An audio regret of mine, name yours too, i want to hear it!

[SuBXeRo]

Read my review and post something along the same format. I want to hear your whole hearted opinions on the things that you are genuinely disatisfied with in your home theater system and what you would do within reason or tangible capabilities or your own in the future to resolve your problem spots

After doing home theater for about 2 years now, i have had a couple regrets over the years, most of which are only recently apparent to me. All of the decisions i have made and regret are all products of places and ties i have been in my life with wha resources i have had at hand.

Emotiva XPA-5:
I want to love this amp in everyway possible but I can't. I love the XPA-5's dynamic capabilities and its brute force but i feel it lacks some refinement. I have complained before about it and its the fact that the amp itself is noisy. I have had it tested by emotiva and it performs within specs and i have also hd a chance to test my marantz avr to eliminate the UMC-1 as the issue. The amp is just noisy and it is somthing that i have heard through every speaker i have had the opportunity to hook up with it. My idea of a quality amp would be one that is found in my HK 3370 stereo receiver or my Rotel RX 1052, they are both dead silent when the power is on. It is something that i think could be refined by Emotiva to truly make it a knock out contender. I would have paid several hundred more to get that quality.

I have heard others say their power amps are noisy, ones with higher wattages like the XPA-5 and i could say, if its truly the high wattage issue and is quite common, i would have rathered a 5 channel amp at 100 watts a channel and purchased two and bi-amped my entire system. This is something i will consider in the future to replace the XPA-5, of the brands i would choose, im not sure. I love my rotel and the quality is what i look for in a piece of equipment, I would also like to try outlaw audio for 2 reasons, they are US designed and manufactured (i want to support my local economy) and i have heard they are real rock solid amps. I would also want to check out parasound. There are others but it would all come down to value/performance for me and what is reasonable.

Klipsch RF-5's:
I regret selling these but i needed to recoup money on my RF-7 HT purchase. Had i known i'd be where i am some 6 months later, i would have kept them. They just had such a magical sound to me and i am upset that klipsch hasnt produced a speaker as well refined aside from jumping to the palladium. They were tangible sized speakers that were so dynamic.

I will be seeking out a new pair (new used at this point) and will invest in another pair in the future and i would love to put them in a tube amp setup, that or some heritage speakers.

[wuzzzer]

I've also heard people having 'noise' issues with highly sensitive speakers like Klipsch and Emotiva's XPA amps. I think Emotiva recommends their UPA amps for that reason.

I sold my SVS CS-Ultra along with a Samson S1000 pro amp back in the spring since my wife and I were going to be moving from our house to a small town home. The sale of our house fell through a week before we were supposed to move. I absolutely loved that sub. I did just buy an Outlaw LFM-1 Plus that should be arriving on Thursday so it will be nice to have a sub back in my system.

[SuBXeRo]

i would consider trying the UPA amps when the new ones come in at some point, i have heard they are quieter, i just wonder..how much. I even heard the noise with my bose speakers. I am also considering getting some jensen transformers to eliminate ground loops. They are expensive and i dont know how much it reduces the quality of the audio. I shouldnt have any but they could also help just clesan up the sound a bit one would hope. My home theater is tempermental and is ever evolving no matter how stream lined i make everything.

[Guest " "]

A few years ago I started buying up amps just to try them out and get a sense of their characteristics. I regret not doing that earlier. settling on which amplifier to base your system on is truely a subjective process and you need to listen to different amps until you get to the finish line. The amp I settle for may be one that you dismiss and vs versa.

[Quiet_Hollow]

As far as components go, sitting on my hands in 2008 waiting for Outlaw to come out with their 997 Trinnov-based receiver. It was never released. Meanwhile, Panasonic was liquidating their soon-to-become-legendary XR series. I completely missed the boat there, so I spent a few more years with the trusty Yamaha.

Not getting into horn speakers sooner. 5 years of listeing to my bestfriend's father's B&W 580's throughout adolescence. Then got the snot beat out of me at a local rock concert by some wierd-looking Cerwin Vega boxes labeled "Earthquake". They hit like the B&W's never could, at any volume. Built my first Sansui knock-off's in highschool powered by my late grandfather's JCV VR. I got a ton of mileage out of those clones and the Yamaha NS-A's that followed, but never could get that in-your-face, tight bass that I recalled from that concert. After snooping around I determined that horn's was were where the action was at, and I was 24 when I acquired La Scala's that I own to this day. It was a full seven years after graduation until I got into the Klipsch hot-seat and my audio experience took off at mach 10.

Finally, giving up the cornet and musician scene altogether in 7th grade.

Playing

an instrument was where I could really express my emotion. That came to

a halt too soon in life, thanks to an absolute prick for an

instructor and suprisingly little support from my family at the time.

[Rich_Guy]

As the original owner of my RF-5's I have always absolutely loved them, I have never sought a replacement. I am disappointed that Klipsch did not come out with a new RF-5 ll with the new RF-7 ll lineup.

As for your XPA-5 being noisy I find that odd. I have owned an XPA-3, an XPA-5 and an XPA-2 and all have been nearly dead silent for unwanted noise. These have all been the quietest I have ever had powering my system with a black and nearly dead silent noise floor.

I can't really think of any regrets I have in my system choices, I have made my choices pretty carefully and almost every upgrade I've made I been happy with, I am extremely happy with my current system.

[Thaddeus Smith]

My only regrets are around subs. I shouldn't have sold my RW-12, and I shouldn't have purchased my RT-10d. The RW-12 was a solid performer and a great pinch hitter. It's not the greatest, but it's also not the worst. The RT-10d was just a foolish purchase; I picked it up used and CHEAP and was plagued with parts issues the entire time. Never really got to hear it sing like it should and it cost me far more than it should have in order to offload it.

I've got an ultimate sub brewing at the moment. Good clean high spl's down to 20hz and the WAF to go along with it. More on that after baby is born in march.

[CECAA850]

Why is it everyone regrets selling RF-5's? [:S]

[Thaddeus Smith]

Why is it everyone regrets selling RF-5's?

I plan to avoid that problem for as long as possible. I sure don't regret buying mine.. [6]

[Vital]

My only regret is buying a Denon AVR... other than that I have made pretty good choices by researching before hand and it has paid off. I'm wondering what it is about the RF-5's as well. I have never heard them, surely they can't sound better than the RF-7... or can they??? hahaha

[CECAA850]

My only regret is buying a Denon AVR... other than that I have made pretty good choices by researching before hand and it has paid off. I'm wondering what it is about the RF-5's as well. I have never heard them, surely they can't sound better than the RF-7... or can they??? hahaha

Better is subjective so we won't go there. They do actually sound slightly different however. The RF-7's sound bigger, fuller and deeper. I think the magic in the RF-5's is that the mid drivers are smaller than the drivers in the RF-7's so they go a little higher with less effort. It's a little more seamless transition with the tweeter. That's just my opinion however.

[Chris A]

I want to hear your whole hearted opinions on the things that you are genuinely dissatisfied with in your home theater system and what you would do within reason or tangible capabilities or your own in the future to resolve your problem spots

I'm not seeing equipment that I've been dissatisfied with discussed yet, so I'll add one or two (and apologies in advance if I step on someone's toes for writing the following):

Outlaw Audio 970 AVP:
Wow, where do I start? Doesn't have HDMI (only DVI connectors which preclude playing DVD-As and SACDs in native format), doesn't have XLR connectors, has cheap S/PDIF optical connectors that break about the second time that they're used (but so does most everything else out there), doesn't always auto-detect video modes correctly, has a noisy FM receiver without HD capability (but so does most everything else out there), menus are not intuitive, volume control is flaky (so much so that my wife always exited the room when I attempted to change the volume... [8o|]...since the unit tended to crow-bar the volume high when it malfunctioned and that can be real fun to turn off with Jubilees about 3 feet away...),

Power-off didn't work when the unit malfunctioned (had to remove power cord to power-down), there is an RS-232 connector instead of USB, there is an inability to use "pure" audio decryption as default, there is a hard-to-use front panel with much-too-small display characters to read from more than ~3 feet away, the unit tended to lock up during system power-up (in interesting ways - depending on the time of the day it seems-- including crow-bar volume events that were exciting...), and a lack of full DTS support. Did I miss anything - oh yes, and all these things started to happen about 2 months into use.

I wouldn't sell this thing to my worst enemy - if you want it for a boat anchor - come and get it. In the meantime, I'm thinking about using it for a little known audiophile equipment sacrifice ritual...when I get around to it... Sheesh [+o(] I replaced this unit with an Onkyo PR-SC886, and have never looked back.

Crown XTi 1000 amplifiers:
Another interesting experience. Apparently there was a batch of these units in 2008 that came with defective channel volume control knobs - and the volume pots were non-standard to replace. Additionally, the DSP noise floor of these amps when hooked to Jubilees was clearly audible at the listening position, and the level of noise was not a function of the channel volume (gain) control setting, i.e., it is simply DSP noise, not amplifier noise.

Another issue is the fidelity of the amplifier's output for driving Jubilees. I didn't realize how bad these were. I can recall no one telling me before I bought them how bad they were.

However, they work extremely well powering horn-loaded subwoofers now - they put out a clean 1kW into 8 Ohms in "bridged sub" mode. I actually recommend the XTi's for this duty since the built-in DSP does all the crossover and EQ that you would ever need. I cross the subs over at 40 Hz to the Jub bass bins using a steep L-R crossover filter. I have four of these amplifiers (presently using two), so if I could figure a way to get two more SPUD subwoofers into the back of the room, I could set up a four-subwoofer double bass array... [<)]!

Speaker stands:
Don't use speaker stands: the resulting loss in bass is really bad when you do...even though they look nice. But the stands hold potted plants now and look very nice.

Pioneer PL-990 Turntable (new):
Amazingly bad in every way but I could play really old records while I looked around for a real turntable--which I eventually found in an Empire 398...wow...the living and the dead once again. The records that I sacrificed on that little Pioneer turntable weren't of much use to me anyway - they were already hogged out from years of 1950s-vintage Garrard tank-type arms trying to re-lathe their way through. This little Pioneer turntable now holds down collapsed equipment boxes in the garage right now.

Klipsch RC-62 (between two Jubilees):
Well, I just started laughing when I got it setup - it was so bad that I just turned it off. This one is for sale. It has about 6 hours of operating time on it. Finally replaced it with a tri-amped Belle. Now the setup works as an integrated home theater with front Jubs, center Belle, Cornwall surrounds, and tapped horn subs.

Bottlehead 300B Paramount Monoblocks:
If you ever wonder why I hate SETs--here is your reason. I bought two units directly from Bottlehead, built by Bottlehead, with Doc's personal guarantee that they were in good working order. As soon as I got them hooked up to replace the "low cost" Crown D-75A that they temporarily replaced, my wife came in and said: "what happened? It sounds awful...muted or something [:$]...what did you do? Can you fix it?" After 6 weeks of fiddling, one of the 300B tubes in one of the monoblocks advantageously decided to call it quits: that's a service life of about 40 hours.

I'm now saving them for the next wave of nostalgia to raise their prices to unbelievably high levels (...the tube amp marketplace = yuck). I've got a First Watt F3 in there now and have never looked back.

Chris [:#]

[JJkizak]

AR truntable. It had excessive hum the closer you came to the motor toward the center at about 98db SPL, it sometimes would not start and you had to push it to get it to rotate, the center spindle was slightly oversized and I had to pencil out almost every record to fit. The tone arm was real sticky when you tried to move it sideways. It would not track a warped record. The size of the motor was not big enough to run a car toy. Generally a piece of junk.

JJK

[jhoak]

My deepest “audio” regret is allowing my wife (now ex) to talk me in to selling my 73 Belles because they were “big, ugly, and she was tired of dusting them”.

In perfect 20/20 hindsight what I SHOULD have done was keep the Belles and ditch the wife 10 years earlier than I did.

As far as purchases that I regret I can't think of any. What few bad experiences I've had hardware wise I've been able to sell the offending item and suffer little if any loss. Something to do with really researching everything before I pull the trigger.

I've had a few cars that I regretted buying and more than one relationship that I deeply regretted but by and large I've been pretty luck in the audio department

Cask05 - I had an Outlaw 950 and a 990 and thought that they were both pretty solid pieces. Never had a 970 but read a LOT of horror stories about them.

[Youthman]

I can't say that I've regretted any audio purchase. Like jhoak, I typically spend a lot of time on the front end researching (sometimes too much in fear of making the wrong decision) so by the time I actually pull the trigger, I knew what I was getting. I try and buy gear at such great discounts that down the road, if I choose to sell, I can get at least get my money back from it. Doesn't always happen that way but that's the goal.

The one thing I learned way early on in this audio hobby was when I bought my first receiver. I REALLY wanted a Dolby Digital receiver but ended up settling for a ProLogic receiver. I didn't have it long, sold it and quickly purchased a DD receiver. My lesson was to do your research, determine what you really want, save up, look for deals and buy it with confidence. Most of the time when you make compromises, you will likely regret it, sell it at a loss and end up buying what you really wanted in the first place.

With that said, when I get ready to replace my projector and go to sell it, I will probably deeply regret paying full retail ($2500) for it. LOL At least it was paid for with my income tax refund. []

[willland]

Even though I am very satisfied with my main HT system, I do regret selling my (5) Marantz MA-700 monoblocks. They were great sounding but sold them because they were too deep for my TV stand. I eventually replaced my stand with a deeper and taller one that would accomodate my NAD receiver and the monoblocks. An all monoblock HT system would have been really cool. All was not lossed because when I sold them I did pocket about a $415.00 profit[]

Bill

[Dandoyen]

Another interesting experience. Apparently there was a batch of these units in 2008 that came with defective channel volume control knobs - and the volume pots were non-standard to replace. Additionally, the DSP noise floor of these amps when hooked to Jubilees was clearly audible at the listening position, and the level of noise was not a function of the channel volume (gain) control setting, i.e., it is simply DSP noise, not amplifier noise.

Cask05, ears were burning and led me to EXACTLY this paragraph. You have a PM

[Audible Nectar]

It's hard for a guy like me to complain much about the relative efficacies of my HT rig. It took me a decade to build it, brick by brick, and by and large can be nothing but thrilled with what I have done.

I got the break of lifetime on my subs (two JBL 4638 cabinets, each with two 15" woofers), and that one stroke of extreme luck took my system from "pretty good" to "I outdid myself".

But if I had one thing I could realistically change it would be the HT processor (old Krell) and multichannel amp (Outlaw) to something that more perfectly matches the Heritage sound. Something selected with the care that I chose my vintage Mac and VRD/JM combo for 2 channel use. I'm thinkin' something like Classe, Mac, or other with a clear, liquid sound that would make the sonics perfect.

But that said, I'm not complaining about the present, but in the realm of realistic wishes for the HT, that's about all that is realistic.

Oh, and if I end up buying this place I would install a front PJ. 55" will suffice until then.

[SuBXeRo]

Some people say their xpa amps are dead silent while while others like myself say they have a loud noise floors. I Try and compare and find out why and i have had them in 2 states, different power conditioners (its always been plugged directly into the wall) and now different receiver/processors. Just plugging the amp in by itself with no connections yielded static because of the lack of connection but underlying that was still hum.

The rf-5's have a deep crisp bass foundation with good clean thump down low to 21hz ish and really thumps at very low listening levels. As you increase volume the horn dize and crossover reconfiguration let it be more open to vocals and was a smoothe transition to the woofers. This is where i argue they are 10 times better than the rf-7's. The 7's just dont have good low end crisp thumpy bass punch at low volumes but have a very large and power soundstage. My opinion on it though.

All of you have contrubuted very well. And id like to comment on the research bit. Its good to do a ton of research and i enjoy doing that aspect but in the end, you could get a bud run of equipment or just something that doesnt appeal to you. Its almost nice to buy a max because you know that is it so incredibly rock solid that all the extra money you put into it is sort of peace of mind. At the same time, alot of us spend less and try to get the bargain bang for your buck and often require alot more effort for satisfaction.

On the topic of subs...i will, at some point, hen i get a house an a space guranteed to be dedicated to home audio a bit, i will build myself a custom quad 18" vented enclosure or multiple enclosures with 18's because they move the necessary amount of air to really punch your in the chest if you design its enclosure properly. That will be my eventual project psycho sub for me. In part i love customness so it works.

[DizRotus]

I donated a fully functional AR turntable with SME 3009 II tonearm and Shure V15 III cartridge to Purple Heart. I hope it's appreciated by someone now.