maxg
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Posts posted by maxg
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"Hey, Max. How do have your system set up. Room size? Distance from you to speakers/between speakers. Do you have your HII's on stands? How far off the side and rear walls do you have them."
OK- - room is 5 metres (16 ft) by 6 metres (19 Ft). Off to one side is the Kitchen (4*4 metres - 13 * 13 ft) joined through a sliding wooden door with a 2.5 metre (7-8ft) width. Ceilings are 2m50 (8 ft). the system sits along one wall with a door in one corner and a fireplace in the other. Opposite is a double sliding glass door leading onto the patio and the main front door off to one side. Slightly to the side of the entrance and a short distance into the room is a pillar supporting the ceiling (this is getting complicated isnt it). All solid concrete construction with Marble floors.
In the middle of the room are 2 leather recliners, mine is in the sweet spot. I sit about 3 metres (10 feet) away from the speakers (on the centre line) with the speakers 2 metres 60 (8 feet) apart towed in with one pointing directly at me and the other slightly less towed in so it points almost at me (to correct the imbalance in the room's accoustics - 2 weeks play to get it right).
The speakers sit on top of 2 cabinets about 1 metre 10 (4 feet) from the floor. This height puts the woofer slightly above my ear level when I recline so I have used coffee mats under the backs to angle the speakers down rather than up. This works great (I can get away with it because the speaker bass output is not the strongest in the world).
The speakers are 30 cm (1 foot) form the back wall and about 2 metres (6ft 6) from each side wall.
Surprisingly given the layout of the room the accoustics are remarkably good (especially with the amount of furiture in there. Other than the aforementioned recliners there are 2 arm chairs off to the right as I look at the system from the recliner and a 3 seater settee along the wall in front of the fireplace (I should draw this for you). Various objet d'art along the sides and lots of paintings on the walls.
During winter the carpets are down and sound is superb, during summer there is some reflection and the background noise of the air-conditioner to contend with.
At all times the sound is best with the wooden kitchen door closed.
"I have a pair (actually 2 pair, now) of Heresy II's and have been experimenting alot with placement. I'd be interested to hear how you have things set up."
Oh boy - 4 speakers to setup. That could take some time. Enjoy the playing!
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Just to share some CD titles that really move me and others might enjoy. I have only recently discovered XRCD and am amazed how good a "normal" CD can be made to sound. Would love to hear any vinyl lovers reactions and comparisons:
Jacintha - Tribute to Ben - XRCD recording. This is an OMG recroding and a half. I have never heard anything that comes close to her rendition of Danny Boy (as the choice pick of the album).
Three Blind Mice sampler disk (JVCXR-9001). Track 8 - Brdige Over Troubled Water/Ayako Hosokawa - both her voice and the sax are just incredible (as long as you can ignore the "Blidge over trabelled Wah-ter)(LOL). Watch out for the end of the song - she holds the last note for a seemingly impossible time and eventually lets it drop off so casually it is just incredible.
JVCXR60158 SONNY ROLLINS/SAXOPHONE COLOSSUS . The whole damn thing. Oh god it this good! Nothing reproduces a Sax like a Horn and this recording has some of the best Sax I have ever heard. Strike that - this is the best Sax I have ever heard.
If people are interested I will share more.
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Come to Greece HornEd.
You will get the reverse.
"Hello, I am looking for a new refridgerator."
"KLF 30's are really cool, or RF3's if you want a smaller capacity."
Do you know how hard it is to buy BOSE in Greece? LOL
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"Why are (have) you gotten rid of your surround stuff? I mean, there's this little button on my Denon remote called 2-ch. stereo. Push it and presto, I get vanilla stereo. Heck, I can even turn off my sub. Did your previous system not allow for you to turn off your surround?"
In a word - compromise. I fund that the quality of the stereo sound I was getting out of my amp was inadequate. I originally tried to fix the problem by adding a Rotel 2 channel power amp (1080) to the Yamaha 595a I was using. Whilst this made a huge difference to the quality it simply wasnt enough. Highs were so bright at times it was painful and ruining my enjoyment of the music. When I moved to an Accuphase integrated amp the quality leap was so dramatic the disposal of the 5.1 / DTs setup was automatic. Maybe your Denon plays stereo better than my Yamaha did, I dont know, but I would be surprised if it matched the accuphase.
"Personally, that's what I like about my system - it's flexibility. If I wanna listen to vanilla stereo, I can. If I want explosions and helicopter fly-bys and earthquakes that piss off the neighbors, I can have that too. Heck I can even enjoy 5-ch stereo."
I too wanted that flexibility. It was only after having the system for 2 years that I realised that for me flexibility was no substitute for quality.
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Seems I am a "cool newbie". Is this like a Private in the Army. How do I get promoted and what to?
Should I aspire to "crazy poster"? What else is there?
I imagine administrator is out...
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The other night I was sitting with a friend into the small hours listening to Suzanne Vega's new album (Tried and True) and chatting about where we could take my system now.
Currently the setup is Marantz CD6000, Accuphase E211 integrated amp, Synergistic cables and Heresy 2's. I love my sound but hey, that has never stopped me upgrading before.
There were many options discussed, amougst which came the inevitable question or tube amps. This is something I will do some day, I know, and if I am going tubes then I will go monoblock (why not?)
The problem is space - there is no room to put a pair of amps, unless they go on top of the speakers (not a good idea).
I then suggested we encase the speakers in a marble jacket and we could then put the amps on top of that. This was a joke but it started us thinking.
In theory some sound will be seeping through the Black laquer finish of the Heresy's. If we encased the speakers in a tailor made, snug fitting marble jacket that alone would improve the sound (how much I have no idea).
The thing is that here in Greece Marble is relatively cheap. I could get a pair of jackets made for a very reasonable price (even in black marble which is more expensive). It would certainly look different, not to say cool. The question is what sonic benefits, if any would we really achieve?
Be optimistic people - I am dying to try this one out -lol!
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WEll I am all in favour - as long as we keep it international.
Greece loves Klipsch as much as any country out there....
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Firstly congratulations on your choice. The RF3 is the only speaker I seriously considered as an alternative to my Heresy 2's that I finally purchased. It has truely great sound, and, in my experience, is the least "amp-fussy" speaker in the Klipsch range.
I have seen this thing being driven by everything from a $10,000 tube amp with 60 wpc down to a 20 year old Marantz SS amp with about 25 wpc in class A mode that was bought for $40.
Enjoy..
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THere is something funny going on on this DVD. I have noticed a strange, brief whooshing sound (best I can describe it). From memory on Hotel California (for example) about 3 minutes into the track it suddenly whooshes (both stereo and DTS mode) and I am sure it is not part of the music (it doesnt happen on the digitally mastered CD - even through the same player.
Anyone else experienced this?
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Having realised that my system use is 98% listening to music and 2% watching movies I decided to forgo the compromise of a surround sound system in favour of a plain vanilla stereo sound.
So I sold the Yamaha 595a, the Rotel power amp (1080 - 2 channel - for stereo listening) and the KSW 10 sub and demoted the Denon 3000 from a DVD/CD transport to a DVD only unit. I purchased an Accuphase E211 for amplification and a Marantz CD6000 as a stopgap till SACD/DVDa sorts itself out.
These are mated to a pair of Heresy 2's - no centre channel, no sub, no surrounds.
Here's the funny thing. I watched a movie yesterday and enjoyed it more than I ever did with the surround sound setup. Why?
In simple terms I realised that whilst the effects of a movie, blasts from the sub - helicopters overhead via the surrounds - discreet voice channel, are missing I gain in the most important aspect - the music.
Well before sound effects gained the importance they have today in movies music was, and still is, used to generate atmosphere. (How frightening is the shower scene in Psycho without the sound track?) Musically my system is so far ahead of any surround sound system in my experience it more than compensates for the lack of punch of the odd explosion here and there.
Vanilla is such a wonderful underrated flavour sometimes.
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"HOW MANY watts were you putting into those Heresys??"
The Rotel power amp is rated at 200wpc @ 8 ohms. I was at 12 o'clock on the dial which should be around 100wpc - the limit of continuous for the speakers. THe music playing was madonna and I would guess that I probably pushed the 400 wpc peak.
"And where the heck were you?"
Standing well back (at home).
"I believe the Yamaha we have is about 160 or 120 watts."
The Yammy was not acting as amp but pre-amp using the main outs into the Rotel.
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Acutally I think you can have to much power, especially if the power is not too clean.
I have Heresy 2's and was driving them from a Yamaha 595a via a rotel 1080 power amp (200 wpc).
On a rather bassy track we were pushing a little too hard and popped a woofer. Needless to say we wacked the volume down immediately. We seem to have got away with things and since then I have switched setups to an integrated Accuphase E211 running at 4 ohms / 130 wpc.
Not a pop since....
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Oh guys don't call me knowledgable for heavens sakes. No, the Heresy (2's) are not biwirable - there is only one set of binding posts, however...
If you cable in one set using the bare wire screwed in and the other via banana plugs then you have connected A & B speaker outs to the speakers. This is not true biwiring obviously but it does reduce the impedance, increase the watts, increase the amount of cable, and affect the sound.
We did a simple blind test with a friend switching the speaker A or B on or off and me saying whether we had one of both connected. Surprisingly to me I was right 100% of the time. It does make a difference.
Hope this clarifies things.
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Try not to judge a nation on the basis of one man's ramblings. I am English (living in Greece as it happens) and own (and love) a pair of Heresy 2's.
Firstly the reviewer was certainly talking about 2nd to Bose in terms of sales, not quality.
Secondly it is no surprise he did not like the sound. English speakers are much more laid back, his background is different from yours is all. Klipsch take getting used to and its a shock to come from, for example, a pair of missions to an RF3.
What we do not know is how long the reviewer lived with the system. When I first heard Klipsch I thought it was a horrible, in-your-face sound (I had Wharfdale speakers). As time past I got used to it and then grew to love it, now I cannot look at any other make.
Rest assured that Britain will catch on to Klipsch, but it will take a longer lead in time than most other markets.
Just as a complete aside - I think I know why there is a shortage of Klipsch in the US. They are all here in Greece!!
I visited 5 hifi retail outfits over the weekend locally. They all had Klipsch products both in stock and on display (with not a single Bose on display anywhere). Each time I asked a salesman for a recommendation on which speaker to look at they all pointed to Klipsch products (they did cary other makes).
I would be amazed if Klipsch is not the leading brand in Greece in terms of sales as well as quality.
Either the Klipsch distributor is brilliant here or they are shifting a lot of units to a well educated Greek population, or both.
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I have done it with Heresy 2's using Synergistic silver speaker cable. There is a difference but it is not huge.
My guess is that the difference comes from dropping the impedance from 8 to 4 ohms. Using both A&B speaker connections I think I am raising the power from 90 wpc to 130 wpc on my Accuphase E211.
The result seems to me to be slightly better staging and more clearly defined bass - maybe slightly better driven woofer. I stuck with it on the basis that more bass on a heresy is never a bad thing.
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Q-Man - You are as mad as a March Hare! I love it! I cannot imagine ever having such a system, its the sort of thing I would want to hear though. On the positive side my wife has become a lot more accepting of my system having seen yours.
I am just so glad you are not my neighbour! LOL
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Tested this a while ago on the following setup:
Marantz CD6000, Yamaha 595a amp, (Rotel 1080 power amp, Heresy 2 speakers).
We compared Optical, Coax and analogue connections simultaneously to different inputs on the Yamaha switching between the sources.
Both the Coaxial cable and the RCA's were Mogami's finest (around $200) and the optical was a Zimmerman for a similar price.
The optical cable gave by far the best quality sound (all 5 people listening agreed) whilst the performance of the coax marginally shaded that of the analogue connections.
We then repeated the test with a Pioneer DVD player as the source (playing CD) on a Sony amp with much the same result.
Trying to interpret the results I would say both the analogue and Coax connections suffered from the poor quality of the connectors on the amps (cheap metal connectors - not gold) but that is a guess.
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I hate to break it to everyone but we are all assuming one or other will win. Seems to me that the folks out there want their music easy and dont care a damn for quality - witness the explosion of MP3.
People bought into DVD initially because they wanted the cinema experience at home. Quality of sound didnt really come into it, quality of picture - yes and surround sound yes - but quality? Suddenly we think that they will jump over barrels and pay out more money for music quality.
I am begining to doubt it. SACD and DVDa could be doomed to an audiophile only existance with less titles available than XRCD's have (supposedly about the best quality CD on the market - and it doesnt need specialist hardware to run it).
I hope I am wrong and one or other takes off, but right now - I just dont see it.
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My current setup is strictly stereo (Heresy's and an Accuphasee E211 with Marantz CD6000 source).
The CD6000 was a strictly temporary move till the new formats establish themselves and either one wins or a player comes out to handle both.
Anyway, the point. I understand that SACD is currently 2 channel and will develop multi-channel at the end of this year. From what I hear DVDa is only multi-channel (ie not 2 channel). Is this correct? Would I need surround sound for DVDa? IF SACD is in both 2 channel and multichannel will it continue that way or will that to go multi-channel only.
Right now I am a touch
about all this. Any one out there can explain? -
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Originally posted by Q-Man:I just picked up another pair of Klipschorns, for just that reason. One will be for the center channel with a screen in front of it for a front projector. the other one will be used for a center rear channel.This means I'll be building a new room that will give me six 90 degree corners, and not necesarily in the corners. Figure that one out.Q.
Erm - wow!! That should be quite a system. You may want to consider not building proper corners for these extra 2 but using a 90 degree corner made of freestanding marble or something. It would save you building an alcove but you would lose some space inside the room itself.
I will be happy if my next house has a room with 2 corners for KHorns let alone 6.
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Setup:
Accuphase E211 amp
Marantz CD 6000
Heresy 2 speakers
Synergistic silver speaker cable (both A & B into the Heresy's - it wasnt easy).
Symptom:
Although the sound I am getting from the above setup is utterly amazing to me in terms of its quality I have hit a recent problem in that a small part of the bass is missing from certain tracks. This is not the expected, below 50Hz, loss that is a part of the Heresy's more limited range but higher up the range.
I was playing a track that I have heard on many many systems (in quality upto a KHORN setup and down to a standard Ford car Stereo).
At one part there is a lead guitar and a bass guitar playing together. On my setup the bass guitar is missing (well not missing but overly subdued to the point you can barely hear it except at huge system volumes). I would guess that it is playing at around 70-80Hz. Immediately after this part it plays a louder lower section which comes out perfectly. I would give you the details of the track and the CD but it is a Turkish CD and will not mean anything to any of you, I imagine.
Strangely I then went to listen to the same track on another Heresy setup with a different CD player and a different amp (it was the Sharp SACD player with the Sharp 1 bit digital amp). I observed exactly the same effect there to, but even more marked. The following louder lower base was also subdued on that system.
My feeling is that the Heresy 2 has some "flat spots" in the sound it reproduces, which, as a total guess I would put down to the crossover. Anyone else experienced such a thing?
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I have a pair of Heresy 2's that were connected to a Yamaha 595 surround sound amp. I then bought a Rotel 1080 2 channel power amp. Enter staging. The difference was incredible. May be worth a thought, though since then I have moved to an Accuphase stereo amp (E211) and there was another huge leap forwards.
Then there was the cables.....
It was a long fight - good luck.
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A Refridgerator - long story - posted elsewhere so dont ask.
On the other hand Boa got me thinking about a complete surround system in a separate room which I will have to build. Unless I move the dogs out of the kennel....
Oh yes and about 10 feet from a Sony 32 inch 100 Hz flat Wega TV with a number longer than most serial numbers. Its got VGA input, dolby surround, and loads of other goodies I never use. It also has the ugliest remote I have ever seen.
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My denon 3000 is almost 4 years old now. There was no DTS when it was made. Maybe they upgraded it later on - I dont know. In Europe it is no longer available - they got all new models here.
about all this. Any one out there can explain?
photos - if this works...
in 2-Channel Home Audio
Posted
This may or may not work but I just thought I would share pics of my system as it is now. Hopefully I will be replacing the accuphase amp with tubes soon.
The picture above shows the main components. From the top:
Humax 4400 digital satelitte receiver
Sharp VS-FH video recorder
Marantz cd6000 cd player
Denon 3000 DVD
Accuphase E211 amplifier
This is the wider view and shows the raised klipsch speakers and the Sony 32" wide screen TV.