Post by garbulky on Jan 2, 2018 0:33:42 GMT -5
Four behind the speakers
Two behind the listening position
Two on the side-wall first reflection points
i tried an additional $1K of panels and bass traps (two on the ceiling, second reflection points, and corners) with no apparent improvement.
Much of my music library was originally in iTunes and initially ripped to ALE format (Apple Lossless Encoding). When I discovered that uncompressed WAV files sounded significantly better, I converted all the ALE files to WAV. I've been ripping directly to WAV using jRiver since.
Despite their (deserved) poor reputation, I connected the analog headphone jack of my MacBook Pro directly to the line-level inputs of my Yamaha integrated tonight. The music doesn't have the dynamics of the Oppo, but about another 25% of the remaining midrange "overload distortion" is now gone. This means that the cause of said distortion is either the rip / conversion, the Oppo itself, or the room itself.
My next "experiment" will be to play the original CD in another CD player (not the Oppo), then the rip from jRiver through the same CD player. If the original CD is clean-sounding on the alternate disc player, then the problem is either the rip or the Oppo). I may need to re-rip that portion of my library that sounds troublesome.
If the substitute CD player sounds clean, then I'll play the same disc in the Oppo. Distortion? Time to return the Oppo - I got a defect!
If the substitute CD player sounds no better than the Oppo when playing the source CD, then it's fair to assume that garbulky has been exactly right all along, and i need more (LOTS more) room treatment.
plug some headphones and see f there is a difference between the two transports
