(This entry was updated 1/16/23 with current models and prices.)
A year ago, the entry in this blog called Can you hear what you’re doing? was the first in a series written with the hope of helping musicians and other recordists who are interested, like myself, in studio setups that avoid superimposing their own sonic thumbprint on the signals they reproduce. I hope these entries will also be of interest to any music and sound enthusiast who seeks a system capable of what I call “getting out of the way” in order to provide more direct access to the recordings in their music collection.
Previous entries have talked about monitoring system setup and room acoustics. In the entry preceding this one, Magnificent Maggies, I spoke of a particular favorite speaker design, Jim Winey’s Magneplanars, and how I’ve found them to be exemplary in terms of stepping aside and allowing the listener to truly hear the input signal.
To be clear, not everyone really wants to hear the input signal unaltered. Some folks like their systems to offer certain colors that please their ears. While I would never argue with whatever brings anyone their listening pleasure, this entry is directed toward folks who want the colors to come from the music and not from the gear used to listen to it.
A system that gets out of the way is pivotal for those making records. Unless they can be confident they are assessing the sound of the recording itself, they risk altering the sound to make inaccurate monitoring sound “right.” If that happens, when they listen elsewhere they find that the recording itself doesn’t sound the way they intended it to sound. Such a system is important to music lovers too because it reveals all the nuances contained in their music libraries.
I have often been asked to recommend a system for musician friends, clients, and other friends. In the majority of instances the recommendations have been very similar. What I’m going to describe here is the least expensive system I would trust for monitoring recordings. (I’ve heard systems costing considerably more that do not elicit the same confidence on my part.) It is equally suitable for any music lover, whether as a starter system in a college dorm or as an ultimate system for folks who don’t seek anything more. One can certainly spend less and have a very enjoyable system, but I would not recommend such for anyone who makes records or anyone who wants to hear the most from their music.
It is important to remember that the ideal recommended system will vary depending on the source of the recommendation. I often say that if you ask three folks an audio question, you will receive at least four different answers. I will report on a system I have experienced in many rooms and which has brought smiles to many musicians, recordists, and other music lovers I know.
For the purpose of this entry, I’m going to divide the music system into two parts: the front end and the back end. The front end might be as simple as a CD or turntable, or it might be as elaborate as a computer feeding an external digital-to-analog converter (also known as a DAC). The front end is the source from which recordings are played. The back end is the monitoring which includes the loudspeakers and the electronics that drive the speakers. The system I’m recommending here is built around the monitoring.
In the previous entry, I said that I often refer to Magnepan’s now-discontinued MMG model as “The People’s Speaker.” To quote from that entry, “I’ve heard some $10,000 and $15,000 speakers that have so much ‘personality’ they end up exhausting the listener and engendering headaches. MMGs, within their capabilities, just sound like what they are fed. Properly set up, they are a joy that any music lover will intuitively recognize.” A while back Magnepan replaced the MMG with an improved version they called the LRS (Little Ribbon Speaker). They’ve recently upped the game significantly with the introduction of a new model replacing the LRS as “The People’s Speaker” at $995/pair: the LRS+. The LRS+ are the core of what I’ll call “The People’s System.”
What is needed now are associated components that will allow the LRS+s to reveal their magic. The speakers must be paired with an amplifier to drive them. The least expensive good match for the LRS+s I’ve found so far is the RR2160 MkII stereo receiver ($999) from Outlaw Audio. With sufficient power to drive the LRSs, the RR2160 MkII also serves as the control center for the system, where the input source can be selected and the playback volume adjusted, using either the front panel or the included remote.
While they are often overlooked when folks assemble audio systems, I’ve found the cables that connect all the individual pieces of gear to be critical in getting the best out of the whole. In the entry called The High End Arrives, I recounted my earliest exposure to good cables. It started with the loudspeaker cables. From that entry: “…I already had ‘heavy gauge’ wires feeding the speakers. Once the cable was sufficient to pass the requisite power to the loudspeakers, I wondered ‘how could cable make a difference?’ Once again I listened and once again I learned. Where did all that musical information come from? What was formerly just a guitar chord was now a set of individual strings sounding together to make that chord. The room in which the musicians were playing was suddenly also much more clearly evident – both in recordings made in real rooms and those where a ‘room’ sound was added artificially via electronic reverberation. Where cables had previously been not much more than an afterthought, required to get sound from one component in the chain to the next, I came to realize they are components in themselves and as with any chain, the weak link will determine the overall strength.” I wrote more about the subject in the New Connections entry last year.
In my experience, the LRSs will easily reveal differences in cables and so I recommend using wires that are commensurate with the rest of the monitoring system we’re assembling here. For this system, I recommend White Lightning speaker cables ($450/3-meter pair) from Nordost. In order to connect a front end source component to one of the inputs on the Outlaw RR 2160, I recommend Nordost’s White Lightning interconnect cables ($205/1-meter pair).
Each of the cables is available with different types of connectors at each end. I would choose Nordost’s “z-plug” banana connectors on their speaker cables, as these make for easy attachment at the amplifier and speaker ends. Standard RCA connectors on the interconnect cables will work with the Outlaw RR2160 MkII and most source components.
Depending on the setup, shorter or longer speaker cables or interconnects may be desired. In this example, I’ve chosen a 3-meter pair for the speaker cables and a 1-meter for the interconnects as good average lengths that work in most installations (and to “ballpark” the price).
So, excluding the front end source component(s), the system consists of:
Magnepan LRS+ loudspeakers $995
Outlaw Audio RR2160 MkII receiver $999
Nordost White Lightning speaker cables $550
Nordost White Lightning interconnects $278
The total cost for this part of the system is $2822. All that is needed now is the front end source or sources. I’ve heard this system make mellifluous musical magic with inputs as simple as a $35 Sony DVD/CD player spinning a CD, or as complex as a computer-centered digital audio workstation in a studio feeding the system via an external DAC.
One thing that might surprise folks who are new to components like these is that wonderful as they sound fresh out of the box, all of them will improve considerably once they have played music for a while. The cables and electronics get better over the first 100 hours of use, while the speakers can take as much as 400 hours of playing music to get to their best performance. Extension in the bass as well as the treble, smoothness in the upper frequencies, “airiness”, and dynamic range all exhibit improvements. The dimensions of the stereo soundstage expand and overall focus attains greater detail. The system will sound fantastic immediately but will ultimately get even better.
While I could happily live with this system as described (and truly believe it tells a lot more sonic truth than I’ve heard in most studios), one of its beauties is that each of the various components will stand up to having any of the others upgraded within each respective brand. For example, go up a model in the Magnepan line, and the RR2160 MkII and White Lightning will still deliver. Go up to separate electronics, like Outlaw’s 2220 amplifiers, and the LRS+s will respond to the increased power while the White Lightning will still faithfully render the signal from link to link in the component chain. Up the level of electronics still farther and the LRS+ will reveal the differences. Go up to one of Nordost’s more elaborate cable designs, and the LRS+s will reveal the increased performance. These are all components that work superbly together, yet can also allow for growth. And most importantly, the combination is true to the input signal. Of course, models further up the Magnepan and Nordost lines will take the revelation level up accordingly. (There are also some outstanding alternatives for more expensive electronics.) But this system as it is, fits the goal mentioned at the start of this entry: It is capable of getting out of the way and providing more direct access to the music. It gets my vote for The People’s System.
The Soundkeeper 