I have not done this in a couple years. So, with about 125 hours on the mod's in my ZMA (probably another 125 to go), I reversed polarity on my Adagio's. Two days in and loving it!

Your room size, speaker's, proximity "sit" to them & acoustic treatment does garner the YMMV tag. However, if you have not done it in awhile or have never tried. It is a simple/free tweak, you might enjoy to compare.

Most people don't know that in the multi-track world/recordings are polarity F'd and/or phase F'd anyway. I am enjoying the image focus and bass definition, reversed.
Almost like, I know what I'm doing (sometimes), after 35 years in this Hobby!




"From the (Anthony) Gallo Classico CL-3 manual...
Advanced Connection: If you are an experienced listener, you should try connecting the Front Left and Right speakers with the polarity reversed. [i.e., positive (+) (red) on Amp to negative (-) (black) on Speaker, and negative (-) (black) on Amp to positive (+) (red) on Speaker].
Listen closely to the differences from the standard polarity hook-up, as this reverse polarity variable in the system can yield significant performance gains with a reversed polarity setup."

I can't count the number of times I've listened to tapes out-of-phase and didn't know it.  It doesn't play by the same rules.

The fact that things that should sound like crap often don't and things that often don't sometime do is just too typical of this hobby.  Tonight is a perfect example.  Here in my own little center of the universe, I have been enjoying some Christmas tapes on an Ampex reel-to-reel that I've been coaxing back to glory...  and I'll have to tell you it's some of the best sound ever!  

That said, tonight was different.  Started out great and then the pitch began to slip.  The problem seems to be circuity not mechanical.  Anyway, after the pitch began to grind down into unusable territory, I finally gave up and pulled the tape from the machine.  Happily I have more machines, so I put it on my Otari modified transport that has served me flawlessly for years, and the tape was dragging.  The initial 1K tone was at 578Hz.  What?

I finally did what a monkey would have done and pressed the other buttons until the speed changed from 7.5 IPS to 15 IPS.  Suddenly, the tape sounded great.  Problem solved.  But not really... it is a 7.5 IPS tape, and I've been listening to it at that speed over 4 times during the past few days...  nevertheless as I type this, it's clearly a 15 IPS tape.  God help me... if that's the biggest problem I have over the holidays... dealing with the supernatural, I will consider myself lucky!

Lucky but nevertheless tormented, because this is a 7.5 IPS tape that now will only play at 15 IPS.  Go ahead, make the assumption... I know it's coming.  This is just some jack-off who wondered by the marble pool that the Audio Gods look through, and decided to entertain himself for Christmas at my expense I guess.  Probably has an iPod in his pocket with a pair of ear-buds and has no concept of analog.

Reverse Polarity - can't get more backwards than this!  That said, there are at least 30 tapes in my library that can be played out-of-phase and still sound right!  That also drives me nuts, but it's happens.  It has never once happened with digital in living memory.  There is nothing like the experience of understanding physics and have the rules reversed and everything still makes sense... it's impossible yet there it is... what to do with that right?

Merry Christmas and I still can't believe I listened to a tape at double speed and it sounds right?!?!  No drugs or eggnog involved or alcohol involved either btw...  it is the absence of those influences that make the experience so disturbingly disturbing. ; )

OHHHHH, wait a minute... !!  I just remembered something...  Holy Crap!  I changed the speed on this machine a few weeks ago so that it would play 3-3/4 and 7-1/2 IPS as a function of HI and LO speeds.  Did this to listen to some archive reels from Woodstock.  BTW, to listen to 3-3/4 master tapes just use the ZP3 in RIAA mode instead of TAPE mode and the top end that is typically missing at that speed will be there and sound good... the tapes were like being there in the rain!

Anyway, that means that the tape machine switched to HI (usually always 15 IPS) it is now actually 7.5 IPS do to the speed modification I made.  It really IS amazing how long it messed with me before I was allowed to remember that I made that modification!!!  Life really is an accumulation of habits.  Would have been nice to figure this out before I started this post, but in the holiday spirit I'm not afraid to be momentarily brain-dead because not one of us can claim immunity.

God bless you all an happy holidays!

Steve

I posted the graph of my REW measured OB frequency response on one of my FB groups.  One of the guys came back and said that some of the dips were due to polarity and try reversing it.  I did and remeasured and the biggest dip went away.  What's more is things became clearer.  I have been running that way for the last two days.

Also, Audirvana has a setting so that if polarity in inversed, it will switch automatically.