Just ordered the LMC/LPA Combo

[petvan]

Hi All,

I heard about Emotiva Friday, and ordered this combo Saturday (won a couple grand playing poker ;-)

I was going to do an outlaw audio combo for some time, but came across Emotiva and have been really impressed with the reviews, and this combo is a good 50% less than what I was going to spend elsewhere so I snapped it up quick.

It will be replacing my Cambridge 540R (rev 1) which I really do like, but was looking to augment with power amp anyway. I've always been disappointed with the 2 channel sound in my room (which is awkward) as driven by the Cambridge (my rega mira sounds a good bit better to me), and I'm hopeful I'll see some difference there, and for my movie viewing as well. I think also I'm just bored, and looking for some cool kit to wire up that might help me learn more about audio to boot ;-)

I almost bought the MMC/IPS combo, but figured I'd try to UT's first as I expect I might be happy and save cash at the same time.

For the record, I have a relatively cheap panny S97 DVD player which I really like, a use a Rega Planet 2k for a CD player as i lost my dedicated two channel room to kids (d**n kids! ;-). My speakers are canadian made by a now extinct company called Zetag, and are called Kinima's (H1G2/KC2 centers, H1G1 rears & occasionally another set of H1G1's substitute for the H1G2's when I'm bored). 93db sensitivity if I recall correctly. SVS PC 20-39 (powered) does the bottom end.

I'll post my comments, neophyte as they are, when the kit arrives!

Thanks all for your open comments, and gonk especially for numerous comments all over which I've been reading as a lurker for years I think ;-)

P

[theophile]

Petvan,

Congrats for your Emo UT Series combo purchase...I'm sure you are going to love it! ;D

Have mine for about the past 10 days, it totally blew away the Sony HT receiver I had in power, sound-stage, dynamics, articulation, air and separation! Heck, the top end and bottom end seems to have extended an Octave on the extremes!!! Very musical and powerful sound all-in-one!!

Let us know your thoughts with your gear!

Ted

[petvan]

Here' s a quick update. The order/shipping process was stellar, and I received the well packaged combo in short order, and great shape.

Had the rebuild my Altantis Reference 5 Rack a bit to accomodate the height of the LPA-1. In doing so, I unhooked my Panny S97 DVD, and when I re-hooked it, it no longer powered up ;-)

Thus, when I went live, I had 2 sources, my Rega Planet CD player, and my satelite PVR.

Firstly, with the Planet using L/R of the 7.1 analog in, the sound was excellent. I really enjoyed it and believe it added a lot over my 540R, but I need to do some back to back listening to be certain. However, I was very happy.

On the digitial front however, I'm having some challenges. The LMC seems to struggle with identifying the source material and getting the decoding right. Where my cambridge did this channel by channel seamlessly, the LMC seems to need a push here and there, and sometimes flat out goes silent.

However, Lonny is helping with this and is very responsive, so i'm hopeful to have a glowing update soon. I ordered an Oppo 981HD which shows up tomorrow, and I hope to get some good DD 5.1 stuff running right away. What I've heard from the HD channels off my PVR has sounded great, but I need to hear some old faithfuls to get a good feel for the relative quality.

More soon...

Pete

[petvan]

Hi All,

I've spoken and traded emails with Lonnie, and spent a little bit of time playing with the LMC / LPA combo over the past few days and have resolved all major issues.

The LMC takes a bit more time than I'm used to to figure out what type of signal it is receiving, but in general it does what I can tell is a reasonable job of doing so, and with time I am becoming more patient with the process and don't find it much of a bother. In many cases it works fairly transparently.

I have continued to use my Rega Planet on the 7.1 inputs and have to say it sounds fantastic. This is the first time I've had decent 2 channel sound in my awkward theatre room beyond those times I try and shoehorn in my Mira amp.

I picked up an OPPO 981HD and watched a couple DVD's, including the David Gilmore semi recent live concert one (how is that for vague) and was very happy with the product.

I haven't got out my AVIA disk yet and tuned the setup, and my SPL meter actually needs batteries so I'm certain the sound levels are well off, but despite that, my initial impressions are very positive.

I'm no audiofile, so I won't through words in like imaging/soundstand/brightness etc ;-) However, in thinking that, I have to say I think the soundstage is nicely wide, and I'm placing instruments well, with nice clarity and definition.

For a grand, I can't see how you can go wrong, esp if you can deal with few nuances around signal recognition, which I really don't think is that big a deal.

I was thinking of upgrading to an MMC, but I heard there may be new stuff coming in the new year, and think I can be happy for a good while with my LMC.

Pete