Yes, although the speakers are so sensitive that I’ve never been able to completely get rid of background hum. It’s not too bad, but it’s there.
No other sources apart from the TT - we haven’t got CDs anymore and I’m too much of a Luddite for streaming.
1 Like
Tried to PM you @nafaiutb, interested in hearing more about your experience with those lovely speakers. How much of a limitation have you found their very high sensitivity?
Do you think it is an earthing issue? I’ve had Viva amplification with different horn set ups and it has always been dead silent.
1 Like
Yes agree, that’s what I meant. With the lounge maybe first if I find the right thing, and then the basement project to follow once @Spenagio has filled my head full of exciting conversion ideas!
4 Likes
Lots of reasons why kit hums - it might be an Earthing issue, i.e. - a high impedance mains Earth (which is bad news for household safety and needs a proper sparky on the job immediately), but usually people mean a Grounding issue - most often a Ground loop - which is much commoner.
Ground loops are confusing things, because they’re often caused by a lack of appropriate connection, ground potential/voltage disequilibrium, or high impedance between connected devices, and can be a bastard to work-out of a system.
Or, of course if valves are involved, those may be suspect, equally it might be EMI pickup somewhere in the tangle of boxes and cables, or magnetostriction of transformers due to DC-offset in the power supply… Or something oscillating somewhere, or… . . . .
Tying all of your equipment’s casework Earthing back to a single Earth point via suitably volt/current rated green’n’yellow wire + a current-limiting resistor is my preferred bodge, but you need A Clue, and of course it excludes Class II kit…
4 Likes
You’re right, the Solista was silent with my Triangle speakers.
It seems to be something to do with the bass amplifiers inside the Swings, either in themselves or somehow in how they work with the rest of the system (grounding like Paul said?). Turn the bass amps right down on the back of the speakers, the hum goes, as do the bass frequencies in the music 
The Solista has a subwoofer output & it half crossed my mind to get someone who knows what they’re doing (emphatically not me) to bypass the Swings’ bass amps & connect the bass drivers directly to the Solista.
One of these days…
2 Likes
Fancy a holiday in Alsace Paul? 
2 Likes
As the mains hum is likely to be 50Hz, only the bass speakers will be likely show it, just a thought. It could be elsewhere.
1 Like
1 Like
I liked this sentence from that
“I was pretty much convinced about the main goals I should seek in my system: tone, dynamics and speed. Usual audiophile attributes such as imaging, 3D etc I increasingly started failing to notice on live performances.”
For me, when you don’t have much of the first 3 things, to which I would add delicacy, scale, slam and depth, then all you can focus on is imaging, 3d etc - that and plugging in endless grounding boxes, audiofool fuses and Basilisk thick cables😂
Hoping the tone, dynamics and speed etc feature highly here.
2 Likes
You can tell it was posted over ten years ago - a lot of the replies are friendly 
3 Likes
Yes, I liked that bit too. Hopefully Gordan @anubisgrau sees this and can give some follow up thoughts.
He was talking about horns, not carbon cables!
1 Like
A few things for consideration:
(1) Are you 100% confident the noise is being emitted by the drivers (a), or is it perhaps the subwoofer enclosures/plate amps physically vibrating (b).
(a) - if yes go-to (2)
(b) - if yes go to ifi DC-blocker - cheap enough to try and see if it helps.
(2) Are you using a mix of balanced/XLR and unbalanced/RCA cables (a), or are they all the same (b)?
(a) If XLRs are an option, use these throughout, they are usually more immune to system noise, if not, use RCAs throughout.
(b) Are any of them so-called pseudo-balanced (screen connected only at one end), or some kind of weird design (box in the middle, Van den Hul carbon-fibre crap, unscreend DNM Reson, etc), if they are, ditch them in favour of something normal!
(3) Lots of valve amps have a ground-lift switch, check and see if the Viva’s have such, try changing the setting (safest to power-down - switch - then power-up again).
(4) Is everything plugged into the same outlet? More than one plug-board can be a bad idea, especially if you’re using the cheap shit that twats on forums insist is all you need. Even different wall sockets can be on different ring-mains, or stupidly-long spurs. It’s better to plug the whole lot into one high-quality plug-board and use long runs of power cable to reach the speakers.
(5) Any wanky mains cables in-use? There’s a cyclical fetish for using US-stuff, or even omitting an Earth connection. Don’t.
(6) Old house? Is all of the wiring to modern standards? Are the outlets you’re using definitely Earthed? Is the Earth of good quality (i.e.more than a strap to a central heating pipe). You can do a basic check yourself with a socket tester that incorporates an Earth impedance checker - something like a Kew Loopcheck107 - you could get a UK model and use it with a good quality converter plug.
(7) Easy common ground - grab an ESD plug -
And a cheap reel of 0.5mm Earth wire, undo a screw on the case of every bit of kit, including the (I assume) plate amps on the speakers, strip 1cm from the end of each wire and twist round the screw, then screw tight enough to hold, same at the other ends, twist 'em onto the binding posts on the plug, again if you got the UK version then you’ll obvs need a decent converter, but presumably all these things have Euro equivalents.
This way you have a common low impedance system ground which has a high impedance to Earth, so no risk of faults taking the wrong path and not tripping protection devices.
OK, I’m out of brane for now. Good luck!
8 Likes
PS: somewhere I have a boxfull of those UK ESD plugs (don’t ask…), if you go that way drop me a line.
1 Like
Thanks very much for taking the time to reply Paul, I appreciate it 
(1) Are you 100% confident the noise is being emitted by the drivers
- Yes
(2) Are you using a mix of balanced/XLR and unbalanced/RCA cables (a), or are they all the same (b)?
- All RCA cables
(b) Are any of them so-called pseudo-balanced (screen connected only at one end), or some kind of weird design (box in the middle, Van den Hul carbon-fibre crap, unscreend DNM Reson, etc), if they are, ditch them in favour of something normal!
- 1pr ANUK, others I’m not sure, names lost in the mists of time & beer. I’ll get a few sets of regular interconnects & see if that makes a difference
(3) Lots of valve amps have a ground-lift switch, check and see if the Viva’s have such, try changing the setting (safest to power-down - switch - then power-up again).
- The phono pre has a ground lift - it doesn’t seem to change much in terms of hum. Can’t see one on the amp.
(4) Is everything plugged into the same outlet? It’s better to plug the whole lot into one high-quality plug-board and use long runs of power cable to reach the speakers.
(5) Any wanky mains cables in-use? There’s a cyclical fetish for using US-stuff, or even omitting an Earth connection. Don’t.
- I don’t mess about - Wychwood multisocket & all mains cables from a firm called Evolution Audio 
(6) Old house?
- 12 years old so should be to modern standards.
Is the Earth of good quality (i.e.more than a strap to a central heating pipe). You can do a basic check yourself with a socket tester that incorporates an Earth impedance checker
- I got an electrician to check that & it was good
(7) Easy common ground - grab an ESD plug
I’ll try that, thanks.
Are u using a sut?
I’m embarrassed to say that I don’t know - the Viva Fono LT only has an MC input but I’m not sure if there’s a step up in there 
Westminsters
Going by the name do they produce a non stop noise that has no detail or substance?
1 Like