Nick The Slick

howdy Nick, wanted to pick your brain if you don't mind. I want to replace my internal SATA dvd burner drive and I want to get a Blu-ray re-writer player SATA drive. what drive do you recommend and if it's a drive that doesn't come with software, is cyberlink 18 a good bet or is there better for the burning and BD movie software?
thanks for your time buddy!

Haha, yea no problem man. I'd be glad to help if I can. Just let me know what you need to know.

Thanks for the link to you pc gaming rig. Very impressive. May I consult you in the future as if I do go down this route I will start as an amateur. I used to be a pc gamer but not hardcore. It makes me want to vomit thinking of smartphone and tablet games getting a grip on the mainstream market. I guess this is me giving a huge two fingered solute to that.

Well I don't have the converter attached anymore. I used to use to it get that extra bit of gain in the signal because I felt my pre-outs weren't driving it properly, but I must have had it set up wrong on my first attempt. I now have it connected directly via RCA cables and just have the gain cranked to max and let the AVR calibration do it's thing to balance things out. As for hiss, it's dead silent with or without the cleanbox until you get literally an inch or so away from the tweeter. So in short, you don't NEED the cleanbox, but its nice to have that extra gain stage if you think your pre-outs aren't providing enough voltage.
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P.S. It seemed like when I removed the cleanbox music got a bit cleaner (despite the name of the converter lol). Maybe it was adding to the THD? Not sure, but it could also be placebo or my imagination there.

hey Nick i saw that you have a Art cleanbox attached to your XLS pro amp. Can i ask why you need to use that art cleanbox? Was there too much hissing in your speakers without?