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MC39693

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    this universe
  • My System
    Denon x7200WA with Luxman R-117, Luxman M-02. Sonus Faber Olympica I F/L. Velodyne DD10 x 2. Cambridge Audio BDR752. Luxman PD-289. BlueSound Vault 2.

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  1. @Jeff Matthews I wouldn’t claim to have heard a modern flagship receiver, a modern flagship AVR if that’s what you meant, yes the Denon x7200 WA while about 3rd in Denon lineup is still pretty formidable. It’s the best AVR I’ve had by a long shot. And I got mine on an incredible deal as a newly minted relationship hinged on a gentleman of similar advanced years as me, was told by his new mate to get the HT stuff out of their abode! Wow. Others on this forum mentioned the R-117 in some writings and that encouraged me to try one, but I had already had an Akai AM-2850 and liked its sound. I’ve owned Parasound A23 as a power amp too. It was good but to my ears nothing stood out vs the vintage receiver sound which I would describe as more full bodied and with more warmth perhaps some would call distortion… whatever it is, my ears like it. BestBuy has gone way downhill here in Canada. You have to find a reasonable audio shop or… cast your net into US Audio Mart BUYER BEWARE.
  2. Sorry for the confusion if any, the Waxwing is for real time digital conversion of my TT, not to create a digital file. But, Yes FLAC is the way I went for files, on a music server.
  3. @Jeff Matthews, I should also mention… since you posted under Home Theater … if you want to use your Khorns for HT audio … if your TV has an ARC HDMI output, then an AVR that supports ARC input would be useful. In my setup the Denon x7200 supports ARC with my TV, bingo 5.2 channel surround sound. The Khorns would be light years ahead of tv speakers. Hence ARC integration is a plus in favour of an AVR. There are other ways to integrate ARC into a setup, eg Oppo BluRay players and Cambridge Audio 752/CXU players support ARC. Both sets of players have analogue, digital optic or coaxial and HDMI output so connecting further in your setup is possible although you are then wondering away from simple and easy to use! But, this step lets you use any of the amplifier options to integrate ARC. Many TVs also support digital optical audio output so you can get audio out to an AVR or a BluRay player that way too. Not sure that helped in your decision process! MC
  4. I have used the following; 1 - Denon AVR x7200Wa. Excellent AVR with 150 watts in 2 channel, great DAC, and tons of preamp inputs and controls. Strongly suggest this AVR unless you have 8K video in which case you have to go up to the 8500 model. The negative for an AVR in 2 channel only mode is you are paying for a lot of amplifiers you will not be using. 2 - Luxman M-02 power amp. Sound depends on the preamp input which will also depend on DAC if you use digital front ends. Excellent sound when I paired it with a Cambridge Audio 752BD as DAC and as the stereo amp connected to the above Denon as preamp. The positive and negative is you need a preamp of some sort. But you use exactly what you pay for, 2 channels of amplification. 3 - Vintage integrated receiver. Ah, now this is good. Luxman R-117. Has a preamp for analogue inputs only, you need a separate DAC to handle digital inputs. Lots of power, 160 watts into 8 ohms. And, the Luxman R series have a remote control. I used all three above with Heresy speakers and others I won’t mention. My favourite… the Luxman R-117. Others I used, Akai AM-2850. An AM-2950 would be equal to the R-117 although no remote control but the Akai has VU meters if you like to watch your music! The AVRs offer one package convenience, power amps the most targeted value for money and the integrated receiver right down the middle. A used vintage integrated might do the trick. Of course there are concerns with age of the electronics. I had my R-117 refurbished as soon as I got it. Every electrolytic capacitor was replaced, solder traces verified, factory setting adjustments and new 5 way binding posts… $750 Canuck bucks. It’s good for the long run now. Good luck with your selection process! @Jeff Matthews
  5. Thought I would comment on the Waxwing and Shannon Parks. Simply put both are outstanding. Just bought a mint used Waxwing, installed between Luxman PD-289 Ortofon 2M Bronze then digital out via fiber optic to Cambridge Audio 752BD which is my hub for all sources. You might think AtoD then DtoA won’t sound good but you just might be surprised. The Waxwing has a plethora of attributes to manage cartridges and LP quality. Shannon answered questions via email at 7 PM on a Sunday night, to a potential customer, what more can I say?
  6. @Pak323 I hope they sound as good as they look. Really well done in keeping vintage speakers going! We'll get a time together hopefully and have a listen to both sets; the 1980 you've updated and my "changed" 1984 in honour of the women and men who built both sets more than 40 years ago!
  7. @Pak323, I like it! Don’t loose those grills and badges if you display open to show off that blue! May you enjoy them for 40+ years as I did. Still listening to my highly changed 1984s in original walnut veneer, grills etc. going to be 40 this year too.
  8. @Pak323 Wow, ok, the last time I saw that was maybe April 1981. I was working on an assignment in Edmonton when I bought them and took them up to Ft. McMurray when I was finished that work and I think that is when I stained them. Are you going to stain them or paint them? What a journey!
  9. @Pak323, I can tell you that, I did not do anything to the front board, so perhaps someone else can answer from experience. As others have noted, I’d mask it off, sand, clean and paint. If you search the forum you can find the correct black paint to buy, I might have some around the house. I’m pretty sure I bought a small container at Home Depot. Keep posting pictures, I’m enjoying the journey. I searched and couldn’t find the paint, but searching the forum there’s a lot of discussion on paint. It sounds like #40 Valspar SSG Black is what you are looking for… Rona or Lowe’s may have it? Search the forum for words Valspar Black etc and you’ll find lots of discussion on the paint. I thought I bought it at Home Depot, but maybe Rona or Lowe’s all of which we have here. Good luck.
  10. My 1984 which I believe were the unofficial 1.5 variations have the full removable back panel.
  11. Agree with @JohnA that putting "damping" material around the K-700 did not produce a noticeable change, and I've tried multiple types of material. Having said that, I think it did not decrease SQ and the cost was negligible. WRT the caps. There has been and will continue to be enough discussion around caps to fill the Internet. I offer simply from the OEM site "All Jantzen Z-caps are nitrogen filled, which means that you get more foil per capacitor and no risk of the evaporation that can occur in oil/dielectric fluid filled capacitors." Ok, well yes it's nice to not worry about evaporation or leakage of liquid. I selected those caps after much reading on University of Google. Some know of a site that does qualitative listening and commentary. That site/owners/commentators have been called some names I don't appreciate and I doubt they would either. They simply provide their impression of the sound from various caps, what you as the consumer of such information do with it is entirely up to you. For me their site provided a starting point in comparison of capacitors with a relative impression of SQ produced and subsequent continue investigation on my part for those which fit my budget and were available. WRT the word "upgraded". The forum has requested we not use that word or "updated". I simply say, changed. The other components are quality components within again a budget, eg I did not pay for someone to hand wind an air core inductor or to use precious metal foil. I purposefully did not change the scheme employed, I believe PWK created the design with significantly more capability than I have. I was attempting to return the speakers to a sound I "remembered", and compare them to other changed speakers with crossovers that have significant schematic alterations. Each has its place. The final arbiter of the word "upgraded" are the ears of the owner, @Pak323 although I believe he said these are his first of this type of speaker. I wish him much enjoyment and success in his plans to change the cabinet finish and perhaps I'll catch up to him one day and see his handy work. MC p.S. More fuel for debate club… when I sold the speakers they included 4 post homemade stands that put the squeaker at my ear height in my listening chair. The design was so a small, closed, front firing sub woofer could be placed in the bottom. Maybe not optimal from a SQ perspective but definitely helpful with WAF. I’ve tried tilting speakers, not with nice stands but just simply and did not like the result. There are good threads on the forum discussing the relative merits of various stands and indeed no stands. I hope @Pak323 can use the stands for something if not as the intended speaker stands.
  12. Tuna crudo, scallop crudo, tuna ceviche. Raw spot prawn right out of the ocean, although that was a while ago.
  13. @Pak323 best wishes with the speakers. When they left my care, the sound quality was very good. I don’t come around too often, so don’t get discouraged if I don’t answer a PM promptly. I will say from the pictures you posted, the outside of the cabinets were in better shape when I sold them, the internals look consistent with what I recall. @Woofers and Tweeters, you are too kind… these speakers were the ones I learned on thanks to the many contributors on this forum. MC
  14. @Pak323 sir, I am the original owner and modifier of those speakers, the original documentation is in 1980 Heresy under the Ask the Historian section. I owned them for 42 years. After the thread I note above, I made three rounds of modifications. I’ll honour the current requirements of this forum and will not mention third party items specifically but here is the gist of the changes, 1 - being raw birch HBR from the factory, I stained them light oak and several coats of clear Varathane in 1980. The smears on the motor board I do not recall, but perhaps I am the culprit although I’ll check for photos of the motor board before they left my house. I am pleased to hear you have the original grills and badges as they were in excellent condition when I sold the speakers in Sept, 2023. Be very careful in sanding the motor board, you should remove the drivers so they don’t get dust in them. Otherwise you’ll need to do a very good job of masking them all before sanding. You can look up the type of black paint Klipsch used when you touch up the sanding. 2 - I cleaned the internal cabinet, sealed all seams and lined with 1/8 inch neoprene using velcro dots to hold in place. I also put neoprene on the back hatch ledge I believe, to help make it air tight. I read everything I could on this and other forums about crossovers at 40 years of age and decided to change the E crossovers out. I used quality parts within my budget. At the time I made the crossover, the current JEM direction was not in place. If you want details on the pieces I selected, PM me and we can discuss. I am ok with a soldering iron, functional not a Michaelangelo. At this time I replaced the back panel terminal blocks with 5 way binding posts. The old capacitors were in good shape and within spec for capacitance but I don’t have an ESR meter so can’t speak to that attribute. The capacitors I selected were well researched, excellent reviews and within budget, aka not $500 each! I used the best solid core inductor I could find, not wanting to switch to a large air core. I purchased a new auto transformer with similar specs to the original. These didn’t have to be done but I wanted to do the whole crossover. The new crossovers brought the speakers back to what I remembered as to original sound, I fully acknowledge builder’s bias and weak sound memory of 40 years prior! 3 - The last Change was to internal wiring as I found some light corrosion on soldered connections on the tweeter. So I changed out all the wiring taking into consideration what I felt was suitable for each specific driver. I wrapped the K-700 horn in adhesive backed felt, the black is simple electrical tape for which I apologize but I wanted a second adhesive. I used tie wraps in other applications and was not pleased with the result. All the drivers were original. All tested within specs, but I did not run any frequency checks. All notions of sound quality are “my ears” and totally subjective. i hope that answered your questions, send a PM if you would like more details . Imagine my surprise when I saw your post and the speakers I once owned. I sold them in Sept 2023 in Victoria BC after I purchased other speakers about which I will remain silent. MC
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