Altec with Klipsch?

[Mike 585]

Hi All,

I 'm hoping to draw on the group's experience.

I've been accumulating spreakers with the aim of having an all Heritage 7.1 system. So far I have a pair each of Belles (mains) Cornwalls (surrounds) Heresys (rears) and 2 subs. What I'm obviously missing is a center channel. I'm getting by with a phantom center for now but I am looking at moving and one "must have" for the new house is a larger listening room with a 20'-ish long wall where a center speaker will become a necessity. Ideally, I'd like to have another Belle but they're pretty rare on the used market so I've been looking for LaScalas thinking that, in addition to being more plentiful, the bigger K400 horn would be a plus. I've been looking within a couple of hours driving radius on Craig's etc for a few months but as yet, no luck.

Anyway, I recently came across some Altec Valencias. I went and listened to them and it's obvious they need some work. They're very shrill--even to a horn guy--and the treble attenuator control doesn't seem to do anything on either speaker so apparently the crossovers need work. From what I've read, the Altecs, when working properly, are in the same league with Klipsch Heritage however, I'm guessing they have, for lack of a better term, a different flavor sound than my Klipsch.

So my question to those with experiece with both brands, could one of these work well as a center channel in my system?

Thanks in advance for the help.

Mike

[Ironsave]

Hi All,

I 'm hoping to draw on the group's experience.

I've been accumulating spreakers with the aim of having an all Heritage 7.1 system. So far I have a pair each of Belles (mains) Cornwalls (surrounds) Heresys (rears) and 2 subs. What I'm obviously missing is a center channel. I'm getting by with a phantom center for now but I am looking at moving and one "must have" for the new house is a larger listening room with a 20'-ish long wall where a center speaker will become a necessity. Ideally, I'd like to have another Belle but they're pretty rare on the used market so I've been looking for LaScalas thinking that, in addition to being more plentiful, the bigger K400 horn would be a plus. I've been looking within a couple of hours driving radius on Craig's etc for a few months but as yet, no luck.

Anyway, I recently came across some Altec Valencias. I went and listened to them and it's obvious they need some work. They're very shrill--even to a horn guy--and the treble attenuator control doesn't seem to do anything on either speaker so apparently the crossovers need work. From what I've read, the Altecs, when working properly, are in the same league with Klipsch Heritage however, I'm guessing they have, for lack of a better term, a different flavor sound than my Klipsch.

So my question to those with experiece with both brands, could one of these work well as a center channel in my system?

Thanks in advance for the help.

Mike

My gut instinct is probably not...... It is hard to get good timbre matching speakers of the same brand unless they are the same series; much less totally different brands.

You could try and then use the Altecs for 2 channel if it does not work......

(I suspect you are on a good course pursuing a LaScala).

Good Luck.

[Chris A]

...could one of these work well as a center channel in my system?

The answer to your question is probably related primarily to the Valencia's hf driver/horn: the performance of the lf horn probably isn't an issue.

One way to avoid crossover issues is to think about abandoning the passive crossovers entirely and using an active crossover, which can allow you to dial-in both the hf driver to eliminate shrillness and smooth any lf frequency response issues. One low-cost active crossover is the Behringer DCX-2496. This will eliminate a large portion of the headaches that might come with taming the Valencias to integrate with Belles.

Chris

[Chris A]

Maybe I should do a little more explaining my rationale:

I've found that, given reasonable quality drivers and horns, the timbre of speakers is loosely related to the size of the horn/driver combinations (...this notion is likely to stir-up the natives...). In the case of the Valencia, the hf driver is apparently a 1" throat driver, while the segmented horn is somewhere in the region of a K-510 or slightly larger horn. This means to me that the Valencia has the "stuff" that is needed to sound like a Belle.

The second issue is crossover design. A lot of energy, angst, and money (in the form of expensive caps, etc.) is typically wrapped up with passive crossovers, which by their very nature are a "cut-and-try" type of proposition. The use of a digital active crossover, like the Behringer DCX2496, ElectroVoice Dx38 or DC-One, etc. allow you to "dial-in" the sound that you are wanting to hear from a center channel speaker. This is easily done by trial and error using the front panel controls or a laptop, on-the-fly.

You can even save multiple settings on the active crossovers for different tastes in overall sound. I'm really sorry to say this, but you just cannot do that with passive crossovers - you'll spend the rest of your natural life trying to get it "just right" and will still have to resort to sort form of external EQ. Additionally, you get the benefit of one amplifer channel per speaker driver, which significantly increases the quality of sound (IMHO) over a passive network design (see this for more information).

If you are using an RTA built-in to your AVP to balance your HT channels and to set the delays, then you can use the active crossover to do the rest of the job, i.e., crossing between the lf and hf drivers and balancing, which is present in the balancing/crossover networks of Klipsch speakers.

Chris

[Ironsave]

I took the OP's question at face value.....

Could he use one of the Valencias (after refurbing whatever may be wrong) as a center with good results?

I still say no. If he decides to try the active X-overs; etc..... That may be very different.....

(Also not mentioned is what He is driving these speakers with).....

OP; Ask yourself........ Is it worth the investment in the speakers; repairing the speakers; and modding them with the active Xovers? Or would it be more simple to get LaScalas and be done with it?

(I am intrigued with the active Xover idea; I think it is a good one....... but little funds and even less time right now.... perhaps someday).

Good Luck to all...... []

[Chris A]

(I am intrigued with the active Xover idea; I think it is a good one....... but little funds and even less time right now.... perhaps someday).

Note that you can try it out for about $270 (US) and the use of a spare amp channel to drive the lf section, The amp doesn't need to be a tube or otherwise very expensive to do the job, IMHE.

If you don't like it, then you can recapture a significant portion of your investment reselling the Behringer on ebay or on this forum...

Chris[]

[Mike 585]

Thanks for the input and taking the time for detailed explanation Chris. Active x-overs are unexplored territory for me but it sounds like a versitile and relatively inexpensive solution. I'll read up on it.

Mike