redwood forest

My mind must slipping. For a moment I thought that I was at Audiogon. In any case you can get used amplifiers for half price at that website. Sorry about that.

I have a pair of ugly Belles (LaScalas), and a pair of Fortes for HT. I am using a pair of Mark Levinson 334 amplifiers to power the speakers. The problem with these horns is that they are so honest and reveal all of the low quality components in the system. This is why I am using Mark Levinson amplifiers. Before I changed over to ML amps, I used their cousins: Proceed amplifiers. While Proceed is not in the same ball park as ML amps, the Proceeds still work very well with Klipsch speakers in HT. The ML 334 amps cost about $3000 per channel, while the Proceeds cost about $1000 per channel for the same wattage. I can recommend either the Mark Levinson or Proceed amplifiers. It depends on what you can afford, or willing to spend. Check the classifieds here at the 'Gon. Used amps go for about half price.

I broke down and belittled myself a couple of days ago by auditioning Bose 901's at the local Bose store. I must admit that they had the "sound signature" of Khorns with a powerful, deep, fast, and undistorted bass. However, after a while I realize something was missing: detail above 100Hz. There was vertually no detail in the classical music CD's. I also found out from the salesman that 901's can not be used in HT surround sound because of the electronic equalizer that the 901 must use. What a pitty! I thought that those speakers could find a potential nitch at HT. I told the salesman that the Bose speakers, although not audiophile material, would satisfy about 90% of the population. He agreed and said that's why Bose stores are popping up all over the nation. I didn't have the nerve to tell him that their HT surround system demonstration was the worst that I have ever heard.

The best way to solve this problem is to ignore him. If no one feeds his attention by replying to his posts, maybe he will slither under a rock and go back into hybernation.

TBrennan, Thanks. Why do I need an active crossover? Won't a passive crossover work well?

Michael Hurd and TBrennan... Thanks for your suggestions. The ContraBass looks like it was meant for a rock band stage so at first I was reluctant to consider this. However, you are right that the short stroke, high efficiency of the Khorn might be too much for long stroke, low efficiency of the other subs. On the other hand, I have never heard of a sub powered by a MOTOR!!! This sounds scary. My sound room is only 13x17 feet. I'm not sure that bass that deep and powerful could develop in that room, although it would be great if it could. Alright, you have my attention now. So how much does this sub cost?

Ray, The REL was one of those that I heard and disliked because of the boomy noise. However, I now beleive that it was due to the lousy acoustics in the listening room at Tweeter. I should have known better than to go there. I'll have to give REL a try somewhere else. The SYS sounds like something to check out as well. I'm a little reluctant to go with the TacT, because there is nowhere to audition them. The strong plus on the TacT sub side is that they are willing to sell me the raw drivers for $500 and provide me with the plans to make the cabinets myself. That will save me $2500.

Ray, Yes I am planning on getting the 2.2x room correction unit for $5000 to operate the subs. This room correction unit can also determine the frequency response pattern in any room based on room modes, boomy walls, bay windows, you name it..., and compensates by lowering harsh frequencies and increasing dead frequencies automatically. The end result is a totally flat response across the board. No room correction pannels, or traps are needed. The correction unit is for the future. For now I can use a cheap crossover to operate the subs. I have been looking around for subs, and I'm not happy with what I've seen. Most are boooooomy and are not very musical. Of course the problem may be due to a bad sound room. I want subs with a fast, tight bass response like the Khorns, but lower in frenquency for organ music. I will have to try some of the others mentioned above. Could you narrow the list to the top three? What about the BAg End Infra 18 Sub? Have you heard these?

I was afraid that this was not going to work. It's better to propose this idea here and get shot down instead of going through all the agony mentioned above. Thanks for the input.

I'm building a sound room from scratch and I'm in a position to make all kinds of changes that I've been thinking about for some time now. I know this is strange, but here it goes. Would it be possible to deepen the bass of the Khorn by elongating the horn? The horn has already been folded several times inside the cabinet. The last one uses the corners of the room to get the final effect. I have raw Khorns, so it would be possible to make modifications to the cabinet. I was thinking about building sides on the Khorn simulating the walls at the corner of the room. Then I could turn the cabinet around so the original back faces outward into the room. To allow for the horn to develop exponentially, I could build the walls of the speaker upward. The sound would then be directed to the corners of the room as before, but with further development. Would it be possible deepen the bass this way? How much would this method deepen the bass? Has anyone tried this before, and most importantly, did it work?

Jochen, The other drivers are M series so you should try and get a K-33M for the bass box. You have an opportunity to get an ALK klipschorn crossover which is better than the one provided by Klipsch. The website to get the ALK crossover is alkeng.com, or ask for Al here at this forum. He monitors this website on a regular basis. The crossovers cost about $500 for both.

The length of both cables should be the same regardless of the distance to each speaker. This is to assure that both speakers have the same signal due to length and quality of the wire. This is why cable companies sell cables in pairs using the same length and quality of wire. Actually it is better to have long interconnects leading to a stereo amplifier half way between both rear speakers. In this way the quality of the signal can be better maintained and the length of the speaker wires can be kept the same.

I plan on getting two W210 TacT subwoofers to supplement my khorns. As you know, khorns go down to 35Hz, but the TacT subs drop down to 16 Hz which is great for organ music. The two subs have no amplifier or crossover. I have an amp that I can use, but I haven't a clue as to what crossover, slope order, or cutoff point to use. Does anyone have any ideas about this?

I have a pair of Khorns and a pair of Belles. Since both use the same drivers, I could replace the Khorns with the Belles as the main speaker. Then I could replace the bass drivers in the Khorns with subwoofer drivers and turn the Khorns into super subwoofers. The Khorn could remain in the corner where it belongs for maximum bass effect, and the Belles could be positioned one third of the way out into the room where the main speaker can produce maximum imaging. How's that for a tweak?