JohnA

Ray's advice is good. With KLF-30s, you won't miss a sub except during certain movies and then not until you have had one for a while. You will eventually need one to get the best performance from your home theater. John

My 2 and 3-channel Parasound amps sound the same. I've noticed that some multi-channel amps don't put out rated power with all channels driven, indicating low capacity power supplies. It sounds like you want mono-blocks so you can add channels as you use them. John

I can't say if the corssover will work, but the K-400 is too long to fit in a Heresy; it and a K-55-V is just short of 24" long. There is a difference in the K-55-V and the -M. The -M is a little more efficient and sounds different. For years Heresies had K-55-Vs on K-700 metal horns. You might want to go that way. John

The input impedance for the sub will be so high there will be no power loss to your La Scalas. In order to have a chance of keeping up with your La Scalas, you need the biggest sub you can find. I would not consider less than a 15". I have 2 HUGE subs, 42" tall x 21" square made by VMPS. They have a 12" driver, a 15" driver and a slot-loaded 15" passive radiator that's tunable. They are 12 dB less efficient than La Scalas. Both are in the corners and are powered by an amp that can put out 450 watts per channel. It is rumored NASA used several of these for sonic boom testing (VMPS claims NASA as a customer). They will barely keep up when I crank the La Scalas. Both together can do about what one Klipsch RSW-15 can do on 1700 watts peak. If you want deep bass when cranked, you need all the sub you can afford. John

LaScalawife, They don't HAVE to be. John

I'm not sure what you're thinking with "a more modern sound". Speakers are accurate or not. I'm biased because I have 4 La Scalas, but I think they are far better speakers than the RF-3s. Why don't you spend your $1000 on a good powered subwoofer. It will get its input from the speaker outs of your receiver. I normally use the second pair of speaker terminals to "signal" the powered sub and that way I can easily turn the sub off if I want (A+B is normal, A is no sub). John

I've got 3 of those hand-woven, garden hose, CAT-5 speaker wires. I did them myself and probably have no more than $50 in them, plus sore fingers and a wife that thinks in certifiable! They improved the detail or clarity on my KLF-C7 a little and did nothing for my La Scalas. My theory is the relative reduction in DCR vs speaker impedance is at work. The La Scalas are 32+ ohms in the midrange, where differences are easy to hear; 1 ohm less in the cable in not much overall change. If the -C7 has a typical impedance curve, 1 ohm less in the cable vs. 7 or 8 in the midrange is a lot of relative change. I have always been a doubting Thomas and continue to be one, but I have some fairly expensive Vampire Wire interconnects because I heard the difference and I liked it. It could be nothing more than better mating of the preamp to the power amp, but it works for me. I don't believe there is anything but $$$ mojo in the truely high-end. John

My '81/'82 La Scalas have square magnet woofers labeled K-33-E and my '87s have round magnet woofers labeled K-33-E. The '87s have a 15162 ink stamp on the cone. I can't remember the square ones having anything on the cone. Since buying the '87s I've wondered what's up. John

Sure we do! But, maybe I'm not a full-grown Libertarian! John

I don't have large or small, but I cross over my KLF-C7 to my subs at 60 Hz. That is sort of like a "small" setting. Sending the center bass to the subs improves the impact of sounds in the center. John

I use my Sony DVP-S3000 as a DVD player and CD transport. I chose it initially for its dual lasers. It is not designed to pass DTS and will only do it if there is nothing but DTS on the disc. So, I've been thinking about a transport and/or a new DVD player. I don't doubt the Theta sounds great. How can I slip that into the house? John

The correct voltage is 2.83. 0.283 is 10 dB lower than 2.83. It looks like your speakers are spot on. Both the EQ and the 3BX can cause clipping in narrow ranges at SPLs that normally wouldn't cause alarm on a meter measuring average outout. I fried 4 sub drivers (at the same time) about the same way and paid a $400+ stupid tax for it. I didn't hear clipping and MAY have overpowered the drivers with my amp. It turns out it was capable ot that. The bulbs are a variable resistor with power, the more power the more resistance they have. They have wire loops on each end making them easy to solder leads on. DJK has found a really neat, unobtrusive sonically, way to save your tweeters. John

I don't have a problem at all with the lack of an LFE channel. All of the Pre/Pros and Receivers I've had contacts with have a sub configuration that will send low bass to a subwoofer. I did not see the article, but if the DVD-A can't essentially equal the performance of vinyl, I'm not interested. I think that means a very high sampling rate to ensure near perfect waveform reproduction (much better than CDs' 16 bit/44.1 kHz). John

Klipsch is very easy to work with directly. Your damaged drivers probably can be reconed for less money. When you talk to Matt or Trey ask about that and ask about exchanging your damaged ones for a pair that are already reconed, like the auto parts store does. John

BobG has said the KLF-C7 turned long axis vertical would make good rear channel speakers. They are obviously M-T-M configuration and should work pretty well. I like mine as a center. They absolutely will require a sub. How far are you from Canberra? John

That looks like just what YOU need! John

The brands I listed are all SS. There are a handful of tube designs, but I can't recall the names, now. The Aragon preamp is all Class A. John

Your power figures won't be too far off IF you measured the SPL at 1 meter away. If you were 2 meters (10 feet) away, like my speakers are, the speaker is putting out 6 dB more SPL. 6 dB is 4 times the power required. Clipping at any frequency adds huge quantities of harmonics (you have to add lots of highs to make a flat-topped, or clipped, wave). Many of those harmonics are in the tweeter's range, adding lots of power that shouldn't be there. So, a bass note at 125 Hz that's clipped can produce enough highs to kill a tweeter that can only absorb 2 watts continous. The tweeters in my La Scalas have been said to have several different power ratings, but 2 watts continuous comes up frequently. I'll bet yours is the same. "No clipping Aloud" John

My La Scalas benefitted HUGELY from Dynamat on the squawker horn. The horn itself has small resonances within its frequency range that color the sound. Dynamat or rope caulk just about kill all of them and the sound is a lot smoother and more relaxed. My favorite electronics dealer said he hated La Scalas until he heard mine and he had to allow they didn't sound like horns. John

Before you say you can't hear a difference try to pink noise to calibrate the speaker levels. If you still can't hear a diffeence, it doesn't matter. John

There are many good add-on phono preamps from Acurus, Aragon, Parasound, and Creek, to name a few, you could use and keep your current preamp. I use an Aragon 47K, but could be happy with the others as well. The 47K is a great phono preamp and has enough gain for moving coil cartridges. John

Try it in the cabinet. It can't hurt anything. John

The boy can play and sing, huh?! John

Your HCA-1500 operates in Class A up to almost 3 watts and uses MOSFET outputs. I'll bet it sounds really nice! I can't justify trading my 1000A/1203A for an even bigger amp just for MOSFETS. John

The RSW-15 is better than good, it's great. Lots of output. Follow the white rabbit. John