Lemon string

They are my favorite EL34 thus far. I also have a pair of their KT-88's. I've done cryo and non. When I bought the cryo it was only a extra $10 so I figured why not. Can't say if it made a difference.

i say do nothing. Drones will continue to get cheaper. New cameras are coming out every six months to a year. Is it a tool that you could make $ off of in your line of work or is it just a hobby that you're interested in?

I may have shared this link previously so excuse my being redundant but for those that missed it I think its a good read in light of this thread. http://www.trueaudiophile.com/phony-watts/ I have two amps from the manufacture that wrote this, Audion. I have their Sterling EL34 and Sterling KT88 amps. The 12w EL34 drives my CW II's and the KT88 is on a pair of Fortes at my office. I love both of them but favor the EL34. With both of these amps I run a passive pre. The amps requires very little input and are dead quiet. All of there amps are class A power. I should mention, by coincidence, that shortly after I bought my first Sterling, the EL34, i noticed that Klipsch and Audion held an event in Lonon demoing the heritage line of speakers with audion amps one weekend last year. I never saw any coverage on the event but it made me feel good about my purchase knowing that both manufactures thought there was a synergy between the products and thought highly of one another. cheers and as always may you be victorious in chasing and slaying the ever elusive audio dragon

i"ve been following this thread and don't really understand the issue I guess. I have a 12 w SET amp that is class A. In my room it sounds fantastic. It powers a modified pair of Cornwalls, Cornwall II's originally, with EASE. It will play as loud as one could possibly want, with a completely natural sound and extremely clean and clear. I originally started off with a Yamaha AVR, then a adcom GFA 5235 (design by Mr nelson Pass) with a emotiva UMC 200. All I can say is in my room the the 12 w SET amp is the hands down winner, no contest. Im actually shocked to see that there is a question about accuracy with a SET amp. Pretty amusing. The SS amps in my room were veiled and lacked a natural presence, air, separation of instruments and lacked the strong holographic phantom center channel. Clean pure power seems to me to be the most important issue. Theres always a lot of talk about head room in these discussions but Khorns have a efficiency of 106db, with a 20w amp you've got a ton of head room. Good luck chasing the ever elusive audio dragon.

thats a damn nice Pre! The Dueland caps are some serious whiz bang caps!

What tube are you talking about? Winged C for $25 a tube?!? If you know where to find this deal please let me know where.

great stuff! I too would like to hear about what your mains consist of.

I saw a nice pair of designer Cornwall I's at hionfi in Dewitt/Syracuse back in the fall. You might check with them, they may still have them. I think they were asking for $1k.

I would recommend thinking about clean quality power. The first few watts are the most important as they say. Im a big fan of class A power. I use a class A SET amp that produces 12 watts. I find it to offer really nice balanced bass as well as the expected mids and highs.

I bought my son a stereo this year for his birthday which consists of a pair of forte I's with crites tweeters. I am powering them with a sansui AU-555A which produces 25w per channels at 8ohms. I've been really impressed with this set up. It comes very close to my set up, cornwall II's with upgrades. That said I haven't done a side by side with them both powered by the same amp, same room etc.... but they sound really good. The big difference I'd say is how they image, separation of instruments and overall clarity and accuracy. The Cornwall being superior to the Fortes to my ears. The Fortes may produce a bit more bass or a low end that is a bit more forward. The Fortes are in a smaller room set into the corners about a foot off of both walls. I only mention this because I seem to notice Fortes seems to show up on the used market pretty often at pretty good prices. In fact I bought a second pair after buying my sons. I got the second pair for $200 in walnut. With out the crites upgrade they do lack a bit of clarity in the highs and mids, they have a bit of smearing I think. Moray, could you explain how the chorus are more difficult to drive? I thought that both the kg5.5 and the chorus are 8ohm loads. I'd be interested in hearing your explanation. Seems you always have great info.

uh.......... what the hell just happened?

Thats AWESOME! Justin is a great guy and Im so glad to see e's being recognized for his work. If you haven't had the pleasure of dealing with him I recommend you give him a call if your in need of a new amp, pre or have an interest in tweaking your system. Congrats Justin keep doing what you're doing.

same question.... are they still for sale?

good story and from where I'm sitting looks like a good deal. Good luck

heres are covers from some of the music played

Hey guys thanks for coming it out it was great to see everyone and Zeus an Derrick you were both missed. Heres the run down as I can best remember...... house system: Audion sterling EL34, Schitt Bifrost Uber upgrade DAC, Schitt sys passive, Rega p3-24 w/ dynavector 10x5 mc cart, dynavector p-75 phonostage and apple tv for digital streaming, Cornwall II's with Kappa 15c woofers, Aletheia upgraded crossovers and crites tweeter diaphragms We started off with an analog selection that Bubo brought, The Jazz Crusaders. The first track was pretty rough from exposure to the elements, as is often the case with older LP's. Beyond that the album sound really good and remained fresh despite being, I'm guessing, a 80's recording. Next we streamed the opening track, A Slow Hot Wind, from Benjamin Hermans album Trouble. The track has a female vocal that is sublime and the players are on par in support. Next up was Melody Gardots, Worrisome Heart, 45 rpm LP. I think everyone agreed that the 45 pressing delivered a heightened fidelity. We switched out the amp at this point and brought in Jimjimbo's HK integrated, Jim remind us of the model # please. The unit is stunning, it looks brand new, it is obviously a well built piece. Here we played selected tracks from Steely Dan's AJA. At this point I think we hooked up the JBL 4425's that I just got back from having the woofers refoamed but I can't remember if we started on the CW's or the 4425's with Jims HK?? Someone will chime in..... Anyways, overall I thought the HK sounded like it had some power but it seemed to present the music in a fairly tight package. On the cornwalls Aja it didn't have the same separation of instruments or holographic image that I am used to hearing. The Jbl's cleaned up the sound field I thought but really lacked the mid range that the CW's have. Again those of you who were there please share your opinions. My neighbor Rick went and retrieved his Pioneer integrated (sx 980?) to compare to the HK. The pioneer had just got serviced with new caps. The Pioneer did offer a more full sounding reproduction of AJA and I think eveyone agreed it made the music sound more full bodied and lush. I can't remember exactly but I think we next plugged in the MC40 Brandon brought. While this was happening a few of us went downstairs and watched The Lake Street Dive, Nobody Knows video, a couple of Hooverphonic videos and a scene from the Bands The Last Waltz. The downstairs system is currently: RF-82's, RC-62, RW-12 and RB61's in the rear. The power is two adcom gfa 2535's with a emotiva umc-2 we streamed the videos with apple tv. The MC240 was ready to go and up we went. We started with Janis Joplin's Kozmic Blues. The MC240 deliver a warm sound with much power. From here we played a bunch of stuff on the MC240, I can't recall it all but the MC240 was probably in play the longest. Overall I wasn't as taken with the MC240 as I was with Brandons MC30's from the last get together. I don't think the unit had as detailed of sound or the openness. At this point a bunch of folks wandered into the sun room with the Forte set up with the Sansui AU-555A. Not clear on everything that was listened to but I think across the board everyone was singing the praises of the Fortes. Back to the Cornwalls the MC240 was moved out and the Dynaco ST-70 that Dale brought was moved in. We listened to the Tedeschi Trucks Band, Everybody's Talkin', Live Lp. It was probably the highlight of the night for me. It just sounded so right and really swung. It was spot on. Next was an Album that Bubo brought, mark please remind me of the title and artist. This was a close second. The recording is a Harp new age Jazz sort of thing and the recording really has precision and sparkles. Thats pretty much the night as best as I can remember, I feel like I forgot something. I feel like we hooked up another integrated that Brandon brought.

Hey we would have got a cake had we known!!! Happy Birthday

so saturday sept 26 3:00ish is a go sorry for any confusion and the short notice. Again please contact me for details address etc..... Rock on

ok so due to work I won't be able to camp with the boy scouts which means we can do a GTG at my pad on sat. I was thinking usual game plan meet at 3ish...... order pizzas at some point. let me know who can make it. Anyone that hasn't been before hit me with a pm with your phone # and email address for further details. Cheers

so I probably spoke to soon.... Boy scout campout that I spaced If it is the case lets look at the following weekend. We're way over due!! Mark, my amp is a 12w class A Set, so that will be available. Also, since you guys were here last, I finished my basement which has the RF-82's & RC 62 set up with the RW12. This set up has the Emo UMC-2 and an adcom GFA 2535 powering it. Hoping to wire up the RS 42's and RB-61's soon. Last week I acquired Fortes for my sons bday. They are set up in the three seasons room with a Sansui AU-555A and a technics TT w/ a Grado black cart. Its a great system, especially for a 16 year old boys first stereo. Lets make something happen. I'll let you guys know asap.

Hey Chicagoland crew I know this is short notice but I wanted to put out feelers to see if anyone would be up for a get together next weekend if I were to host???

beauty

congrats to Justin, Nice review! Also Im a big fan of the New Record day stuff so it was cool to see this.

awesome thread

I just called he's holding them for someone driving from IN. Im bummed there 18 miles from my house!