1. Replace Bellwire Cables

One of the easiest ways to produce contemporary crisp sound from your old system, is by ditching the bellwire cables usually supplied with the system, and replacing these with a thicker shielded cable, such as the Award winning, Chord Company Silver screen cable. This will immensely improve your listening experience.

2. Secure Mounting

Appropriate mounting of all components of your hifi, especially loudspeakers and record players is essential in getting top quality sound out of your system. Recommended for turntables is a large solid slab of slate, placed either on the floor or on a heavy iron and lead table. Loudspeakers that sway or move creates the Doppler shift (music modulated with unsteady underlying tone). To rectify this, the use of spikes are attached to the base of the speakers in a tripod position. This will make sure your speakers don’t wobble.

3. Room Acoustics

By introducing a mixture of hard and soft surfaces into your listening room this prevents the repeated reflections of sound. Make sure opposite surfaces are treated differently i.e. placing a soft carpet on the floor opposite a hard ceiling or  a hard surface on the floor might work well against a heavily acoustical tile ceiling. Walls are better filled than left empty, and again the rule of opposites applies (don’t place similar items opposite each other). If shelving is used, it is better to fill shelves rather than keep them empty. Corners can be filled with odd shaped items, found in the likes of car booth sales. Avoid large curtains as these can dull the music.

4. Allow Access From Every Direction 

By selecting seating with a low back that doesn’t obstruct your ears, this will allow sound to be heard not only from the front but also from the back and sides, giving vital acoustic experience from all dimensions.

5. Electrical Source

Check your electrical outlets and make sure your Hifi System is independent from major appliances such as fridges, kettles, washing machines and computers etc. This will correct electrical interference. Shielded speaker cable mentioned above will also help reduce this as will good power conditioners. A power conditioner will help reduce or eliminate electrical mains interference.

6. Stacking Your System

Power amplifiers can emit a hum from amplified appliances such as turntables, tape decks etc, it is recommended to vertically space out your system a few inches apart to reduce the chance of hum.

7. Beef Up Interconnects

Remove interconnects supplied with the Hifi and replace these with cables such as Chord Company Crimson. Improvements here are the shielding used, better quality conductors and the VEE 3 plugs with precision connection from the earth with the socket.

8. Warming Up

Switch your system on for 15-20 minutes before you sit down to listen. Like ourselves Hifi tends to work better from a warm up than from cold. This will result in a sweetening of your sound.

9. Keeping it Level 

No tool box needed just a level, If you are a fan of  Vinyl it is important that the platter is always level, but Vinyl aside, this also relates to your Cd player, as disks at an angle may struggle to be read by Cd lasers. Free spirit level apps are now available on most smart devices, so is another of our no cost recommendations.

10. Grills

Experiment with taking the speaker grills on and off to find which suits best. It is commonly thought that by removing the grills allows the speaker to perform to at its best. This may not always be the case. For a warmer less in your face sound the grills attached are preferred. Alternatively if your sound is muddy and lacking detail removing grills will rectify this.