scotbuck

Greetings, Yes it was........... MY home! Take care, Scott

Greetings, Congratulations on the K-Horns! It's a great feeling to puchase something and have it not only meet but exceed expectations. I've never heard music through a K-Horn (and since I don't have the corners for them, perhaps that's a good thing ); however, I suspect these will be the last speakers you'll ever want to own. ENJOY!!! Take care, Scott

Greetings, After reading a number of posts extolling the virtues of the Scott 299B amp, I decided to dust mine off and try her out on the La Scalas. *** WOW!!! *** Whereas the Scott sounded very thin on my 6-ohm kg4's, it sounds *amazing* on the La Scalas -- effectively retiring my Audio Note from La Scala duty. The Audio Note still sounds wonderful, but in comparison to the Scott, it sounds more thoughtful, polite, and well mannered -- like a respectful guest wanting to do the right thing. The Scott, on the other hand, sounds more like a family member with nothing to hide and, consequently, the amp lets its guard down, rolls up its sleeves and *dives* into the music. Very much more of a live sound (I base this statement on my memory of last night's session of live acoustic music both at a bar and in the studio as a reference). Anyway, many thanks to everyone for chatting up the 299B -- otherwise I might never have though to check it out... Take care, Scott EDIT/Postscript: After some more toob rolling, the AN definitely has its place ... and I find that it's more reserved manner is a little more neighbor friendly here in the condo!

Greetings, I would recommend listening to the Scott for awhile before sending it off to be refurbished. You might find it sounds fantastic as is, and then you'll have the $$$ for the turntable. You can always get the mod at a future date (I think there's something to be said for doing things in stages and enjoying each stage for what it brings). Hope this helps... Take care, Scott

Greetings, I know you folks have likely heard this all before from others but..... After some careful toob rolling on my Audio Note OTO SE -- now a mix of Telefunken 12AX7 and Amprex 6922 in the phono stage, Mullard 12AU7 in the line stage and Mullard 12AT7's in the driver stage (a little cleaner and tighter than the specified 12AX7's), and Sovtek EL84M's in the power amp -- I carefully toed in the La Scalas and put them quite close, but not touching, the back wall (getting this right actually proved to be somewhat tricky but highly rewarding in terms of dynamics, slam, and overall "rightness" of sound). Since we're scheduled to record some solo piano at the studio tomorrow, I decided to listen to some piano recordings to refresh my memory as to how a properly recorded piano should sound. Man was I in for a surprise! First off was Vladimir Ashkenazy's London ffrr recording of Chopin etudes. The solo piano had a real-life weight, size, and a woody "thickness" that no other speakers I've owned were able to achieve. And the dynamics not only captured the big, blossoming lows and chiming highs, they also reproduced the low frequencies associated with the high notes (the "plunk" of the hammer on the string) with startling accuracy. Big smile there... Next up was an early pressing of an RCA "Victrola" recording of Gary Grafman and the San Francisco symphony performing the Piano Concerto No. 3 by Prokofieff. Even though it was obvious this was an o-l-d recording, the dynamics were fantastic. At one point a cymbal crash even made me jump, which in turn made me laugh out loud! The performance of both these artists never sounded so good in my home. Truly, the happy mix of a good toob amp and the La Scalas have reintroduced me to the pure, unadulterated joy of an evening of listening to music. Thanks PWK!!! Take care, Scott

Greetings, The fact that so many less-than-talented "stars" are payola-pushed on the public doesn't explain why the public goes out an buys it. Junk is junk. When I was in my 20's I gravitated towards acts such as UFO, Black Sabbath, Rainbow, Blue Oyster Cult, etc. Most of them received only token airplay here in Chicago, yet their albums sold well and their concerts sold out. And while MTV has spent the last 20 years glorifying the lowest common denominator, I can remember shows such as "Rock Concert", "The Midnight Special" and "American Bandstand" which regularly did the same thing. (Can anyone remember Neil Sedaka or Elton John with Kiki Dee -- gimme a break! ) I suspect there's as much good music being made today as there ever was; sadly, it's still a matter of spending the extra time and effort to find it. Take care, Scott

Greetings, A short time ago I checked out both the Teac and Sonic Impact amps with kg-4's, which were my speakers at the time. This combination sounded incredible -- actually better than a relatively expensive single-ended toob amp. However, when I purchased a pair of La Scalas, I found that the tripath amp sounded dull and that my toob amp never sounded better (bring out the Mullards!). It would appear that the relative merits of any individual piece is only half the story; whether it achieves a synergy with the system as a whole appears to be at least as important. All the same, with the right speakers I bet the Bel Canto sounds stunning! Take care, Scott

Greetings, I had a fortune from a fortune cookie that read: "He who knows he as enough is rich." I kept that at my desk for a long time because I thought it was truly words of wisdom. Of couse, it's sometimes challenging to know when we truly have enough! For right now, though, I'm quite content with what I've got (and in fact never expected to ever have this much). Take care, Scott

Greetings, I just picked up a pair of La Scalas with the Type AA crossover network and alnico-magnet speakers. I paid $1,550 for them and they're dead mint. I'm using a 10wpc single-ended toob amp (using 6BQ5's so it's not a triode), and the La Scalas are quite happy with what they're being fed. With a little toob rolling and speaker placement about a fist's width from the wall, the bass extension is surprisingly deep. The dynamics and overall sound just breathes -- and sometimes explodes -- like no other speakers I've owned (including Lowthers). And I'm finding that the speakers draw attention to the music rather than to themselves; they kind of just get out of the way and let the recorded performance shine. Of course, if you need ultra-low bass, you'll want a sub-woofer that is relatively quick and dynamic; other than that, you're good to go. In short, I think you'll love these speakers! Hope this helps... Take care, Scott

Greetings, I've had several experience where changing the polarity of the AC plug causes a substantial difference. On some of my guitar amps, and most recently my turntable, there is definitely a "right" and "wrong" way to plug the two-prong plug in. The "right" way generates less noise. Also, in live music, if you find that your guitar amp has a different polarity from the PA system and you happen to touch your microphone, you'll be in for a real shock! I believe that's why many vintage amps (with a two-prong AC cord) have a polarity switch which lets you find the "right" setting without having to unplug the amp. Hope this helps... Take care, Scott

Greetings, Man, I'll bet that sounds like heaven! Congratulations!!! Take care, Scott

---------------- On 7/17/2005 10:12:31 AM colterphoto1 wrote: ...Enjoy a while before pursuing the modifications. Michael ---------------- Greetings Michael, I couldn't resist the urge to roll some toobs. I brought back the vintage stuff -- Telefunken, RCA, Amprex -- and ya know what? Me likee!!! Take care, Scott

---------------- On 7/17/2005 10:38:32 AM mandi wrote: ... You will have to change the nickname for your speakers or I will be very confused, since there is a memer here who routinely takes out his twins (tube amps I think),but you can keep the name. ---------------- Greetings, Sounds fair enough! I'm open to any and all suggestions! Take care, Scott

---------------- On 7/17/2005 9:44:39 AM leok wrote: scotbuck, Congratulations on the Twins. I wish I could fit a pair of those in my house. I'm curious about what it is about the sound of tube over Tripath that you prefer. I find the same, but our reasons may be different. I find with tubes (both SET and PP), the very top end is cleaner. I've always attributed the Tripath high end issue to be the op-amp front end, but am beginning to wonder. What do you prefer about the tube sound? Leo ---------------- Greetings Leo, It's a very interesting thing because with my kg4's I actually preferred the tripath sound. I noticed, however, that the tripath amps have a nominal 6-ohm load which perfectly matches my kg4s. Perhaps this is a contributing factor??? In my home with the La Scalas, the tripath now sounds a little too "gray" with slightly subdued highs and lows. This is puzzling because when I visited the seller's home to audition the La Scalas, I brought my tripath amp (the toob amp was just too dang heavy!) In the seller's home, using his cables, the tripath amp sounded great. Even the seller, who owns some SET monoblocks, had his jaw drop in disbelief. So perhaps his cables let the tripath amp sing despite the slight impedance mismatch with the La Scalas. Conversely, the somewhat weak sound I was getting from my tube amp with the kg4's has vanished. I'm getting the same strength and impact I got with my Lowther setup (although I think the La Scalas sound better). The sound is quite natural and more realistic than with the tripath. Why is this so? As the King of Siam said to Anna: "Is a puzzlement!" Take care, Scott

Greetings, Today I officially adopted a mint pair of 1978 La Scalas and introduced them to their new home in my living room. Aside from general giddiness, here are my initial impressions. THE LOOKS Before I even plugged them into my system I was impressed by how gorgeous these speakers are. While they're quite large, they really do look like fine furniture. The grain on the birch is stunning, and the all-wood look of the basshorn mouth (as opposed to a grill) sets things off nicely. Definitely an unexpected bonus. THE SOUND A buddy helped me transport the speakers (he dubbed them "The Twins") and requested that I christen them with some "Dark Side of the Moon" on vinyl. The song "Time" seemed a good place to start. Now I've heard this song more times than I can count on a variety of systems I've had over the years, but I've never heard it the way "The Twins" handled it. First off, the bass drum at the beginning of the song was deep and plump, with no sponginess -- just a series of good, meaty "thwak-thwaks". The drum was, compard to most other speakers I've had, a little more recessed in the mix (but still more prominent than it was with my old Lowther-based system). Next, the tom-toms had incredible dynamics an size. They really breathed and expanded into the reverberant physical space they were in. Definitely gave the impression that these were real-sized drums rather than a compressed version of real drums. The same holds true for the cymbal crashes, which also had an incredible amount of air around them without the annoying "fizz" that many speakers have. Next on to "461 Ocean Boulevard", also on vinyl. Eric Clapton's voice was reproduced with much greater clarity than what my kg4's offered up. On the kg4s he seemed a little muffled, whereas on the La Scalas his voice sounds mellow without being swallowed up in the mix. Guitars had more weight and real-world size, and the harmonics from the distortion (whether it be natural tube overdrive or effects pedal based) was unexaggerated and natural sounding. At this point my buddy and I had to run (there was beer to be brewed ) so I'll have to provide more sonic impressions later... THE FRONT-END TWEAKS I've read numerous times that a lot of the Klipsch speakers are not very forgiving of any equipment flaws in the front end of the system. This was borne out in my initial listening session. First of all, the La Scalas definitely prefer my tube amp to my tripath amp (lucky thing I didn't sell it!). Interestingly enough, the opposite was true of the kg4's. Also, I've heard from several sources that the OM series of Ortofon cartridges (mine is an OM-5E) can be somewhat strident. With my Lowthers and kg4's I never found this to be true; the cartridge simply let the mids and highs come through better, whereas, say, a Sure V-15 sounded a bit rolled-off. With the La Scalas, however, I can now hear what the reviewers were saying about the cartridge. I guess it's all about system matching -- but it looks like a new cartridge is definitely in my future. Any suggestions??? (Currently I'm using a Kenwood KD-500 'table with an Infinity Black Widow arm.) Well that's it for now. As always, your thoughts and impressions are very much encouraged and greatly appreciated. Take care, Scott

Greetings, How 'bout just replacing the stylus? For Ortofon, you can check these out at Needle Doctor: http://www.needledoctor.com/s.nl/sc.2/category.63/.f Hope this helps... Take care, Scott

---------------- On 7/12/2005 9:52:34 PM maxg wrote: Too hot....just too damn hot. ---------------- Greetings, I sympathize completely... There has been a stretch of hot, humid weather here in Chicago that's been pretty sweltering for this time of year -- of course, just in time to see my air conditioner on its last legs. Tonight, however, I came back from the studio to be greeted by my just-today-installed new air conditioner. Oh, Lord have mercy is this ever beautiful!!! Take care (and stay cool), Scott

---------------- PWK: Do you know what a Patrician is? FM: An Electro-Voice corner horn licensed by Klipsch. PWK: No. A Patrician is someone who gets out of the shower to take a pee. ---------------- Greetings, LOL!!! I've never heard either a K-Horn or Patrician, although I suspect they *both* sound great. Anyway, thanks for the PWK quote! Take care, Scott

---------------- On 7/2/2005 7:43:25 PM Corvette6769 wrote: one pair of Klipsch stereo speakers ... $30 obo. " ---------------- Greetings, I think ya got hosed ... betcha ya coulda got 'em for $25! Congratulations on finding the deal of the century! Enjoy!!! Take care, Scott

Greetings Julie, I heard Heresies for the first time a couple weeks ago. Man were they impressive! I think you're gonna love 'em! Take care, Scott

---------------- On 6/30/2005 7:15:58 PM leok wrote: scotbuck, Isn't that something. Any "defect" can be a feature. I'll bet the crossover distortion cuts through. I hadn't been aware of the fuzz boxes that will produce mostly even harmonics .. not easy to do. So, I guess you keep the ss amp out of trouble and let the fuzz-box "clip" first and get a tube-like overdrive sound. Is that correct? Leo ---------------- Greetings, Actually, a fuzz works best when the amp is relatively clean. Early models using germanium transistors can be heard in the mid-to-late sixties on songs such as "Satisfaction" (Maestro fuzz), all of Jimi Hendirix's early material (Fuzz Face) and Led Zeppelin I (Sola Sound Tone Bender Mk II Pro). By contrast, others would use a germanium "treble booster" which gave a (relatively) clean boost to the mid-to-upper frequencies to overdrive your tube amp (think early Tony Iommi and Brian May). Each used the same transistors to a very different -- but equally tasty -- effect. Later, partly due to the instability of the germanium transistors, manufacturers switched to silicone-based fuzz boxes and overdrives. These overdrives had even-order harmonics, but in a limited manner. Early examples were the Ibanez Tube Screamer model TS-808 (think Stevie Ray Vaughn) and the Boss OD-1 overdrive; I find that these sound best when the amp is already working hard and you use these to "go to 11". Also, distortion pedals -- which kinda fit between an overdrive and a fuzz -- appeared. One very popular model was the MXR Distortion + (think Randy Rhodes) and later the Boss DS-1 distortion (think Steve Vai); I find my amp can be a little distorted on its own to use these. I read in a book detailing The Beatles' studio work that George Martin was somewhat taken aback when they were experimenting with early fuzz boxes. I don't think the band used any such device until Paul McCartney used one on his bass for the song "Think for Yourself" off of the Rubber Soul LP. Like you said, it's interesting that something which was considered a flaw could be so well used (even the "dukes of distortion" at Marshall amps used to advertise "100 watts of clean, undistorted power" ... NOT!!!) A lot of rock fans are glad they were sooooooo wrong! Take care, Scott

Greetings, In the past I've owned both units -- unmodded -- powering kg4 speakers. I found the Scott to be very sparkling and clear with a wonderful "toobey" glow to the upper harmonics and midrange. Dynamics and bass response, however, were on the soft side. On the other hand, I found that the H/K 430 had more detail (without the sparkle) and more slam and tightness in the bass. However, through the kg4's I thought it wasn't overly dynamic either (although it's big brother, the H/K 730, was an absolute monster! ) I thought each amp, in its own way, was darn good for the money! Take care, Scott

---------------- On 6/30/2005 12:30:01 PM leok wrote: ... Crossover distortion is a strong characteristic at low powers in many pp ss amps ... ---------------- Greetings, I found your info on crossover distortion to be very interesting. Most guitarists (myself included) like distortion coming from our guitar amps. And for many years manufacturers have been making "stomp boxes" that enhance the amp's own natural distortion. Most of these devices -- whether they be called "fuzz", "overdrive" or "distortion" boxes -- generate some manner of even-order harmonics. However, a small company called Z-Vex has developed a unit specifically designed to generate crossover distortion. The unit, called The Machine, has a sound which is so *pervasive* it can even cut through the even-order distortion from a fuzz-box and stand out. (You can hear sound samples of this unit compared to their other stomp boxes at http://www.zvex.com/effects.html ) If this quality applies to the crossover distortion coming from a home audio amp, it's easy to appreciate how many listeners might have less tolerance for crossover distortion than even-order harmonic distortion. Of course, another type of distortion I've heard about is intermodulation distortion (although I don't know whether this is different from crossover distortion...). Take care, Scott

Greetings, I had an interesting conversation with Dusty Vawter of Channel Island Audio this afternoon. I've been going back and forth between my single-ended tube amp and my SI tripath amp and decided to try the SI with a more substantial phono preamp than the one I've been using to see how it would fare overall against the tube amp. So I ordered one from Channel Islands. After I completed the business end of my order, I inquired about how CIA's monoblock amps (one a version of the "gaincard" chip technology, the other a non-Tripath twist on class-D switching technology) would compare to the SI. Among other things, Dusty mentioned that some folks might be hearing some soft distortion in the SI since the amp develops only about 5wpc. I find this interesting because everyone I know who's heard the SI has exclaimed, "Man, that sounds like tubes!" (Ok, maybe not an exact quote... ) On the face of it, such a statement doesn't seem reasonable since tube and switching technologies seem light-years apart. But if part of what folks are hearing is, indeed, some very soft, even-order harmonic distortion from the SI, then the "sounds like tubes" statement makes some sense. At any rate, just another item for discussion... Take care, Scott

Greetings, I agree that a Thorens TD-160 is a good starter 'table. They're available for a very reasonable price on ebay all the time. I'd recommend starting with a good second-hand turntable simply because I suspect you'll want to upgrade down the road; you should then be able to sell your turntable for what you paid for it. Hope this helps... Take care, Scott