BE36

Penta 98 or Penta SC does it make a difference?

.55V Based on a professional inspection. . .

Does this tell what the Bais should be?

Alway been a dreamer . . . and some minor trouble listening to Experts. But if the guy who designed the Amp, a cool and honest guy, is saying Penta there probably is something to it. I will call Doug on Monday. The fun thing about the VRDs and out put tubes is that nothing has sounded bad I just keep them for spares.

If there is a scale of 1 to 100: 1 being string and paper cup. 100 being an exact reporoduction of live, and the best system I have every heard costing more than my house being a 92, The three Output tubes I have tried; Standard Chinese KT-88s, Genalex Gold Lion Reissues and KT-88Z have made less than a 10% differance I would put it at 5 - 6 % The front tubes I have tried, JJs Tele's Amperex (5 Varities from 58' - 68', moslty Holland Made) make more than a 20 percent difference -- lot more bang for the buck. I have heard almost more tube to tube differance with the same type tubes up front than I have heard between different brands of output tubes. I have not tried the Pentas, but I just might, sounds like the sweet spot in the performance cost curve. I really like the warmth of KT-88Z when listening female vocals but the other half of my listening has artists and groups with either a really good Bass Guitairist or some good strings down low in Jazz music. The Genalex reissues excell with the latter. I am also glad their are vendors out there trying to make better tubes. With modern machine controls, materials developments, and consumers willing to pay for highend, I am hoping that the golden age of tubes is ahead of us. . .

Tried KT-88Z side by side with Genalex Gold Reissues. Bass is tighter and stonger with Genalex Gold Reissues. Mids are more bright on Genalex Gold Reissues. Highs are very similiar. Did not realize how warm the KT-88Z were unitl listening side by side. For bass intensive type Rock, read Nirvana, I perfered the Genalex. For everying else, female vocals, piano, trumpets, etc. I would go with the KT-88Zs. If budget is a consideration and Rock/Metal is your game Genalex Reissues would be all you would ever need. KT-88Z are more warm, more linear and very detailed. How detailed? 4:54 into track 9, Tori Amos, Under the Pink after hundreds times listening to this track on many of my sytems and many other higher dollar systems at stores, Audiofest etc. for the first I could hear the piano bench "sqeauk" when Tori moved.

From the K-Horn Manual . . . What You Need to Know About Installing Klipschorns The Klipschorn® requires corner placement because the walls of the room serve to complete the speaker’s low frequency horn. To achieve full low frequency extension, the Klipschorn® should fit tightly in a corner without baseboard or trim interference and the wall surfaces should extend at least 25 inches beyond the side grilles without obstructions. The Klipschorn is equipped with rubber wall seals to ensure airtight contact with the wall. Ideally the corners should be at least 8’ but less than 20’ apart with the ability to place the listener at least as far back from the plane of the speakers as they are apart. In situations where the Klipschorns will be greater than 20 feet apart a proper stereo image may not develop between your speakers. A third speaker, such as the La Scala II, can be installed in between widely spaced Klipschorns and fed a mono signal to compensate for this:

For the boomy bass I would look at: (before rebuilding the cabinets) Room placement, Sitting position Amps Room treatmens, carpet etc. And maybe the cross over. If it was not for this forum I would not consider rebuilding my cabinets because of boomy bass, quite the opposite, I have listend to a 1/2 dozen K-Horns in all kinds of rooms and have always thought that my La Scales have tighter/better bass. They just need need a little from a sub for the really low stuff. K-horns seam to fill the room with bass but not that tight of bass for my taste. When I relocate my system, hopefully within the next year, K-horns will be a better fit for the space but I will likely stay with La Scalas, a sub, and put another 3/4 inch of plywood on the sides and call it day. With VRD tube amps there is plenty of non-boomy bass for all most all music with out a sub woofer. Some La Scala owner have put a brace inside the cabinet that joins the Dog House to the Sides that eliminates the issue with boomy bass around 150 hertz.

New cross over's will not likely help with the harshness in the mids. Mid Harshness Cures: 1) Tube amp - with the right tubes 2) Good Solid State - Nelson Pass etc. that is not so harsh. 3) Tractrix Horns I have tractrix horns and tubes. With my current tube line up the tractrix horns are not required to fix the headache issue but I have kept them any way - very linear. My ALKs have brought out a lot of detail and added life back into the music. Other networks have sounded flat in the mids or have been bass shy. For Tweeters BOBs are an improvement and good-fits-in-the-cabinent solution. I put JBL 2404s on top, $120 used each with new horns, and love what they do for the highs. I was missing alot of the music before they where hooked up. Sensitivity is rated at 105 Db so there is not really any crossover work required. Just find a pair that has orginal diaphrams and test good. Lots of old church stuff out there that is plenty of life left. Beymas can sound good also if you are looking for new. No More Headaches - BE36.

Pics! With $$s saved if you listen anything but Classical you can buy some ALKs and some like brand new speakers!

Mike, Good info on the 6550's. Is there a year or Black Plate etc. that you prefer? Interesting choice on the Bugle Boy Tele combo. I tried a Tele on the 12au7 slot but not on the 12AX7 slot - I will give your combo a try this weekend also. I tried the Amperex 7316 in the 12AU7 Slot a few weeks ago - I now have a lifetime supply. Warm like 59 - 62 Bugle Boy but with the detail of a Long Plate Bugle Boy. VRDs sound so great right out of the box, but with tweaking the tubes to fit your system they just sound amazing.

I got mint La Scalas with JC built ALK Networks for less than that when the economy was much better a couple years ago. . .

190 Hours into KT-88Z 150 - 300 hour break-in. Very detailed with good base -- very similiar to Genalex Gold Reissues. I will do a Side by Side this weekend with Genalex Golds.

It is always a good Idea to make sure your ground/bonding clamps are good. I use a Ohm meter, should be way less than one. One lightening expert recommends 0.4 ohm or less. Michigan requires at least two ground systems. If you have city water, one is usually to the supply pipe. I use a clamp and get around 0.2 or less resistance accross the clamp from ground wire to water supply. The Second system is less protected from lightening so I used a thing called a Hot Shot. It is clay contianer filled with magnesium. Place over the ground rod, run the ground wire through, light fuse and you have a ground wire "Welded" to the rod -- 0 resistance. When Lighting Strikes - I thought the path of least resistance being out of my house, verses from my Panel in the back of the house through my finished basement to the front of the house were the water supply comes in, sounded like a good Idea. Put the rod(s) in moist area, where water drains off a roof, by a downspout, etc. (Only one 8 foot, 5/8ths diameter rod is required in Michigan, I used two 10 foot, 3/4" solid rods) I think if you are hearing hiss it may have nothing to do with the ground rod? I hate hiss also, Finger Nails on a chalk board are better than hiss on a playback. Things done to lower hiss 1) Descent Speaker wire and cables combined with carfull routing 2) Mc Intosh Pre-amp 3) Quiet Tubes I have to listen to my VRDs at over 100 Db C wieghted for me to here a slight hiss when the music is almost none exsistant, opening of some Pink Floyd songs, pauses between notes on piano solo, ect. So if I am listining at 85 -90 Dbs with peaks a little over 90 Db - Non Hiss. (Unless I am using my La Scalas as Head Phones 1 foot or less apart) Before all the above actions I could here slight hiss at 8 feet and 60 Db or lower if the recording or tube was bad enough, drove me nuts even when I was all Solid State, (Pioneer Elite and Adcom - Hiss was audible over soft sections when music was playing on poor recordings)

So assuming V1b is right channel in my case then it makes sense that swapping V2 with V3 made no difference. Thanks for the education Mark. I will get smarter but it will be a slow process. You will not get any smarter. . . Only more knowledgable. I gain knowledge really really slowly.

$ for $ Speakers. That being said, I have heard Corwalls sound great or terrible, Solid State or Tube does not matter. Matter of fact the best Cornwall sound I ever heard was on some Old, very old 70s Marantz Solid State and no it was not in the 70s, it was last year and no I was not experiancing better living through Chemistry. For what is worth when I hooked my old bone Stock Forte' IIs up to McIntosh & Adcom they sound darn good, 90% of Stock La Scalas. When Hook the Forte IIs up to medium grade Solid State they only get to about 70% of the Stock La Scalas on the same equipement. Even my Academy sounds pretty darn good on McIntosh and VRDs, only audiofiles notice the difference to the La Scalas during a movie. If it is good movie I do not even notice or care about the difference. Thankfully all my Bluray audio is mixed away from the center channel so it does not make much of difference there either. But I digress. Morale of the story the last 10% of the job takes 90% of the effort or for audio - 90% of the cash.

If you look at as Octaves it works out Each Octave doubles and this doubling starting at 20 Hz puts roughly 3 octaves in each "Band" Bass, Mids and Highs

http://www.stereophile.com/reference/50/index5.html Really sure - Gordon Holt. See link above. midbass The range of frequencies from 40-80Hz.

I would like to read that Dope From Hope article and thier definition of Mid and Upper Bass. Stereophile defines Mid Bass from 40 Hz to 80 Hz. Upper Bass 80 - 160 Hz. Is there a link to all the Dope from Hope articles?

When turning the screw in hold the driver face down so that any debris falls to the gound -- not into the driver. Can not say it was a huge improvement but I feel better about them now.

Anyone out there running these yet?

JM Peach with good SS amp sounds great for 2 channel. Listened to this for hours with an at BSButton place when I picked up La Scalas. Female vocals were Outstanding. Peach can be had for less the $800 and has a pass through for HT system. If I were smarter I would have built a system around a Peach instead an could have saved some $s. But I do not mind have a McIntosh Pre.

Picture of a sealed back on a K-Horn can be seen at this Link: http://www.klipsch.com/na-en/products/60th-anniversary-klipschorn-overview/ "For the first time ever, the rear of the speaker has received a cosmetic, and functional "facelift." Solid panels now enclose the rear high frequency and low frequency cabinets to add a more elegant appearance, eliminate any corner and response issues and for the first time in the Klipschorns history allow for toe in or out."

Seal the back like 60th aniversary and the false corner would not be required - From your description they are close enough to the back wall for this to work well. There are a pair of 60th K-Horns at the local dealer, we kept pulling them further and further away from the wall one night for fun. We had them almost 25cm from the wall before there was any bass real output drop.

Al - Thanks for your Input. I am auditioning several Mid horns for the next few months to finalize the Mid Section of a La Scala optimiztion project. The B&Cs are worth a look & listen, $100 less per and will have a lot more options when setting attenuation. I did not find these on my searchs. Thanks again.