Parrot

I have read that drivers need to be broken-in, but it seems silly to me. More likely it is a matter of the listener getting used to a new sound. Doesn't that seem more reasonable?

You cannot rip the SACD layer. IF you want to make a copy, you would have to play it back on an SACD player and take the signal from the analog outs and feed it into whatever you're recording on, at realtime.

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Man, artto, you had connections back in 1983! artto is correct: Just because something is on SACD does not guarantee it will sound great. The original recording may be bad. It'd be like blaming a Klipschorn for a bad-sounding record, when you ought to be blaming the artist/producer/engineer. That said, there are a lot of superb sounding SACDs out there. I could name you twenty-five excellent classical SACDs without a sweat, but there are a lot fewer pop and rock titles. But definitely check out the Rolling Stones' Let It Bleed and Beggars Banquet. Make sure to get the ones in digipacks that came out in 2002, and not the old CDs, which are pretty bad. The hybrid SACD/CD Rolling Stones titles (stereo only) will set you back all of about $12 at Circuit City.

kjohnsonhp: "Multi-channel fans seem to like four speakers in four corners where HT seems to like sides and center rear. Does multi-channel sound as well in a Dolby HT speaker setup? Too dominant (placement) of rear speakers can make the multi-channel sound worse." The recommended configuration for multi-channel (not including optional sub) is 5 speakers equal distance from the listener. Ideally the center should be a little behind the plane that the front speakers are in, so that the front 3 speakers form a small arc. The two "rear" speakers are really misnamed. They are much more situated to the side than they are in back. If you looked out the side of your eye, you should just barely be able to see the "rear" speaker with your peripheral vision. Having the "rear" speakers behind you is not the way to go--it's not the way any multi channel is mixed in the studio. The "rear" speakers should just be slightly to the rear, say 10 or 20 degrees from a line that would come out from your arms if they were outstretched to your sides.

You're welcome, Gary. The thing to keep in mind is that it takes quite a lot of time and costs a fair amount of money to remaster a title into multichannel, and probably the majority of these issues so far have been net losses. But Sony thinks it's worthwhile because once there are enough titles out there, once it reaches a critical mass, more people decide to buy the format.

There is no "glut of high frequency sound" on SACD. That's just anti-SACD propaganda. As far as price, most titles are available for $12-$17. Considering these are better than the gold audiophile CDs of years gone by, which retailed at $29.99, they are a bargain.

There are far more classical than pop/rock titles in multi channel. But give it some time and there will be stuff that you like. Here is a list of all that is available in the USA on multi channel. There are more links at the bottom of the page, including upcoming multi channel. http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/bmoura/msacdnow.htm

artto, Actually, SACD is more secure than DVD-A. SACD has been out since the end of 1999 (in Japan) and its coding scheme has not been broken. The only way to copy it is to take the analog signal out and record it to something in real time. Nobody much wants to do that nowadays, you gotta be able to rip it at 48x. Having something non-rippable is a huge selling point to record companies. The recommended multi channel configuration does not call for a square room, but it does call for all the speakers to be equidistant from the listener. This is the ideal, not necessarily what everybody actually does. I have found that I am *less* confined to a sweet spot with multi channel than with stereo. I believe it has to do with having a discrete center channel signal. With 2-speaker stereo, you will lose the center channel illusion if you move too far left or right. But the listener position is much more forgiving with the discrete center channel of multi channel.

whell, Your Eagles disc might very well have instruments in the side-rears; it could be one of the exceptions. I never heard it so I can't say; but if you heard it that way, I wouldn't doubt you were right. But like was said above dts isn't SACD or DVD-A.

whell, Very few multi channel releases have instruments in the side-rear speakers. There are exceptions, but the large majority have ambience in the side-rears, which gives your brain cues as to the size of the room the work was performed in. But I don't mind aggressive multi channel mixes either, in which instruments are directly coming out of the side-rear speakers. No studio work is recorded with the group playing all at once in a configuration like on a stage. There would be so much leakage that it couldn't possibly work. Everything is either overdubbed or else the performers are behind walls or in separate booths. It's all illusion. The producer and the engineers are the ones that mix all the tracks together to make it sound real, if they're good.

jzoz, Try the Search function for SACD and read what has been posted in 2-channel forum since, say, January. Lots of good info and opinions. I love the 5 channel music experience (I don't use a sub), although 2- or 3-channel stereo, or mono is fine too. Since you had a good impression, why wait? Prices are already a tremendous bargain. My philosophy is, I might get run over by a truck tomorrow, so why put things off? I would not buy a multi-format player. I have not read any in-depth reviews of them that are favorable. The cheaper ones usually scrimp on SACD. Plus, buying a separate SACD player and a separate DVD-A player, both of good quality, is cheaper than buying a combo of comparable quality!

The close-out selection at BestBuy is slim pickins nowadays, but Stefan is in L.A. so he's probably got about 25 stores to choose from.

Stefan, Check out some of the BestBuy stores in your area, and similar electronic places. You may be able to find a Sony SACD/CD/DVD player on close-out (new models won't be out for a few months). You may be able to get something for around $119-149. Check their multi-channel area, which will probably be buried somewhere toward the back of the store. If it's missing the box and/or manual, talk them down. They can come down considerably on no-box close-outs. CD playback will be fine and you'll also have the option that way of discovering SACD. It's a better bet than buying something several years old on eBay for your price range.

Easy Eyes, There's just no point at all in putting CDs on reel tapes. You'd have as much in ten rolls of good blank tape as you would in a computer CD burner. And you couldn't access track no. 8 within a second on a reel. And you'd have some extra hiss too. Unless you're going to record someone live, or play back already existing tapes, there's just no reason to go that route.

Quality open reel decks sound wonderful when quality recordings are played back on them. After all, open reel masters account for about 99.99% of every record or CD you've ever heard. But your main problem will be source material. Prerecorded reels, with a few exceptions, are fairly bad. They were run off at very high speed on huge duplicating machines and a lot of times they are made for playback at 3.75 inches per second instead of 7.5 ips. (Studio masters are normally recorded at 15 ips or 30 ips). Plus prerecorded reels weren't typically made from a master tape made from multitracks, but from a copy of a mastertape used for records. That means at least another generation away. End result of all this: high speed duplicating, slow speed playback, higher generation source--a lot more noise and a lessening of fidelity. If you record live events, say a friend's band in a club, recording on reel to reel will yield great results. But I can't think of much use for one nowadays except to play back reel to reel tape collections. Nostalgiawise they can't be beat. And sonically, played back on vintage equipment, will be fine. There's nothing fundamentally different about using reel to reel as a playback source--you still want to use whatever amp and speakers sounds best to you.

No, Klipsch was not represented. I doubt we can *officially* represent Klipsch because we have no business relationship with them. But Craig, if you want a room for NOSvalves and we have Klipsch in there to demonstrate vintage amps, that seems like a great idea. Mike, yes, they were Tannoys, that's right. Some of the different stuff I heard was hard for me to keep track of. I think someone in there said that the Tannoys we heard could be had for about $400 on eBay. The RadioShack super tweeters were something like $15. And then all you need is a sheet of plywood cut in half. When I was in there they were playing something tougher than a solo female singer, but if my memory serves, that was something that the 1.5 watt amps couldn't handle adequately. But as far as the speakers themselves, it'd be a neat thing to throw together for someone who likes the hands-on experience. One other obvious thing, everyone there had way different tastes in music. I didn't hear any music that I liked the whole day! A lot of people brought in their own favorite stuff, and I wouldn't want any of it. But I'm sure if I'd have brought stuff in, others would have thought, What is this crap!!?? When I say something sounded unnatural, that is based on my conception of what instruments and singers sound like in real life. It is possible that some of the source material I heard was mastered poorly, like with a smile EQ. In that case, when played back on equipment that I hadn't heard before, it's hard to know how much of the blame should go to the equipment and how much to the bad source material.

Yes, this has a great multi channel mix, which you need an SACD player to listen to. It sounds better than the stereo mix--with the multi channel mix they went back to the multitrack tapes, rather than using a mixdown tape. The Floyd envisioned this originally in quad, so 5.1 is a lot closer to the original concept of the sound than the stereo version. And everybody approved the new mix. I don't have the quad LP, but I've read about it and there are some slight differences in the mix and in placement (besides the center channel difference). But SACD is a major improvement over quad LP both in terms of the groove info on the vinyl and the playback equipment.

JMON, I agree with you that those speakers mounted just on a piece of plywood sounded really good. That was my biggest surprise.

The Midwest Audiofest was fun. But I gotta say, one reason I was pleased is because I heard nothing there that I would exchange for what I have already: Klipsch heritage and Eico amps. Good thing I didn't like the $20,000 a pair speakers! IMHO, any of you guys with Khorns have nothing to long for. And I kid you not, I prefer Heresies to maybe all the speakers I heard but two or three. The corner Hartsfield speakers had shrill treble and overpowering (in a bad sense) bass. I know Mike liked them a lot and there was a handout with praiseful blurbs from audiophile reviewers, but not only did I find them inferior in every regard to my Klipschorns, they were probably the least pleasing speakers I heard at the show. Obviously not everyone would agree with me, but I was downright eager to leave the room. I liked Bruce Edgar's Titan loudspeakers, and Bruce is a great guy. But I did not care for his Seismic Subs at all. The low bass sounded unnatural. Of course it didn't help that the ceiling and walls were rattling like crazy! The Titans sure are pretty though--probably the finest looking speakers at the place. The worst sound of the show by far was in the Welbourne room. Mike blames the room and maybe so, but the bass was horribly indistinct and I don't know why the room itself would have been any worse than the other rooms. The vinyl I heard played was a recording of simply two acoustic guitars, and the bass we were exposed to was at completely unrealistic levels, and just always there. Sounded nothing like bass from two guitarists--maybe it was a bad case of the infamous standing wave. Mentally tuning out the continuous bass boom was impossible for me because it dominated the presentation. One thing going for Ron's speakers over the Hartsfield was that at least they weren't shrill. If this really was the fault of the room, he'd have been better off not playing them at all, because this made a bad impression. Generally speaking, most of the demos at the Audiofest fell apart in the bass department. They were either unnaturally emphasized (did not sound like real instruments) or they didn't even attempt anything tough to reproduce. Often the source material I heard was a 100-pound female singing slow and sleepy jazz with minimal accompaniment, which is okay as long as you're never going to listen to anything more demanding. Does that include anyone? Easily the most pleasant sound was in the Chicago Horn Club room, listening to old Altec A-7 Voice of the Theatre speakers, and that was with solid state even. Rather than wanting to exit fast, like in some of the other rooms, this system was musically involving and made me want to stay and enjoy. It was really nice to meet other Klipsch board people, but Audiofest was definitely not the place to scout for babes. Why is this a 99% guy-hobby again?

Thomas, Thanks for the great pictures. If you haven't already thrown them away, make sure to keep those original shipping cartons! You never know when you might need them, and almost nobody holds onto them. I believe they cost hundreds of dollars from Klipsch.

mopar, My recommendation is go with an SACD player. The best SACD recordings easily beat the best CD recordings. And so if you buy any CD player no matter what it is, you are cheating yourself out of hearing SACD recordings.

I don't know about the impedance of Heresies, but with a Klipschorn, according to the review in AUDIO magazine, the range goes from 4.5 ohms at 55 Hz all the way to 42.3 ohms at 2,155 Hz. So keep in mind that just because a speaker is *nominally* 8 ohms, that doesn't mean it stays at 8 ohms over the entire frequency range. I have ALK networks on my Khorns and center Belle, and with that crossover design they provide a constant impedance that stays between 4 ohms and about 9 ohms. I have mine connected to the 4 ohm speaker connections on my amps, since most of the power is in the lower frequencies, and the woofer is 4 ohms. Paul W. Klipsch suggested hooking his speakers to the 8 ohms connections on your amps, but that would not apply when the back of the speaker indicates 4 ohms is better. So go with 8 all the time unless something else is indicated, like in this particular case.

Dean, PWK comments on quad a little in one of the Dope From Hope papers. I started a thread on 3/15 about it, entitled Paul W. Klipsch on 3-channel and 4-channel. The thread is about 7 pages back in the thread index. A key thing, to repeat, is having quality speakers all the way round. Certainly PWK would have liked selling 5 (or 6) speakers to everyone instead of 2 or 3! Paul had two main reservations about quad: 1) Phonograph records weren't capable of delivering quad adequately. Open reel would have been fine, but quad open reel didn't catch on in a big way. I think he would have loved SACD with 5 or 5.1 discrete channels, which does not suffer from the distortion of the stylus/quad vinyl arrangement. 2) He wanted three speakers across the front, not just the two that quad used. If 4 speakers were mandated, he would have used 3 across the front and 1 in back. But now since 5 speakers are used (plus the option of a sub) in multi-channel SACD, you have the three speakers across the front. So, again, a reservation PWK had about quad is now moot.