sherbourn for awhile. It was all good until the Blue Koolaid Group set up their corner stand again with the XPA-1Ls. Damn it Jim! I'm an audiophile, not a commoner! Class A monoblocks that I can afford?! B. E. A. Utiful! I enjoyed reading the members raving about them so at the next sale they were mine! I also enjoyed finding similarly spec'd Pass Labs amps (only 10 W class A but gorgeous!) that were 10 times the price I paid!!  There was some hassle before I could listen to them though. One of them powered on nicely but the other didn't. I got the blue E and the red status and then I thought I saw a flash of light. Then I did see a flash of light, greenish white, from inside the cover. Since I had unpacked spare fuses I suspected both had blown, one after the other. I opened it up and saw I was right. I replaced them with the spares and hooked up power and switched it on while looking at the fuses. I got the amber E so I clicked it and less than a second later both fuses flashed at once this time. Crap! Called the store and the guy said it could be 1 of 4 things but they needed it back to fix it. I explained that I'm north of the border and I use a parcel pickup place in ND. He said if they could temporarily have a credit card number, he could ship a new one to that ND address with an RMA shipping label in an envelope stuck to the outside of the box. All I had to do was box up the broken one and drive down there (an hour away), get the return label off the new one and stick it to the old one, leave the old one there and take the new one home! Once they received the broken one they cancelled the credit card transaction. No additional cost to me. How simple was that! Didn't even have to drive down twice. See? Only a little hassle, I couldn't ask for a better solution. And... I ended up with a serial number closer to my good one. Awesome. Now I was cooking with gas. Everything worked great and looked good. And sounded fantastic! Such power and grace those things have. I think I've reached the point of diminishing returns, it's getting hard to hear differences from upgrades now. I think the next biggest difference I'm going to hear is playing with all the bands of PEQ and Dirac when I get the xmc. By this time I had reached a point where I needed to change my power conditioner. I had been using a Monster HTS-1600 which worked fine (it saved me a couple of times) but the fact was I needed more outlets for all my pieces. 8 no longer cut the mustard, I needed 12. I looked at power bars from Tripp Lite and full sized components from Monster, Panamax and Furman. Ideally I wanted a something that looked like another component to fill up my rack, preferably with some kind of gauge/display on the front (which ruled out Tripp Lite, didn't have enough outlets either). I don't like how expensive these things are but I recognize the job they need to do. I liked the cut of Furman's jib because they've been around a long time and they are now the 'professional' line to Panamax's consumer line. Unfortunately, to get a Furman that has the word Reference on it, your looking at over 4 figures. So I dialled things back a bit and did a lot of hunting to find an Elite-15 PF i for less than the msrp in 2006 when it came out. I found it on a local shop's website, on sale, for $150 more than the msrp I had seen. No way. I found it much cheaper online from the US, even with the exchange. Even though I bought it for practical and audiophile status reasons, their claims of sound improvement don't hurt. I haven't taken the time to A/B it and compare the sound, but I can't find fault in their argument, assuming they aren't fudging their results. If you're interested, I found 2 videos from them: a short one and a long one. The short one is on YouTube from Furman. The long one is an episode of Home Theater Geeks with Scott Wilkinson. Home Theater Geeks 139 I'd be interested to hear comments on their assertions. Well, that's it for today. I really think I'm almost out of stories. I must be talking to myself by now! |
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Post by cwmcobra on Jan 31, 2015 9:00:18 GMT -5
Nope, still listening with ears wide open! Have a great weekend!
Cheers!
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Post by n9eryeah on Jan 31, 2015 9:06:37 GMT -5
I greatly enjoyed reading your episodes.
I am in Winnipeg as well so as you speak of different brands, stores and goofy pricing I know it all to well.
Welcome and we will see you around.
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Post by creimes on Jan 31, 2015 12:33:56 GMT -5
What are your impressions of the snobby Advance Electronics, my experiences there to me relate why brick and mortar stores are dropping like flies haha
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Post by creimes on Jan 31, 2015 12:35:32 GMT -5
Well, that's it for today. I really think I'm almost out of stories. I must be talking to myself by now! Are you yelling over there to the East, I think I heard you out here in Brandon hahaha  |
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Carlito55
Minor Hero
"I know what that is... That's music!"
Posts: 20
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Post by Carlito55 on Jan 31, 2015 18:23:38 GMT -5
Nope, still listening with ears wide open! Have a great weekend! Cheers! Thanks for being louder than the crickets!  I'm glad to know I haven't lost the audience yet. |
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Carlito55
Minor Hero
"I know what that is... That's music!"
Posts: 20
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Post by Carlito55 on Jan 31, 2015 18:35:24 GMT -5
I greatly enjoyed reading your episodes. I am in Winnipeg as well so as you speak of different brands, stores and goofy pricing I know it all to well. Welcome and we will see you around. Thank you very much! I see you have some cool stuff at home! Monitor Golds; must sound fantastic over there! Glad to know another local on the interweb. |
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Carlito55
Minor Hero
"I know what that is... That's music!"
Posts: 20
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Post by Carlito55 on Feb 1, 2015 4:50:07 GMT -5
What are your impressions of the snobby Advance Electronics, my experiences there to me relate why brick and mortar stores are dropping like flies haha Hmm, I'm sorry to hear that. I've bought all my speakers there and my Marantz CD player. My audiophile buddy has had good experiences there too, Rotel and Paradigm. In the past, he and I found Creative to be a little snooty because they didn't want to deal so one could get the same thing at Advance for less cash. When I auditioned the Monitors, I found out Creative had changed ownership and the guy was accommodating for me. I've had good experiences at Brian Reimer too. Bought my ADC eq there, many many blank cassettes, car audio, patch cables and my latest tv. I always liked to window shop and dream in those places too, you could pick up brochures and literature on equipment and analyze them to death when you got home. I guess I still have nostalgia for the brick and mortar specialty audio stores because that's all there was when I grew up. It's clear they're having a harder time because they can't compete on price with the Internet. I'd say that's one of the main reasons we're all fans of the Blue Koolaid Group. That and they build a great mouse trap! I, for one, am not ready to see them disappear just yet. |
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Post by creimes on Feb 1, 2015 11:25:09 GMT -5
What are your impressions of the snobby Advance Electronics, my experiences there to me relate why brick and mortar stores are dropping like flies haha Hmm, I'm sorry to hear that. I've bought all my speakers there and my Marantz CD player. My audiophile buddy has had good experiences there too, Rotel and Paradigm. In the past, he and I found Creative to be a little snooty because they didn't want to deal so one could get the same thing at Advance for less cash. When I auditioned the Monitors, I found out Creative had changed ownership and the guy was accommodating for me. I've had good experiences at Brian Reimer too. Bought my ADC eq there, many many blank cassettes, car audio, patch cables and my latest tv. I always liked to window shop and dream in those places too, you could pick up brochures and literature on equipment and analyze them to death when you got home. I guess I still have nostalgia for the brick and mortar specialty audio stores because that's all there was when I grew up. It's clear they're having a harder time because they can't compete on price with the Internet. I'd say that's one of the main reasons we're all fans of the Blue Koolaid Group. That and they build a great mouse trap! I, for one, am not ready to see them disappear just yet. I agree that it is exciting to go out on an adventure to check stuff out in person, it just drives me crazy how they can treat someone who doesn't have deep pockets haha, I've had good and bad experiences but of course the bad ones are the ones that stick with you the most, same thing for when i was younger there was no internet so Brian Reimer and the local Future Shop were my places to check out, when I was like 14 or 15 I listened to some Boston Acoustic speakers at Brian Reimer but at the time didn't have the funds to complete the purchase haha, oh but there was a lot of dreaming cause that was free lol, I really should get a discount there though, my middle name is Bryan and my last name is Reimer haha. Peace out for now, Chad |
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Carlito55
Minor Hero
"I know what that is... That's music!"
Posts: 20
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Post by Carlito55 on Feb 3, 2015 23:35:27 GMT -5
Hmm, I'm sorry to hear that. I've bought all my speakers there and my Marantz CD player. My audiophile buddy has had good experiences there too, Rotel and Paradigm. In the past, he and I found Creative to be a little snooty because they didn't want to deal so one could get the same thing at Advance for less cash. When I auditioned the Monitors, I found out Creative had changed ownership and the guy was accommodating for me. I've had good experiences at Brian Reimer too. Bought my ADC eq there, many many blank cassettes, car audio, patch cables and my latest tv. I always liked to window shop and dream in those places too, you could pick up brochures and literature on equipment and analyze them to death when you got home. I guess I still have nostalgia for the brick and mortar specialty audio stores because that's all there was when I grew up. It's clear they're having a harder time because they can't compete on price with the Internet. I'd say that's one of the main reasons we're all fans of the Blue Koolaid Group. That and they build a great mouse trap! I, for one, am not ready to see them disappear just yet. I agree that it is exciting to go out on an adventure to check stuff out in person, it just drives me crazy how they can treat someone who doesn't have deep pockets haha, I've had good and bad experiences but of course the bad ones are the ones that stick with you the most, same thing for when i was younger there was no internet so Brian Reimer and the local Future Shop were my places to check out, when I was like 14 or 15 I listened to some Boston Acoustic speakers at Brian Reimer but at the time didn't have the funds to complete the purchase haha, oh but there was a lot of dreaming cause that was free lol, I really should get a discount there though, my middle name is Bryan and my last name is Reimer haha. Peace out for now, Chad Lol, that is hilarious. I'm totally on your side: discount all the way! You may not believe me (since my wife didn't) but I suspected your last name might be Reimer. I looked at your screen name and thought if the c is for Chad, what are the odds the rest is Reimer. Good play on words. My last name is Fast so it was easy to make that guess. |
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Carlito55
Minor Hero
"I know what that is... That's music!"
Posts: 20
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Post by Carlito55 on Feb 5, 2015 5:22:26 GMT -5
Episode 5 - Emotiva Strikes Back I thought of another story I should have told earlier: The Dreaded Ground Loop. After I got the UMC-1 hooked up and all sources connected, I noticed a hum from my MLP which is a little over 12' from the main speakers. I found that to be quite unacceptable. While it's true I can't hear it over most music, I do have material that's quiet enough where I do hear it. One of the main reasons for going separates for me is better specs which in this case is a quieter noise floor. I did a bunch of reading on here and elsewhere then some diagnosing. The 60 Hz hum was independent of the volume control, it stayed at the same amplitude regardless of where the volume was, or which input was selected. I still had it after disconnecting all my sources including cable and tv. I also had all AC and cable coax fed through the Monster conditioner which I thought would help. My next step was to remove all 6 RCAs between the UMC and Sherbourn. When there was only 1 connected, silence. When there was 2 (or more), didn't matter which 2, I got the hum. I read that too; as soon as there's 2 connections between devices, you have a physical loop which makes a ground loop possible as was the case here. So the foundation of my system at that point had a flaw. I didn't know what to do about it or how to fix it. I lived with it for 2 years until this past Christmas. I crossed a major hurdle in my life in early fall which translated into additional resources at my disposal. Happy, happy, joy,joy! I gained a lot of ground recently in terms of components I wanted. Since I got the monoblocks, I didn't need a 7 channel amp any more so I was looking to decommission the Sherbourn and replace it with an XPA-3. I was also looking at a pair of XPA-200's which would allow me to add a surround rear channel in the future. When the fall sale hit I noticed that my 2 options were the same price so I chose the extra channel option instead of more power per channel. I also ordered myself the SVS PC-13 Ultra to replace my DIY car sub. I also ordered a URC MX-450 remote because my old MX-500 had no backlighting any more and was becoming increasingly annoying. And I ordered a pair of Airmotiv 5s's for the desktop. That was the most expensive Christmas I've ever had and most likely will ever have. Even though I bought it all and knew what I was getting, I still had a great time opening my presents! Back to the ground loop: I'm surprised at myself for not noticing instantly but a couple of weeks after I had the XPA-200's performing center and surround duties, I realized I had no more hum! Not even the upgrade to the Furman got rid of the hum. And it is claimed to provide a star ground configuration which can help in some cases. Now I've got a proper electrical noise floor, something that is implied by the rack of "complicated" components in my living room. BTW, my actual in-room noise floor at my MLP is 28 dB (A) and 38 dB (C) so it's reasonably quiet in here. And now it stays that way when the system is powered. My other Emo piece is the ERC-3. What a fine piece of kit! I'm currently using the analog RCA outs and bass management in the UMC and it still sounds better than the CD5001 connected digitally to the UMC. The CD5001 uses a Cirrus Logic DAC so I assume it will sound similar enough that I might as well save a conversion and just let the UMC do it since I need BM anyway. I was a little put off but the racket produced by the transport in the ERC-3. It was helpful to learn that it's a DVD transport so the CDs spin faster than normal. It has calmed down a little with more use and it does vary a bit depending on the disc. It does still bug me a little because I've read that others hear no noise whatsoever from theirs but apparently there's nothing wrong with the ones that do make noise. Anyway, it is my opinion that I'm not basking in the full auditory sweetness of the ERC-3 because of another fundamental flaw in my system: my small main speakers. I do love my 2 channel but I always require BM. I do expect an improvement after I get the xmc with its ADC and DAC capabilities but I still won't be able to take advantage of its Reference Stereo mode. Currently I can only use Direct mode in the UMC by playing multichannel SACDs. Eventually I will have to upgrade my mains to full range to keep the signal chain as pure as possible. However, even with my current conversion needs I expect to be completely satisfied by the sound of the XMC when I jump off that bridge. I'm very much looking forward to that and have enjoyed reading about the beefs and bouquets since it's release. Well kids, I have a feeling this will be the last episode for a while. Perhaps I'll do #6 when I bring home the big SSP. Then it'll feel complete since I've been ripping off the Star Wars titles. I thank you very much for your time and to Emotiva for providing the venue to ramble on endlessly! I'm so glad to have taken the plunge with this company. They have provided me a way to own 4 power amps when I thought I would only ever get to dream of owning 1!! Thank you, thank you, thank you! Did I win the longest introduction award?  Carl |
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Post by cwmcobra on Feb 5, 2015 7:17:09 GMT -5
Carl,
You win my award for not only longest, but most interesting. Your story about the 60 Hz hum with the Sherbourn amp got my attention. I own two Sherbourn amps and have experienced a bit of a hum with the 7-350. I was hoping you would share a "magic bullet" cure, but see that the cure was to take it out of service. I'm not hearing a hum from my 7-150 and hope that the hum with the 7-350 will be cured with different cabling when I put it into service.
Cheers!
Chuck
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We couldn't smell anything like burnt windings, it was strictly mechanical. 3 of my 4 woofers were shot just like that! I took them out of the cabinets and could see nice bright copper voice coils so we deduced that with being fed twice the power they've ever seen, the cone excursions were so great that the formers were bottoming out at the back of the magnets causing them to knurl over. They then begun to scrape the sides of the narrow magnetic gap they are supposed to operate in. Game over.
I literally had tears coming out of my eyeballs and trying my hardest to be quiet because the wife was sleeping a few feet away! My laughter had a hair trigger for quite awhile because it was mentioned a couple more times. I didn't get much read after that. My abs felt like I had done 50 fast sit-ups.
There was some hassle before I could listen to them though. One of them powered on nicely but the other didn't. I got the blue E and the red status and then I thought I saw a flash of light. Then I did see a flash of light, greenish white, from inside the cover. Since I had unpacked spare fuses I suspected both had blown, one after the other. I opened it up and saw I was right. I replaced them with the spares and hooked up power and switched it on while looking at the fuses. I got the amber E so I clicked it and less than a second later both fuses flashed at once this time. Crap! Called the store and the guy said it could be 1 of 4 things but they needed it back to fix it. I explained that I'm north of the border and I use a parcel pickup place in ND. He said if they could temporarily have a credit card number, he could ship a new one to that ND address with an RMA shipping label in an envelope stuck to the outside of the box. All I had to do was box up the broken one and drive down there (an hour away), get the return label off the new one and stick it to the old one, leave the old one there and take the new one home! Once they received the broken one they cancelled the credit card transaction. No additional cost to me. How simple was that! Didn't even have to drive down twice. See? Only a little hassle, I couldn't ask for a better solution. And... I ended up with a serial number closer to my good one. Awesome. Now I was cooking with gas. Everything worked great and looked good. And sounded fantastic! Such power and grace those things have. I think I've reached the point of diminishing returns, it's getting hard to hear differences from upgrades now. I think the next biggest difference I'm going to hear is playing with all the bands of PEQ and Dirac when I get the xmc.
