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Deang

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Posts posted by Deang

    RF7's Are in the House

    in 2-Channel Home Audio

    Posted

    Wives are people too.

    Mine puts up with me well enough - she's a real sport about it. My real problem in the past was getting dedicated time on the system without everyone making me nuts.

    I decided the best solution was to move everything out of the living room into our bedroom upstairs. Now I can listen and play in peace!

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    deanG

    Passive Preamps

    in 2-Channel Home Audio

    Posted

    Speaking of Creek Audio. One would think folks here would be big fans of their integrated units with passive preamps and MOSFETs - but I don't recall ever hearing them mentioned here.

    About every couple of months I'm tempted to try one out.

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    deanG

    RF7's Are in the House

    in 2-Channel Home Audio

    Posted

    Crash - before you throw any cash down you probably should try to hear some of the bigger Heritage stuff or some Legends. That way you can make more of an informed choice. I have my idea of the 'ideal sound' and I would have to say that the RF7's come closer to that ideal than Heritage. However, everybody else has their own idea of that 'ideal sound' and it's not the same as mine. As a matter fact - I'm outnumbered on this board 10 to 1.

    Jethro - My friend Mark has had DQ10's for over 20 years. During that same time period I had Advents, powered Advents, AR11's powered by a GAS Ampzilla amp and Thalia preamp, and then Magnepan 1.5QR's driven by my Luxman amp and Athem preamp and CDP. Where I was always chasing refinement and detail - Mark was always pacified by the DQ10's.

    The DQ10 certainly throws a huge soundstage and is one of the best overall sounding speakers ever made. However, they are not that transparent sounding compared to some other offerings and they do tend to sound a little shrill at the higher SPL's - of course, Mark thinks they sound great even when they are begging for mercy.

    When I first got my RB5's, running them with a Boston PV1000 - I really felt it gave me 80% of the Magnepans transparency and over the top dynamics that blew the DQ10's away. It was the first time I heard a system that I thought sounded better than DQ10's all the way around. Mark agreed it sounded great but really likes the DQ's throw sound everywhere approach.

    Well, when I decided to trade the RC7's in on the RF7's I have now - Mark decided to ****** up those RC7's and is running them with two Boston PV1000's. He loves the sound but can't get used to the directional imaging. He's running the system with an original Adcom GFA-555 and a Toshiba DVD player and so you can say that the Klipsch aren't playing at their best. I just can't convince Mark that the upgrades really make a difference. He is caving a little however and seriously considering a CD player.

    So what about those DQ's? Well, Mark wants to set them back up and so I talked him into buying the upgrade kit from Regnar and changing out the caps. He then picked up two more GFA-555's off of AudiogoN to bridge in mono for them. I wanted him to buy a slightly used GFA-5802 or Bryston but he wouldn't go for it. He just loves those 555's.

    After listening to those RC7's for a month or more - I think what Mark is going to find when he rolls his DQ's back out is that yes - they really do throw a nice soundstage, but they also sound compressed, a little dull, and more like speakers playing recorded music.

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    deanG

    Nice Cornbreadwalls on AudiogoN...

    in 2-Channel Home Audio

    Posted

    LOL, you can relax Jazman - yes, I was playing up to that 'other' thread where I was smacked around in grand style by the Heritage brotherhood Smile.gif

    I am well aware of what many here feel about those beasts and was really just helping out my my distant family members by letting them all know of a good deal on speakers I know they love.

    My jesting is strictly in fun.

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    deanG

    RF7's Are in the House

    in 2-Channel Home Audio

    Posted

    The maple is gorgeous.

    I had previously been using a set of RC7's and finally decided to do something I swore I would never do - own a set of towers with dual woofers covering lots of midrange. For the most part I prefer planars or monitors with mid/woofers no larger than 8".

    I made this decision after an afternoon audition where the RF7's left me smiling and feet tapping. It was hard for me to let go of my predjudices, but I could not argue with what I was hearing.

    The RF7's have a very quick sound for a tower design. They do not have that bloated, fat, woody sound you sometimes hear with even the best towers. The bass goes deep, sounds powerful, and yet remains surprisingly tight for a ported design. This they do without sounding like a box. Very impressive.

    With the two 10's and the slightly higher crossover (as compared to the other Reference models), I thought I would surely lose some detail in the lower midrange. I listened to some very familiar material and I could not tell any difference (in the midrange) from what I had been hearing with the RC7's. I know there is probably a difference but it must be miniscule. The mids are just as smooth as a baby's bottom and the RF7's manage to maintain this smoothness even as the bass is vibrating the floors and walls. I tried to smear the mids by juicing the SPL, but my 40 watt Anthem tubie couldn't do it. If there is objectionable IM distortion - I don't hear it.

    The treble is of course wonderful.

    The RF7's throw a nice image. The depth of the image caught me off guard and is fairly impressive for a $2200 set of speakers. I didn't notice the depth of the image during the audition - I can't really account for that. It's very noticable in my listening room however.

    The most dynamic speaker in the Reference Series line is actually the RB5, and when I traded mine in on the RC7's - I realized I had lost some of that when I got the RC7's home. I did however get the detail of the new driver/horn. It was an acceptable trade off. The RF7's come very close to the dynamics of the RB5. I was very happy to get some of that back. Very good slam/attack across the board.

    The RF7's are no Cornwall, Khorn, or LaScala - but then, they don't purport to be. They are part of a new breed and based on my listening experience - are perfectly capable of standing on their own cwm20.gif

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    deanG

    This message has been edited by deang on 02-08-2002 at 02:06 PM

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