A Special Guest Post from a Happy Customer

It all began with a letter from owner Jim Lee in Spring of 2013.

I had made my first purchase on my maiden visit to Nuts About HiFi… a pair of Grado RS1i headphones meticulously selected from a grand total of two pairs that they had in stock, while I was visiting Silverdale from Ann Arbor, MI. This was my second pair of audiophile headphones: one of anything might be good, but two of them represent the start of a collection. That Grado headphone started me on a journey into the land of headphones, and I have acquired at least 50 pairs and written about many of them on the online forum head-fi.com.

I was amazed, a few weeks after my purchase, to receive a letter (remember those?) from Nuts About HiFi. It was from Jim Lee, thanking me for my purchase and hoping I was happy with the headphones. I called him in amazement to express my appreciation for his follow-up. Eight years later I moved to Poulsbo, WA.

Two weeks ago, in September of 2021, 8-1/2 years later, Matt and Adam of Nuts About HiFi completed the installation in my home of a Samsung QN82Q900RB 82 inch TV with wall mount, two Focal Sopra 3 floor-standing speakers, Focal Aria CC900 center speaker, two Focal Surround BE speakers, a JL Audio F113v2 subwoofer, Anthem AVM 70 audio-visual processor, Aesthetix Atlas stereo amp, Anthem MCA 325 3 channel amp for the surround and center speakers, a Sony UBP-X-1100ES 4K BluRay with SACD capability, a Meridian 218 zone controller, a TS-451+ NAS drive, a Clearaudio Concept turntable with moving magnet, Salamander cabinet, $4,500 worth of cables (6% of system cost), a power module, and MX990 universal remote with MRF350 RF module to control it. Whew!

System design was by Matt, who began with a Meridian Sooloos system as music source, but then changed that to Roon when Meridian froze its development of Sooloos. Nuts About HiFi bought me a lifetime subscription to Roon to compensate for the loss of Sooloos.

The upgrade from Sooloos to a Roon subscription is just one example of a whole series of customer amenities that Nuts has offered me. System design began prior to COVID, and the TV, power supply, and cabinet were installed in early 2020. We could not resume installation until May of 2021, and some manufacturers had updated their items, so Nuts updated the diagram. Adam provided excellent installation, particularly in the art of running the ARC Anthem Room Correction, wrestling with a shortage of wall height in placing the center speaker, and programming the remote so that it truly does replace the 4 remotes that we had been using.

Yesterday, I received my first SACD disk (Miles Davis – Kind Of Blue). In listening with eyes closed, I just knew that his jazz band was right in front of me… yes, right there… don’t you see it!?

Thank you, Adam, Connie, Jim, and Matt!!!

John G. Ackenhusen