Heresy III Review in November Stereophile

[Dennie]

Those look good for the price..... [Y]

You may need to update the crossovers, but I still think it is a good deal.

Keep us posted,

Dennie

[Heritage_Head]

I was really trying to find some with the base below so they

angle up. Where did you see the other pics?

[Heritage_Head]

Wait never mind I see he posted more

[Dennie]

I was really trying to find some with the base below so they
angle up. Where did you see the other pics?

If you can't find some used (keep an eye on the "Garage Sale" section), you can probably build them or have them built. []

I've used these on my La Scalas....

Not as pretty, but they work!

Dennie

[garyrc]

he says the treble was raspy and tiresome. I find the Heresy to be very neutral in my system so I'm not sure what he is hearing

...... and he says the sax was too spitty (or some such). Maybe the
speakers he is used to are lacking in a good, clear spit sound. I want
to hear spitty if it's there on the recording ..... and I've heard some
fairly spitty sax sound, up close, in live performances. Also some fairly
comb-on-tissue paper raspy ones. My friend the sax player says this
last may have to do with the condition of the reed, and that some players
cultivate a raspy reed.

On the question of whether a speaker
should be flat at 1M or at the ears ..... hmmmm..... probably at 1M, BUT
at your, say, 10 foot listening position,.... where do you want your
ears to seem to be? In a chair 5 feet away from the closest performer, 25 feet, 50 feet?

Also,
if you put your ear a few inches to a foot in front (where the
microphone sometimes is) of a real, live, singer you may hear sibilance. Do you want to hear it from your listening position?
Maybe. I don't mind it if it's mild.

Some people like their speakers to produce a veiled sound. Dudley?

I haven't heard Heresy IIIs, but I have Heresy IIs, being used as surrounds at the moment, but for a while I used them as my only speakers at work. The one thing I can see in what Dudley wrote about is that there may be a problem with big classical works. My Heresy IIs cant hold a candle to my front array of 2 Klipschorns and one Belle Klipsch on big orchestral climaxes.

[Don Richard]

[

My Heresy IIs cant hold a candle to my front array of 2 Klipschorns and one Belle Klipsch on big orchestral climaxes.

[Y]

[andyo5]

I have to disagree a bit with responses to the Dudley review. The review was generally very positive, except that he felt that the tweeter could sound harsh on certain types of music. For him, this was "a deal breaker" meaning that he would not choose the Heresy IIIs as his primary listening device. He never said that they were unworthy contenders, just that they had one attribute that he didn't like.

Dudley's comment about the tweeters was not the first that I had read like that. I had seen comments like that on this very forum. And I myself felt that they were a bit aggressive when my H3s were new.

I emailed Dudley and suggested that he give them a good break-in and that he should then issue a follow-up review. I did not receive a reply.

[pzannucci]

If redeeming at all, The Absolute Sound concludes it's equipment report as such:

"The Heresy is not perfect, but then no one should expect perfection at its asking price. The real surpise is that it is capable of delivering a significant slice of sonic heaven. It represents a terrific value and merits nothing less than an enthusiastic two-thumbs up recommendation!"

edit: never noticed the finger check.

[Dr Morbius]

Yes, what I got out of it was overall, he really liked the Heresy's. Now what I was wondering (either in this review or another one - can't remember which) Is that they raised the Heresy's off the floor with 24 inch stands. Has anybody here tried that or is it just nonsense ???

[moray james]

nonsense? Best regards Moray James.

[pzannucci]

Yes, what I got out of it was overall, he really liked the Heresy's. Now what I was wondering (either in this review or another one - can't remember which) Is that they raised the Heresy's off the floor with 24 inch stands. Has anybody here tried that or is it just nonsense ???

TAS was the magazine that raised the Heresys off the floor on higher stands

I find that raising older can cause the tweeters to be too hot for my tastes. This may have actually been what the complaint was from Stereophile. Angled about 12-14 inches from the floor and closer to the wall seemed to make the balance much better, adding some weight to the sound. Less likely to be needed with subs.

[Dr Morbius]

So, Mr. James.........having them raised off the floor like in your picture (and they do look durn good!) improves the sound by a large amount ?? - although you might lose a little in the bass end, I'm guessing?

[moray james]

The stands under these Heresy 3 are 20.5 plus about another 3/4" for the spikes. Bass is actually much beter than you would imagine I think because leading edge info is clearer or at least it seems that way. Having the centre of the mid horn (or any mid driver for that matter) at ear level when seated is to me the most important thing that you can do. When you fire the sound either down from above or up from below your brain gets a disconnect (I think) because you realize that in reality the the source cannot be that high or that low. Further, floor and wall reflections can also screw up the sound, I think that is one of the reasons that you see studio monitors placed up at ear level and away from reflective surfaces. At any rate stage and image are excellent and the bass from my modified H3 is very good. The ideal height to get the centre of the mid horn is about 39"off the floor, give it a try and see whtat you think. Below is a link to some photos of the new internal brace work done too these H3 as you can see theis is all solid oak. The pictures do not however show the internal damping wich is also radical but you can see from the first posted picture some of my use of F-11 acoustical felt for both samping of diffraction as well as as an acoustical filter on the woofer, you can also just make out the use of the diffraction balls in both mid and tweeter horn. I hope this is of some interest. Best regards Moray James,

http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/sho...d.php?t=438234

[Don Richard]

Yes, what I got out of it was overall, he really liked the Heresy's. Now what I was wondering (either in this review or another one - can't remember which) Is that they raised the Heresy's off the floor with 24 inch stands. Has anybody here tried that or is it just nonsense ???

Not nonsense, exactly, but not the best way to go with the Heresy. The issue is boundary effects, specifically boundary cancellation. When the speaker is raised 2 feet off the floor that moves it to 6 feet from the ceiling boundary in a typical room. That causes a dip in the frequency response at the 1/4 wavelength point and 6 feet is 1/4 wavelength @ 47 Hz. That is not what you want to do with a speaker that is a bit shy with bass to begin with. This is an acoustic cancellation and cannot be EQed. Here is more info:

http://www.peavey.com/support/technotes/soundsystems/new%20boundary%20cancellation.pdf

Note that when the speaker is against a boundary the reflected wave is in phase with the direct wave which increases bass. When placed on the floor and against the wall, bass is further increased. When placed in a trihedral corner, bass output is further increased. These placements can be used to tune the bass response of the speaker. Remember that boundary reinforcement is a theoretical 6 dB per boundary (perfect summation) whereas boundary cancellation is theoretically infinite.

With a small speaker like the Heresy tilting the front of the cabinet to aim the horns at the listening position is necessary. Raising the stand to bring the horns to ear level will locate the speaker such that the cancellation notch will be @ 70 Hz in a typical room with 8 foot ceilings, an important range for bass harmonics and drum sounds.

[andyo5]

I recently proved to myself that moving my H3s closer to the back wall increased bass output. At 12" from the wall, bass was noticeably louder and at times a bit too much (but I also have a subwoofer). They are now 17" from the rear wall with a 1" toe-in. They are 80" apart. Bass output sounds just right and not boomy.

[garyrc]

Any hotness of the midrange and tweeter might seem accentuated due to a lack of balance because of deterioration of the bottom octaves due to any cavity below the speakers, and all the stuff Don Richard said.

I wonder what they would sound like tilted up a bit, but on the floor in a trihedral corner, with the rear parts of the cabinet touching the two walls (as recommended by PWK for all his speakers) BUT with the side walls to either side of the speaker covered with Sonofiber to reduce any reflections from the mid or tweeter. The Sonofiber would only have to be right by the speakers, with another couple of feet at the first reflection points. Based on two tables, I think Sonofiber is more absorptive at all frequencies above 500 Hz than heavy velour.

Now that I see that Art Dudley has been living with a roll-off of 10 dB at 10 Hz with his reference speakers in his listening room that keeps on dropping as it gets higher,* I'm less surprised that he found the Heresy III had too much pizazzz in the treble. Maybe the dispersion pattern of his Audio Note AN -E/SPe HEs allows more of the high frequencies to be spent toward whatever is causing his roll off (absorbent wall treatment? over stuffed furniture?), while the Heresy III is a more straight-ahead-at-the-listener speaker ("controlled directivity"), with less net treble lost to the sides??? Others have complained about the aggressive attack of our beloved horns. Back in the days (before "imaging" became a word) when very wide dispersion was considered a virtue, Klipsch, JBL, and other horny speakers were critized for lack of dispersion. The Heresy can still benefit from wall treatment (as proposed above), but I think it puts out less treble to the sides than non-horn designs.

* Page 103 of the Decenber Stereophile, graph on the bottom right, green line showing Dudley's Audio Note's response in his room, with a similar effect of room on the DeVore Orangutans being reviewed in that room. See the following page for the quite audible difference in the Orangutan's treble in JA's room. I'd love to see a picture of Dudley's room to see if there is a lot of absorbtion off to the sides, where it would have less of an effect on the Heresy treble. Constantine Soo (sevearl years ago) commented that he did not need room treatments with the Klipschorns he was reviewing, because of controlled directivity. An overstatement, IMO, but, in the high treble, I can see his point.