Threesome, anyone?

You know what? You get to be lan si (snobbish) being first. First in your class, first to achieve a record, first in competition etc, there is a lot to be proud of. For audiophiles, first to own a flagship, first to own an alien brand, first to discover kick ass power cord and so on are the most satisfying.

Humbly, I also scored some personal first in audio, I'm first to own Mosfet LMos150, first to owe DIY63 dac with outboard 6 independent power supply, first to DIY Lighter Note in Malaysia, probably not. Now, I could add another score to my "First" tally, first to listen to three Power Banks. Hehe! I bet some out there are seriously wondering if three Power Banks worth a go?

The latest FPB replaced the filter setting to input polarity setting

The story begins with me offering to fetch uncle G, FPB designer and a technician to commission Power Bank in a reputable audio system. I'm sorry for nameless heads that I did not get the permission to reveal the identity nor the system but I can reassure you that this is a million dollar system and you do not get many in this level of play in Malaysia.

Infrastructure in Malaysia is among the best, road fatalities in Malayisa is also one of the highest in the world, what does it tell you? Poor civic mindedness. The recent deployment of AES is akin to 24/7 invincible traffic police raise public outcry. I opined that AES makes the road users behave and restores order on the road. It definitely will help bring down the number of accident. Life is tough, no one wants another ticket. With AES in place, everybody adhere to the traffic rules. It is a good thing at least to keep the reckless driving in watch. So, the journey took us close to three hours to reach our destination, a little more than it should.

The host can't wait to receive uncle G, it is like old friend. He was cordial to us and after the friendly hello, the guys went straight to work. Vocal is the host main music staple. He first spun some vocals to establish a standard. Uncle G brought his trusty Clarity 16 and ready to kill. You got to be impressed with uncle G agility, this uncle is no ordinary elder. Don't play play, I bet he can beat all of us climbing stairs, easily. Clarity 16 is a voodoo. Don't try it at home if you don't intend to buy unless of course you can bear with Insomnia.

As its name implied, this thing injects clarity. Better separation, notes are distinguishably detached from notes, more airy, more sparkle at the top and slightly more gain. The host was happy. The host has one Clarity 16 in his rig already and two Clarity 4s, but Two the merrier. Clarity 16 blew Clarity 4 away and the result was astonishing . Uncle G looks real cute. "See, what I told you?" Tips : Clarity 16 is most effective at the source and power amp, Clarity 16 stays.

After a little less than an hour, the guys had Power Banks fired up. Power Banks steamrolled Clarity 16 with ease. That did not surprise us. In combo, the improvements have compounded. It was time for my "Wow!", that's my role on that day play. The host was stunned, his eyes were wide opened in disbelief, speechless. There and then I know that the ice was broken. What could be better than a product speaks for itself? If Clarity 16 brought forth 10% of audio improvement, together as in a combo, brought forth 30% compounded with interest. Bear in mind, Power Banks are new, they should sound better as the breaking process continues.

We stopped at 1:30 pm for food. The host treated us a mouth watering lunch. The menu was, authentic shark fin soup, fried sliced lotus root with peas, steamed prawn with special soy sauce, one Pomfret two cooking styles, steamed on side and fried on the other side of the fish, mushroom oyster oiled chicken and Cantonese fried hor fun. The host has a mission, a taste for us to savour. Excuse me, I start craving while blogging. The lunch was fabulous. Taste versus sound, we are now even.

Power Banks have hit a little more than two hours after the lunch break, my findings are consistent with my first encounter with my Power Bank, the sound has become more liquid but with less than doubly darker background, inner ummph, separation and sparkling. One plus one does not always equals to two. The glossy sound (extended highs) however compensated the rather over damped room. The host hold his smile like most business men do, his poker face. He has finally found his missing puzzle. The Clarity 16 and Power Banks combo is a runaway success.

The clouds of doubt have been thoroughly removed, the host initiated to try the third Power Bank to see how far it can go. We happily obliged as all of us wanted to know the result too. It was a little Armageddon. The third Power Bank brought forth an unexpected leapfrog improvement. "Wow!", that's my role again. I suspected Power Bank hammered the source right. The traditional Chinese plucked strings has a bumpy decay, that was not entirely present and choppy before these upgrades, a full note with some degree of resiliency was audible. It is like chewy glue, no way you could chew them to pieces. The masculine power was immediate akin to additional 200W power. The host dropped the idea of upgrading the power amp and save up. The designer looked and whispered at me "Want a second unit?" Bugger..... @#$%

The fun did not stop there. Uncle G and I were eager to know if a better power cord could make a huge impact on Power Bank. The stock skinny power cord that comes along with the third Power Bank looks pathetic. The earlier Power Banks were connected to the sub DB. The host resisted the temptation. "Enough! Enough! Enough! Don't suck me dry. I'm putting a stop in audio". A stop? Easier said than done! Uncle G ignored the host reluctance, pulled and plugged his power cord to satisfy our inquisition. Hell ya!

Wow! What a notably improvement. On Dave Garret live in concert, his pale skin colour (from the projector) became accurate. Even the unlearned technician can tell. What amazes us was the colour depth of Dave's violin!!!The wears of lacquer on his violin was visible. The strings on his violin were articulate. Black becomes blacker, white becomes whiter. Contrast increased. The colours vibrancy was to be appreciated, saturated. The shade, brightness, chroma improved. All of us fell from the chairs. This power cord is essential.

On the action packed "Da Wu Sheng", the knockings, the gush of wind, the shrill of Chinese sword and spear, the percussion and the drum were vivid. The wind, O my God! Can you guys enlighten me wind in hertz? GSC and TGV are no contest.

Audio wise also benefited from the uncle G's power cord. Cai Qin's Lao Ge is high on musical value but average on recording quality. Lao Ge was recorded in 1985, if your Cai Qin sounded milky, thick and ripe, go check on your system. The host rendition of Lao Ge was pin point and transparent, and with the right age, supposing in her late 20s. You can rob a bank but don't rob Cai Qin voice. She was 27-28 when she records Lao Ge.

These virtues alone on Lao Ge are unheard of, really. Dare I say, the Cai Qin mouth is of the size of 20 cent. The images were rock like. Phenomenal for a more than six foot height multi drivers speakers that could have the ability to image like bookshelf speakers. Separation was breathtaking, reveals plenty of space around the musicians. Eat that out! This track can serve as his showcase reference. The host has set a very high bar on Lao Ge, difficult for others to surpass.

"I have finished with my power cord, I will now pull my power cord, thank you." says uncle G. "No, no, no, don't touch it! Let it as it is."
"Please check how much is the power cord, buy it, courier it to me and I will mail you a cheque"
"No, no, no, what was I thinking? Leave the power cord here and I will write you a cheque." His audio adrenalin never cease.
"Hey Mr designer, I want to order another Power Bank to make it four." Surprise order! God only knows when he will get his unit.

The host was lucky to receive three Power Banks ahead of his time. I looked at uncle G and teased him a bit "Now that you know what can Power Banks do, how to wait?" Anxiety, I knew that he has been waiting for his second unit for some time now.

"Damn @#$%! I will definitely have Insomnia tonight. The highs and mid better mine and they will haunt me in my sleep. The wait for Power Bank is killing me!" Uncle G was on a roll, the passion of audio rose higher.

Clarity 16, Power Banks and the undisclosed power cord combo has reignited a cold audiophile. The host sound has now elevated many storeys in performance. Shouldn't he be thrilled?

Resonance control III

Perfect combo, lamb with mint sauce

You know, the best sermons relate to daily life and lively delivery. The worst one, bash, bash, bash all the way. You should have done this, you should have done that.... A long and boring sermon is a torture. Give me a break. Writing style is no different. Business reports or any kind of reports, utterly boring.

After my first sweet success with Gaboon ebony, little did I know that the addiction was unstoppable. Gaboon ebony treated the mid and highs so magically, just like a grilled lamb with mint sauce, a heavenly gastronomical. The bass, the meat of music, is yearning for attention. How to cook the bass? The some sort of perfectionist nature in me is relentless. I could be so hard on myself, sometimes. No pain, no gain, results are my best consolations. Nuts do crazy things.

The banker looks exactly like the above when in awe

Not that my bass is lacklustre, American made speakers never short of bass anyway if anything else. Bass is the single element that make people go oh and ah on first encounter. We see audio exhibitors blast the speakers to the roof to attract visitors. Most people love bass, especially uncles. Nobody would complain about clean bass, I do encountered some who can live without bass.

Big boys and Average Joe

Bass is the most prominent element in audio that separates the big boys and Average Joe. Walloping bass costs money, clean bass costs a lot more. Average Joe gets puny bass, not louder than elephant fart. So, I get to hide when seeing big boys because my pity system is laughable. Their speaker cable alone costs more than my whole system. No competition! Remember the story about anaconda taking a pee? You have not seen the world yet.

Diffuser is not that all effective to curb excessive bass, but anyway, I never like diffuser. The banker brought down the diffuser and it serves a good washing board. People use bass trap and as the name implied, its working principal is similar to fish trap. What goes in never comes out.

Alternatively, I took the Macassar ebony route.

What is more credible than referring to guitar makers on their findings of Macassar ebony? The smartest way in life is to learn from people's mistakes and experiences without having to bear the cost. The downside is, you will always be a follower. China is the champ in this regard, they copy everything on earth. Everything has a price, I'm a happy value camper. Innovative companies charge you through your nose for their innovations, so called big capital R and D. The flat screen TV is an excellent example. The prices were steep when the first flat screen TV launched, the prices of flat screen TV dropped over time thanks to economies of scale, with even better specs. Hybrid car is the next big thing.

Taylorguitars.com has written a comprehensive research on tone woods. Below is what they say about Macassar ebony.

"Origin: Indonesia
Used On: Limited Editions, Custom Guitars

Another dense hardwood, Macassar boasts a lot of presence and is typically clear and loud with a broad dynamic range. It seems to be a wood that is uniquely responsive to different playing styles. It has a strong bass and lower mids; clear and transparent highs that respond like an accelerator pedal as you move your right hand closer to the bridge and dig in a bit; and a slightly scooped midrange.

Macassar likes to be played hard, and tends to take a slightly longer period of playing time to open up. When it's used with a softer top wood like cedar or redwood, it makes a balanced instrument. When topped with Adirondack spruce it becomes an all-out cannon. Some players tend to pull more brightness out of the wood; others, like Bob Taylor, tap into its darker side.

"To me, Macassar has a great 'low-fi,' old Gibson vibe," Bob says. "It's dark, it's dense, it's heavy. It's killer for a very manly, old school strum. We put a super clear 'finishing salt' on its tonal flavor using our style of construction to brighten it up, but to my ear the tonal beauty of this wood is the low-fi vibe. I love the sound. I bought one."

Goes Well With: Old-school strummers and players with a heavy picking hand who like a thick old school sound; players who struggle to get enough brightness and articulation from traditional woods."

Here's what Mangore.com on Macassar ebony

"Deep clean basses and great sustain preferred to Brazilian rosewood by many guitarists and builders. It is sober and generates a full, round sound. It projects very well and the figuring can be quite striking. In the same league with Brazilian rose, African Blackwood and Maple... Some of the most striking instruments are made with this Indian species. If you love dark looking  instruments, this is definitely the wood for you."

A long waited parcel finally arrived at my door step, 15 pieces of Macassar ebony from Indonesia in total. Beautiful tiger stripe grain, precisely machine cut. Ebony is one heck of hard wood, not worth the effort cutting yourself. Pound per pound, Macassar ebony is cheaper than Gaboon ebony, by 30%. Wasting no time, Macassar ebony blocks are up.

Gaboon ebony on top, Macassar ebony at the bottom

Faber Castle's Blue Tack is a handy product, affixing these blocks to the walls was a breeze. Blue Tack allows sufficient tack to hold the blocks in place and readjust later if necessary. As Macassar ebony is known to reproduce clean bass, hence it is logical to place them at lower height. Don't shoot me! I never said that the above configurations yields optimum results. This would be an outright irresponsible claim.

Honeymoon, this guy does not know what he is getting in to...

And so, my inquisitiveness got the best of me. Trying out them at different height to determine if these Macassar ebony works or was it merely a mind game. You all know that our mind can trick us, we all tend to get super excited with new stuff regardless how they perform. You are transported to honeymoon state of mind, everything is rosy. When your little brother is straight, you just couldn't think straight! Reality only kicks later. That's why I make it a point to allow second opinions.

Nice clean bass

Let's get to the result, Macassar ebony responds to localization. Macassar ebony cleans up my bass. No, it does not produce bigger bass. In contrary, the bass is powerful, taut and tuneful. At times, you get to think that the bass loudness reduced (less smearing), it is a blessing in disguise. Quite amazingly, it hold up the wholesome bass and adds dimensionality to it.

Blue sky

Imagine this, countryside blue sky. When too much mid bass, it becomes too much of a good thing, it becomes dull. Bass kind of intrude the midrange and screw things up, it smears the midrange. Yuk! The damn thing is you never know until you experience it. Nat King Cole does not sound like thick chocolate, Chai Qin vocal is not smooth. Go listen to vocal from a pair of good bookshelf speakers, you get what I mean. The Brits opine that it is technically much easier to build a two way speaker than a three way speaker. They are dead right. Even a probably designed three way speaker, an untreated room will mess it all up.

I always have a soft spot for Nordic jazz, a breeze of clean and fresh air from Nordic. The originator of minimalist. Lighter, simpler arrangement, not over improvised, but most of all, sung by white folks, not Afro American. Afro American sometimes try too hard woo us by changing the song to theirs, they went overboard.

Sofia Pettersson has a unique voice, a little nasal "girl to woman" voice. She reminds me of Ricky Lee Jones. Slow Down is a cool pop jazz cover version. Her rendition of 59th Street Bridge Song is refreshing.

The gut strings are made of these nasty cow intestines 

The double bass intro, wow, not lean nor exaggerated, Macassar ebony replicates the elasticity and chewy of the gut strings, the reverberations is fascinating. Now, the piano, double bass and drums seem detached from the mid. As a result, the mid opens up, this is an early Christmas for me. The bass is fertile and the locality seems lower too.

Guys, listen to her version of Hallelujah. This song is written by the poetic Leonard Cohen, widely covered, almost 200 artists in various languages. Leonard speech like tempo has a way of drawing you into his music. The thing is very hard to mess up this melodic song. Sofia is definitely one of the better ones.

I do realise my outspoken will self abducted into the SKL hall of fame. What the heck! My findings are not for sake of wooing readership. I don't make money from my blog but self esteem.

Friends were shook by my bass corresponding to my hardware and room size. My bass makes me proud! Not in the way that they will rock your boat but in a civilised manner, the punch have got inner strength. I'll be totally honest, I do keep a small bass secret recipe.

Tone deaf

The Olympic badminton final between Lin Dan and Lee Chong Wei battled out yesterday. Lin victory squashed Malaysian hope of clinching a gold medal, I'm not sure if this is the first one. I have found new respects for Lee, for his timid demeanor and sportsmanship. Lin Dan has an intimidating and arrogant demeanor in contrast, a reflection of his game too, speedy and aggressive. I feel Lee's devastating pain and helplessness. Nobody remembers the runner up. Who in the world never experience failure and dejection in life? Loss of contract, flunk in exam, betrayal, conned etc.

A great champ is usually a lousy loser. A great champ hates losing. You see this quality in Alex Ferguson, Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Nicole David, Mohammad Ali etc. The master of winning ugly is John McEnroe. He uses everything to upset your mood. "You can not be serious!" John always yells at linesman, questions the empire decisions. These little actions pose adverse effects on the opponent. I saw Lin did many little little unsporting things to upset opponent's psychology/rhythm. Most obvious one, refused to change shuttlecock upon request. The others like waiting for play. This is the mental game. Short fuse players are doomed.

Great champions are not the easiest people to be around, they battle on every issue. No worry if you do not have great champs as friend, a combative lawyer friend is equally self opined. Audio sinshe is no exception too, I called these people Mr "Know It All". Do not argue with them, but listen, listen and listen.

One fine day, the music man came to listen and pointed out the time and phase incoherency of the sub integration when playing the rapid plucking of double bass. Aiyoh! My pride was towed away all the sudden. Never too late to know, the string notes was somewhat overlapping.

大碌

The notes were dirty and required Daia to clean up. My system failed miserably in this regard. It was this double bass that makes me retire my sub. Without the sub, the notes were much cleaner and articulate albeit there is a loss of bass weight. Now, I truly comprehend the meaning of "Less is More".

In order to remedy, I tried many things and I read quite a bit. Sorry if this sounds academic, it is absolutely necessary to go back to basic - sound behavior. The past couples of weeks was very interesting and equally challenging.

Fact One : The Speed of Sound

The speed of sound in air is determined by the air itself and is not dependent upon the amplitude, frequency, or wavelength of the sound. Speed of sound corresponds directly to ambiance temperature and humidity. If you turned on your air conditioning and the humidifier (drier air), the slower the sound travels. That's explained why German made speakers sound the way they do, yes or no? Why Danish speakers sound (slower) the way they do?

Soon enough, his hairs will start dropping.

Fact Two : The Speaker Positioning

The strength of equilateral triangle positioning is the least affected by reflected sound and holographic pinpoint imaging. The downside are narrower soundstage, small sweet spot and the low frequency is amiss. Everything is well and good but you will miss the weight and authority of the bass when the passage calls up if Classical is your music staple.

The standard layout of orchestra

Fact three : The Sound Mapping

Do you realize that most basses come from the right side? There is a certain standard it seems. Orchestra layout is the standard. The basses are located at the right side, you can expect more bass coming from that side.

I want to establish my own sound signature

Speaker positioning is an audio fundamental tantamount to second degree audio murder. My past experience taught me that you need to experiment sitting in various points along the critical one and a half foot axis to achieve your "perfect" bass. I need some compensation here.

Depending on the speakers, bookshelf speakers are less fuzzy than floor standing speakers. Some aligned to mili-meter in measurement, I'm not that fanatic. I can't tell the sound of three mili- meter.

I get my best listening spot when I am 9 feet from the mid point between the speakers in my room, where the highs, mid and low meet at the same time. "There is my bass!" was my first reaction listening to Youn San's Pancake. I have got my bass 1/8 octave lower. This track is funky and the bass is wonderfully recorded. Bass quality of this recording is rare! The bass is big and weights a ton. No problem with Dream of An Opera's one off drum stroke albeit a little noisy or any similar kind of bass. My system can put these in the pocket. A pleasant surprise.

I have also realized that my seating moved three rows behind with the soundstage gets more "panoramic". The downside is, I lose a small degree of razor sharp clear mid and highs. The room resonance comes in to the play.


Every system is unique even though they are identical. Their sound can be categorized as above, perfectly balanced, highs eccentric or weighted to bottom. This is my tone analyzer. Tone deaf - when A key does not sound like A key, it is time you re-examine your system. No matter how expensive the system, one must get the tone right. I am not a fan of ultra resolution. Good luck.

Resonance control II

Back in time

Frank Power Bank post kinda of upset the sequence of posting, I must say. It is an amazing product that once you have had a taste of it, there is no returning. You would not want to listen without it. Power treatment is always a good investment, it improves on all departments. It sounds like an advertisement if I continue to harp on Power Bank. For your information, firstly, I do not get paid for reviewing anything and secondly I hold a double role, a user and a consumer. These audio gears do not go into the store. Doc Brown, is the time machine ready? Send me one month back in time to finish my untold stories.

Mpingo disc

Men have started making musical instrumental since the Middle Ages, flute was documented to be the first  musical instrument mankind ever created. History has recorded that the surroundings have great influential over the local cultures and foods. Story has it that people live in the mountain is politic/power prone whilst people live near the sea are business prone. Sea freight is still the preferred transportation for goods. People live near the port have a clear business advantage over mountain people. Mountain people for instance, Genghis Khan was a fighter and ruler, power hungry people. You may verify this theory on your work place too.

Woods were abundant and easy to work with. Different woods have different characters. Over time, guitar, violin, drum etc come.

Ebony is premium. Ebony for audio was made famous by the good people from Shun Mook, loosely translated as Magic Wood. They are made their first pot of gold with Mpingo discs. Knowledge is power, knowledge leads to K-Economy. I could still recall many were happily smitten by Mpingo discs. So good were the Mpingo discs, they seldom appear in pre owned markets.

The literature on Mpingo disc as below
"Mpingo Disc - The Mpingo Disc is invented by the Shun Mook team. It is made from a combination of Gaboon and Mpingo Ebony, treated with a proprietary process that gives the disc a unique property to regulate the resonance of any sonic component and its transmission. Yet this is a very simple them to us. Just place one to three disc on top of your preamp, CD transport, DA converter turntable etc., and listen for the wonderful change in you Hi Fi system, When his disc is excited by any external acoustic energy, it will resonate throughout the entire audible spectrum, thus overriding unwanted harmonic distortions and at the same enriching the musical reproduction."

My jet black Gaboon ebony

If ebony is good for musical instruments, it could not be bad for sound room. I would have sucked dry if I buy Mpingo disc because their prices are not at peace with me. My swallow pocket to be blamed as well. Lady luck has been kind to me that she let me have a block of African Gaboon ebony for a reasonable price, pre cut it into 12 pieces. Each measures 2" length x 2:" width x 1" thick. Almost odourless, the appearance of my Gaboon ebony is almost jet black, good but not premium quality.

Gabon ebony

Jet black Gaboon ebony is of the core of the old tree trunk that grows in the highland. Young Gaboon ebony would have irregular black and brown color. The high density of the Gaboon ebony causes it to sink in the water. Due to slow growth and growing demand, the price of this species has been hiked up.

As from my first hand experience at KF's place, Gaboon ebony raises the height of soundstage. Although, the difference is audible, one piece of ebony is not suffice to spell its magic! No one picks one cent from the ground these days, or even ten cents! Things could be different for a buck.

Wasting no time, I placed one Gaboon ebony right at the dead center of my front wall at a little less than five foot height, that's the height of the projected microphone height. Placing one each to the side from the center piece and I sat myself down and listen. You would want to smack the wicked smile on my face! The effect was apparent, the echoey is remedied somewhat. I would not want a dead ambiance that every live recording sounds studio recording. Nuances are being absorbed. Driven by the positive effect, I affixed them all up on the wall, arriving at the above configuration. The side walls received two and the ceiling received one. Musicians, drum roll.....

Emulsifying process

A droplet hold up to semi sphere when it drops on to high surface tension. This is the best I can come up with pertaining to sound effect of the Gaboon ebony.

Gaboon ebony was akin to increase the surface tension of my wall, resurrecting the images from the nameless wall.

Half face (left), Flat face (right)

Before Gaboon ebony, I got half  and kind of flat face, relatively speaking. After Gaboon ebony, I got full face with three dimensionality.

The highs was as if diamond in the rough, shinier and with a wee bit longer decay. Men look good in suit, a Mont Blanc and a Breguet will add class and gui qi 貴氣 to men. There is a saying in Malaysia, you can violate any law but just do not get caught. In high societies, you wear fake accessories and still get away with  no suspicious. Ladies highlighting high nose, rosy cheek, hot lips, deep V dress and accessorise with some sparkling diamonds make men turn head.

Gaboon ebony gives life to sound by enriching the mids. The mids got a rounded and denser sound, making the voices unbelievably right and any other musical at this range received their fair share of magic too. Enthusiastically, even Gaboon ebony on the power cord will better the sound. This is better than inviting David Footballfield, David Copperfield impersonator to your room.

Holy cow! Gaboon ebony stretches the soundstage too. The stage extended to a foot from my seat, I could reach out and touch it.

Tonal quality is a like the tropics warmth and humid against cool and dry. Men have the essential chestiness to sound muscular while women femininity is intact.

Delicious

The soundstage was panoramic, like a movie experience. Friends told me they are on the same stage with the performers. I hope they lied and that no one would come to challenge me on this. The truth is yes and no, I came to realise that one thing that I do resulted the more forward soundstage.

Audio pilgrimage

Gaboon ebony sets a milestone in my audio pilgrimage. As in the tweaking wilderness, some works, some less effective. Some compliment each other, some go against each others. You will have to choose the combo that is right for you. And that's make audioing interesting because there is no hard and fast rule, everyone can do.

Friends told the changes in sound is unbelievable, this is a double confirmation. The banker also reported similar results for he too have bought Gaboon ebony, albeit with different placements. Everyone has their ways of seeing things, the big direction, I'm quietly doing my own "Oppa Kanasai", the invincible horse ride....

You might also try out the crystal based Stein Music Harmonizer for similar effect. I have no way of telling which is greater but one thing for sure mine is definitely cheaper and zero maintenance. Good luck.