Bangalore audiophiles are one very cool bunch of dudes! Thanks for a great time!

The last two days have been all about handing out with our genteel, down to earth totally chill bangalore Audiophiles.

Each and every system i listened to was a treat, each and every one quite remarkable in the way they were sounding.

most importantly, the warmth and camaraderie among our ranks is of the highest order.

Saturday started off with listening to Stevieboy's Lyrita audio based analogue setup.
Very well made speakers, amp and phonostage looked great as well.
But when i heard the prices for each of the components i was pleasantly shocked. Steve played a few records for me on his Project 9(i think) TT. The sound was very organic, and the full range drivers were imaging great and could actually have a coherency across the freq spectrum with enough low end extension to satisfy most music.

All in all a very fine system for the price. I am happy to see Steve has taken the bold step into vinyls, something that i keep chickening out of. I would have loved to listen to the Garrad as well..but perhaps another time when you havve it all setup

hats off to Viren for making some very fine equipment and pricing them just right.

Next I moved on to Siva'jis place..Steve was invited as well as he was close by but he had some exams coming up (best of luck btw).
When i pulled up next to his house, i realised he had new house..mighty fine looking one too. He met me at the gate and ushered me in. As i walked in, i saw a coupleof huge behemoths with their faces tilted slightly down looking menacing. But they were nothing compared to the massive wooden blocks with bright glowing glass bottles sticking out of them, flanking on either side of a center rack with a couple of gorgeous wood cased electronics

My jaw dropped and was blown away at the sight. IT was impressive in every definition of the word.
Siva sir tortured me by having us eat lunch first before listening to that gorgeous monstrosity.

Once done with lunch, we moved to the listening room, those so far silent behemoths sizing me up as Siva sir gestured me to sit down in the "sweet spot".

From the moment I sat down to the moment i reluctantly had to draw the audition to an end, I knew what I was hearing was something that couldn't be matched unless you spent a ton of money and time integrating the components to worrk as one unit. This system was so tailor made by Siva, over a period of 10 years that his devotion, passion and all the other possible adjectives to decribe his love for the quest of "his sound" shone trough.
Unfortunately I did not have any CDs with me as i packed hurriedly, but even this turned out to be a blessing in disguise of sorts as for the next 2.5 hours Siva's taste in music dazzled me and left me breathless for more. That reminds me i need to have him send me a full list of the tracks/cds he played.

Notable were the planets By Holst i think, Uranus the Magician was the track. Eva Cassidy sounded like she had come down from heaven to sing was us that day. The Grandma song was downright insane to listen to. That was the first time I heard taht track. He also played some LIvingstone something which also sounded great.

In the midst of all this we got around to compare our DACs, my Assemblage DAC 2.7 and his own home brew CD player.

While my DAC was commendable in its performance something was sounding off in the 4-7kHz range. Siva rightly i think pointed out that it is due to the analog filter on the output stage of my DAC. He said his ran without a filter as well and this was the reason why there was a lack of phase coherence on my DAC.
I will experiment on this further.
I could go on and on extolling the Siva's system but only justice that can be done to it would be to actually listen to it. This is the level of DIY i aspire to, look up to. Perfection, evolution of tastes, of thinking, of individual thinking!! I thank you sir for such a great treat.

I had to meet other friends, in hindsight I probably should have blown them off and enjoyed the system a bit longer

I rarely request to have folk take a picture of me with their systems, but this was special. It was a treat to my senses in every way and i wanted a souvenir and Siva graciously agreed to take a pic. He might post it later on this thread perhaps.


I will post soon about my Sunday with the ever amiable Abhi and Arjun. Oh and also Vinny(square wave) who i had the pleasure of meeting for the first time.

Sorry for the longish post..

Savyasaachi schrieb:

lol @ Abhi..no way man..I thought it is u are the host all the time Vinny, indeed it was fun meeting you. Shame it was such a short visit. We need to hang out next time I am in town..get some beers, ..ooh invite Jeeves over..and reignofchaos as well. Abhi, I am going to be keeping the DAC for the foreseeable future. Vinny, I will hit up Siva about those Japanese studio ICs..they were phenomenal IMHO.

Yes.....beer and a bunch of audiophiles...

I will look forward to this.

Cheerio.