HornEd

What "riot" through yon window breaks? It is is fini, the consummate craftsman, who would have us beat upon the Plumb Bob's in our multi-fauceted ignorance. Let he who is without Teflon cast the first metaphorical sink trap! I yearn for a twist of vintage fini-al humor before I beat up on the commercial water bugs with my Big Basin wrench. -HornEd

Ah, and well they should Oscarsear! The essence of a horn is to begin with a nearly perfect wave, albeit small and weak, and "grow" it along the length of a properly tapered horn until it enters the listening area... still as nearly perfect but robust with power! Properly engineered Big Horns inherently provide a more honest sound because they start small, relatively speaking, and maintain aural purity through the wave growing process. Part of the genius of Paul Klipsch was to design a commercially viable horn by folding it into a cabinet and the adjacent corner walls that extend the horn effect. The patented Klipschorn horn design jump starts the sound building process by putting a rather large speaker in the "small" end of a folded horn. The results? Magnificent! -HornEd

Rexroth came to San Francisco eleven years before I was born... and already he was a seasoned pro in the writing game... and an intellectual force and critic of just about every social system then known. A libertarian through and through, and somewhat of an esoteric elitist to my mind, in those years he was more of an enigma to me... a bit more commercial and seemingly more critic than advocate of the Beat phenomenon. I knew of him but I can't remember our paths crossing... but then that was a long time ago. Then too... sometimes the joy of being a young man immersed in an ocean of stimulation misses an opportunity that is not recognized until much later in life. And much of my Beat Generation experience was as a tolerated puppy in the lair of free-spirited old dogs... of which Rexroth was probably the oldest... and, for me at the time, most distant in my comprehension of life, love, and disassociation from the powers that be. I do remember that by the time he had a column in the San Francisco Examiner, I had already living, working and studying in Europe. Some years earlier, I too had a byline in the same paper, but I covered Bay Area high school sports... which fueled my customized Oldsmobile... but was chaff in the wind when contrasted with the thought provoking, if controversial, public musings of Rexroth. Alan picked one of my favorite Rexroth imageries. My appreciation of his work grew, as I did, after I left San Francisco and he was dead before I returned. Probably his most insightful writings deal with the dynamics of community... and the disassociation from it... which is generally how he saw the "non-commercial" Beats. It's been a while since immersing myself in Rexroth... and with the current community building in which I am engaged... it's been too long since I revisited his panoply of 100% copyrighted work. Curiously, these Santa Cruz Mountains in which I live were also trod by Rexroth in another time. Currently, we mountain folk are trying to thwart a proposed major logging activity by a water utility that we believe would take 40% of the majestic old redwoods and firs and leave behind an increased fire danger. I believe if Rexroth were alive and kicking today, he would be here defending the mountains from the societal aberration of rapacious corporate goals over enlightened forest management. Thanks, Parrot, for shaking old memories before they have completely atrophied! And thanks Alan for reflecting the essential character, honesty and artistic appreciation in every post... enlightened veteran contributors, seriously inquiring newbies, and appropriately tolerant administrators, become the "multi-faceted stuff" that makes this Forum a cut above the rest. -HornEd

Ye Garrards and Little Fischers... trying to recollect what I have spent on my HT systems has caused me to remember a dozen or so Klipsch speakers that I have stored away and completely forgotten about. Last year I calculated I had over $30k in HT hardware... and over a thousand DVD's... nearly all purchased new. Of course, I also use a 30' free standing structure that cost another $15k for materials. -HornEd

Alan, it's so good to hear someone else remember Enrico. My father used to caddy at the Olympic Club. My great grandfather was its middleweight boxing champion for many years. And its head chef is an old culinary friend. I was born in San Francisco (St. Luke's) and raised in Daly City (the foggiest place on the West Coast... the actual venue of the Olympic Club. I used to caddy for my dad (a politician who was quite welcome at just about any course in the Bay Area) at Harding Park... where I learned what a grouch Ken Venturi can be! My dad also played with Enrico, who knows, you could have met him. He was a southpaw and was always a hacker no matter how much he spent on his clubs! Between caddying for him and being blind in one eye, golf just never became my game. Anyway, Alan, thanks for the memory. Just thinking about those early days of poetry, coffee and jazz brings so much joy to my heart. On Sundays in the summer, I bring live acts for concerts on the lawn. Last week it was Alex Lipadus and his "Tasting Room" quintet. His roots are in Brazilian Jazz and fusion with other jazz forms. With all the emphasis on music and movie playback, it's nice to have a little live music in our lives for Saturday night dances and Sunday concerts. Of course, our PA is pure Pro from Shure 57s and 58s to EAW speakers and QAS monitors. This Sunday it's the Blues... on the Old Oak Stage. Well, enough of this fun, it's time to get back to work! -HornEd

Wow, what an anniversary present for Kassandra and HornEd... and to think we missed it until today. Fortunately, Kassandra was in the room when I stumbled across the thread... like a five year old encountering his first Liberty ship hawser. Hmm, I actually have a WWII memory like that! For whatever its worth, all of you have brought joy to our hearts this day... thanks to Benton reviving the thread from obscurity. As you may know, Kassandra's five diamond anniversary ring to mark our first night together was delivered in a somewhat uncanny way. I bought a hand carved four foot tall Nutcracker. When Kassandra drove up in her vintage Mercedes Benz 560SEL (another present... she gave me another pair of Klipschorns and Belles), she saw the Nutcracker and immediately said how much she liked it. I told her it had one peculiarity... that when you opened its mouth, it stuck its tongue out. She immediately grabbed the lever and looked closely into its mouth... and then began to cry. I had created a tongue of rolled red paper... and put the five diamond ring upon the tongue. Two days later, she presented me with a five diamond ring. At our wedding, we exchanged carved suns on a gold necklace instead of rings. So the rings were a surprise for both of us. For her birthday this past July 27th, I gave her a red plastic see-thru box with a big bow on it. Inside was a present that she guessed was a belt to be used when lifting something heavy... like some of my speakers. But, no, it was actually a soft sculpture puppet in a soft sculpture garbage can. She tentatively put her hand in the puppet and slowly the lid rose to reveal a cute, soft sculpture raccoon. In the dim light, she caught a sparkle... and then realized that the little raccoon was wearing certified diamond stud earrings. Yes, my Forum friends, I am still very much in love... and, remarkably, so is she. Interestingly enough, the place most responsible for our falling in love was the round Klipsch Legend Theater... and it continues to be a renewing source of aural joy and profound togetherness. Yes, Benton, the round room prototype was built and the K-horns and Belles successfully tested. The K-horns and Belles than went back into storage to await their permanent home. The round prototype has been home to an enhanced version of my 6.1+2 Klipsch Legend Theater and still thrills about 40 or so visitors a week. For HT, there is nothing that creates movie ambience like a 6.1 monopole system in a non-reflective round room. As outlined in another recent Forum thread, the front center and the rear left, right and center KLF-30's have all been modified to provide a larger sweet spot which allows an uncanny orientation where ever you may roam in the room. As some of you may recall, I do not allow the KLF-30's to go below 85Hz... depending on my custom stacked SVS Ultras to carry the load below 85Hz. This allows great low sounds that don't bump heads, null or double up... and a faster, cleaner, deeper mid-range... which even held true when the K-horns were in the six discrete slots and the Belles in the front effects positions! I have been very busy building "Little Village" (a group of year 'round cabins in a portion of our forest that overlooks a lake) and expand the resort to 236 acres, more than double its original size. If I find the time, I will build a new Village Theater into a mountainside. I am completely sold on a round building with a conical ceiling as an ideal sound environment. It should be noted that the walls must be porous enough to let waves under 85Hz escape the room. Obviously, bi-pole and di-pole speakers show their base quality and die without the reflected glory they rely upon to create pseudo-ambience. How is it that some reject the blanket reverb of "hall", "stadium", etc. as being "unreal"... and then accept the sound sprayer effects as being "real"... it boggles my ear pans and doth cloggin' my noggin. -HornEd

Not only did I go, but it was in such a coffee house that I read from my first poetry collection ("The Null & the Void"... a heady concept for me in those early years) as progressive jazz laid a far out background. Interestingly enough, Eric Nord, who was the true leader of the Beat Generation, used to be a member of the resort I now own in the Santa Cruz Mountains near Los Gatos, CA. Eric and the faithful core of the Beat Generation headed out for the tall timber once "Beat" became popular... leaving Jack and the pretenders to make of it what they might. It sure was a lot different in person than in the storybooks! Eric and a few of his ilk were classic free spirits... Jack and the rest took money and smoked spirits. Eric was the originator of the "hungry i"... he had the concept down right but he wasn't the businessman Enrico Banducci was. It was Banducci that catapulted the "i" to popularity that brought fame to many of that generation's controversial comics... and to such groups as the "Kingston Trio"... which started on the Stanford campus, about 45 minutes from my mountain retreat. A much more received group by sincere Beats was "The Limelighters" an irreverent group of graduate students from Cal who all had other careers postponed by their musical success... except for the lead singer, Glen Yarborough. When Eric left... the commercial rendition of the Beat Generation changed what might have been... and I became a division manager of a San Francisco land development corporation. But through it all, the free-spirit born in Beat Generation coffee houses long ago... continues to sustain the joy of living... and the joy of Klipsch! -HornEd

Right you are, Sunnysal! I was so intrigued with the design... including the curve of the front panel which supposedly radiated the stereo sounds in a way that increasingly blended the two channels for a better sound stage. A great try... and not cheap as I recall. A business mentor of mine, the late Ray Monson, bought one. He also bought the first TV in our neighborhood... so long ago in San Francisco... one channel... and a couple of dozen adults in Ray's living room marveling at "Howdy Doody" on a seven foot console and a five inch black and white screen! Sadly, the Paragon didn't measure up to my early monaural Klipschorn acquired from a North Beach audiophile Beatnik down on his luck. Hmmm, Colin welcomed me back to the Forum on another thread as an Old Hippie... little does he know that my rebellious nature was nurtured in the coffee houses of North Beach long before the Hippies found Haight-Ashbury... Meanwhile, has anyone every heard this Italian macho-twin subwoofer horn? Check out the update at: http://www.royaldevice.com/custom.htm -HornEd

Ray, it's great to see you are alive and, well, still indulging in the black art of engineering... Do you have any thoughts about http://www.royaldevice.com/custom.htm? I thought you might like to see the updated version of this big horn. Frankly it influenced my desire to build a big, smooth gunnite, subterranean horn subwoofer. I was a bit taken aback when I saw the numbers of this behemoth were a bit under what I now have with my custom SVS rig. Have any of our globe trotting Forum friends heard this beast? Tom V. of SVS fame offered to design his concept of an enormous, no holds barred, custom subwoofer for me... one that would need its own major space... maybe it's time I took him up on it. It's time we Klipschophiles took the Big Horn title back from the sheep! -HornEd

Ah, yes, MH, I spent many happy years in France... But, your post reminds me of small town Texas mayor, Homer Pfeil (of German ancestry), who would tell new people he met, "My name is Pfeil, pronounced FILE... the "P" is silent as in 'swimming'!" And now back to pooling our "maximo" horn thoughts. -HornEd

Redtop, I agree with STL, if you have 9" between the back of the '30 and a solid wall, keep some vent space around the cabinet... and you will have it made. The reason I use port deflectors on my '30's is because I use porous walls to allow low end waves to pass through walls rather than rebounding into standing waves. Since you have solid walls, port deflectors are not necessary. Venting the ports to the front will take away some of the slam inherent in the 30's. Enjoy! -HornEd

Thanks Amy... I hoped it wasn't because my posts were thaaaat looong! I have more to say but I am enroute to a root canal. If I would have known I would have scheduled it for THAT weekend. -HornEd

Hmmm... does that mean if it isn't wonderful you will be the "Hurd shot 'round the world?" -HornEd PS: Thanks for taking the leak!

Wow, stick my nose in the Forum after many moons... and, wham!!! ...they had to take a weekend off... and force me to answer all the PM cards and letters before they diffuse to the great bit bin of oneness. Ah, but the plot thickens... what lurks ahead for Forum heads with nothing to do but take old Bose ads out the garbage... or fantasize about a glamour shot of Amy languidly draped upon a mighty transparent Klipschorn. Deprivation... where can I buy that used Klipsch that stimulates the market for new Klipsch products... Innovation... its the old hard scare of new software. -HornEd

Redtop... it's good to see so many Klipschers getting into the horizontal act. KLF-30 woofers need to have their port area free to work properly. They are tuned ports and fire rearward to get the benefit of the wall for dispersion. In my 30' yurt theater, the modified KLF-30's in the three rear positions have the motorboards with the woofers out as far as they will go... as in the first picture on this thread. The ports were not moved and have reflectors that shape the port exhaust toward the audience. This method preserved the best timbre match aspect with a non-modified KLF-30. The Front Center KLF-30 has the two woofers as close to the mid-range and tweeter stack... as in the second picture. I do this because the front three speakers are closer together than the rear array speakers. Thus, the center speaker tends to remain in the center of your sound stage. Of course, since 80% or so of the sound comes from the front center... getting that speaker right is more important than any other in home theaters! By placing the woofers as wide apart as possible in the cabinet, the rear array has a much wider angle of dispersion... and that relates to having more of your room in the "sweet spot." Well, I must dash... I hope to read all of the entries on this thread at a later time. -HornEd

Thanks J.T. I knew somewhere in my ramblings that I had encountered something along those lines... but I can't seem to make my "think tank" cough it up... and hoped someone would get the general idea from my vague description and respond. Thanks again and I will pursue that book. I haven't heard from the Q-man (another Merritt Island denizen) for a long time. I hope he is well and building the free standing Klipschorn theater for which he sent me preliminary plans. His approach is to put all that explosive Heritage Klipsch Power in one room and have at it! Actually, Gary has done wonders with his main room acoustically... and his cabinetry skills are about the best I've seen. He's my hero! Clearly, taming the shorter waves is rather easy. The difficulty increases with the physical size of the wave. My approach is to create near-perfect low frequency waves and send them through a huge horn that enters the listening area through the projector's screen and then is absorbed through the walls after one path. This one time smooth flow through the listening area precludes big waves hitting big waves projected from several different sources. As mentioned earlier, the existing 30' test theater proved the circular room and conical ceiling to be equal to negating spurious reflected waves above 85Hz. The concept of negating big waves in a pit by bumping head-on with their reflected frequencies is exciting indeed! I'll let you know how it goes, J.T. -HornEd

Thanks, Hardhead. The joy of spiritual victory and the agony of physical defeat have taken a backseat to an old "hardheaded" habit of pushing he envelope as an over achiever. It seems that at 67, my bride of 2004 thinks that I still have the energy of an 18 year old. Hmmm, perhaps I should not have married such an "old" women. You, see, at 18 I would be closer to her age than I am now. But, fortunately, the dynamics of age in a relationship - like the dynamics of speaker preferences on ears - is a study in trade-offs in qualities of life. And, so, the 27 year gap between us has largely evaporated in the joy of sharing life's adventure together. I'd like to say that every day is pure joy... but the pain of remaining alive and hard charging takes its toll... and, yet, the philanthropic projects in which I have been immersed have begun to take shape and show promise of broad spectrum quality of life benefits in a free society. Regrettably, many of my Klipsch speakers are in storage but the Legend Theater continues to excite the members of our private village and guests to our mountain retreat. As you may recall, four of its six KLF-30's sport modified motorboards to maximize the sweet spot potential. I have replaced he 65" Mitsubishi rear projection unit with an InFocus X3 projector, added a ViewSonic High Definition TV tuner, and a Pioneer Elite DV-59AVI DVD player. The next change will probably be an upgrade to the new Yamaha top-of-the-line receiver that should be announced soon. I like the way Yamaha discreetly expands the apparent soundstage with front effects speakers and the quality of the matrixed sixth channel (rear center) from 5.1 DVD's. Between hard charging on my current projects and the forced timeout visits to the hospital, I have delayed building the Paul Klipsch Tribute Theater that I had started a year or so ago. But, a couple of days in ventricular tachycardia prompted me to check in on the Klipsch Forum... and a recent purchase of a diesel tractor with front end loader and extended backhoe... and my staff recently completed welding a new steel bed in my bobtail dump truck... so the spirit to build is once again willing... and the tools and staff are on hand and will likely complete the project by next spring. In the interim, my research into acoustic and psychoacoustic approaches to building a round room with non-reflective, bass porous walls, with diversion of longer waves to bass traps between the solid outer walls and the yurt-fabric inner walls. The test theater (e.g., the Klipschorn array has also been tested there) has proven beyond a shadow of doubt that a non-reflective round room with a non-reflective vaulted conical ceiling provides a sound experience beyond any other listening environment I have encountered in my decades of searching. Frankly, most audio engineers I have spoken to about idealized performance have speculated that a circle would be impractical... and, yet, a circle fits well with our "predator" mounted eyes and ears fixed on the three front mains... and the ambiance and reality check of three rear mains brings aural bliss to sooth the savage perfectionist beast within. Well, it's 3:30 am on the Pacific Coast... I have done the meditation it takes to dampen the fires that burn in my damaged spinal chord... and try for a couple of hours of blissful sleep. With the dawn comes another busy day... which includes the installation of some new bridgework... not on the property this time... but in my mouth. It seems my lovely wife enjoys making her old warhorse husband into a more decorative being externally. Fortunately, the essential being within is not being compromised. I guess it's a little like PWK having to take a perfectly functional LaScala and turn it into a WAF approved exterior he named after her, Belle Klipsch. I recently formed a new corporation in Las Vegas, Nevada, which will be the hub of an international business based on the Internet. Part of it will be a return to the publishing business for me as it will have a subscription based monthly magazine for those who spend a lot of time in the sun. There will be a line of high quality and very reasonably priced products related to lessening sun damage to the skin and other products designed to add quality of life benefits to a greater slice of the world's population. Much of the research of the last two years has been in the area of health and nutrition as I search ways to prolong the joy of being alive with the love of my life. Many of these improvements have been added to our village restaurant and extended to the poolside cafe. Of course, no magazine on better living would be complete without a section on home theaters, tweaking personal systems, and building over-the-top theaters to Klipsch-enhance listening space the world over. For whatever its worth, this is NOT an advertisement, but rather a notice to my Forum Friends that my zest for living and passion to share good things with fellow human beings has not diminished. Meanwhile any wild (or tame) ideas to building a better mouse...err bass trap... would be most appreciated. -HornEd PS: Despite the vintage Klipsch speakers and Mercedes cars in my life, I really have turned to a far simpler lifestyle that brings me closer to nature and further from the scramble of fashion, one-upsmanship, and trendy excesses. And now I have a soul mate who enjoys the same simplicity... with some refinement of this old carcass, of course!

Here's the situation (the questions are at the bottom): As the busy resort season wanes, I look forward to building a new free-standing theater in the village. Current plans call for a subterranean subwoofer horn chamber that enters the theater through the screen... into a large round room with fabric walls... allowing waves under 100Hz to pass through the walls and be reflected into a subterranean infinite baffle. The purpose is to create an acoustically dead room into which will be built six strategically placed Klipschorns, one for each of the discrete channels. A set of Belles will be set into the walls to the right and left and somewhat higher than the right and left front Klipschorns. In my experience, a 30' round room with acoustically transparent walls provides the cleanest bass and mid-range I have yet encountered. The trick in the new theater is to have the advantage of no standing waves and minimal room ambiance so that the sounds intended to be heard from the media will be as close as possible to the original. Personal experience also demonstrates that waves under 80Hz are better radiated from a single point source behind the large screen since human hearing cannot detect the source. To preclude aberrations from conflicting low waves, the six full range speakers will be limited to waves above 80Hz. It's a bit uncanny, but when the subwoofer array behind the screen in the test model put out a huge volume of sound of an explosion, the sound seemed to come from the rear of the room where the sounds above 85Hz that were associated with the explosion were heard. In essence, as long as your subwoofer array is clean (i.e., doesn't leak associated sounds in frequencies that can be located by your ear), the location of the subwoofer array is moot. I choose to put it behind the screen since there is always a distance between the screen and the first theater row... which assures enough distance to allow effective dispersion to the entire audience. The underground chambers will be constructed of steel rebar, mesh and gunnite (sprayed concrete as used in swimming pools). The theater will be partially imbedded in a mountainside with a vaulted conical ceiling. Remember, the apparent walls will be fabric and considerably inside the outer walls which will be designed to reflect sound into the underground base traps. The question is, how would you design a system that would reflect long waves into the base traps and what materials would you use within the base traps themselves? All serious views, including dissenting ones, are welcome. -HornEd PS: Oh, yeah, and fini can send some funny ones!

A fair assumption, Dr. Who... and one that may well apply to adapting lesser quality speakers to less than ideal listening areas. But it was my understanding that this was a thread dealing with optimization of classic monopoles like the world's longest selling speaker design, the Klipschorn. Dr. Floyd E. Toole is the pro's "Whose Who of Audio"... an Englishman by birth who spent decades employed by the Canadian government as the head of acoustic and psychoacoustic research. For the past several years, he has been Vice President of Acoustic Engineering for Harmon Industries. His "White Papers" (located at http://www.harman.com/wp/index.jsp?articleId=120.0) make a great starting point in this fascinating field. Again, Dr. Toole's comments are more directed toward standard home and theater environments... essentially mainstream concerns for buyers of Harmon Kardon, JBL, and other somewhat upscale products. My acquaintance with Dr. Toole and his work resulted from my research on the acoustic theories of Paul Klipsch (who was often at odds with "Klipsch engineers" in the era when he no longer controlled his namesake company) and the many engineers, Heritage line speaker builders, and key executives with whom I have been privileged to relate over the years. The place where my acoustic and psychoacoustic theories differ from those of Paul Klipsch and Floyd Toole occur in the construction of idealized listening environments which take maximum advantage of the ability to shape sounds with "horns" rather than planer surfaces or cone speakers. After all, I did pick the pseudonym "HornEd" ...rather than "PlanerEd" or "Cone'Ed" ...and certainly NOT "BiPolEd!" Both Klipsch and Toole overwhelmingly favor front-firing radiators with an emphasis on properly designed horns and the "perfection" of a non-reflective audio environment. Most speakers are designed in a "flat field" in which there are essentially no sound reflections. Modern recordings are made with the assumption that the sound engineered is the sound that the consumer will hear. Practically speaking, this doesn't happen at home or in professional theaters. Standing waves, differing timbre characteristics of speakers, Gestalt reflective surface considerations, compromised speaker heights and placements, and coloration by reproduction electronics and speaker systems collaborate to make problematic the quality of sound that reaches the consumer's ear. In cases where "sound sprayer" techniques (bi-pole, di-pole) attempt to conquer poor room dynamics, re-creating laboratory sound perfection of discrete tracks is hopelessly compromised. It is the nature of the beast inherent in bi-pole and di-pole design. But... it IS a band-aid for chronically wounded acoustic environments... like movie theaters that compromise sound quality so that every seat in the house sounds "good" at the expense of those that could have been excellent. The comment of the validity of an extra speaker on the sixth discrete (rear) channel does indeed have to do with the fact that human beings have eyes and ears biased toward the front... like most predators. The ability to hear sounds directly from the back of one's head is poor at best. Putting two speakers with the exact same material at some distance apart creates a wider "rear sweet spot"... particularly in very large rooms or with rear speakers that need distance to achieve a wide enough coverage area. The forward focus of predators is compensated somewhat by the so-called "sixth" sense of danger behind the predator. However, as a "sound issue" the usual background sounds fade into ambiance and a sudden departure from that norm creates the "danger" signal. Since that danger signal tends to rise to the forefront of concern, it may indeed be misinterpreted as to location... but very quickly, location and level of danger is determined... and that, after all, is what the audio engineer intended when he set up the sound track. In a properly integrated multiple speaker sound system, few venues require an additional speaker on the sixth channel. And that opinion comes from actually setting up seven Klipschorns to test the 6.1 effect with six or seven sound sources. In a round room, Klipschorns limited to producing sounds over 85Hz have an adequate angle of sound dispersion to blend in with their left and right rear brethren to provide a seamless sound wall that delights the "sound predator" within us all. I have proven to literally thousands of listeners, including those with audio credentials, that properly engineered motorboards adapted to the mission of a front firing radiator can create an idealized sweet spot that works no matter which direction a listener may be faced. This benefit is only enhanced when one has the advantage of superbly designed horns such as my favorite, the venerable Klipschorn. The "single source" rear sound is further a non-issue because the sound from 5.1 sources that is matrixed from the discrete offerings of the left and right rear channels... so the "unique" sound of the synthesized rear channel has associated sounds coming out of the left and right rear surrounds... making any reference to a "one speaker" sound source a non factor in nearly all acoustic situations. I will grant you, however, the instance where listeners are subject to "sound sprayers" for left and rear surrounds and a direct radiators for the rear channel... the compromised effect of sound sprayer listening will be enhanced by two direct radiators on the sixth discrete channel. A situation in which I do NOT want to put my theater guests. In 1934 (four years before I was born!) then state of the art acoustic research indicated that three equal speakers with discrete inputs relative to their positions across the front produced the best sound for music. At the time, it was not considered a marketable concept. If the speakers are very large, the WAF aspect may not allow that wonderful solution in many peoples lives. Fortunately, my wife bought another pair of magnificent Klipschorns for me as an engagement present! Ah, there are more ways to a man's heart than the stomach... as overly ample as mine tends to be. I have not been as active on this beloved Forum for several reasons... including time constraints, health issues, and the fact that most of my acoustic and psychoacoustic research of recent years has been in idealized listening environments not achievable in most home or professional theater venues. Another issue is economic and domestic (WAF) resources... most Forum folks have more constraints on what goes into their systems than I do. My concerns have always been with achieving better sound in a "practical" way... and, clearly, "practical" is a concept that is nearly as varied as the difference in "ears" that provide the ultimate sound reproduction that occurs within the dark folds of our respective brains. Six-and-a-half years in the Army Medical Corps shaping how the mind reacts to stimuli have served me well in understanding psychoacoustic aspects... but, perhaps, not well enough. It is an amazingly complex field... but one that seems to have found resolution in the minds of those who view movies in the idealized environments that I construct for the use of my family, friends, and self. Although I have busied myself with projects that enhance the human condition and quality of life... at least this is what springs to my mind. I have not been engaged in activities to add to my wealth for at least fifteen years. Through the Klipsch Forum (and a couple of other lesser audio venues), I have tried to help a wide spectrum of proactive sound enthusiasts (I hesitate to use the term audiophile) to achieve better sound in light of their respective listening room and budgetary constraints. Better sound begins with better assessment of one's listening environment and the appropriate placement of speakers. I was, perhaps, best known on this Forum for re-engineering motorboards for various Klipsch speakers to achieve better sound for movies and music. A point on which Paul Klipsch and Floyd Toole were always in agreement... and one in which I fully concur. As Floyd Toole notes, 80% or more of the sound of movies is anchored in the center speaker. Having really great left and right speakers (a must for good music reproduction from sources other than movie DVD's), sound spraying or direct radiator surrounds, or one or two rear channel speakers are of lesser importance when they only share 20% of the total sound when watching the latest blockbuster. The key to having a Home Theater and a Home Music Center of quality is having three speakers of equal capacity across the front array... ideally mounted in exactly the same way (including distance from the floor and ceiling) to keep the timbre signature of each speaker more nearly the same. Well, it will be dawn soon, and my meditation to quell the fire in my spinal chord from my neck breaking experience of yesteryear has worked well enough that I might get an hour or two of blissful slumber. For those of you who burn the candle at both ends... and sometimes in the middle to boot... be advised that there is a 100% correlation between those who average less than six hours of sleep a night... and being afflicted by type 2 diabetes before the age of 65. And, sadly, I fit those parameters... and then some. But lifelong industry does have its rewards. Last month my Swiss born, naturalized American, wife celebrated her 40th birthday (I am in my 67th year) and I brought her to a private ocean beach in Northern California. She was reluctant to go because as she put it, she was born in the serenity of the alps and oceans always seemed a bit noisy and ominous. After an hour or two relaxing on the sand under a warm sun and rhythmic sounds of the surf, she turned to me and said, "I think I would like to own a beach." That evening, I dashed off a letter to the owner of the beach. Upon receiving it, he came up to visit (Ah, yes, yet another convert to the HornEd approach to Klipsch home theaters)... and we are now into the final stages of negotiation by which I expect to acquire his ocean beach and an adjacent "pristine" canyon with an ever flowing stream that has carved a magnificent canyon out of solid rock in its push to the ocean. The canyon includes caves with where probably used by early Native Americans and has only known the lumberman's axe and saw once... and that was before 1920. My concern, of course, is the preservation of the beach and canyon ecology for the benefit of present and future generations. I have he benefit of friends who, like me, are essentially retired from commerce but kept busy by our common interest in improving the quality of life for all. Some of these friends were highly placed in the implementation of the Superfund and with the EPA. The last thing we want to see in either place is another money grubbing condo project to "modernize" the landscape. So, now you can see why, even in my private forest, I have concerns about creating effective traps for sound waves that would otherwise pollute the surrounding forest. There is so much joy in being alive... and so much work in doing so... -HornEd PS: To all those who tire of the length of my responses... my sincere best wishes for a quick mouse click to areas where you can find "your thing."

As someone who owns one, Klipsch Academy is a great speaker for its size... particularly when matched with Heritage speakers. However, if its Home Theater and you have full size Heritage speakers in the front left and front right position, and an Academy in the front center... you are pushing upwards of 75% of all the sound on your DVD through the Academy in the center... and your cherished Heritage jewels do not truly show their luster. In the above Forte II, Academy, Forte II (front and rear) example far better sound could be heard by putting three Forte II's across the front center, putting the remaining Forte II in the rear center and the Academy's in the left and right rear surround slots. Try it; you will be absolutely amazed by the difference! -HornEd PS: Yeah, I know, the TV is in the way... well, friends, maybe it's time to get one of those slick InFocus X3 DLP projectors for a little over a grand and free up some space. Add a hot High Definition TV tuner and a Pioneer Elite Pro and you will find the local movie house allure fades fast.

When building an ultimate Klipschorn system, my preference is a 6.1+2 arrangement with 6 k-horns for the six actual channels plus two Belles for front extension speakers and a custom subwoofer built into the floor and bass traps leading to infinite baffles adjacent to the subterranean bass chamber. Granted, having at least a 144" High Resolution projector and compatible screen is more appropriate than the 65" Mitsubishi that I formerly used. The working model was built inside of a free standing 30' circular yurt with a conical ceiling (PacificYurts.com). Since the yurt is covered in fabric, the hard to handle long waves below 80Hz go through the walls rather than reflect back to create havoc. Also, the circular walls and conical ceiling offer no large reflective areas. Granted that I have the luxury of placing the theater in the middle of a forest with 236 acres surrounded by thousands of acres of forestland on which no human habitation or development is allowed. Never-the-less, the new theater is being built to contain the sound and still preserve the clarity of the non-reflective subwoofer experience. I cannot say enough about having a subwoofer array that flows all waves below 80Hz together... rather than have them competing for clear air space. Predicting the sound pattern of shorter wavelengths that largely get absorbed by furniture, walls, people and pets is fairly easy. Taming the long waves that physically bump into one another because of multiple speakers... and harder to fathom... multiple reflective areas creates a seemingly never ending need to shift speaker positions and/or heights and angles. A good subwoofer array that emits sound on a common plane and direction with no stray frequencies above 85Hz and can produce at least 121.5dB at 20Hz will cover the spectrum of all commercial DVD movies... and nearly all music... except for magnificent organs... and a stray alpenhorn or two. Those who are familiar with other Klipsch Home Theaters I have built recognize the pattern of matched monopole purity and forbidding even the mighty Klipschorn from emitting sounds below about 80Hz. To my ear, even Klipschorns track midrange musical notes and sound effects more accurately if they are freed from having to make the long excursions that are required to push enough air to make a 36' long subwoofer wave into a gut shaking reality. Note that I only use six Klipschorns rather than seven. 7.1 is a marketing ploy... 6.1 can be a marvelous cinematic experience... providing you have the right equipment to turn 5.1 DVD's into the six discrete channels of a so-called 7.1 system. The rear middle channel has only one discrete sound source and the "7.1" configuration merely connects two speakers to a single discrete sound source. Following that logic, a person who put two speakers on each of the six discrete full range channels and two subs on the subwoofer out... and then he could brag that he has a 12.1 system! The only reason to put an extra speaker in the back is if you are using teeny-weeny speakers that cannot cover the gap between left and right surrounds adequately. Unless you are in an auditorium... there is no need to put two Klipschorns on a back center speaker. Since I use a top-of-the-line Yamaha in my larger theater, the ability to have two discrete front effects channels along with the six primary channels and one subwoofer channel, the range of sound stage shaping and apparent directional source are legion. The sub channel should be powered by a separate pro amp that generates at least 1,000 watts to reach Dolby Digital's 121.5dB at 20Hz criteria for professional theaters. While listening to strictly music is a joy that does not necessarily follow a 6.1+2 requirement (e.g., populated with six speakers of equal timbre), the full enjoyment of the cinema is quite spectacular when presented in a way that a sound from any speaker sounds as equal as possible. Having different size and design of speakers makes it impossible for the same sound to be heard from a speaker in the front of the room as it would be heard coming from a speaker in the back of the room. And before a certain wag dangles his tongue around the "Klipsch sound engineers know best" line... let it be said that Klipsch sound engineers are need to know how to build speakers that people will buy so that the company may prosper. The motivation, spending capacity, and "ear" of the general public is probably not equal to that of the average member of the Klipsch Forum (wags excepted ) and, thus, there is reason for us to pool our knowledge and launch better sound environments as befits our individual tastes and pocketbooks. For whatever it's worth, the acoustic theory that I use is an extension of that of Paul Klipsch and Dr. Floyd E. Toole... neither of which, to my knowledge, have experimented with round rooms with vaulted conical ceilings and bass traps that essentially preclude reflections... and a few more issues like altering motorboards to fit the function and placement of a speaker to maximize the sweet spot. Of course, Bose and other purveyors of out-of-phase sound sprayers take advantage of strategic disorientation of your ears to create the illusion of "full" sound with cheaper speakers. Perhaps a sound engineering triumph to some... but it's mucking around with our inner ears in my book! Klipschorns are capable of providing marvelous sound with relatively little amplification. Thus, a room doesn't have to be super-gigantic to accommodate six Klipschorns... and a couple of Belles for front effects. To sum it up, a 6.1+2 Home Theater with non-reflective subwoofer surfaces creates a listening experience that allows the sound sources to emanate from the appropriate speakers... instead of spurious reflections. Thus, your hearing the movie the way the sound engineers always hoped you would. My apologies to all those who have heard these words before... but there seem to be a new generation of Klipschers out there... asking the same old Klipschorn questions. -HornEd PS: I have been very busy, very happily married to my Swiss Miss now Mrs. and currently negotiating to buy a 172 acre private ocean beach property 24 miles from my resort. My old heart nemeses slammed me down today and so I am supposed to be in bed. What better time could I choose to spend a few moments on the Forum with the folks that have been so good to me? Okay, with maybe an exception here or way, way out there!

Klipschorns not only ROCK... they ROLL you into a DVD like nothing else I've heard under $50k. A 6.1 system with a pair of Belles for Front Effects Speakers... put 'em in a 30' free standing one and a half story building with sides that let out the long waves... and you have a realism that few mortals experience. Yep... Klipschorns really rock... and, like my fellow Klipschers are telling you... they reveal every bad note and poor technique on a CD, DVD, etc. Klipschorns are for good stuff!!! -HornEd

Wow, it's nice to see Klipsch Forum Folk still paying attention to having the front center channel up to what it ought to be. While just living has been a challenge... and my Swiss Mrs. an ever unfolding joy... I have missed the pleasure of Klipsch Kompanions on this Forum. The experimental, free standing, 30' yurt (which allows anything under 85Hz to escape into the forest) has proven a smashing success. With the addition of the X3 InFocus, HiDef, projector, the Mitsu 65" was retired to other, more prosaic, TV duties. The DVD player of choice has become a Pioneer Elite and the HiDef Viewsonic has become the interim TV tuner of choice. Front projectors are still not what I would hope they would be... at least in the "reasonable" price range... but the X3 with an appropriate supporting cast can do a great job in transition. The pace and challenge of being alive in 2004 has not given me the opportunity of picking up the $1,800 of Klipsch I paid for... when I drove for hours to pick up the goods, the seller doubted the HornEd check... which he cashed with nary a problem. At least he now knows that HornEd is not only real... but so is his check! For those who would like to see photos of HornEd in his "natural" habitat, got to lupin.com and on the initial "splash" you will find a composite photo of HornEd in his wedding Top Hat with his red headed Swiss Miss now HornEd Mrs. At sixty-seven with the love of his life not yet 40, HornEd's life is higher than a horn tweeter on steroids. There's a new, Klipschorn based, home theater brewing on HornEd's turf. With six matched Klipschorns (and a pair of Belle Klipsch for front effects speakers) and a subterranean cavern modified as an upscale subwoofer... be assured that HornEd has not yet joined the dear departed. HornEd

Package of silence??? Is that where I've been... but it was "Fini the Grate" that pried me loose with the sound of one Klipsch clapping. -HornEd

Echo Mark... a great thread... with no shortage of cello fellows... and I second the reminder to get an "up close and personal" seat to enjoy the full Ma! -HornEd