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  1. Trex 12 in. x 16 in. x 10 in. RainEscape Deck Drainage System Downspout I wonder how well the color would match the copper cones of the reference series? Anyone try these out yet? 😇
  2. I don't think anyone picked up on this.... I was always told we had to get our audio toys before getting married. You are a brave man, haha. Btw, newly married myself and getting a new house this year. I haven't broached the speaker conversation yet, so I might be reaching out for tips, haha Oh, and congrats! And good luck with this crazy housing market.
  3. Woah.... For all these years I thought you were just way more sensitive to modulation distortion, and the multi-way approach makes a ton of sense in that regard. Are you still listening to the same music / same loudness / etc... ? Or maybe music preferences have shifted? I never thought you'd go 2-way (or I guess technically 3-way if you're running subs). I'd love to hear more about the pros/cons of why you've made the change. My biggest criticism of the new heritage Jubilee is it feels like that compression driver has to work hard to dig so low in frequency. It reminds me a bit of those old lowther designs where they try to use a single driver over the whole audio range. My biggest praise of the new heritage Jubilee is Klipsch finally has a bass horn that sounds great. Not a hint of tubbiness at all, and it doesn't have that "too accurate" sound of lascala / khorn that makes rough recordings sound really shrill. Roy blasted some Tool for us at Axpona last year and the bass was incredible. Overall the Heritage Jubilee is definitely an upgrade. I know I'm nitpicking about the HF performance...I think it's just worth noting that there's some compromise there (as are all things audio / engineering related). The place I notice it the most is in the oompf of a snare drum thwack. It gets crunched up a bit instead of having this thwack that hits you in the neck. You could get that thwack back pursuing some sort of 3-way with the Jubilee, but then that crossover to the highs would destroy your imaging - and there's probably not a way around that (yet). I remember the UG Jubilee having more thwack in the snare, but it comes with some tubbiness in the bass. The Heritage Jubilee is definitely the better compromise, but that snare drum sound is sooo important for a lot of music....maybe less so in the jazz / orchestral realms that a lot of audiophiles listen to. Anyways, this stuff comes to mind because Mark has always been someone in my mind with a super fine detector for modulation distortion. I'd really love to get your thoughts, Mark, on the UG versus Heritage sound if you've had a chance to compare them side by side. Unfortunately I'm going off memory and very different environments when I got to hear them in person.
  4. Scratch that.... After hearing the Jubilee at Axpona, I'm no longer interested in the underground version. Ya know, it's kinda funny..... After hearing the underground Jub, I was totally enamored with the K402 and wanted something a bit nicer on the LF side. Then comes the official Jubilee, I've fallen in love with the bass bin and now want a better top end I think at the end of the day, I might prefer the sound of a 3-way over a 2-way speaker. I was super impressed with the improved refinement of the Jubilee. The 2-way felt super integrated, like it was one speaker - even at short distances. Probably because the HF was covering such a huge bandwidth. It's certainly an elegant solution for sure. But several years ago (back when I was touring with a band), we came across a PA with some horn loaded 10" drivers...similar to the Klipsch Cinema bin that I think uses an 8" driver on the K402? K402MB I think? Anyways, I'll never forget how good I could get the snare drum to sound with that speaker. It's an illusive sound that I have heard on occasion from other systems, but it's the only thing I felt was lacking from the official Jubilee. I've also thought a lot about Mark's preference for his system where I think he might be running 5 way or something? My goodness I feel so outta the Klipsch community loop. Anyways, it's been in the back of my mind for years how the bandwidth of the driver determines the starting point for that system's IMD performance (due to the doppler effect). The more you divide up the bandwidth, the lower that distortion.....and it seems to me that IMD is heavily related to the sensation of dynamics / impact - especially for percussive sounds since they have such a wide frequency bandwidth to them. The downside to a multi-way system is that you need to combine the wavefronts together....so you're pretty much forced with a tradeoff between point source realism and imaging versus dynamics and impact. Anyways, I'm curious to get the thoughts of others that got to hear the Jubilee down in Hope. Do you guys hear a similar thing? I'm not totally convinced it's IMD related because the highs didn't flutter around like I would normally expect, but maybe there's something special happening in that driver? I haven't had a chance to read up on its construction. My only other thought was that it might be suspension related...I've heard a similar sound with another driver in the past that was definitely caused by the suspension - and it had a similar effect on the sound. Anyways, just thinking out loud to see what others thought. I'm actually not sure I would prefer a 3-way design either....every system is riddled with its tradeoffs / compromise. I guess I'm just curious if this is the limit of a full bandwidth 2-way design, or if maybe there's a little more meat left on the table for Roy to pursue in version 2? Or would that be version 3 if it were a 3 way? Ya ya, I know PWK wanted a 2-way and this is a beautiful homage to that vision. Not trying to criticize the design.....just trying to understand it and what I think my preferences might be. Part of that is wanting to understand how the rest of y'all felt too.
  5. So did anyone else have a chance to visit the Klipsch booth at Axpona? We bought our tickets 2 years ago (before Covid changed everything) and we were elated when we heard Klipsch was gonna show up. The official Jubs were awesome - great job @Chief bonehead Such a step up from the underground Jubs. I think the most notable thing for me is that Klipsch has finally done a good job with an electronic circuit - their past track record has been a bit underwhelming, but the active crossover they put together sounded really good. Or maybe I should say really transparent? It was something that never came to mind while listening, which I think is where you want things to be. I still wish there was a digital input and even better would be to include a music streaming service. Qobuzz was a major sponsor at Axpona so everyone was using that. I personally prefer Tidal because you can also use Tidal as a streaming source for DJ'ing...which I'm sure nobody here cares about, haha. Anyways, I really enjoy streaming Tidal from my Minidsp SHD and could totally see something like that built into this preamp, or digitally fed into this preamp. Regarding the speakers - finally a good bass horn. Whatever Roy did has resolved the issues that I felt plagued the Underground Jubs - or perhaps it's just the lower bandwidth that they operate over? If I had to nitpick, there was some coloration in the ~350Hz range that I think was probably the "tweeter" struggling a bit. Definitely a unique distortion signature somewhere down in that range, and I think it might have just been intermods from the huge bandwidth coming from the HF unit. Maybe some suspension breakup too? Not sure. It's most noticeable with snare and other percussive sounds, but again this is me nitpicking. The highs were quite good and effortless, and wide polars without that hashy breakup sound you get with drivers like the K69. Also gone was that honky conical coloration noticeable with the TAD drivers. One other thing to note....the official Jub did not sound bad with non-audiophile recordings. I've always felt speakers should be serving the source material, and I think that's one thing that differentiates these speakers from the rest of the Klipsch lineup. The band, Tool is probably produced better than most pop recordings, but there was no hesitation to crank it up and load the room. It's so addicting how loud the Klipsch stuff can go, and there was no sign of strain whatsoever. I know it's real popular on this forum to think good speakers make bad source material sound bad, but the new Jubilee demonstrates how that doesn't need to be the case. I think it's more true that bad source material reveals the flaws of the older speakers more noticeably than simpler audiophile music. Regarding the subwoofer range of the Jubilee...I know Roy says they go flat to 20Hz, but I'm not sure we were getting that in this room. The Jubilee was very impressive in the 30 to 40Hz range, but they didn't pressurize the room the way I've experienced from other dedicated subwoofer systems. However, low bass is so room dependent so it's probably not a fair assessment since this room was so much larger than most typical listening rooms - and the speakers were nowhere near the corners. I suppose it's also possible we were sitting in a room mode, but it didn't seem to change much when walking around the room so who knows. The important thing is that tubbiness I associate with folded horn bass bins is pretty much nonexistant. My only final thought is that the price is very confusing for me. I know a lot of people were saying the price should be higher, but then I think the higher price points would require slightly nicer finishes. I personally would prefer a lower finish quality that brought the speakers into a lower price bracket. I was actually gonna purchase a pair when I thought they were $16k for the pair, but it's actually closer to $16k each... I just don't make the kind of money that can justify that expense. Maybe there'll be a used market in the future? I was super glad to hear Klipsch has been selling several units. We need people buying new stuff to keep the industry alive. Anyways, just thought I'd leave a quick review. I wasn't expecting to get to hear the official Jubilee anytime soon and was enamored with the sound. I'd love to hear them in a proper listening room sometime since the hotel ballrooms are a different experience. I bet these sound even better in a smaller room...
  6. Ah, totally understand the confusion. The mathematical definition of AC doesn't require a zero crossing. It just requires the slope of the line to be nonzero. The "alternating" aspect is the slope of the line changing between positive and negative (rising and falling edges). The "DC" aspect is the average value. Sliding your curve up and down changes the average value, but it doesn't change the slope that is constantly changing. Edgar added a caveat where you have a signal that rises once and then flattens out, and calls that AC. Technically that's true in the math, but engineers don't typically call that AC. And if you want extreme technicality, then you have to require the circuit to be perfectly linear for Forier or Laplace transforms to be meaningful.... Which isn't true for circuits (like a power supply) that exhibit that behavior. That's why I think it's better to think of AC as alternating slope, and DC as the average level over the period of interest. The AC level just tells you how far your signal deviates from the average level. If you get into other waveforms like Edgar is describing, then I don't think it's helpful to call it AC or DC. I agree it's technically AC, but my circles will typically call it an impulse, or ramp, or integrator, or whatever description fits the context of the circuit. I think the important thing is that current flows through a capacitor when there is a nonzero slope on the voltage (back to the fundamental equations). Once the slope is zero, then the current is zero, and we call that DC.
  7. But it is AC... And the capacitor is letting only the AC component through. This is a very important fundamental principal, and I hope you take the time to grapple with it. I ask a very similar question when interviewing EE candidates. They have a degree and years of experience in electrical engineering, but most of them still get it wrong...and that's unfortunate because i want to hire people with strong fundamentals. My point is that although it's fundamental, it's still not simple. Or at least not simple to me. It took me a few years to really grapple with it. The fundamental equations are always true: I = C x dV/dt V = L x dI/dt There is no current if there's no change in voltage. That instantaneous change from 0V to 12V is a change happening in zero time (dt =0)... Which means you're dividing by zero, and that means the dV/dt term approximates infinity.... Which means infinite current if it weren't for the other impedances in the circuit. I think in your mind, you're thinking you have a "DC source" and you're hoping a "DC blocking cap" will "protect" your tweeter from that "DC source". I understand why these abstractions are attractive, but your analogy doesn't include a (mathematical) abstraction for the "switch" that instantaneously connects that DC source to the tweeter. That switch needs a mathematical model too. And as such, the cap blocks DC, but it doesn't "protect" against the AC event that happens when you flip the switch. So if it makes you feel better, think of the switch as a DC to AC transducer. And once you're comfortable with that, then you're well on your way to understanding Class D amplifiers. And then maybe some time after that, you can start exploring "parasitics" where we move from a simple capacitor to adding circuit elements that describe the true physical structure of the cap.... Which has its own ESR, inductance, magnetic fields, shunt capacitance, hysteresis, piezoelectrics, leakage, temperature variance, thermal losses, thermal expansion, etc.... The things that make the different capacitor structures important when choosing a part. You can put most of this in LTspice if you want to take the time to explore it. I certainly do when I'm designing filters.
  8. Hahaha, i missed this the first time around. So profound. I wonder if the others here know you do market research and have formal training in psychology? This is the very topic you formally study and call your profession. From a philosophical perspective, I've always wondered at what point does one draw the line between truthful and deceptive marketing? If there is a cognitive bias changing the customer's experience, then isn't that achieving the claims of the marketing? The mechanism may be purely psychological, but it's still successful? There are entire fields that study interior design and architecture and how it emotionally impacts us. All of the greatest listening rooms have these visual design cues that further aid the listening experience... It could be as simple as dimming the lights for an evening listening session, and yet that has no impact on the acoustic waves. However, the emotional state it puts us in sets the context for how the music is heard, and in that sense has a hugely dramatic impact to the music listening experience. Is that snake oil too? Thinking about it some more, isn't the entire audiophile hobby built on the same fundamental principal? The seductive voice we hear singing isn't actually in the room, but we sit in the dark imagining that it is. The entire hobby is established on an experience that isn't physically substantiated. The illusion of music exists only in our minds. Who are we to say one illusion (or cognitive bias) is more acceptable than another? Perhaps the "wife" (symbolic of the one not succumb to the illusion) is "always right", but I think it's more fun to be wrong....
  9. I think there are a few reasons... 1) The goal of a xover design includes more than the voltage response at the transducer. You're trying to blend the acoustic output of two drivers together, AND you're trying to offset the power response of the speaker. The ideal voltage response will therefore be different than the ideal filter calculators compute. 2) A Zobel requires extra parts, which adds cost. For the same price, you could go to a higher order filter and get more frequency shaping.... Whereas a Zobel doesn't necessarily move you in the right direction (although sometimes it does). The Zobel is just one of many filter tools to achieving a desired result. 3) A Zobel consumes power, although it depends on how it was designed. High power dissipation tends to be a recipe for injecting distortion.
  10. You're hitting the noise floor of your measurement rig. You can probably play with your gain structure to improve this a bit, but you'll always run into this limitation when measuring filters. At some point the filter attenuates the signal so much, that it's below the noise floor of your measurement gear.
  11. Just means you're measuring the wrong thing, or you're correlating your experience to the wrong metrics. I truly believe it's that simple. Isn't this hobby all about discovering new musical experiences? And is it not helpful to correlate and find language to describe the things we experience?
  12. Are you guys able to share any of the measurements you had done? Curious what the test conditions were and if you did any hysteresis plots too?
  13. Haha, too funny. I've never had the experience of digging through records. I guess I'm still too young to be considered part of the target market for audiophile gear? I'm shocked that the audiophile market still hasn't picked up a high fidelity version of Sonos/Spotify. For example, Klipsch spent all that money to make a custom digital box for the Jubilee and they didn't throw in a web-enabled chip to stream music directly from it. But I guess it makes sense for the older cats that come from the different experience you describe. I know there's been a surge in the vinyl market lately with the younger generations....I think the psychological root behind it is that music lovers want something that feels artisanal. And I think there's something to the vinyl ritual that sets the emotional context for the listening session. However, the friction points in Tidal don't feel artisanal, so I think there's still opportunity in the high fidelity market for a digital based system. I'm having a similar emotional reaction to the new Jubilee. There marketing feels too much like other corporate sponsored products versus the artisanal experience that the underground Jubilee had. I bet the marketing team probably feels like they're pitching the artisanal vibe, but it still comes off corporate to me.
  14. You guys think Klipsch will ever come out with a "raw birch" option like they've done in the past with heritage products? Or maybe even ship a flat pack DIY version? This hobby is brutal....I think I finally save up enough pennies and then the prices basically quadruple (it was like $8k'ish for a pair for the underground, right?) Is it still possible to get an underground version? The way my mind works, i can get a CNC router for the same price that would let me build as many speakers as I wanted... And with the "Ikea effect" cognitive bias, I'd think it sounded better even if it wasn't
  15. I'm not sure it would be that straightforward? Sounds like they're doing some phase correction magic with FIR filters, which would be hard to mimic with only IIR filters. There is the DIRAC section of the SHD units which should be doing FIR filters, but I'm not sure if that can be manually controlled? Any of you guys play with Dirac? I'm afraid to touch it because apparently it's out of the signal path until you enable it - and then once enabled it's always in the signal path. Unfortunately I don't think I'll make it out to Hope that week, but maybe there'll be another opportunity in the future? Did I read correctly that the new Jubilee is $16k each? Not $16k for the pair? https://hifiheaven.net/shop/Klipsch-Jubilee-Flagship-2-Way-Fully-Horn-Loaded-Loudspeaker-American-Walnut-EACH?language=en&currency=USD Ooof...
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