Source characterists for Klipsch speakers

[MikeSt]

I know that Klipsch love tube amps, what kind of sources do they like? Laid-back or not?

[Don Richard]

The question that needs answering is... what do you like? Personal sonic preferences and the type music you prefer are important. Listening trials are in order.

[garyrc]

Yes, what do you like?

It would make a difference as to which Klipsch speakers we're talking about.

Klipsch speakers tend to be revealing of the good and the bad, Great recordings (and front ends) may sound better on Klipsch than on many other speaker systems, and bad recordings may sound worse. Unlike many audiophiles, I believe in tweeking some recordings with the careful (and "blind") use of tone controls, and adding small amounts of ambience to a few, through side/rear channels only, with a Lexicon..

In the past, I'd rank order the front ends playing through Klipschorns as follows, with # 1 being the best:

1) Crown Reel to Reel 15 ips magnetic tape unit with master or first or second generation (real time transfered) analog tape recordings.. My unit sounded better without noise reduction, but I sometimes used DBX or Dolby on music with a lot of quiet passages. Yet, in our little, unscessful studio (Inner Journey Productions) ther was a sign on the wall: "Beware of the Dolby."

2) Good players (don't have an up to date one to recommend at the moment) with exceptionally good DVDs or Blu-rays, maybe about 15% of them, probably the ones for which a lot of time was spent recording, mixing and sweetening

3) Good old fashioned Ortofon moving coil phono cartridges, such as (was it?) the SL15, SME arm and Thorens table (haven't heard this combo for several years, and there probably are better cartridges now. Even so, this old combo produced better sound than at least 80% of CDs I"ve heard on any player, through Klipschorns.

4) I'd guess a good SACD player would go here, but I don't have much experience with them

5) NAD CD player for about $500 when i bought it a few years ago (NAD C542) with, again, about 15% of the CDs I.ve had, sounds really good A friend had a Luxman partly tube CD player back in '90 that sounded terrific through K-horns.

(6 through X) For the rest, go figure ..... somewhere below would be good players with average or bad recordings, and average or bad players with good recordings, althouth the former might just reveal shortcomings in the recordings.

[MikeSt]

I like rock mostly. Live concerts are the best.