BE36
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Posts posted by BE36
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BE36:
I am greatly interested in what you think of your Fastrac horns compared to the k400. Would you mind if I asked you to characterize some of the differences you found -- not in the sense of 'better' or 'worse' (which can be ambguous) but rather the nature of the sound produced by one compared to the other. I would appreciate it! ErikSorry - bin working too late last couple of weeks.
I am a tin ear but hear it goes:
More accurate reproduction to live, less bright. Less ringing after the main note on instruments like a piano or symbols.
Changes in "Sound" are sublte but there are two major differances between Fastrac/Tractrix and K-401 & K400: (Yes I have tried four different Mid Horns in my La Scalas)
1) I no longer get a headache after 45 minutes of listening
2) My dog stays on the couch when volume is 80dB or more.
IMHO PWK would admit to two things if pushed:
1) Tractrix is better than exponential Horn for Mids ( Somewhere he is qouted as saying the K400 was too long?)
2) Horn effeciency is only really a benfit on the power hungry woofer, on the mids and tweeter it is more marketing than an engineering requirement.
Regarding 2) -I have heard great sounding Direct Radiating Mids but the best tweeters Use some sort of a horn or reverse horn, JBL & B&W.
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Good advice Eric, re:AL networks. Another example would be Al K's extreme slope x-overs. If you like to listen loud, they sound very well behaved, but are not appropriate for SE tube amps.
But extremes do sound good to me with VRDs in Utralinear.
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My ultimate plan was to update the K-horns with better components. I just wasn't planning on upgrading so soon. Since the mid-range can be pretty difficult to listen to, I'll probably have to complete this sooner than later.
Can these K-horn upgrades be completed easily? Here's the low-down on my mechanical skills. Very basic. Replacing the speakers seems pretty basic but the wiring and soldering scares the bejeezus out of me. I tried to self-study electronics from old WWII manuals many years ago....then the chapter on Ohms Law came up and suddenly it looked like too much work and I bailed-out. Really, I'm a music lover first. Not totally helpless, just fearful of screwing it all up.
What idiosyncrasies are involved in replacing the AK-3 crossovers in 1993
K-Horns? I understand there is a second set of crossover
components in the woofer cabinet that have to be bypassed? Is this easy
to complete? Would I need new woofer doors? Gotta drill new holes?
Thanks for hanging in there with me....Rob
Easy to replace mid horn - Fastracs are bolt on replacement, use same holes as stock horn. No drilling no soldering.
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Will sound ok if speakers are rear mounted, will sound better if side mounted.
Check out the THX site.
Less than one percent of movies are engineered to send different sounds to the rears, most rears are just the same sounds the side get.
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ALK universals or extreme slopes
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Thanks to all for the great advice.
The most unpleasant sound appears to be coming from the mid-horn. Just too loud and shrill and not blended well, like the bright sun shining on your face. Certain recording are worse than others but there is a definate boost in the overall mid-range. The tweeters seem fine. It is a naturally bright room that I have warmed up with rugs, wall coverings, bulky items, etc. The sweet spot is still sharp. I have the tube amp on a 2" maple butcher block. SACD (Onkyo) player is on a metal rack. Turntable (VPI Classic) is on a 3" butcher block.Turntable/CD both have mid-range shrillness albeit the SACD player a bit more.
The Decware amp is brand spanking new, still in break in mode, about 40 hours on it. There are all kinds of knobs on the amp, bias control, impedence controls, bass, treble controls... I have tried all the amp settings with no remarkable sound changes. I have played the amp on much smaller Sound Dynamic 300ti's for several hours, it sounded sweet.
Some archived posts made it sound like one should start with the basics; check wiring, room, and bass cabinet fit. That somehow the bass cabinet fit has some effect on mid-range performance(???).
I'll fiddle around with the various tweeks in a few days. I'm getting my butt kicked at work right now....not much free time.
I loved the Klipsh Heritage sound but I would get a Headache, literally, after a half hour or more of listening.
The K400 & k401 produce a distortion/ringing, others can better explain technically, that makes your ears bleed.
Tractrix horns solved the problem.
FYI - Klipsch uses the crossover to attenuate the Mid Range, the distortion in K400 Series makes the midrange sound louder then the woofer and tweeter. When you go to a non distorting Midrange horn you will need to turn up the midrange. Must be hard for you to believe right now.
The ALK have a feature that allows you to adjust the midrange, I raised over 6dB when I switched to Dave's Fastracs.
I have a extra pair Dave's Fastracs.
Fastracks are a drop in replacement for the K-401.
Tubes or the correct solid state amp can also help solve the problem.
Fastracs/Trackrix horns are fastest and easyest solution.
I assume you are not far from 14 and Woodward?
You can stop by and listen to my system and pickup some fastracs ALKs to demo in your system
Send me PM for Contact Details.
http://mysite.verizon.net/res12il11/id96.html
http://www.alkeng.com/trachorn.html
FYI - I do not get paid to endorse ALK, NOS Valves VRDs or Dave from Fastrac. I do it to save and promote Klipsh Heritage.
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Replace the mid horn with Tractrix horn, fastrc horn is a bolt inreplacement. Replace homemadecrossovers with ALK crossovers. Bob tweetr is bolt in replacement. With these you have speakers that can compared to just about any speaker out there at very smal fraction of the price.
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Excellent choice.
Only problem is there will not be much to upgrade now.
Just enjoy the music and search for albums worthy of your system.
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UPDATE: something still wasn't "right". The midrange is actually so clean with these new networks that it's possible to set the level too high without noticing; my default setting was 2-5; I had tried 0-4, wich was noticeably too "hot", and assumed the next level down 2-5 would be "correct", period.
I now tried X-4 (next level down) and I'm in HEAVEN! The warmth is back, imaging is better, better front to back layering, clarity to die for without projection, and transients are fast as lightning without being "piercing". Really amazing. The "sharpness" was not the networks, or my tweeters, or my amp: the mids were just set a bit too hot! I'm relieved...
These networks are really TOP NOTCH! MyScalas are soooo much more refined now, I don't see wich other speaker at the price (or even higher) could even come close!
LaScala owners, give your ears a treat: EV SM120A midrange horns + Beyma CP25 tweeters (with L-Pad) + ALK universals = PURE BLISS!!!!
Good job, mister Al K.! and thank you!!! :-)
Welcome to the Club!
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Note that I find the range of bass drums and bass guitars (e.g., Jimmy "Flim" Johnson --bassist for James Taylor, Flim and the BBs) typically are sub-30 Hz recordings.Most Bass Guitars go down to around 41 hz. A Bösendorfer Grand Piano down to 21 Hz, most pianos are closer to 40 Hz.
Carol Rosenberger's Delos recording of "Water Music of the Impressionists" is very impressive (Bösendorfer Imperial). Babatunde Olatunji's "Circle of Drums", and any Billy Cobham, Marcus Miller, Stanley Clarke, etc., etc. recordings are sub-30 Hz. Virtually all pipe organ recordings that I own go below 30 Hz.
My TH subs add a great deal to these recordings--among many others in my collection.
Chris
Chris,
Cool Chart.
Thanks for posting.
For your music sounds like a sub is required.
I do not own or listen to any of those recordings.
Audio Systems Technology, Handbook For Installers States the lowest note on a Standard 88 Key Piano is 27.5 Hz. (Page 77)
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2404 Boxes - Need Poly to help matching to the Cabinets.
Thinking of using a 8" Round Tractrix with a 2" throut and mounting JBL 2404 next to round Tractrix and having it all fit inside a Stock Cabinet.
Motor Board would be revised but the Stock Grill cover could be used and they would look perfectly Stock from the Front.
Pay no attention the the man behind the curtain.
FYI - Stock (prefered) or Box is required due to WAF issues.
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JBL's really blow away the stock K77. Symbols sound so much more real.
I have friend who used be a professional drummer, he can not believe how close they sound to the real thing.
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No holes required for Music.
NOS Valves VRD Amps will solve the lack of punch issue.
Sub is only required for movies.
I don't think amps make very good equalizers .Before any one has an outburst: I am not including amps that are clearly inadequate to begin with.
Try relocating the speakers nearer to the front wall and the side walls. Warning: This can be a tedious process of trial and error.
BTW, There is no harm in borrowing an inexpensive sub to see if that helps thing out.
Not an outbourst but.
I would rather buy adequate amp that matches the system and does not need an Equalizer.
Equalizer adds too many compents and connectors and distortions into the signal path.
Now the active discussion will start. . .
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My Room with a Sub Crossed at 80 Hz.
This weekend or next I will make Curves with the new Set up both With and Without the Sub.
The La Scala 180 Hz nump can be seen, stiffing the side walls of the cabinate may help but then they might not have the La Scala Upper Bass that I love.
Some the drop off is the room. If I boost the Sub to match the Fletcher-Munson curves on the low end it just does not sound right. The Low End between 20 - 40 gets real strong but neither the Sub or the La Scalas can seem to do much between 40 - 80.
Writing this just got me thinking, since this graph was made I have new sofas, open underneath, and foot rests that are round and covered with soft material and look like they could be bass traps.
Sound seemed to improve when sofa were replaced, maybe the 80 hz hole got plugged?
New graphs should be entertaining.
The highs when listened to are stronger and more accurate than the graph would suggest, especially when compared to a stock tweeter.
The JBL tweeters are reported to be 2 - 3 dB hotter than stock klipsch tweeters, I believe those reports more than how accurate my Radio Schack Meter is calibrated.
Local Band drummer who has played a Gig as teh main act in the Georgia Dome, has confirmed the tweeter balance. He is good enough to tour but prefers to stay closer to home with his wife.
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BE36, I think this is a very good topic worth discussing. There are several issues at play here, and for the sake of the discussion, lets orient this to only music. Most folks that watch movies have a sub in even the most basic setups.
The issues, as I see them are that there is almost no full range speaker capable of flat response in your, or my room down to 20 Hz. Now, quite a bit of music does not have stuff down that low, but there is a good bit that does, and unless your speaker can reproduce 20, 30 or 40 Hz at a 'level' SPL relative to the rest of the frequency...you are missing something that is in the source. Besides Billy Cobham, Billy Idol, and Bruce Springsteen come to mind. Many of their cuts have a good bit of stuff below 40Hz. Even the specs sheet published by Klipsch will tell you the speaker can't effectively reproduce those frequencies, they roll off below a certain point.
Add to this, the fact that our hearing is not linear, i.e. flat at all frequencies. Our hearing requires that bass sound be actually louder for us to perceive the sound at the same SPL as higher frequencies. This is what led many folks to use the 'house curve' to compensate for the way we hear sounds.
I am no expert on all this stuff. What I do know, from experimenting with an RSW-15 and my Khorns (which I no longer have) is that adding the sub to the mix brought out stuff in familiar cuts that 'I never heard before'!
The best way for you to 'see' this is to download Room EQ Wizard (REW) and hook it up to your sound card. Use a microphone or even a Radio Shack meter to get even a rudimentary idea of the response in your room. You will easily be able to see where your speakers roll off 'in your room'. Yes, room proportions, decorations, furniture, materials and speaker placement all made a difference. But, there is no way to make your basic full range speaker reproduce a 30Hz signal at even the same SPL as the speaker can do with say 1kHz. Of course, the Khorn can go lower than the La Scala and the LaS can go lower than other speakers. But neither can fully give you the lowest octave with authority....it takes a well tuned and placed subwoofer to do that.
Adding a sub to two channel is not easy without some electronic assistance. Either a pre/pro that can cross the sub and the mains for you, or an active setup like I am using. In my case, my DBB mains are 'three way' with an RSW-15 at the bottom, the DBB bass bin, and the HF horn.
As I said earlier, I was in your camp for a long time. That was until I started messing around with a sub and eventually was able to add it to the system seamlessly.
Continueing the Discussion . . .
I think we are saying the same things.
I think you are correct that a sub adds something on some songs.
Most Bass Guitars go down to around 41 hz. A Boesendorfer Grand Pianio down to 21 Hz, most pianos are closer to 40 Hz.
How often is that last string used all the way out to the kneck? That last few few keys on the Boesendorfer?
To the great majority of music that I listen to a sub does not make one bit of difference and for me is not required when listening to music and I could listen to music the rest of my life and not miss my sub.
So yes the sub is nice to have and it adds that last little bit if you are going for the ultimate cover all the bases all the time system. But for me it is not requirered to have a good system for Music.
Long ago I decided for HT a Sub was required. So rather than port my Scalas that would just make a slight improvement to some of the music some of the time, I would just buy the sub that I needed any way. Sub came with it's own crossover.
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I like the apple route also.
Fiber connection on Apple and most systems is limited to 24/96. (Sounds so much better than CDs)
Hearing rumors that Firewire may become the next way to connnect to a DAC and support 24/192.
If you purchase PureMusic for iTunes, then you can send up to 24/192 ( actually higher.. if you read the PM manual, but who as a DAC that can do 32/384?)
Also did some more research and downloaded the demo. PM allows you do use the "AudioUnit Plug-ins" which are PRO Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) plug ins. There is one Plug in made by IK Multimedia that provides licensed MultiEQXT from Audysssey. Therefore, provide you purchase PM and the IK ARC plugin/w Mic you will have a full fledged 24/192 capable room correcting digital playback system.
But wait there's more,
PM allows users to take advantage of it's built in Crossovers ( up to 4 way), for those with Klipschorns, Lascalas,or other bi/tri amp capable speakers/subwoofers this means you can do all the crossovers in the digital domain and send straight to your 8 channel DAC (there are many pro ones out there) and then straight to you amps-preserving a limited Analog stage and getting the best fidelity.
cool, huh?I do not have one, but there is a company in Colorado that just announced they have a low jitter 384 USB connection.
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Sub is only required for movies.
I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to disagree here. I used to be in this camp until I added RSW-15s to my Khorns and then my DBBs. There is a lot of music in that lower two octaves that we are have been missing out on. The problem is to seamlessly add the subs to your mains. But, once you do, you will always use a sub.
As an example, listen to Billy Cobham's albums with and without a sub. You may find you have been missing quite a bit.
Let see, maybe we can agree to disagree or at least gain some understaning.
I have never heard of Billy Cobham, I will try to listen to sum of his music with and without the Sub.
One of my test songs for bass response is Eagles, H#$$ Freezes Over, Hotel California.
Others songs I have used to test bass with and without as Sub are Frank Sinatra and Diana Krall tunes. Both tend to use lots of bass.
So when listening to these songs I have not heard any significant drop in Bass performance with or with out the sub, especially since adding the Bel Canto DAC and Pre.
Maybe those songs and most of what I listen to just does not go that low, I have a Sound Level Meter but not one that measures frequency.
During my next listening session I will use the Stereophile Warble Tone Test CD with and without the Sub to put some numbers around the La Scala performance in my system/room.
Then I can post numbers from both with and without as Sub in graph form.
The graph's I have posted before were always with a Sub, but were with a different Preamp that sent everything below 80 herts to the Sub.
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No holes required for Music.
NOS Valves VRD Amps will solve the lack of punch issue.
Sub is only required for movies.
I don't think amps make very good equalizers .Before any one has an outburst: I am not including amps that are clearly inadequate to begin with.
Try relocating the speakers nearer to the front wall and the side walls. Warning: This can be a tedious process of trial and error.
BTW, There is no harm in borrowing an inexpensive sub to see if that helps thing out.
Totally agree with you Tom, speaker placement and siting position can make huge difference.
Also inadequate amps compared to good ones that match the system make a big difference also.
I tried have a perfectly flat response in my room
Hated it.
Put back to curved.
Then Stumbles accross the Fletcher Munson Curves a few months latter.
What a relief at least two other guys as crazy as me.
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Cool.
We always like pictures.
I would say before1985 based on my 1989 Labels.
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I like the apple route also. I keep the movies on Blue Ray when I want quality and Netflix streaming for others.
DAC for less than $500 highly rated.
http://www.cambridgeaudio.com/summary.php?PID=320
I am using fiber optic, over 45 feet long from an iMac to Bel Canto. Bel Canto reccomends less than 30 feet but I have tried shorter cables an not heard a difference.
Fiber optic isolates the computer elctricaly from the DAC/system, less noise and no ground loop issues.
Fiber connection on Apple and most systems is limited to 24/96. (Sounds so much better than CDs)
Hearing rumors that Firewire may become the next way to connnect to a DAC and support 24/192.
Replacing a Stereophile "A" rated CD Player with a good DAC, I am surprised by two things.
1) How good a good CD can sound (via iMac & DAC, much better than the old CD player)
2) How bad a good CD sounds compared to a good 24/96 recording.
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Post a picture of the label.
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No holes required for Music.NOS Valves VRD Amps will solve the lack of punch issue.
Sub is only required for movies.
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odysseyrevolver - Nails it.
CD Player = Boat Anchor
DAC + iMac + iPad = Way better than any CD player I have heard.
CDs are on shelf in the basement.
CD Player unpluged within 48 hours using the DAC.
24/96 and 24/192 is the way to go.
98% of Vinyl with 30% less hassle.
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My 2 cents on way Klipsch and Tubes go together is the brightness of Kilipsch Midrange Horns, especially the K-400 on K-Horns and La Scalas.Klipsch can be veryhard to listen to for more than an hour, I used to like the sound but would get headaches after anhour of listening.
Warm sounding Tubes and or Tratrix horns can solve the problem. I listen for 5 - 6 hours now with issue and still have that "Live" sound of a Horn.
Help,I May Need A New Crossover and Cabinet Reglue For A Heresy II, 1986
in 2-Channel Home Audio
Posted
Groomslakearea51,
Great post, even after all these years.
By blending and easing do mean tapering down both the side panel and the top panel veneer at the corners? (Double bevel - Bevel top panel and side panel at the corner?)