First off the input selector went on my 2+ year old amp last Thursday, thankfully my parents took out the extended warranty on it and so that’s back at Richer Sounds, hopefully being sorted as I type. I must admit I do slightly hope that it’s not ‘cost effective’ for them to fix it and a suitable replacement is offered. I doubt it but I can hope.

Second toy to go was the hard drive on my 3+ year old Mac mini. Boy oh boy am I soooo glad that I’m running Leopard now, Time Machine has been a real life saver. Ok life saver is a little extreme but the convenience of being back up and running so quickly with no data lost is, well ideal and perfect. The cost of upgrading to Leopard has been worth every penny and then some.

I must admit I don’t know if Vista or Win7 have a built in backup daemon, for Microsoft’s sake I certainly hope so. Further to that I hope it is as easy to use as Time Machine. Short of my impatience it has been a dream to use.

So the huge downside to a HD crash, losing all the data has been averted but the other downside is finding a replacement drive. Seems the older (P)ATA 2.5″ tech is old enough now to be something of an antique and thus somewhat pricier. Still, I’ve ordered a 160GB drive for about £50 that should see me through until this Mac gets replaced.

So how do I know Time Machine worked so well to back up from?

Thankfully I have a disk lying about from my old laptop that I’ve been able to wedge in until the new disk turns up, phew!

The silk pants? Ok I haven’t got any but heck, got your attention right?

Dan

So Friday Rachel came over and Kita got some Christmas shopping out of the way (think I’ll be starting that soon) and Saturday we all just relaxed in the lounge, watching movies and catching up. In the evening we had some HP friends over for a somewhat epic Monopoly game, finishing somewhere between 2 and 3 Sunday morning. Come to think about it though, are there any Monopoly games that aren’t epic?

Sunday was somewhat busier however and I don’t think I was too popular waking Kita up to head back to Oxford. First off I had to go to Richer Sounds to take my poorly CD player back for repairs, then sort out a refund from Halfords and finally go to Debi’s (Kita’s Mum) for dinner.

The left channel has been intermittently cutting out on the CD player and only a full power on/off will resolve it. Seeing as I took the Super Care package out on it I figured I’d best get my money’s worth turned out to really be worth it. I’ve got a loan unit whilst mine is away (2-4 weeks) and the customer service was simply superb. I’d done the usual thing of losing the receipts etc and the clerk was plenty happy enough looking up the purchase. I’ve now decided that on the basis of all the excellent service I’ve got over the years that when it comes to any other purchases, assuming they sell the product, it will come from there.

So I was a happy customer at Richer Sounds and then tried to sort out the battery mess from last week, Halfords’ tried to wriggle out of the refund a little bit. I’m not sure if this was intentional or if they just didn’t understand, who knows? Still it’s all sorted now and my credit card got refunded

The evening saw us having a meal at Kita’s Mums place and well, I guess you can tell from Kita’s post it was… interesting! I haven’t got the time to go into it right now and if you follow the link my comment should give some indication of how things are. I’ll probably post about it later, if anything, just to get my thoughts clear and committed.

So yeah, successful retail experience in the day. Less successful evening.

Dan

So thanks for the advice, it paid off

Although it was not without its sacrifices, sand is heavy and walking even just 10 minutes up the road to B & Q was hard, well the walk back was hard, very hard. In fact I think Ben and I could now both do with some kind of back board to straighten ourselves out!

Dan

A couple of google’s later and it would look like the best way to fix this and as a by product, produce more bass is to fill the stands. I must admit I vaguely remember reading something along those lines in the manual as well.

So my question is what with? There’s plain play sand, cheap and hopefully cheerful or Atabite, the erm, audiophile solution! Thing is the only advantage I can see of the Atabites is less mess but being larger than a grain of sand they wont fit in as well, if that makes sense :S

I was also thinking I could put the sand in bags but annoyingly I couldn’t get them in the stand tubes doing that

I’m open to suggestions!

Dan

It sounds better than I thought and I can have a fair bit of volume without a) distortion b) annoying everyone as the stands seem to be doing their job

I would post a photo of it, ‘cos I’m sad like that but the room is too much of a mess. I think it’ll wait till Portsmouth probably, then I can have it set-up perfectly (and looking good!).

So yeah rather chuffed, just wish I had more time to listen, I’m sure it’ll be good at Uni whilst studying etc

For those that are interested my system is now:

• Cambridge Audio 540A V2 Amplifier
• Cambridge Audio 640C V2 CD Player
• Monitor Audio BR2 Speakers
• Atacama Nexus 6 Stands
• Cambridge Audio Arctic Interconnect
• Chord Carnival Silver Plus Speaker Cable with Banana Plugs

Sounds cracking, hopefully some of you will get to hear it

Enjoy music

Dan

Sticking with the hi-fi/Cambridge Audio theme I’m doing a site based on their Incognito range of products. This evening I’ve knocked out the design in Fireworks and made the template from which the rest of the site will be based, let me know what you think. The design isn’t marked (I don’t think) which is a shame as I’m rather chuffed with it

So that was my Tuesday evening, also seem to have had a really good time with God tonight, can’t really explain it other than just a good chat, a catch-up really about thoughts I’m having at the moment, it’s good to chat with Him

God bless

Dan

So I’m tired but elsewhere back to the amp issue. It could be that it isn’t an issue at all as according to Richer Sounds at low level the amp is biased to the right channel as it saves wear and tear on the torridal transformer.

In response, can you please confirm if this problem occurs at very low level? If so this is common with all Cambridge Audio Amplifiers to save wear & tear on the Torridal Transformer.

If this is occurring at higher volumes, then you best advised to have the unit booked in for an assessment.

Anyway time to clear up J’s

Dan

After various listening sessions with Ben earlier it seems that the right channel is stronger (volume wise) than the left. It’s an annoyance rather than a problem as it’s in warranty etc so financially I’m not too worried about it but it’d be nice if it would just work, would just be right.

I was thinking that it might be the speakers but we’ve checked that, swapping them over, the only other hardware is the speaker cable I guess. We tested it by putting a constant note from the Mini in Sibelius through the amp and varying the channel on the computer and the level was more than noticeable

I’ve asked on a forum for advice as well so hopefully it’ll all be ok. The main downside though is that I don’t want to really be hauling another amp all the way to Oxford, again! With summer not being that far away I might just leave it till then but is it better to do it whilst I notice it etc, strike whilst the iron is hot? Also I think it is like having a dead pixel, you know, how you just can’t help but see it.

Anyway I really should be in bed as I’ve got work in the morning.

Night

Dan

I’ve been to some pretty impressive concerts; Live 8 and Muse (many years ago) stand out but oh how I wish I had been slightly older than 7 when Pink Floyd embarked on their last tour (to date). I was fortunate enough to see them at Hyde Park for Live 8 and that was a fantastic experience (Kate if you read this thank you for that) but to see them on their own stage looks and sounds incredible, the DVD shows that much. Talking of which, it’d be awesome to put on a whacking great plasma screen and crank up the volume wish I could have cranked up the volume here.

Following my viewing I even watched the special features on the 2nd DVD, something I rarely/ever do and it had the induction to The Rock and Roll Music Hall of Fame for Pink Floyd where Billy Corgan of The Smashing Pumpkins handed the band their trophies. Before that though he went on about one song that really affected him, Wish You Were Here. He talked about how he play it over and over when his Grandma was dyeing of cancer and it got to me.

I haven’t been feeling to great the past week or so and Sarah seems to be never far away from my thoughts and what Billy Corgan was saying was right on.

How I wish, how I wish you were here.
We’re just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl,
year after year,
running over the same old ground. What have we found?
The same old fears,
wish you were here.

I think it’s just this time of year, it was a turbulent time in our relationship followed by one of the best times. It was all good don’t get me wrong but the last few months were really incredible. I have a shocking memory at the best of times and most of my memories come from this time of the year, two years ago.

Dan

Had a few lectures today; one Ben and I just went “Huh?” at and the other’s were fairly boring so I’ve spent the rest of the day looking at Hi-Fi stuff that I quite fancy! At some point I’ll work out how I can afford it as well, maybe! The new amp and CD-player have somewhat overtaken my desk but oh well, they make a lovely sound. Shame the volume doesn’t get close to 9 O’clock

It’s good to see friends here again and tomorrow will be good to catch up with friends from King’s. I know though that when Kita goes it’ll be that bit harder/lot harder and it is a bit weird being back here compared to home. I really don’t share much in common with my flat mates here and I think I have probably only had a finger full of conversations with them ever but oh well.

Notice how at the top of my post I didn’t put home. That was very deliberate, this place doesn’t feel like home, not close. Next year in a house will be with people I choose to be with but ho hum. I guess the 1st year is a gamble and I think Ben somewhat won that one.

Still I’m sure it could be worse, and I have been lucky in getting a room plenty large enough for 4 people (in here at the moment as proof!).

God bless

Dan