What are your favourite 2-channel tweaks for under £100?

[password1]

Squash balls cut in half and placed under my cd player.

Washing machine isolation pads under subwoofer feet. Does the same job as the expensive SVS isolation pads.

 

[Onlythesound]

Blu tac; blu tac & blu tac. - nothing worse than seeing a piece peeking out from underneath a speaker tho!

 

[password1]

Blu tac; blu tac & blu tac. - nothing worse than seeing a piece peeking out from underneath a speaker tho!

Blu tak leaves a messy residual in the long term. double sided acrylic tape leaves no trace or smell and is strong. Strong enough to attach a car number plate and lights on the motorway.

 

[Oasticles]

Squash balls cut in half and placed under my cd player.

Washing machine isolation pads under subwoofer feet. Does the same job as the expensive SVS isolation pads.

@password1 - interested in the washing machine pad idea. Looks like they come in all shapes and sizes! Any pointers to which one's you've found work?

 

[password1]

@password1 - interested in the washing machine pad idea. Looks like they come in all shapes and sizes! Any pointers to which one's you've found work?

My advice is don't buy the cheapest you can find because I had to buy another pack. I tried to save money by buying the cheapest. The first pack were poor quality, edges a little rough, cheaply made and they were not completely flat. I have OCD and couldn't live with them not being the same shape and flatness. I bought another pack off ebay a long time ago I think they were £8 or £9.

 

[BlueWizard]

For virtually FREE - SPEAKER PLACEMENT.

I am stunned by how many people poorly place their speakers, typically too close to the wall behind the speakers. When the speakers are poorly place, it boosts the bass, and you would think that would be a good thing. But, when that bass boost happens, you get both MUDDY Bass and Midrange, and that generally sounds terrible.

Try pulling you speaker about 1 meter into the room to see if they sound better. If you like the results, then start working them back until you find the best compromise between Clarity and Bass.

You'll thank me in the long run.

Steve/Bluewizard

 

[ricof90]

For virtually FREE - SPEAKER PLACEMENT.

I am stunned by how many people poorly place their speakers, typically too close to the wall behind the speakers. When the speakers are poorly place, it boosts the bass, and you would think that would be a good thing. But, when that bass boost happens, you get both MUDDY Bass and Midrange, and that generally sounds terrible.

Try pulling you speaker about 1 meter into the room to see if they sound better. If you like the results, then start working them back until you find the best compromise between Clarity and Bass.

You'll thank me in the long run.

Steve/Bluewizard

The caveat to this is when you have a small room and or/fixed listening position.

In my room, pushing the speakers into the corners then dealing with bass response/room modes with REW and filters was far better than having them awkwardly positioned.

 

[deantown]

For virtually FREE - SPEAKER PLACEMENT.

I am stunned by how many people poorly place their speakers, typically too close to the wall behind the speakers. When the speakers are poorly place, it boosts the bass, and you would think that would be a good thing. But, when that bass boost happens, you get both MUDDY Bass and Midrange, and that generally sounds terrible.

Try pulling you speaker about 1 meter into the room to see if they sound better. If you like the results, then start working them back until you find the best compromise between Clarity and Bass.

You'll thank me in the long run.

Steve/Bluewizard

Nice to see you posting again Steve, was worried you might have succumbed to covid as you haven't posted for a long time. Welcome back.

 

[acgingersnaps]

The caveat to this is when you have a small room and or/fixed listening position.

In my room, pushing the speakers into the corners then dealing with bass response/room modes with REW and filters was far better than having them awkwardly positioned.

Yup. Fairly much all of my many room issues have been ironed out by stopping faffing about with small fixes and succumbing to the call of Lyngdorf and Room Perfect.

My sub hundred spends shall henceforth be restricted to records, whisky and brandy.

 

[password1]

The problem with the average size house in the UK is room sizes and most people dont have a dedicated perfectly shaped and treated listening room.

If manufacturers typically recommend placement a minimum of 2-3 feet away from all walls for bookshelves and 3-6 feet for floorstanders (even more for larger floorstanders) then thats impossible if there are radiators, doorways and access to switches in the way or of the speakers would be in the way.

It rules out most speakers if we follow the recommended placements.

 

[muljao]

Chromecast audios for 30 pounds when they were available to buy

 

[Flobs]

MDF old cupboard shelves or desk tops no longer needed great to use as decoupling under anything that needs it (essential these days when there's so many glass shelves that vibrate more than ...). Of course blu tack to fit them and for a more permanent job double sided sticky tape.

Switches that have 4 ins and 1 out, Toslink optical mainly so you don't need a DAC with multiple entries and can get a decent DAC with 1 entry that costs about 15 quid.

Demineralised water and micro fibre cloths for those vinyls you had forgotten and have a sudden urge to listen to again.

Sure I'll come up with some more like a tape measure for speaker placement, can save a lot of time if you know a few basics like 1/3 and 1/5 lengths and resonance zones (also saved me buying speakers that could never go in my lounge).

 

[password1]

where can you get demineralised water from?

 

[Flobs]

where can you get demineralised water from?

Your wife should have some for the iron. If not supermarkets, Halfords (used in batteries, cooling fluid etc).

 

[BlueWizard]

Nice to see you posting again Steve, was worried you might have succumbed to covid as you haven't posted for a long time. Welcome back.

Still alive and well, sometimes it kind of hard to tell, but I'm still alive and well.

I've been posting on REDDIT and QUORA lately, but I feel like I'm starting to falling behind on the latest audio news, so I'm starting to come back.

Steve/Bluewizard

 

[Khazul]

The problem with the average size house in the UK is room sizes and most people dont have a dedicated perfectly shaped and treated listening room.

A few years ago we were looking around at new builds just because there seemed to be a lot of them going up around here were curious and I came to the conclusion that architects must learn exactly how to design houses to be as awkward as possible for a decent hifi and/or AV setup.

Typical open plan huge and oddly shaped kitchen/diner area but often a tiny lounge even in larger 4/5 bed houses.

 

[musicphil]

A few years ago we were looking around at new builds just because there seemed to be a lot of them going up around here were curious and I came to the conclusion that architects must learn exactly how to design houses to be as awkward as possible for a decent hifi and/or AV setup.

Typical open plan huge and oddly shaped kitchen/diner area but often a tiny lounge even in larger 4/5 bed houses.

That's why I have a converted garage as a dedicated music room, with the added bonus of concrete floor.

 

[Khazul]

That's why I have a converted garage as a dedicated music room, with the added bonus of concrete floor.

I can understand that. I am semi lucky is that while I have a small house (2 bed chalet) its downstairs living area is quite big (6.5mx5.5m) and has a solid floor plenty of room for larger speaker to breath
a bit without too much interference from Room modes at awkward frequencies.

But my AV/HiFi layout lack any acoustic symmetry at all speaker placement yes with its zone, but room acoustics - no, which brings us back to this thread...

REW + a measuring mic (which I already had) ended being the cheap fix that ended up making a huge difference as I already had Roon, so just a case of learning to make a good correction filter and loading it. In the end I have been though many iterations of the process now and each yielding better sounding correction, more advanced correction techniques and filter creation etc, but I am probably at the limits of what I can do in REW + rephase now so may have to look at 'Acourate' (which is not cheap) for the next round of filter creation if/when I think of better ways to do it. As it stand now, I guess I have a correction that seems quite comparable in approach to Roon Perfect on a Lyngdorf amp in some ways and maybe actually more transparent.

Now every Roon endpoint I have is running some level of convolution based correction dsp. I even have a few correction presets I made for the various locations I use a JBL Extreme 2 wireless ghetto blaster (via iphone+bluetooth or a chromecast audio when its in the bedroom) to tame the bass bloat on the damn thing and get a half decent tone out of it.

 

[andybebbs]

Tried these silicon dots on my rega p3 after various matts and i find it really helps with dust and static and sounds good. And very cheap off ebay.

 

[password1]

any link to those 'dots' please?

 

[andybebbs]

100Pcs Silicone Rubber Feet Anti-Slip & Collision Clear Self Adhesive Sticky Pad | eBay

100% good quality silicone rubber feet sticker. Material: silicone. Perfect for cupboard door anti-collision.

www.ebay.co.uk

 

[Jaded1]

Second the ear syringe which you can get done for free at your local surgery. If you have never had it done, DO IT. You will be slack jaw amazed just how much detail you have been missing out and just how fecking loud the outside world is under those layers of wax.

 

[gibbsy]

Second the ear syringe which you can get done for free at your local surgery. If you have never had it done, DO IT. You will be slack jaw amazed just how much detail you have been missing out and just how fecking loud the outside world is under those layers of wax.

I don't know where this thread is going or whether it's a bit off topic. So........the syringe is good but put some olive oil drops in each ear for a couple of days and then use the syringe, it will help soften the wax and make it easier to flush out.

 

[Jaded1]

I don't know where this thread is going or whether it's a bit off topic. So........the syringe is good but put some olive oil drops in each ear for a couple of days and then use the syringe, it will help soften the wax and make it easier to flush out.

The thread is about cheap hifi hacks to improve sound and somebody brought up the ear cleans.

The difference between using drops and having a full flush is night and day and something you can't know unless you have had it done.

I suffer from a major build up of wax and have to have them done every few years. It's shocking how much comes out. The last time I had it done the nurse said it was a miracle I could hear at all because so much of it.

 

[Onlythesound]

Having just one ear - the left - means true stereo is hard to achieve for me. That maybe why unconventional speaker positioning works for me.