matthewb on Farcaster

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https://warpcast.com/~/channel/hifi

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a few notes from @brileigh and I's visit to the Ojas listening room in NYC * Ojas and Devon Turnbull before founding Ojas, Devon Turnbull studied at Parsons and adopted the tag "Ojas" for mixtapes, graffiti, flyers, etc. in 2003 he founded the streetwear label Nom de Guerre with some friends and over the next few years travelled frequently to Japan as he developed an interest in high-efficiency drivers, horns, and tube amplifiers. in his spare time, he built Altec-inspired horn speakers for himself and friends which later became DIY flat-pack kits sold through Virgil Abloh's Canary Yellow platform. Nom de Guerre closed in 2013 and Turnbull turned his attention to Ojas full-time as an audio practice. by 2018 his custom systems found their way into stores like Supreme, venues like Public Records, and producer Mark Ronson's studio. in 2022 he produced Hi-Fi Listening Room Dream No. 1, an immersive installation that was first presented in Lisson Gallery (NYC, London) before touring to many other institutions.

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* Listening impressions so, what does this imposing pewter grey system sound like? not what I expected, frankly. the physicality of that 31.5" subwoofer gave me certain expectations but the sonic characteristics of this system were actually quite tame for the most part. the only source used during our demo was vinyl, mostly instrumental jazz that tended towards intimate in scale. there was a nice sense of space around the instruments and overall the balance was quite pleasant. you could sit here and listen for hours without thinking about the time or your grocery list. both frequency extremes were quite rolled off and polite rather than brutish. there was also an issue with the right channel that gave it a certain "tizzy" quality (bright/ragged treble), but I suspect this was an anomaly.

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ook what's the hi-fi overlord's view on vinyl vs CD vs digital? i see a lot of CDs if digital files, what sort of player would you need to get everything out and through? i imagine the macbook 3.5 jack won't do huh and is vinyl really superior to CD or just hipster gimmick feel free to QC and do a thread pls ehm ehm

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👋 HIFI nerd here (also record label owner who press vinyl). Technically, CD’s are technically more precise because you have the raw / uncompressed files playing exactly what was recorded (no added flavor) There’s a thing about vinyl tho, which is hard to explain, that makes the sound very different, warmth / less bright and feels more natural. Vinyl goes through a separate mastering process and has a much higher dynamic range which might change how you perceive things. It’s the classic analog vs digital debate and I think you should pick your winner. There’s also some UX differences- with vinyl you need to switch / flip the record every 15 min vs a CD that can play for 1 hour and there are several multi cd units. There’s def some cool factor involved - which is why hi fi bars play vinyl and not cd’s

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thank you for sharing, love it! most things I agree with but not all. some thoughts in this thread: https://warpcast.com/matthewb/0xae01ca0e

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