In life we sometimes get caught up in the everyday happenings and forget to enjoy things along the way. This is probably even more true at work. Being in the AV business, I sometimes get so caught up in things like client scheduling, finding the right dimensions to fit our recommended equipment and various other minutia that I forget why I got into this business to begin with, that being the enjoyment of music. I have been after better sound since when I was a young kid. Today I was reminded of this and thought I'd share my experience with you.

With today being Saturday I went in to the office with the thought of catching up on the things I didn't get to Monday - Friday. Since we are not officially open on Saturday, I don't have to listen for the phones, nor do I have people trying to talk to me. So..... I get to listen to my sound system at a louder than normal volume. Because the volume is louder than the typical work week whisper, I was able to notice all the little musical details you wouldn't normally hear. It’s always great to hear something in a song that you’ve never heard in it before.

Allow me tell you about the AV sound system I was using. I usually play either wav or high resolution MP3 files that reside on my computer. These files are pulled over the office network from my PC through a Sonos ZP-90. The ZP90 feeds an original Decco tube amplifier via a coaxial digital cable. The Decco amp is driving a pair of ERA D4 speakers. Lastly there is my most recent addition, a PSB HD8 subwoofer which is truly awesome and I'll talk more about later. The Sono’s ZP90 does a much better job of delivering the music than the USB connector on the PC. I can’t remember the science of why that is, but I think it has to do with “jitter” and that using the digital output on ZP90 is superior to the USB output of the PC. Testing both soon proved to me this was accurate.

I first heard the Decco tube amplifier demo'd at a trade show I was attending. I remember I was talking to a another sales rep about whatever product it was that he was rep’ing. I heard the Decco begin playing and was so blown away with the sound, I stopped the conversation mid sentence and ran over to the Decco booth. I wanted to see what was sounding so awesome. At the booth, the Decco folks were showing their Decco tube amp along with the Design 4 or D4 speakers. The folks from Decco explained to me that their goal was to make lower quality digital music actually sound good. Well they sure met their goal! The music sounded fantastic! They even had some old Elvis material ripped at a bit rate below 128 kbps and it sounded decent.

The Design D4 speakers are made of 1” MDF. When you go to move them the first time you’ll be stunned. These speakers are so heavy they likely won’t move until you lift little harder than you probably first thought you’d have too. I was told this very solid structure, is very helpful to the sound quality by reducing vibration.

The PSB HD8 Subwoofer is an 8” sub with dual 8” passive radiators. My PSB rep told me that by having exactly two times the cavity size as the main driver they get really good punch from it. For the record, I personally am not a big subwoofer fan. Sure, you need one for movies and you need one to give bottom end to “small” speakers. However, too often most subwoofers are way too “boomy” and don’t really sonically match the speakers. The result ends up being that it is all to obvious you have a subwoofer. Not with the PSB HD8 though. It’s small size (8”) crosses over at a very musical point and makes it very difficult to distinguish what sound is from the sub and what is from the speakers. Even though the HD8 is only 8” there is no noticeable lack of bass. The first time I heard this sub was a quick test at the office before we installed it on a client's boat. The client had to use this because it was the only “decent” thing we could find that would fit the existing cavity he had on the boat. I loved the way it sounded immediately. It sounded far better than the KEF PS2150 10” sub I was using at the time.

So back to the main point, through “good sound” I was transported to a place where there I was working away and the music was just so beautiful. Work was so enjoyable, I got tons of work done and I even just thought of a few tracks I wish I would have listened too. Well, there’s always early Monday before the crew comes in.

Sono’s ZP90 $349
Decco2 & D4 speaker package $1,199
PSB HD8 Subwoofer $1,099

As a footnote I need to try this again with both the PSB Imagine bookshelf speakers ($1,099 pair) and the PSB Synchrony Two Bookshelf speakers ($,1849 pair). Also Decco has a new Nova out that’s twice the wattage at $1,199. It would also be interesting to try this through some of our Marantz components and see how well they match up. I bet they’d do well.

Follow Up

So I ordered a set of Imagine B speakers and we had a chance to test them side by side with the Decoo speakers. They were stunning. It's not even fair how much better they sounded especially at the bottom end. The PSB speakers had a lot more punch to them just above where the low frequencies roll off to the subwoofer. They were also a lot less harsh. This harshness is something you really wouldn't even notice until you heard them side by side. The Imagine speakers also had far more detail and separation of space than did the Decco's. In fairness they are also twice the price. I honestly had no idea how good these book shelf speakers could sound. Consider me impressed, they are now going to be staying on my desktop!!