LarryC

Hi Rich -- long time no see! Do you still live in that very nice place in No. MD? I don't have any great opinions of my own, but note that AJConti (RIP, very sadly) in his highly regarded Basis Vector ran a continuous wire from the cartridge pins to the RCA pins entering the preamp! Very awkward to install, but the fine sound from that arm suggests his extreme idea might have some merit. I like the quality of good RCA's, and think long-term interchangability ease between future arms and preamps will save time and trouble down the road. I just suggest you minimize the number of connections, whether RCA or DIN. I doubt you will gain by having mini-anything after the tonearm in your signal path. I think some quality manufacturers like Graham use DIN-like connectors inside the arm and TT-arm connections, but go to RCA's at the preamp. Jud Barber's and Ken Stevens's preamps stuck firmly with RCA's. Since so many high-quality makers use either RCA or XLR, I myself would stay with them,

Aragon amps are very nice, as well!

I got a pair for someone about a year ago, so I'm pretty sure they're still made. GThey've been around for quite a while. Check with the Klipsch website. Australia, I don't know. You should be able to find out from Klipsch. I think they sound very good and function very well with Bluetooth. Larry

The knowledge and expertise in this thread are spectacular IMO and well beyond my aging capabilities. Rather than try to compete with the people here in singing quality, adjusting my Oppo player (205, but I wouldn't know where to start in doing that!), Let me suggest some DVDs that I like and may be a bit out of the mainstream: Monteverdi Vespers, DG DVD 073 035-9; a true masterpiece, perhaps the greatest before Bach, with an entire textbook devoted to it, by Jeffrey Kurtzman. Gorgeous views of the interior of San Marco in Venice. This must be listened to by following all the text and familiarizing yourself with the interesting instruments used in the early Baroque. Other more advanced "filmings" exist, such as the Royal chapel at Versailles, but this is probably the best and most informative. Berlioz Damnation de Faust, ArtHaus DVD 102 023. Great work well-led by Solti if you like his style. Top-notch singing by von Otter, Keith Lewis, Jose Van Dam, Chicago S Chorus and Orchestra. Berlioz Les Troyens by the Met, Levine conducting -- spectacular recording and performances, staging, and leadership. A very great opera from the 19th century, fully as long as Wagner's, and of course finely orchestrated. DG 00440 073 4310. Norman, Domingo Mozart Don Giovanni, conducted by Wilhelm Furtwangler, perhaps the greatest conductor of the 20th century! He came at the wrong time, with the Nazis, and his most easily available recordings are on Youtube, but the clarity and greatness of his interpretations are unmistakable. It's well worth sitting down with Youtube for an entire afternoon and evening, and going through one Furtwangler recording after another. All monophonic 1930's, '40's and '50's German taped sound of course, but the music itself conveys wonderfully well without great concerns for technical reproduction issues. I more and more listen through such technicalities to pay very close attention instead to THE MUSIC. The DVD series of the Beethoven 9, by the Berlin Phil conducted by Claudio Abbado in Berlin and Rome. This set really keeps your attention on the instruments, and the great, profound, gentility of this beloved conductor, may he RIP. This is currently my favorite Beethoven 9. Larry

I like Basis because of my experience with it -- it has an outstanding sound quality. With Basis, one does not need to go higher than the 2001, which AJ Conti used for himself. The admirable Basis record clamp is a must, however. The Vector arm seems to have been a great leap forward. Sadly, AJ's untimely death may have stalled the company, as I haven't heard much about it recently.

The classic Richard Heyser article. Hard to believe it's over 30 yrs. old! In particular, I liked how his subjective comments related so well to the real world, like the accuracy of replicating the sounds of helicopter blades and car doors slamming, and how well the accuracy of things like piano recordings traveled from room to room. We take those things for granted nowadays.

Indeed it is. Just don't confuse "information" with opinion, and everyone may not agree with said opinion. The word "upgrade" is used to imply that it must be better -- but it may not be.

Well, it's all fixed now. I use Safari for most things, AOL for e-mail, the Forum and a few other things. At least AOL has good phone support. Thanks.

I use a PS Audio power regenerator. It makes anything with a motor (TT, tape deck), CD transport sound better IMO, supposedly because the AC waveform is made pure sine wave. I'm not sure what "conditioning" means in power terms, would appreciate explanation.

I this this is probably careless numbering at the factory. My 1962 K-horn matched pair have consecutive numbers for the right and left (1A 837 and 1A 838, I believe), and the numbers are stamped on both the bottom and top sections, but the the tops and bottoms won't fit together if their numbers are matched! The screw-on hangers were obviously hand-drilled and screwed, and the worker wasn't careful to match top and bottom numbers on each side before assembly. They fit perfectly on both sides if the tops or bottoms are switched. Chalk it up to early '60's hand-assembly!

Hi Chad, I'm using a MacBook Pro. AOL is my browser. Thanks for the clarification. No, I don't know how to take a screenshot, at least not on a Mac. I'd be glad to know how, if someone can tell me. Larry

No, they don't. I don't see a profile pic, not sure what that is. You mean my avatar?? That is not in the upper right. In fact, I don't see my avatar unless I am replying, like just above in this reply, but on the left. Sorry, I'm very confused by what all I'm looking at, and what I can do with it. Where would I find past messages and do we still have notifications? I can't see those. It's hard to follow so far. Where is the "Activity" tab? I don't see the things that I see in the box in your earlier reply above, "Content I Posted in", namely the message and notification icons. Those things are now completely missing from everywhere in my display. I'm not clear on why it was desirable to make these confusing changes, when I, at least, had grown used to how to use the forum. Larry

Hi Chad -- where do the messages, PM's, and notifications show up? I'm also not sure where one can see date and time of the latest postings, and by whom. Thanks, LarryC (Larry)

Of even a good SS amp like a H-K integrated should sound good. A good Scott or Fisher tube integrated would be great if you don't go beyond their gain capability with an MC cart. They might have a very good middle range and treble sound if they're anything like the Shorthorns. I hope you can give them a good full-throated try.

To me, this looks quite similar to a Klipsch Shorthorn, at least in concept -- a direct-firing15" bass driver , a horn MR and horn tweeter, and a back-loaded corner horn for the bass and lower middle range. Even the drivers are the same or similar -- a 15WK for the bass and lower mid-range (but crossed at 300 instead of 1000 Hz), and an EV T-35 tweeter. The lesser complement used a downgraded 15WKB (I'd never heard of a B-model 15WK!) whereas Klipsch used a 12" SP 12B, in the standard Klipsch Shorthorn cabinet. It would probably suffer the Shorthorn's disadvantage of a limited low-frequency range (perhaps 60 Hz), although the sound of the 15WK would make up for a FOR lot of it, IMO. Curious that the sheet doesn't give the low-end frequency response. The Shorthorn was very smooth and well-integrated from the treble to the bass. How does it sound?

The "B" style tops were VERY complicated, several slightly different heights, widths, and lengths to each of the several veneered layers or "slabs" including the collar -- it's a big job just to get the measurements right, let alone to cutting them. I once tried to spell it out in detail, and gave up because it was made so complicated by so many different measurements. Look at the above thread and pics, especially in the last several posts, to see how complicated it would be to replicate. Much easier to just find another pair of B's.

I believe our hearing comes courtesy of an "ear-brain" internal analytic system that is far more complicated than just being able to hear frequency responses or simple differences in impedance. I think that much of what we perceive is actually a learned response that differs among people -- hence sometimes big differences in the kinds and amount of detail that people can detect and determine. Some can hear a very low-level telephone ring in a noisy room and some cannot analyze it enough to tease out and recognize the faint sound tones. This seems similar to the "eye-brain" system that allows us to perceive a uniform height and perspectivetive of a person or building even as we approach closer and closer and walk around it/them even though you know that fundamental changes in input are taking place on the retina. The brain does one hell of a lot with that simple image. It also does one hell of a lot with the simple waveforms that are registering on your eardrum.

Well, again, I may have missed it, but what is the width of your room? That's different from what you gave me, the distance between your K-horns. I got along for years with a room width of 11'; 13 to 15' is better, gives a more workable sweet spot.

Basis TT and arm, USA (AJ Conti, RIP) Tranny cart, Japan Wadia 2-box CDP, USA Joule Electra pre and OTL's, USA Townshend Seismic Sinks, UK Siltech cables, Netherlands PS Audio power regenerator & ESP power cords, USA Are we not seeing the solidification of a trend toward US design, distribution and sales, and Asian manufacture? The US and Asian firms have a partnership in dividing up the labor, like Klipsch does with its lower-line speakers. My brand new Oppo UDP-205 is totally manufactured and shipped out of China, but whose design and quality control seems to be strongly based in the USA, unless they have me fooled. Totally marketed, sold and shipped out of California. Totally bypasses local USA bricks and mortar. A local store doesn't seem to mind, they sell enough higher-end stuff anyway.

I liked Magnum Dynalab's tube modification of my MD-102 tuner to an MD-102T. I think they mostly changed the output stage from SS to tube. The result to my ears was the softer, modestly more realistic musical sound that I expect from tubes. I think the mod cost $600 at the time. Yes, the 102 was a pricey unit, kind of in the middle of MD's price range. Its sound quality now fairly matches the rest of the system. I always liked SAE electronics' good sound. I also had as good results from the Dynalab ST-2 as any other antenna when I had a house.

I may have missed it -- what is the width of the end of the room where the K's would go? IOW, how far apart will they be?

The tube amp sounds like a good idea (Yamaha has sounded a little flat to me, too). I, too, would try the old drivers for comparison. Getting the tops and risers correct is harder than it looks -- PWK struck gold (in my opinion) with the proportions, dimensions, and variable thicknesses of the layers in the top hat, and everyone else's just don't look quite right compared with the original. Hopefully you can locate a true Klipsch finely veneered "B" style down the road. Keep your eyes on Craigslist, especially from West Coast cities. Colo too, maybe. For more info on how the top hats were put together in the B-syle's, scroll down for the pics in this interesting thread:

I am a demanding listener, and classical music is particularly demanding in my book. I was comparing the 38's-plus-sub on Aragon with the 37's under circumstances that I don't recall. (As you can tell, I have a fair amount of confidence in my audio memory and judgement.) "The next level" describes what I heard from the 38's-plus-sub. The RF series is not as much my cup of tea, are different from what I usually prefer for classical. I haven't heard Acurus, but your comment is similar to my reaction to good vs. so-so electronics on Klipsch. I'm not sure you and I are listening to the same kind of music in the same way, e.g., punchy and fast, which is just one criterion of several that I apply. That can be an issue in comparing different peoples' reactions to different speakers, etc.

Do you have a Palladium sub to team up with the 37F? When I played around in Indy several years ago with 37's, 38's with subs, and 39's, I concluded that: The 37's were not terribly adequate and I wasn't interested. The 38's w/sub were wonderful, were very satisfying in classical music because the bass was so ideal. In particular, I could easily and clearly hear the string basses under the cellos in the Dvorak New World. Even my K-horns don't do that. The larger 39's w/o a sub were a little boomy, but not as nearly as nice bass-wise, as the 38's w/sub. The above reactions were predicated on using the superior Aragon electronics that Klipsch had at that time. Their later (and lesser) Asian-based pre-pro was greatly inferior and did not leave me with the same inspired feeling. (It wasn't Onkyo, but some Asian brand that I think was made by Onkyo.) I wouldn't have been interested in the same speakers with that mediocre pre-pro! The Palladium sub was beautifully engineered to complement the F line. I didn't hear or compare with any other subs. The 38's with the Palladium sub provided much better classical bass than the larger 39's without. Those subs are really big! Obviously, careful listening to your choices is important. But I don't blame you for being dissatisfied with the 37's. I don't mean to suggest that I think a sub will solve your 37 problem, or that the Forte III's would benefit much from adding a sub. I am strictly praising the 38's and the Palladium sub.

I read somewhere that a very quiet auditorium would be 25 dB, so 35 dB would be exceptionally quiet in many household rooms. I suspect that an exceptional signal-to-noise ratio would be necessary to perceive recorded music as live.