Reality Technologies Surround Master - Info, Questions and Ordering Thread

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Dear All

As you know we are developing a mega pre amp but we will design a new Surround Master in an economy preamp form with Volume, individual level controls, Bluetooth, optical, MM, MC in a metal enclosure. The price will be higher than the existing SM and somewhere between $700 to $950.

This is great news Chucky. Any ideas as to availability? Hope to see the photos soon.
Cheers,
Soundfield.
 
Hope to get a render in a week or two. The final date depends on Dave the bitch who is permanently sick at the moment, lost a ball, currently has the flu, off because his "wife" is pregnant.....blah blah blah. It is hard to get good help these days.

I hope February next year

Regards

Chucky

This is great news Chucky. Any ideas as to availability? Hope to see the photos soon.
Cheers,
Soundfield.
 
I look forward to the new housing/next generation Surround Master. And seeing what it will look like. I've held off buying one to this point, especially having heard a while back that a new metal housing was under development... I'm holding out for the sexier packaged version. With operational upgrades (volume and level controls, connection options)? Awesome!
 
I very much might be in at the lower price if it has adjustable input levels, it is 24/96 all over, the switching between modes is not clunky and the firmware is either soft or a swappable chip. Also if it could be configured as a line-level device with not preamp controls.

I would be in at the higher price if it includes the digital side of a CD-4 demod but I guess demodulating in the PC will be ready before the new SM is designed.

Speaking of CD-4........what has happened to that project for us?
 
Hi

Its just an issue of overload on other (solar related) projects, Dave has been working on the big fancy higher $ preamplifier, he got sick and lost a ball, got pregnant and is distracted all the time, got sick with the flu and got even more distracted - frankly he does not do work anymore. We want to finish of these two preamps and then we will look at the CD4.

Really sorry about the delays but cash flow is always the issue and you need to set the sails where the $ wind blows. Our hearts are with the audio.

Regards

Chucky

Speaking of CD-4........what has happened to that project for us?
 
A question!.
Are there any SM Left?, Or do we wait for the new version. I'm happy to wait for one that has 6-4 audio outs and some kind of digital out with the option of "bringing your own preamp" so you can switch the inbuilt preamp on or off.

But also am happy Building a 4 channel amp myself to power it. (or 6)
 
Hi

I think we have 5 left

Regards

Chucky

A question!.
Are there any SM Left?, Or do we wait for the new version. I'm happy to wait for one that has 6-4 audio outs and some kind of digital out with the option of "bringing your own preamp" so you can switch the inbuilt preamp on or off.

But also am happy Building a 4 channel amp myself to power it. (or 6)
 
Thanks for that, I'm off finding a amp off Ebay and ill be in touch!. I'm sick of the "script method", many hours of farting about. Its a pain in the arse. Plus as I do like QS albums I'm interested in what the Involve mode will do to other stereo stuff. When I get round to ordering it, do I just order it from the Web page with SQ enabled?



Hi

I think we have 5 left

Regards

Chucky
 
Thanks for that, I'm off finding a amp off Ebay and ill be in touch!. I'm sick of the "script method", many hours of farting about. Its a pain in the arse. Plus as I do like QS albums I'm interested in what the Involve mode will do to other stereo stuff. When I get round to ordering it, do I just order it from the Web page with SQ enabled?

I have used the QSD1 for nearly 40 years for stereo Surround
on radio CDs LPs and anything else as well as QS records and CD,s
the Surround master does the same thing as the QSD1
So you will not be sorry
Ron
 
Hi

Thats right



Thanks for that, I'm off finding a amp off Ebay and ill be in touch!. I'm sick of the "script method", many hours of farting about. Its a pain in the arse. Plus as I do like QS albums I'm interested in what the Involve mode will do to other stereo stuff. When I get round to ordering it, do I just order it from the Web page with SQ enabled?
 
While I agree that script decoding is a pain in the arse, once it's done it's done. I've been playing around with the scripts a bit but admit that I havn't completed a single album yet, but do plan to get around to it, as time permits. If you have a good decoder such as the Surround Master or QSD-1, 2, 1000, I suppose that the scripts are unnecessary.
I have the Involve evaluation module and have be testing it out. On the bench the outputs look perfect for a QS decoder, better than the QSD-1. For stereo enhancement you really need some sort of pre-synth circuit, such as proposed by Scot Varner in MCS Review. That circuit adds a bit of out of phase blend to produce the surround effect (pulls left and right side images to the rear) or in phase blend to pull the left and right to the front. My old home built preamp has this feature, so with it connected in the circuit I have my surround mode for stereo sources.
I can confirm that the Involve decoder sounds very much like the QSD-1 surround wise. I've always thought that the QSD-1 colours the sound a bit, the involve seems to have it's own characteristic sound as well, a bit of an upper midrange lower treble glare but is cleaner than the QSD-1.
I decided to tweak the separation pots on the QSD-1 and found the the left to right of the midband board would not adjust properly, luckily the chips are still available on eBay, looks like a bad phase discriminator, taking the time to re-cap as well.
The Involve and QSD-1 create a busier sound-field than single band units, but I actually prefer my single band Photolume (QSD-2, clone) for music. Imagine that with a multi band decoder an instrument is playing from one location while it's harmonics are coming from someplace else, the sound becomes less focused. I'm convinced that is what happens with multi band decoding.
 
Regarding my QSD-1, I ordered HA1327 Phase Discriminator chips from a U.S. seller on eBay and they arrived quickly. Previously the left/right separation trimmers were found not to be having any effect, I replaced the chip and got it to work but now the front and back were not adjusting so replaced that chip as well now everything is fine. Most of the capacitors have also been replaced. It's interesting that Sansui used different electrolytic capacitors for coupling than in other parts of the circuit, this at a time when it was generally accepted that a capacitor was a capacitor was a capacitor for audio use! The old capacitors still appear to be fine and might of been good for another 40 years without replacement! I used Wima poly caps for coupling, they are about the same size as the original electrolytic caps. I quickly auditioned it and seemed to be much more focused and cleaner sounding than before. I will be doing more comparisons against the involve board as time permits.
 
Regarding my QSD-1, I ordered HA1327 Phase Discriminator chips from a U.S. seller on eBay and they arrived quickly. Previously the left/right separation trimmers were found not to be having any effect, I replaced the chip and got it to work but now the front and back were not adjusting so replaced that chip as well now everything is fine. Most of the capacitors have also been replaced. It's interesting that Sansui used different electrolytic capacitors for coupling than in other parts of the circuit, this at a time when it was generally accepted that a capacitor was a capacitor was a capacitor for audio use! The old capacitors still appear to be fine and might of been good for another 40 years without replacement! I used Wima poly caps for coupling, they are about the same size as the original electrolytic caps. I quickly auditioned it and seemed to be much more focused and cleaner sounding than before. I will be doing more comparisons against the involve board as time permits.


Very cool work Ken!

So are you removing the blend resistors in the Sansui D units?

I have a Sansui QRX-777 (European version) with the blend resistors removed and preamp inputs and outputs added. I have a black faced D-2 (stock) and have had in the past a D-1. I will be adding a D-1000 to the system soon.
 
Very cool work Ken!

So are you removing the blend resistors in the Sansui D units?

I have a Sansui QRX-777 (European version) with the blend resistors removed and preamp inputs and outputs added. I have a black faced D-2 (stock) and have had in the past a D-1. I will be adding a D-1000 to the system soon.


Yes the blend resistors were removed some time ago. My D-1 is sounding much better now, I don't know if it's because of the new capacitors or just that it wasn't functioning 100% with bad chips in it (it's not like it wasn't functioning at all, separation was good even before the repair). I would of loved to get my hands on a QSD-1000, but a bit out of my price range, but maybe some day.

My Photolume, "Vista QS100" (QSD-2 clone) dosn't have the output phase shift circuit or blend resistors at all. Upon checking the outputs of the Photolume I see Lb to be out of phase with Lf, I might try inverting the phase of Lb to see if it sounds better. I'm recapping that unit now and will likely add separation pots (in place of it's fixed resistors), although it works great as is.
 
Wow, I'm so happy I just ordered a Surround Master after hearing so many great things and realized it's nearly sold out. I have had many great quad receivers over the years (haven't listened in stereo since 96 :). Super excited! Well -then I realised that Involve is in Australia, not far from my sheep loving homeland of NZ!
Now I rock my rebuilt Sansui 6500 and 4 JBL 100's, in a big living area- with a heap of inputs but mostly bluetooth digital lately to be honest.. It is beautiful.
I have had soo many people comment on how great quad sounds, but it's pretty hard for people to find a nice setup now. This is soo cool , I'm very late jumping on the band wagon ,but I really hope that Involove might influence the mainstream. When people have 4 good speakers (not shoe box sized rears) and a great decoder and amp I think they will see how amazing quad can (still) be ! Peace ..in 4 channels :)
 
When you set it up
and play SQ and QS LPs
and stereo through Involve (QS) let the QQ,s know what you think
From the Mainland
yours
Ron
 
On behalf of those of us on QQ who have enjoyed a year of surround sound delights, thanks to the magical SM box of tricks, I'd like to wish Chucky and everyone at Involve a Merry Christmas and a Very Happy New Year!
:woopie:party:music:brew:brew:music:party:woopie

Season's Greetings from Soundfield
 
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