arcam cd37 cd player

I've had a CD37 on home audition for the last couple of days and in between the various building works I've had a chance to listen to the player. The CD37 is a natural upgrade to the CD72 that I own (now available to purchase on gumtree if anyone is interested!) An interesting point to note is that one of the reasons for buying a CD72 was that the DACs could be upgraded to the similarly award winning CD92/CD192; a 192 upsampling improvement over the 24 bit DAC in the CD72. However by the time I made a decision to upgrade Arcam had revamped their CD player range and the boards were no longer available.

Straight out of the box the it was clear that there was a need to run the player in, over the last couple of listen sessions there has been a marked improvement with greater definition and more detail being pulled from the discs. The sound stage is wider and fuller than the CD72, with greater separation of the instruments and voices; the close vocal harmonies on Gillian Welch's Orphan Girl along with the sparse guitar picking stand out. One thing I like about Arcam's sound is that it's laid back, not strident or aggressive so you can enjoy hours of listening without the feeling that your ears needed a rest. Not all Arcam's disc spinners were this easy going, I once auditioned an Alpha 7SE and after twenty minutes I was longing for the quiet dead of night.

The transport and tray are solidly engineered, and the player takes time to load and read discs, no doubt due to the fact that it also plays SACDs. I don't own any of these although I've ordered one up from amazon to get an idea of what this format does sonically. I won't go into my cynical view of vinyl vs CD vs other formats here, I'll save that for another post. Suffice to state that the SACD format hasn't taken off as perhaps Sony would have hoped, no doubt not helped by the iPod generation, streaming and downloads.

Which leads nicely to why spend a very large chunk of cash on a seemingly soon to be obsolete item of hi-fi? There are personal and practical answers to this question. I've amassed a large collection of CDs and I prefer to spend time listening to the music rather than copying it to a hard drive, mp3 player or whatever, that is when I'm not out enjoying the hills and fells. And when I'm out I prefer Natures Soundtrack so I have no need to carry my favoured tunes around on a flash drive.

chanukah

Chanukah starts this Friday so I was out on a mission to find a menorah. Back where I grew up this would have been a easy task; walking up to Stamford Hill and having a browse around the shops on the parade. In the depths of northern Surrey I'd have to improvise. Philip Werner suggested that I make one (Brent Council have a PDF on their website with instructions for a menorah made from recycled materials in case I was that way inclined). However I was going to find a candle holder to suit the Festival of Lights needs; it must hold nine candles, one for each day of the Festival and one for the Shamash, which the other candles are lit from.


The menorah is one of the enduring symbols of Judaism and is traditionally a linear affair but then there's tradition, and then there's tradition. My offering is a modern take on on this, well that's my belief.

golite peak – first impression

A new model for 2010 which Bob at BPL UK managed to acquire limited stock of this side of the 31st December. Naturally I had to have one because… Well because it’s new but it’s not shiny; I ordered one in black, and I had need of a 40l rucksack (that’s my justification out of the way).

It’s basically a mini-me version of the Jam 2 only smaller and with a few refinements. The bag is made from grid reinforced dynema but with one difference, it’s made from 100% recycled material. In fact all rucksacks in next year’s product line will be made from recycled material (or as their website states 100% Tier 1 EPM’s). The bag boasts the same compactor system allowing you to skinny it down for smaller loads, the same large front pocket, the roll top closure, hydration sleeve, and two side pockets. My Travel Tap fitted snugly in one of these as would a platy or one litre water bottle.

One of the main differences between the Peak and Jam is that the hip belt fins on the Peak are removable and have be re-worked to fit the hips better, a bit like a single strap version that’s found on the Osprey sacks. The hip belt fins have pockets that will hold a couple of cereal bars, compass, GPS that sort of thing. I’ve not detached them yet so I can’t comment on how easy this is to do or undo. The bumph that came with the bag states that you can save 140g by removing these. I like hip belt pockets so I can’t see me removing them but will tinker and report back. Incidentally on my scales the bag clocked 793g.

The other difference is that there’s a foam back panel that’s removable to save weight when not required. I had a look at this and found it slotted in with a tight fit, so didn’t attempt to remove it. It looks like that it can only be taken out if the bag is empty, so no use as a sit pad at lunch then. Also the foam didn’t look like it was closed cell to me, only way to find out is to take it out and run it under a tap. Again that’s a tinker for another time. I’ll stick it on the scales and post a stripped down weight with my other findings.

I used the bag to carry my work bag and other bits and pieces home, and the bag fitted snugly. It was not loaded with a great deal of weight but it felt a comfortable carry all the same. Golite claim that you can carry loads up to 30lbs (14kg) but with no lumber pad and minimal padding on the hip belt fins I can’t help but doubt that, I could of course be wrong. That said the typical load I had in mind for it was circa 6kg, so unless I’m feeling masochistic at some point I’m not going to bother going to that extreme.

The next thing was to look at loading the bag. I stuffed my regular down bag into its 8l dry bag and this fitted with room to spare in the bottom of the sack. With this space to spare I knew that it would be ideal for the type of trip I planned to use it for.

At this point playing with the pack was put on pause – I had supper to cook.

mardale pile bivi boots

The above items are one of those luxury items that you dream of at the end of a long day when your feet are wet and cold, and no amount of burying in the sleeping bag and wiggling of toes will make them warm up.

These are like buffalo pile mitts for the feet. The extra large (10-12) weigh 172g so not as light as I’d like. And being pile they are bulky too. Perhaps I should have indulged myself and bought some down booties from PHD but there’s one big advantage to these; they have a thin but durable sole so you can walk around in them. Non-lumpy ground obviously, I wouldn’t want to stand on a stone in these. Answering the call of nature in the damp dead of night is a foot wetting thing of the past.

The boots have, rather strangely, a pointy toe, very much like a Teddy Boys Winkle Picker. As a ice breaker in an alpine hut I could break in song, “Don’t you step on my blue pile shoes…” Or perhaps not.