2nd hand CD player experimentations

The QS Ref does just that.

No, it does just this, unfortunately!

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, Steven, is to find an equally unfavourable review of Mana.

 

It's a challenge in itself to find any review of Mana that was written since the 80s

Michael.

 

To be absolutely fair here Michael, reviewers by and large tend to review new product and Mana has stubbornly stayed the same, despite the fact that John could have made a small fortune out of mk2 and even mk 3 Mana by now if he had had less integrity.

Imagine the shocked awe of the mk2 in the pages of the August What Hi Fi, " Beats Hell out of mk1" etc, magazines need the new product or the new sensation, by not rising to this Mana are not playing the game and thus tend to get overlooked. The new space age Carbon Fibre and Titanium resonance buster will always make a better story whether or not it actually works.

 

Fair point Paul.

Michael.

 

I think that the approved phrase these days would be "Makes Mk1 Mana sound broken".

I don't know about anybody else, but that "broken" nonsense gets right up my tits. On a similar note, I re-read RG's Kalista CD transport review tonight. Anybody looking for information in there will be sorely disappointed, as is usual with Mr Gregory. What an absolute load of verbal candy-floss. Utter gibberish.

 

I have a copy of HFC from 2001 that was not very kind to Mana.


BTW, the picture shown of the QS Ref shows it to be set up completely wrong. Why is the runt shelf shown half way up the rack and not on the bottom?

 

The runt stand.

 

The QS Ref is a breeze to set up compared to Mana and yet those goons at HFC did it wrong.

I think the review was a foregone conclusion with vested interests (imho) just like the 2001 review that slated Mana perhaps unfairly. It placed the QS Ref back then in the no.2 slot with the Townsend job at no.1

I don't bother with magazines any more.

 

We are all straining at the leash to tell you something, Steven, but we can't, really.

I think the runt shelf looks just lovely where it is. For a Mana user, you do seem very critical of it; do your own Mana stands 'ring at certain critical (high) frequencies'?

What are these frequencies, and what makes them 'critical'?

 

I think it's time this little stand war stopped before it escalates into something nastier

Michael.

 

Maybe I could help

 

1) It looks "lovely" as you put it because it looks suitably rediculous and precarious. It is a caricature of the Ref stand that obvously makes you smile. It would be like putting Mana Sound Stages on top of the Amp Rack, or even upside down.

2) I only use Mana under my speakers where it can't work its ringing magic into my electronics.

 

Steven, if one were to remove, say, a heavy amplifier for example from a tall Mana stand, as has been tried recently elsewhere, then I could understand that the relatively unladen stand might well 'ring'.

OTOH, the thing that almost certainly won't stop ringing in such circumstances is the phone in another house!

 

I have absolutely no idea what you are talkng about.

Is it relevant to this discussion?

 

Not really, you have a PM. I'd be interested in your reaction to it.

 

Which bit of "I think it's time this little stand war stopped " didn't you guys understand?

Michael.

 

Steven, have you perchance had the opportunity to audition the plastic QS?

 

Michael,

Behind the scenes I've been working on ending another silly feud that sometimes rears it head here. I have reason to feel optimistic.

The banter between James and me is light-hearted and certainly couldn't be classsed a flaming.

Alex,

A single perspex shelf is on order for me to try under the CDX. If it isn't signficantly better than the MDF I'll keep it anyway as I could use another shelf.

If it turns out to be a comlete no-brainer upgrade then I'll consider changing the rest of the shelves over to perspex, perhaps one by one.

I'll let you know how it performs. I have reason to feel optimistic about this too.

 

Alex,

I would be delighted to supply you with some different types of perspex to try with your Hutter, we really must keep you a step or two ahead of the QS gang. My guess would be green under the CD, red under the pre, and black or possibly grey under the power.

Do feel free to conduct your own experiments though.