billfort's system with Altec corner cabinets
Billfort

billfort's system with Altec corner cabinets

Speakers: Altec 604-8G drivers in DIY corner cabinets. 9ft3/40Hz vented boxes, Baltic birch with cherry veneer. Markwart crossovers sit outside boxes, hard wired with single strand 24ga solid core copper wire. This page describes my journey with these http://www.wardsweb.org/Billfort/

Amplifiers: DIY scratch built 45/2A3 SET, WE417A driver, RCA 245 globes or RCA blackplate 2A3s, all James iron, Cerafine/BlackGate/Jupiter caps, stainless and SA mahogany chassis. Sometimes, scratch built 300B SET monoblocks - started as Angela91 but since changed to 6SN7 driver stage and DC 300B heaters (Schottky bridge, CLC filtered). Current tube mix is Mullard GZ37 rectifier, Western Electric 300B and Brimar CV1988 (6SN7).

Pre-amp: all tube Joule Electra LA-100 MKIII, modded Sonic Frontiers SFP-1 phono stage.

Turntable: VPI Aries Series 1 table with JMW-10.5 arm, ZYX Airy 3 X SB M/C (copper wire & silver base).

Tuner: Scott 350-D (tube) and Accuphase T-101 (SS) tuners with Dynalab ST-2 antenna.

Digits: Sony SCD-777ES SACD/CD player on Final Labs roller bearings, AudioNote Kit 2.1 non-oversampling DAC with Siemens 7308's.

Wire & stuff: various garden hose looking things and pretty silver hanging around but lately a Coincident PC on the SACD player, Silverstrings PC on DAC, Marinco/Belden DIY PC on amps, mostly Final Labs copper/cotton interconnects and Western-Electric copper/cotton thin ga. Litz braided speaker wire. Monster Cable power conditioner for tuner, everything else into dedicated audio circuits back to the panel. Spiked Lovan modular racking system.

Room: 12.2x22.6 dedicated listening room.

Headphone setup: Antique Sound Labs MG Head with Amperex Bugleboy EL84 and Mullard 12AX7. Sennheiser HD-600 phones.
Very attractive setup. The sound treatment panels also look good. I owned a pair of 604-8G's a number of years ago and liked them a lot until I heard a pair of QUAD esl's.
 
Billfort,

I wish I had your ears, patience, and technical knowledge!! Your system is just plain amazing, and I would give anything just to be able to listen to it once. I read your story over at Luther's place, and the sound that comes out of that must be like a nectar. I could truley plan a vacation, to come hear your system, hell I don't even feel right calling it a system. Okay, I'm gonna get outta here and clean the drool off my keyboard.

Take care,

Ron

Edit: Don't know how everyone else could rate it a 20, it only goes to 10. Anyway, it rtaes my highest praise, what ever that's worth!!
 
Beautiful set up. Too bad we can't sample the sound as well. Have you tried the Coincident IC's? I see you have at least one of their power cords. I have Total Eclipses with Atma OTL's and find Coincident IC's and speaker wire to go very well and at a nice price, especially used (pre-burned in).
 
I missed these comments somehow guys and thanks! The picture is a little old (the AN DAC, Joule Electra pre-amp, Sonic-Frontiers phono-stage and cobbled up Markwart crossovers are not shown) but it's pretty much the same, just messier.

Never tried the Coincident IC's zoe, kind of stopped playing the cable game after settling on the thin-gage copper/cloth covered jobs, just seemed a nice match for everything.

If you ever make it to the Toronto area Ron make sure you contact me, I'd love to have you over for a listen.
 
Great setup.

How will the corner speakers sound in a larger room with one speaker on the corner but the other one 4-5 feet from the other corner? The reason is there is a door I have to avoid.

Is the 604-8g best suited with SET or how about with PP or even solid states?
 

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