Shock-Late

Well, they only give the phono input signal/noise ratio, and it's 97dB(!) so i suspect line inputs are even better. THD is given at 0,003% and bandwith is 6Hz-100KHz (if my memory's good) at +O,-1dB. But **** I'm not sure to get it since till yesterday i was the only one on the auction but today someone else seems to be very interested...GRRRRR!! Thanks for the help, anyway! Frans

I don't find the Henry Rollins picture embarrassing at all. He's one of the most sincere rock artists. He's intelligent. He makes some great music (I can understand some people hate this KIND of music, but then we're talking personal taste here). What's more, the first task of any loudspeaker is to reproduce music; it's normal and it's good to see a small part of the site devoted to music. Because some people seem to forget what this stuff is all about. i know some people who listen to sounds coming from loudspeakers, and not to MUSIC. I work in a records shop, and it's sad to see many audiophiles buying records just because they sound good, and nothing else. And the fact that it's actually a rock musician, and not a jazzman or a classical conductor for example, just shows how much klipsch is open-minded, and i can't help but admire it. Finally, and you can believe me, henry's music sounds great on Klipsch speakers, specially on the big ones from the heritage series...

The "rear" mounted tweeter is something that has always been "wrong" for me in the heritage line. Theorically it should cause diffractions and resonances, considering the depht of the cut-out; just like building a little box around the tweeter! Anyway, what's true theorically can't always be heard, so i was wondering if flush mounting the tweeters really made an improvement; i don't want to make my scalas look like junk by doing "woodwork", if it doesn't help at the end...anybody ever tried this mod?

I'd like to buy a beautiful technics SU9070 preamplifier from the early eighties. it seems to be a nice piece of kit, with "audiophile" use in mind (no tone controls, and so on) and a great "pro" look (rack-sized with chrome handles). I don't know if it's a good sounding preamp, tough. I saw in an old review it sold for 460$ back in 1980, so it should be quite a quality product. If anyone can give me more info about this preamp, it would be greatly appreciated. Thanks guys! This message has been edited by Shock-Late on 08-27-2001 at 01:56 PM

quote: Originally posted by mace: maxg, Wow... first off, pretty neat that a guy can be so helpful and selfless as you are. Secondly, it amazes me that someone could have a speaker in the class of the Belles (I've never heard them myself) and make them sound bad! Mace Well, actually, what's so funny about klipsch speakers is that they have the potential of sounding horrendously BAD when incorrectly set-up, way more so than a "banal" pair of loudspeakers. That's why so muh people say klipsch are junk...they didn't hear them in the right set-up.

Thanks Al, thanks Dieter! Oh, by the way Dieter, are you happy with your Rotel preamp? (I'm looking for one) Does it have XLR outputs?? (my amp has balanced inputs) Thanks! Frans

quote: Originally posted by Mr. Blorry: If you think the copper cones are cheesy, have you looked at the baskets that hold everything together? I haven't looked inside the newest RFs, but my K dealer was "proudly" displaying a raw Reference grade woofer, and I almost choked when I saw the speaker basket was plastic. PWK must be saying "This is not my beautiful speaker! This is not my beautiful company! My God! What have I done!" In my opinion, "plastic" (Injected ABS actually, if my memory's good) has very good damping qualities, specially when compared to a K33 woofer basket for example...Please guys, don't begin wasting time laughing about the "plastic baskets" or the "colored cones"! Our beloved heritage series has the worst and cheapiest looking woofers and drivers ever made, and they sound quite good!! That said, the speakers in the reference series are, to my point of view, technically superior (in their own context of course, as it would maybe not be a great idea to make an ABS basket for a 15inches cone). frans

Well, maybe I'm completely wrong, but i would say that the "vertical-mounted" mid and high horns, as well as the mirror-imaged construction, were made for an "horizontal" placing of the cornwalls, as you can see with some studio monitors...the mids being then in their logical horizontal dispersion... Frans

Well, maybe I'm completely wrong, but i would say that the "vertical-mounted" mid and high horns, as well as the mirror-imaged construction, were made for an "horizontal" placing of the cornwalls, as you can see with some studio monitors...the mids being then in their logical horizontal dispersion... Frans

Al, did you ever send a pair of ALK crossovers to a foreigner, let's say in Europe for example, and if you did, how much was the added cost?? I'd really like to improve the sound of my scalas, though i'm not in a hurry (still have to buy a new preamp, a second power amp to bridge them in mono, and also need to dynamat the horns...). The only thing that i'm afraid of is, will I like the sound of your cross-overs? I'm sure your crossovers objectively IMPROVES the sound of the scalas by making them smoother, but maybe i'll miss the "wrong things" of the scalas! If I lived in the US i'd listen to a pair of already improved scalas to see if I like what it does to the sound. That said, I think I'll order you a pair one day because everyone just seems so happy with them... Frans

quote: Originally posted by gregk111: Thanks for the advice, I'm going to wait until I can afford the horns, then I'll move the LaScalas to the rear. Here's what i would do if i was you: keep your new Scalas, buy the old K-horns, then take all the drivers, horns, x-overs and even woofers of your Scalas and install them in the K-horns; put the older loudspeakers from the k-horns in the la scalas. Everything will fit perfectly, you just have to remove "a few" screws. And you'll have new klipschorns!!! as simple as that! The reason you should do this is simple: the old klipschorn will give better bass than your new scalas, but this is due to the shape and size of the enclosure; your scalas have smoother midrange and tweeter (being "new gen"), and their mid-horn doesn't "ring"; swamp the speakers and you'll have the best of both worlds. Regards, Frans (owner of "old" la scalas with ringing midrange!)

After several weeks of searching for a nice little amp, i finally got my hands on a musical fidelity Typhoon power amplifier. This amp puts out 45W on each channel with incredible punch and impact (hence the "typhoon" name). It's connected to my scalas and, yes arguably it's a bit too much "in yer face" for some tastes but with rock it's simply stunning. However, the guy who sold me this amp had two of them in his shop. I know this is a bridgeable power amp; I'd like to listen to my amp in mono bridged, so if it sounds great i could buy the second one...BUT I don't know HOW it can be bridged as i don't see any "mono bridge" switch on it, nor into it; it's a symmetric amp, with balanced XLR inputs only, so i suspect maybe you need a dedicated preamp wich inverts phase on one channel to allow bridging??? Maybe Musical Fidelity's "The Preamp" is the one to try? Anyone knows about this amp and could tell me how it can be mono-bridged??? I struggle to find information about this model on the web... Thanks!! Frans

Revox is back in the shop, and today i'm listening to a much newer (1995) Aura VA100II Evolution. Well....not happy yet. For sure this amp is warm souding and gives plenty of details, but the sound is a bit soft and lacks bass punch and quickness. I plan to try a pair of Musical Fidelity Typhoon power amps, bridged in mono, wich should give me around 120w of Musical fidelity quality on each channel. I hope this time will be the good one (and i hope my friend the seller won't lose his patience during the process ) Frans

Last week I've been listening to my Scalas with my father's amp. It's a Sansui AU6500, I think it's from the same year as yours, just a little less powerful. it's great looking, with rock-solid knobs on a black brushed-steel fascia, with an aluminium surrounding around it. It's still a good amp, considering its age; i think it was quite expensive even back then. I wouldn't say it can compare with upmarket actual brands, such as musical fidelity or whatever, but it's surely better than a brand-new "mid-fi" amp from yamaha, kenwood, onkyo... So if you like the sound, stick with it, it's built like a truck! Frans

Do you remember my "oh my god what have i done" post? well finally the seller took the AMC amp back. And he let me take another amp at home for a try...it's an old Revox B750 integrated. I choose to try this one because it looks sooooooo fabulous, but alas the sounds doesn't live up to the looks: it just sounds, well, like every other old "prestige" ss amp from the end of the seventies i had the opportunity to hear: harsh and wearing, with not even a good bass to talk about, and the worse is that given at 75w/channel this amp sounds like a 2X25w amp to me. Pffff...I will be forced to stick with an ugly, plain-looking little amp (kinda Aura or something)...I would like to find an amp that would be as good looking as it is good sounding... Frans

I would say that this is normal (tough it should only appear with very very very very high levels...gasp), assuming the dust cap is made from aluminium. If the dust cap is made from paper or polypropylene of wathever material who isn't supposed to conduct the heat out of the voice coil, I would say maybe it would better not to run them too long at those high volumes. Frans

quote: Originally posted by Al Klappenberger: Tony, Don't dump your K77M for an alnico version. The "M" is the better tweeter. AL K. I own one pair of K77 and one of K77M...never been able to hear any subsantial difference, maybe because I'm not able to make an A/B listening test? I suspect that if I mount the M's instead of the alnico I currently use, I won't notice the difference...because of the time it asks to get them fitted... The belgian Klipsch dealer, tough, said to me that the alnico version was far less harsh-sounding...?? Frans

What about a damping-rug with the klipsch logo on it? it would look nice on the floor, in front of the Scalas...

Seen a very nice sub in the "Nouvelle Revue du Son" (France). It's an active sub based on the TAD TL1602 alnico 15inch driver. This driver is claimed to have a sensitivity of 100dB wich, coupled to the internal 280Watts RMS amp, should give pretty indecent levels. The brand who makes them (Akoustik, french retailer of TAD speakers) claims this is the ideal sub for use with horn speakers, since it's far more "snappy" and "quick" than most subs. I think the price is at least as terrific as the performances, alas... Frans

Well, I have to say thanks to all of you guys! I really did appreciate your help! I will look around until I find something interesting...but this time I won't buy it without a listen on my Scalas!... Ray, can you tell me more about the TEAC AS100?? how old? how much power? do you have a pict?? Thanks! Frans

quote: Originally posted by sunnysal: thanks spider, I did not realize that was an EL34 PP unit, though I am surprised that he lacks bass punch with that setup...like I said my Dynaco monoblocks do not seem to lack bass! I guess they had pretty decent "iron"!...I think a 2A3 might be a risky choice for head banging...regards, tony Sal, i don't lack bass punch; what I lack is clarity and impact in the midrange. The drums are kinda strangely muted. And i miss the drive and rythmic tension with electric guitar, wich now sounds just like a monotonic "noise". Even with classical music do I miss clarity (choirs appear to sound like a single big voice) and impact... Frans

Thank you all for your help; I will try to find a really good-sounding amp (be it tube or ss) and until then i will dynamat the horns... Frans

Because I 'm not sure i want to keep up with tubes (see the "oh my god what have I done " topic), I'm re-considering a few SS amps. One of them is the PROTON pre-power amp (don't remember the reference, it's the one with the big watt-meters). Is this amp good enough for Scalas? I know it has great dynamics, clarity and bass, but I don't know if it sounds good when only pushing less than 1 watt out. The (excellent) reviews I saw were nealy each time made with "low sensitivity" speakers. Anyone tried this amp with big klipsches??? thanks for your help guys! Frans

I think this is the worst "boulette" (as we say in french about something we shouldn't have done) I've made in my entire audiophile life. But what's sad is that I'm a student, only 23, and this is the most expensive component I've ever bought, since even my Scalas were bought for very cheap (cause they're ugly, painted in pale grey). I had to sell my Musical fidelity amp plus a pair of 38cm Alnico woofers i had in order to get the cash. What's more, i just gave a phonecall to a shop who sells second-hand gear, to see if they could eventually take the AMC and give me another amp instead, and they say they don't want it 'cause running in class A and not very reliable because of this...So I have to sell it, and I'm going to lose a lot of money, I won't have the cash to buy another amp as good as my Musical Fidelity was. In fact the very worse thing is that the reason why I wanted to buy another amp was due to the sound of the scalas, and not to the quality of the MF amp. My scalas are the old ones with the metal horn and the AA x-over; I thought the harsh sound I had was partly due to the SS amp but it's entirely due to the Scalas; indeed, this harsh sound is still there with the tube amp. At least with the Musical fidelity I had punch, bass, details, dynamics, and clarity. Such things I don't have with the AMC. And it's not my CD player, this one, at least, is pretty good. I should have dynamated the horns and saved for a pair of ALK x-overs before changing the amp. It will serve me as a lesson, but it's a bit on the expensive side for such a bad lesson... Maybe it will serve for other people reading this... Anyway, if anyone can tell me if they know a good but not too expensive amp capable of sounding as nice with punk-rock as with classical, please advise me. I'm fed up with wasting money. This message has been edited by Shock-Late on 06-09-2001 at 11:49 AM

I hate my new AMC CVT3030! it only works good with classical and jazz music! And I mostly listen to rock and pop! WHY DID I SELL MY MUSICAL FIDELITY SS AMP??? It was better sounding than this piece of **** ! And so much cheaper!! damn it! On one of my recently bought pop recording (Rufus Wainwright, "Poses"), I can't even hear the background vocals!! And with punk-rock I don't hear the drums, they're like "blom blom" instead of "bam bam"! I should have known that tube amps are only really good with quiet, soulful recordings! but i wasn't able to try this amp with my scalas at home before buying it! What's more, i get a persistent peak in the high treble that's fun on first impressions but soon becomes boring to listen to! I really don't know what to do! Nobody should buy a tube amp without knowing exactly what it will do to the sound, just because people say that "tube amps are soooo great"! i think only very expensive tube amps are great, and even them, I'm not sure they're good with driving music! I hate this hobby...all my money is gone in this amp and I can't listen to it... This message has been edited by Shock-Late on 06-09-2001 at 05:37 AM