When I entered college, I did not know a soul. I'd never felt so isolated and lonely before. One of my better friends was a girl, whom people named "Warts." That was a truncated mash-up of her Germanic surname. Though Warts did not have any actual warts, you're damn well right, she was super-sensitive about any blackhead, bump, dot, growth, polyp, or zit.

Warts and I were in the same Section, which met outside of Core Class. Even though my dorm was in the upper quad, while hers was in the lower, she and I would occasionally eat together in the dining hall. She would invite me to her room, and we'd have chats.

To me, two things about Warts stood out. One, she had the narrowest canine teeth. They resembled something from a scary deep-sea fish. Two, her only jacket, which she wore frequently, was this light-gray, almost dirty white, trench coat.

But in Warts' own mind, she didn't just dislike her hair color, she hated it. It was a matte brown, with kind of a gray tinge. Warts said her hair was like mixing "mud and refried beans," or an "old gingerbread cookie, which turned kind of grayish."

I tried to cheer her up, by saying her hair was like a graham cracker, animal cookie, milk chocolate, or walnut. To which Warts said, "Fuck walnut. I need it darker, like chestnut or macadamia nut."

One night, while we were sitting side-by-side on her bed, Warts leaned her head toward mine, with our ears and temples touching. She said something like, "While I'd be okay with going blonde, I'd really like to be like you - black!"

But when it comes to audio products, I don't like the color black. Thankfully, the outer jacket of Chord Company C-Stream Streaming Cable is off-white, kind of like if Warts had bleached her trench coat, then washed it with "whitening" detergent. The C-Stream Streaming Cable does not have any signal-flow arrows. Chord Company mark one of the plugs with a black dot, identifying the source end. At least with this particular sample, signal should flow in the direction of the writing. I shall write about the RJ45 plugs in a future post.

My three housemates and I moved into the UCSC Crown-Merrill apartments on September 20, 1992. By the late afternoon/early evening, I got a grip on my college stereo, which consisted of the Sony CDP-520ESII CD player; Adcom GTP-400 tuner/preamp and GFA-535 power amp; Monster Cable IL-400 and AQ Topaz interconnects; AQ F-14 speaker cable; and Pinnacle PN-5+ minimonitors. That moment of crystallization occurred, when some radio station played Patty Smyth & Don Henley's "Sometimes Love Just Ain't Enough." Though it was "only" FM, it sounded damn good, and indicated that this school year -- after three fairly miserable ones -- was going to kick ass.

Meanwhile, Ron had put together an IBM PC, and was hogging the phone line. You see, his computer used what was then new to us, a dial-up modem. It made a horrifying scream. But when Ron lost connection, he let out an even more blood-curdling scream. Clearly, a phone line was inadequate for moving computer data. Moreover, we could not have foreseen or predicted CAT5 Ethernet cable being used for audio purposes. Alas, here in the teens, that is indeed the case.

Finally, a few cable manufacturers are coming around, to making their own high-end audio Ethernet cables. As of this writing, the Chord Company's entry-level model is the so-called C-Stream Streaming Cable. It is only available in these fixed lengths: 0.75m, 1.5m, 3m, 5m, 10m, 15m, and 20m. Here in the US, pricing starts at $100 for the 0.75m length. I believe each longer length adds another $25.

In 1992, Pat Buchanan and Ross Perot warned about our jobs being shipped overseas. And they were, of course, right. Unlike cables of 1992 being made in the US and UK, the C-Stream Streaming Cable is made in China. Actually, the packaging tries to mislead you, by saying, "Designed in England, assembled in China."

Back in 1992, $50 for the AQ Topaz hurt, was a lot of money for us unemployed college students. Working backwards, $100 for today's C-Stream Streaming Cable would have been.........$58.30 in 1992! My three housemates and I would have choked on $58.30 for a phone cable, especially one made in China.

Back in the early-90s, if you had said the word "streaming" to ACS, she would have stepped outside our Crown-Merrill apartment, stood on the moist grounds, pissed, and called that "streaming."

Nora had a quiet and introverted wannabe hippie female friend, who lived in another dorm, in the other quad. Perhaps 8 of us were hanging out in the corner lounge, which was adjacent to my dorm room. Someone complained that, perhaps because it was full of bodies, the room was "toasty."

Nora's friend, in a zen sort of way, said that she wished the room were hotter and steamy, just like her naked yoga class (!). And that was the first time I ever heard about "naked yoga."

I looked about the room, glanced at the students, and, under the influence of Nora's friend, pictured them doing naked yoga. Don't be steamed; mind over matter.

Okay, in order to use a Simaudio Mind 180, you need a router with wireless capability; a smartphone or tablet; a computer or network with music files; and a DAC. Assuming your wireless router is working, use your tablet to find the "Moon Mind" app.

A.) Make sure the Ethernet connection is made to/with the Mind 180.

B.) Now remove the power cable.

C.) Go to the back panel. Using a narrow pointy object, hold down on the dimpled "Update" countersunk button.

D.) Reinsert the power cable. Simaudio claim that the initialization or update process takes about 10 minutes. That was not the case, when my unit went through this process. IIRC, it took 15 long minutes. In that time, you could have done a nice, steamy, naked yoga session!

E.) Once the initialization/update is complete, remove the power cable for 3 seconds.

F.) Reinsert the power cable. If the LED flashes red (uh oh, college flashbacks!), something went wrong, and you have to restart this process. If the LED is green or extinguishes, congratulations, you are good to go!

Remember the sign which read:

If it's yellow, it's mellow,
So just let it sit
If it's brown, flush it down,
Cuz it looks like shit

Well, I suspect it was Nora, who added:

If it's red, it's dead,
Flush? Please go ahead!

When I reviewed the Simaudio Evolution I-7, P-8, and 750D, the North American units only came with a red display. That red color was/is an eyesore, compared to the blue-colored display found on foreign units.

Well, the Mind 180 does not have a display. It has one bright blue circular LED, which flashes when the unit is initializing or trying to sync. The photo above does not accurately depict just how bright that blue LED really is. If you find this LED blinding, you should cover it.

In our Friday evening meetings in the dorm's corner lounge, one girl said that, statistically, 1 of 4 females of childbearing age (as college kids, we were all qualified as such) should be on her period.

A dark-haired goth-looking girl stood up, and without smiling, said that she didn't mind being on her period. #1, she wasn't pregnant. And #2, it gave her an excuse to be "left the fuck alone." Mind over matter.

Our dorm's bathrooms were disgusting, not because girls left it a bloodbath, but because everyone (all genders) was a slob.

Not a bloodbath, the only red light to be found on a functioning Mind 180 is the rear-panel's unoccupied Tos-Link jack.

During the Fall '86 semester, we bought the Sony STR-AV780 receiver, which came with a loop antenna for AM, a dipole T-shaped ribbon for FM. Under the influence of Crutchfield and J&R Music World ads, I bought a black plastic, powered, L-shaped FM antenna. Damn it, my audio friends and I have not had any luck, determining exactly what the antenna was. Archer/Radio Shack? Parsec? Recoton? Terk?

On September 1, 1992, I bought the Adcom GTP-400 tuner/preamp, which came with a T-shaped dipole ribbon antenna. My intention was to use and leave the GTP-400 at home, in San Francisco. It was so good, I decided to bring it down to UC Santa Cruz, for my senior year.

Move-in date was September 20, 1992. The college apartment originally had two single-person chairs flanking an end table. We removed all three pieces, and replaced them with the coffee table. The coffee table held Tron's 13" TV; my stacked Sony CDP-520ESII, Adcom GTP-400 and GFA-535; and the Pinnacle PN-5+ minimonitors.

Via our careful experimentation, the mystery-brand L-shaped powered FM antenna worked best, when placed in a corner, behind one of the loudspeakers. With that powered antenna, the GTP-400 could bring in a few local stations, plus - hallelujah - a Central California (Soledad?) Oldies station. On certain days, by pointing the antenna in a northerly direction, we could get 2 or 3 San Jose stations.

No, the Simaudio Mind 180 does not have FM. But even if you use Ethernet, you will still need to use Wi-Fi, for setup. The Mind 180 comes with a small, matte-black, plastic antenna. It screws into the back of the Mind 180, and has a joint near one end. When you were in college, you screwed into the back, and had a joint...oh never mind, get your mind out of the gutter.

In September 1992, our friends and neighbors very quickly learned that we had not just a stereo, but one comprised of high-end audio products. Back then, in colleges, that was simply unheard of. Thus, everyone wanted to come over, and listen to music. Even when we ran out of CDs, we could always see what the GTP-400's tuner could bring in.

Because the Mind 180 has an Internet tuner, it brings in radio stations from all over the world. Back in '92, even world band radio enthusiasts could not have imagined this.

Ribs. When I was in college, the dining halls rarely served ribs. And when they did, were the ribs rare or well-done? Neither. They were burnt beyond recognition. Hard as rock, those charcoal-like ribs made jerky look tender and soft.

Ribs. When I was in the dorms, early in the school year, the staff put on safe-sex seminars. They had a big cardboard box, containing a wide variety of condom brands and types. My neighbor Nora opened a Trojan ribbed condom, saw the teeny tiny ridges, and said that this condom wasn't her idea of "ribbed."

Ribs. I commonly overheard the girls complain that none of the guys had six-pack abs, beach bods, or chiseled, well-defined ribs.

Ribs. But where did we see the girls' ribs? Mostly in the dorm's bathroom(s). Like the guys, the girls would bring one towel to the bathroom. They'd frequently use that one towel, to dry their hair. They'd commonly dry their hair in front of the large mirror behind (in front of?) the sinks. With the towel over her hair, or draped over her shoulders, the girl exposed her ribs.

Ribs. The Simaudio Mind 180's side panels are ribbed, more corrugated than, for example, those old Trojan "ribbed" condoms. Are the ribbed sides supposed to be heatsinks, like in the Evolution series? The Mind 180 is meant to be left on permanently. Accordingly, it does not give off any heat. Thus, I doubt that the ribbed sides are to dissipate heat.

But are they anti-vibration? I'm sure that Simaudio's marketing department, if not anybody else, would say yes.

More importantly, do know that the ribbed grooves collect dust. You may find that those tiny strips are difficult to clean.

Let's go back to September 1992, the start of my senior year of college. While I was hooking up my Sony/Adcom stereo with Monster IL-400 and AudioQuest Topaz interconnects, my housemate Ron was connecting his PC to our regular landline. A cable burn-in device, the Duo-Tech Cable Enhancer, did exist at the time. But as it was not reliable, it was in the twilight of its market life.

Back in 92-93, I do not believe any of us knew about CAT5 cables, RJ45, and/or Ethernet. While we found the AQ interconnects to be more accurate than the Monster Cable(s), we could not imagine any RCA-to-RJ45 conversion or adapter.

But that is indeed what people today use, to transmit audio (from RCA out) via a house's internal wiring. The ones above have two male RCAs on one end, and a female RJ45 at the other. You should be able to find electronics stores, which sell these for well under US$20/pair, including tax and shipping.

It is now 2016, and we now have so-called CAT5 (and higher) Ethernet cable and the audiodharma Cable Cooker. These same RCA/RJ45 adapters allow the Cable Cooker to treat Ethernet cables. Hooray! But do pay attention to which direction you are Cooking said Ethernet cable(s).

When I got to college, the guys in my dorm loved to run around naked. For them, it was a fun activity.

As I got settled, and met more of my dorm neighbors, I would see see females go topless, cuntmando, or fully nude. But I sensed a difference. For the girls, it was not so much about having fun. It was more about comfort. Mind over matter.

Since the Simaudio Mind 180 is in their "Moon" series, everyone has fun equating that with butts. And yes, we have been talking about my college neighbors' moons. Well, if they pulled a 180, you'd see their front side.

Many times while I was brushing my teeth, a girl would simply walk out naked from the shower. She'd pull up to the sinks, dry her hair, floss, or brush her teeth. Either directly or via the mirror, I'd have a nice view of her, um, front side.

When I was in college, NO ONE shaved her armpits, legs, or pubes.

But the Mind 180's front panel, available in either boring black or pretty silver (above), appears clean and shaved. Well, maybe not shaved, but it does have a horizontal groove or cutout. In this trough is the lone LED. Notice that this front panel has no controls or sensors.

Were Simaudio of unsound mind? In Mind 180, the "Mind" is actually a mind-numbingly bad acronym, Moon Intelligent Network Device. Those coeds just cringed, shook their heads, and started minding their own business.