Pamparo in Toronto

There is really not a lot of changes except for the dirt pedals and the size of the board. I sold my Sparkle Drive but somehow still thinking that I shouldn’t have done that … I miss the sort-of-clean boost it provides. The SFX-03 is finally kicked out from the board. It is my longest serving pedal (tied with the TU-2, which I got at the same time). A really really tough choice. But between the Half-Gainer’s 2 channels & the Zendrive, I should have a lot bases covered. I think that removing the SFX-03 even made my Zendrive better as I am forced to start looking into other ways of using it. I am not disappointed by this decision at all!

Pedalboard as of January 2009

The Additions

• Barber Half-Gainer
• VL PP2 Plus

The Subtractions

• VL Sparkle Drive
• SD SFX-03 Twin Tube
• EB Volume Pedal

The Constants

• Hermida Zendrive
• Diamond Memory Lane
• Empress Tremolo
• Boss TU-2

The Variables

• Analogman Bi-Chorus
• MaxxPlay I/O

Pedalboard as of January 2010

Some future pedals to consider are compressor, a boost and a 2nd delay for triplets/dotteds. Although coming from a 4-times-a-week, to a weekend-warrior, and now a once-a-month-sometimes-twice guitarist, I am hard-pressed to buy anything else. Heck, I might not even buy a single pedal again in the next 2 years! Oh well … good thing is that these decisions can change in a heartbeat

You let your light so shine
In life for ninety nine
Christ’s love personified

Years lived in happiness
Joy despite of sadness
You had peace deep inside

We cry and yet we smile
We mourn but look up high
We know you are with Christ

To God we give the praise
We thank Him for your days
Born, lived, and passed away

© 2009 by Rhoy Pamparo

I recently bought an Onkyo HT-S6200 HTIB from Electronics For Less. I must give props to the staff for their customer service. After some confusion about the pick-up or delivery, they delivered it on a short notice and also upgraded the stands for the hassle that I may have even started! Good stuff

Onkyo HT-S6200 HTIB

Amplifier Specs:
130 watts minimum continuous power per channel, 6 ohms, at 1 kHz with a maximum total harmonic distortion of 1%

7.1 set of Speakers:

• 1 x Center (SKC-670)
• 2 x Front (SKF-670)
• 4 x Surround (SKR-670/SKB-670)
• 1 x Powered Subwoofer (SKW-770)

Due to space constraints, I could not put the speakers in a regular 7.1 configuration. So, I set my speakers in a Front Height that looks something similar to the image below,

Devices I connected

• Playstation Slim
• Panasonic DVD
• Cable Box
• Nintendo Wii (via Aquos’ optical out)
• iPod via Universal Port
• Sony Walkman (I can’t believe I have resurrected this!)

What I really like:

• 4 x HDMI 1.3 Repeater, 1 Out. So far I’ve used 3 inputs: PS3, Cable and DVD player. Nice to know that I still have one to spare on both the receiver and the TV
• Flexibility of using surround back or front heights. There is also options for bi-amping the fronts or using Zone 2 (a separate set of stereo outs)
• Dolby TrueHD and DTS Master decoding. These sounds amazing and it’s nice to see the signs lit up on the receiver
• Automatic speaker setup. Plug in the mic and follow instructions. This should be a good starting point before doing manual changes to the speaker config
• Built-in Audyssey Technologies (2EQ, Dynamic EQ and Dynamic Volume). Here’s a good article regarding these technology: What is Audyssey’s Dynamic EQ and Volume?. I hardly use Dynamic Volume but Dynamic EQ really helps when the volume level is low.
• Free IPod Docking station using the Universal Port
• Generous amount of input/output. I especially liked the analog outs for recording to an outboard gear!

What I don’t like:

• Speaker cables are only 22 AWG. You would think that for something this expensive, they will include at least an 18 gauge cable. BTW, here’s a nice article that talks about the topic: Speaker Cable Gauge
• Remote Control. While usable, I wish that they made it a little nicer. But this is knit-picking.
• Generating a little too much heat, imho. I know it’s normal for an amp to heat up so I am not worried much. It even has a sticker on this amp that says it’s normal. I left about 3 inches of space on top and about 5 inches at the back. Maybe I’ll stick a small computer fan later on if it really starts to bother me.
• Huge subs. I mean, literally! I expected more from this maybe because of its size. I find that the sub really sound good in a movie but not as much to my liking when listening to music. The bass sound is not as defined as I would like.

The bottom line is, so far so good. We’ll see how it performs after I put a little bit more mileage on it!