Travis In Austin

Maxg, I used to subscribe to two U.K. audio publications, HiFi+ and name of the other escapes me, Best something? Anyhooo, when the issue of horn speakers came up Tannoy was always mentioned. I got the impression that Tannoy was such a huge presence there, and that it was a superb product, although quite massive. So much so that I read that in Britney they do not refer to it as a PA System, they say Tannoy, the same way we say Scotch Tape or Kleenix when we mean transparent tape or tissue. Was Tannoy so strong that Klipsch had no chance? Travis

There's moderators, and then there's moderators. MAS, maybe you should clear all of your posts with the forum moderator before actually putting it out there. Either that or put a little "JK" after that type of post to let "everyone" know that yer "just kidding" and maybe save yourself a little bashing. Why does it look more and more every day like Hillary or Obama is going to get elected? Wow. How many times do I need to apologize and admit that I'm not perfect before this ends? Keep politics off the forum, please. Why are you even working on a Sat? Or is it to babysit us brats given the events of the last week or so? Or maybe it's not really work, our collective charming personality is just too much to stay away from? Regardless of the reason, I hope you have a great weekend. Travis

This post, in my view, should be of concern. I have learned a great deal from the members of this forum. I would think we would all agree that one of the principal objectives of the forum is to provide a freindly environment where folks can come and ask questions about Klipsch, and topics related thereto. I would hate for anyone who had a legitimate question, no matter how simple or basic, to be dissuaded from posting it because they thought they might get a brush off in some way. I hope I am not guilty of that, and if I am I would hope my friends on here would tell me. I have gained so much knowledge on this forum I could not even begin to repay it back. My first post was something along the lines of what to look for when purchasing a pair of LaScallas. I got an immediate response from several members, a welcome to the forum, and an invitation to respond back as to what the results were. I, for one, do not mind debate about issues of interest as long as it doesn't get personal. However, when it comes to the culture of the forum I would hope that we would all take into account if someone new is asking something that we take the extra step of saying something to make them feel welcome, and not to be shy about asking anything. I believe, overall, people do a good job of that allready, but I know that I could do a better job of that. Loveroklipsch, I am sorry that the helpful and cordial people have been the exception for you. I hope that we can all do a better job in that regard and I am glad you pointed this out. Travis

I agree with Larry. I concur with Larry, and, to a large extent, agree with Fini as well. Travis

OB, I saw Johnny Winter last spring, what a show. He sat the whole show, had help to get off and on, but he wailed for a solid 90 mins. in perfect form. Looking forward to hearing all about it. Travis

Hi Travis, you are correct I have no vibration from the floor at all. I was concerned about the vibration that I feel from the speakers, as you know khorns use the walls for the bottom end. Well they also create alot of vibration down the walls and across the room, my inital question was how would a wall shelf help with all the vibration the speakers are sending into the walls. I listen to music between 80-95 db for the most part, every now and then I will get it up to 100db rarely. I sit about 11 feet away from the speakers and can feel the music at that point, so I just figured that if I could feel it so could my TT. Honestly the music sounds fine, I guess what I really need to do is isolate the TT from the shelf it's sitting on and that should be good. Jay I have my TT rack on the same wall as one of the Khorns, it is about 12 down the wall from the corner. In between the rack and the speaker is a window. With a rack you want it at least 4 feet away from the corner because that should put you into a different piece of sheetrock (4x8), unless they are mounting them on their sides and then you have to go 8' to get into another piece of sheetrock. In my situation you cannot feel the vibration on the wall past the window. That is where new sheet rock started and it just ends there. I think your assesment is correct, at those levels I don't believe that whatever sound vibrations through the air that hit your turntable would be causing any change in the sound to even someone with a golden ear. I think there is a lot of confusion with it comes to things you can buy that go between your turntable and what ever shelf or rack it is sitting on. With your rack sitting on solid tile that is sitting on a solid slab, I don't think you are going to benefit from anything that has to do with isolation. Isolation would decouple the TT from the floor (through the rack). In some situations this has the effect of trapping vibrations within your turntable. You would want something that tended to dampen rather then isolate. Dampening would have the effect absorbing whatever vibration is created by the turntable. A spongy springy Linn for example would sound better sitting on the floor then it would on an air bladder. This is because the suspensions system of the turntable is going to be working against and counter to the bladder. A Clear Audio, or Nottingham, with no suspension system at all could benefit greatly from an airbladder, or other dampening products because it can allow a means for vibraton to escape from the unit. What kind of TT/tonearm are you using now? I am sure it was mentioned but I just can't remember what it is right now. Travis

Pauln, Pauln, Pauln, I am aPauled. I agree with the vast majority of your posts, but this one . . . well the only thing I can think of is you were brainstorming, thinking outside the box, or thinking out loud but just haven't had the time to think the thing through. "The inability of a system to rid itself of it's worst parts is constipation." No argument there, but the key element of this is who decides what are its worst parts, and how it makes this decision. There are societies in the world that have no tolerance for crime, and virtually no crime. That is true, they are dictatorships, or they are run by religious zelots where women are beaten in public for things like exposing too much of their face. Other countrys that have low crime rates, like the Netherlands, have legalized drugs to the point where people to not have to commit crime in order to get their drugs. I am not aware of any country, that has the freedoms as we do, that has "virtually no crime." When I was a child I thought all criminals that did what we call misdemeanors went to prison and all that did what we call felonys were executed. That is because you had good parents. Apparently this is not the case. Come on now, you know the real deal. Compare the number of convictions meriting the death penalty with the number of executions. Shouldn't these rates be about equal? You lost me here. Are you saying that there are executions where the person did not merit the death penalty? Or are you saying that the death penalty is not used enough? In Texas the only capital offense if murder with special circumstances. Under your system, if I understand it, everyone in prision is on death row because your ranking could get to 10,001. So a felony shoplifter is on death row with a habitual drug user, a child molester, a rapist, a murder, etc. Maybe there is a way to address all these problems: prevention of horrible crimes, what to do with extremely offensive criminals, prison over crowding, prisoner misbehavior, and the behavior of ex-cons after release. How do we decide, or who decides what is "extreamely offensive"? There is not a single state that makes first offense child molestation a capital offense. Texas, for the first time this session, is considering making a repeat offender subject to the death penalty. How about this? 1] Each state decides what capacity of prison population they want to hold as a fixed amont. For example, 10,000 inmates. 2] Each inmate in each state is ranked for how bad he is. The lower the number, the worse. Ranks are updated as needed. 3] As new bad guys are sent to prison they are ranked as well. 4] At the point that the 10,001st bad guy goes to prison, the one ranked #1 is executed - like a first in first out (FIFO) inventory system, except here it is worst in, first out (WIFO). Benefits: Prison population is stable. You got me there. Except who picks the number, does it every go up at the population grows? What if the current prison population is 500,000 and we need more money for a new freeway so some politican says, the number will be 100,000 so we can save money, do the rankings and then get rid of 400,000. Or another says, I don't want any executions, make the number 1,000,000 Prisoners have a strong incentive to behave themselves and keep high up in the rank away from the threat of execution. Would need to see data on this, but I doubt it. The worse ones dissappear regularly based on the quantity of misbehavior and incarceration of new bad guys from the outside. Yep, that is true. Again, who determines who is "worse." Bad guys on the outside will think twice before commiting crimes that put them on the inside where their presence threatens those below them in the rank who all get pushed closer to the #1 spot. That is the whole falicy of your system, the death penalty does not deter crime. Mass does not have it and their incidence of capital murder is no higher or lower then states such as Texas that implement all the time. Likewise, Texas' capital murder rate isn't any lower then any other state. For repeat offenders, this counts against them and lowers them in the rank, more so each time. Who does the ranking, who decides it, what if you are ranked wrong by mistake, is there an appeal, a review? Or do they have to trust a goverment clerk? Can the ranking system be changed midstream such that if you had a low number when you went in but because of a change in the way the rankings were done can you shoot up to 10,000? Those inmates in the bottom of the rank (close to execution) have a strong incentive to prevent more outsiders from coming in to the system - their influence on those outside might work to prevent crime. Their life depends on the overall population getting down well below the highwater mark of 10,000. Wouldn't it work just the opposite, wouldn't their foes be trying to frame innocent people so that they could push their foes to 10,001? . Of course no one has the guts to consider this as a serious system - crime still pays well. No I think there are plenty of people with the guts, Sadam comes to mind, Hitler, all sorts of folks. Oh you mean has the guts here in the U.S.? Well I thnk before you can work on this system they would have their work cut out for them. First they would have to repeal the constitution, and that would require an act of congress and then ratified by 2/3 of the states. You are correct, there are a lot of places that have little or no crime. I have been to several as part of legal exchanges with countries like Cuba, the former Soviet Union, etc. I can tell you there is not one that I would want to live in. Travis

Jay, Well of course as soon as I assumed what the construction is it turns out you have exactly the opposite. From what I understand from your follow up to my post, you are wondering about what, if any effect, the vibration you feel from the MUSIC coming from the speakers is having on your turntable. As far as vibration from the floor, you have none. Am I correct? Given that you are on a slab with tile floors (I would kill for that) I would assume that there is no floor vibration. I believe one response addressed your question that if you can feel music vibration then it is also reaching your equipment and having some effect, and he correctly stated that whether it makes a difference in the music depends on the equipment and the situation. You for sure do not need a wall rack with a slap and tile. You have the near perfect floor, and you have plenty of isolation. The only thing you would need to concern yourself with is dampening, that is to try and avoid any ill effects of vibration that is caused by the tt itself by virtue of the motor, the manner in this the platter is mounted (interved bearing, etc.). How high of volume level do you play? There is nothing that you can buy or do that will eliminate the effects of vibration from the sound itself, short of what Larry and Gary do and have the turntable in the other room. I would say unless you have a very obsolete TT, that you would have to be playing at extreamly loud levels for sound vibration to cause a problem with the sound that you would be able to notice. Travis

Russ, I don't know if you are referring to the thead last night, but if you are I had a couple of thoughts. I wrote a great deal on that thread, and I can understand about taking the time to express yourself only to have it be deleated. However, in the case of the one from last night, I am glad to see the whole thing removed. That is because the thing went wrong from the first post, the poster was just trying to bait people into a rant. There was nothing informative about his post, nor was he seeking information. He simply could have added a reply to one of his previous two or three original posts, but he chose to create another one to highlight it in the hopes of bringing out those who decided long ago he wasn't worth the effort. I agree that threads that start off with good intentions, but get off track into personal attacks would be nice to salvage. However, all of his posts were clearly started with only one purpose, to start a fight. I am glad he is gone, I am glad the thread is gone, and personally, if it is not possible to delete just the poster (because he might be the originall poster for example) I for one would rather have the whole thing gone then to have any reminder of a person's shallow existence lingering around. Travis

"He taunted dtel's wife. . . ." That, my fine feathered friend is for sure in first place for the understatement of the year. Your forgot to tell our good friend that guy, name escapes me, posted his original email to Roy that included the dealers name, Audio One, in North Carolina, and posted Roy's original response with his promise to find out what was going and to get back to him. The next time someone from Klipsch talks to the Ron's, Sr. and Jr., who own that store, they have just got to ask what that character was like in person. Travis

I am literally laughing out loud, a smiley face just wouldn't do it justice. Now that was funny. I forgot his name, or what it was even about, I am too busy listening to this demo cartridge I have going and reading these great informative posts and responses from people who have a sincere desire to learn, and those who are doing their sincere best to provide informative responses and/or assistance. Those are really the only things I can remember, the other stuff is like water off a duck's back. Travis

Well let me say your timing with this post is not the greatest, the last several days have been quite a battle royale after someone posted a question that essentially came out and said the quality was junk and the company was terrible. As would be expected there were multiple salvos fired back at this troublemaker, who, unlike you, was not interested in gaining information but was really trying to cause trouble. I will say there there will be an abundance of folks on here that will be able to give you all the skinney on who made what component and when. Of course, if you want a more objective opinion you should get on the stereophile website and look up Sam Tellig's review of the new LaScalla II speakers (he bought them after his review to keep at his home). I happened to be re-reading the hard copy of that article last night and in the article he mentions where the components are made for the current model as well as where they were made in the past. Neat little facts about how Baldwin Piano, also in Ak, made the first speakers bins for the company, etc. Of fcourse those are heritage line and you are looking for reference, but at least it will give you an independent perspective about things. Travis

Short answer is no. The type of suspension system, if any, will have an impact as to how much vibration is actually reaching the turntable and how that vibration causes an interaction bewteen the stylus and the record/platter. Just because you can feel vibrations on the floor does not mean that it is reaching your TT, but it is a good sign that you need to look at the issue. As I mentioned above, like Larry, when folks lightly walked across the room my needle would jump all around. The factors that are going to have a direct impact on how much vibration is going to reach the turntable is what type of stand is it sitting on, the suspension system (springs, like on Linn, can be more suseptable to vibration), the tone arm, and any isolation device(s) between the TT and the stand. What type of construction is the home? First floor? Wood or carpet? If it is pier and beam, wood floors, you will probably notice a big difference with a wall mount. If it is on a slab, it should make little or no difference except maybe wood floors with an unsualy tie end system. I know just the very basics about construction methods, and what little I know is simply from what I have experienced in homes I have lived in. Your part of the world they have such beautiful homes, construction, etc. There is very little slab construction, I mean you even bury people above ground, so I would say you are going to have pier and beam construction, meaning there is space between the first floor and the actual ground. The first floor is supported by wood stilts that sit on the ground (usually on cement blocks on the ground) and the stilts support beams that run the lenght of the floor. These beams are what the subfloor is attached to. The wood stilts (piers) in a lot of places are 4x4's, however, in your part of the country it is very common to see cedar or cypress logs used for this purpose because of subteranian termites. If you are on pier and beam, but have never notice a skip or a bump with people walking on the floor, you could probably correct any vibration issue without going to a wall rack. However, if you do get skips or jumps, with even light walking, or people sitting down in chairs, you will save yourself a lot of time and expense by going to a wall rack and going from there. Travis Travis

Larry, How old is your home, was 13" the std. at one time, or are they 13" apart at that section of the wall because of a door or wall? I know this has nothing to do with TT wall racks but I have always been curious about that. My parents had a home in California, built in the 40's, that had studs on 12" centers, but have never seen anything like it since. Travis

It depends on what stage of the soree you serve. Don't bring it out at the beginning, switch it out 3/4 of the way through the event, if people are drinking their fair share you could pour it into all of the bottles, scotch and bourbon alike. If anyone notices they have not been keeping up with their fair share. Travis

Larry, I think you are exactly right, as usual when it comes to TT's. I have the two shelf target, it is now on an exterior wall. The mounting holes are 16" apart so if you have standard spacing on your wall studs you can can bolt it safely to the wall. The screws that came with the Target were a bit thin for my tastes and i would recommend getting some beefier ones from the hardware store. In my case, the media room is located upstairs. Vibration in that room is a major problem. You can feel vibrations all across the floor when people are walking anywhere in the room. Needle skips were a major problem until I went with the wall mount. After mounting on the wall there were none of those problems, you can literely jump on the floor and it will not cause any jumping on the tonearm. So in answer to your question, the TT wall rack is to isolate the turntable from the floor. If you have slab construction and the TT is going on the first floor there should not be a need to have a wall rack, except for maybe space, height concerns. The Target is under 200 and works great. Finite elemente, the high dollar rack company makes a single shelf unit for a grand, yes, $1,000, it is real pretty wood, and has a grid/baffel system in the actual wood shelf. No way in hell it can be worth that much money. You can buy a lot of extra isolation platforms, air bladders (which LarryC uses), ball bearings, Carbon fiber pucks, and a bunch of other snake oil with that $800.00 diference. Travis

Koetsus are tonight, with the 90x. Will report further and post photos. Gotta run, Travis

Wow, South Carolina, you can invite Thermalup to your wedding, he is near Salem, bet he would be a hoot. Just make sure he understands that when he is told "it will be one sec on that scotch" by staff at the reception that it is just an estimate and that he should not take it too literaly. Seriously, congratulations to you and your intended, and on your upcomming new arrival. Travis

Wow, South Carolina, you can invite Thermalup to your wedding, he is near Salem, bet he would be a hoot. Just make sure he is told "it will be one sec on that scotch" by staff at the reception that it is just an estimate and that he should not take it too literaly. Seriously, congratulations to you and your intended, and on your upcomming new arrival. Travis

Last night we got in the 501, 901, Benz Ace, photos to follow soon. So far 501 is in the lead. Edit: Here is a photo of the cartiridges from first night Travis

Just bring the good scotch...if you show up with the screw top plastic bottle crap it's going to make for a very long and awkward evening. Kind of like comparing a nice 25 yo Macallan to a Clan Mcgreggor...really not fair! Scotch in Tennessee? Thats blasphemy. You could be lynched, if they get wind of this is Lynchberg, you might want to consider at least bringing good bourbon. Travis Travis, you make a very valid point! While I have not had it, I should bring along a nice single barrel Jack Daniel's! Well it's sourmash but it'll do. Travis

That leaves the barn, I call dibs on the pole barn, or did you make them tear that down? Travis

Are these the ones that William just sold that I missed out on by one day? I am going to puke. Travis

It was tonight, we got through Shelter 501, 901, and a little of the Benz. He left the 501 on it for me to play with for a day or so, then we get Koetsu Ureshi, 90X. I took some photos I will post in the original thread. Good time of listening. I think the 901 is for sure out, that is about all I determined so far. Travis

Just bring the good scotch...if you show up with the screw top plastic bottle crap it's going to make for a very long and awkward evening. Kind of like comparing a nice 25 yo Macallan to a Clan Mcgreggor...really not fair! Scotch in Tennessee? Thats blasphemy. You could be lynched, if they get wind of this is Lynchberg, you might want to consider at least bringing good bourbon. Travis