How to treat Cornwall 3 cabinets for better bass?

[mark1101]

The software I use is TRU RTA. There are others as well that are good or better. This one has been easy to use and useful to me. You also need a mic and a power supply for it, (also referred to as a phanton power supply). For that I have a cheap but accurate Behringer mic, and Behringer mixer which contains a phantom power supply (roughly $120 for both). You also need to have a soundcard in your PC.

Basically the software will drive tones, sweeps, pink noise, etc through your system and capture the response from the speakers with the mic.

[Boomzilla]

Alas - No PC here - I have only a MacBook laptop with nothing but OS-X and some USB ports.

[mark1101]

Another comment that will surely piss some off, but it's just my opinion. Audyssey (or however it is spelled) SUCKS for music. It is nothing more than a DSP trick and does not belong in 2 CH systems. It is a HT tool, again IMHO. That is why it is found in AVRs and not 2 CH receivers. I have it in my AVR that I recently purchased. It works pretty well for Home Theater and gives that "engulfing" and reverberating effect, and can balance that within the room so it sounds kinda like that everywhere. I actually put my room back to the settings I had set originally (manually myself) before I used Audyssey because I thought I was able to EQ and setup the system better than the AVR unit.

It is not for music listening IMHO. I see these rave reviews about those using it, and it makes me wonder........since I have it too and know what it does and what it sounds like.

You REALLY have to watch the advice given around here.[+o(]

[Boomzilla]

...Audyssey (or however it is spelled) SUCKS for music...

Well, that opinion certainly isn't unique to you - lots of folks feel the same way. Is it possible to limit Audissey's control to the bass frequencies only? That would provide some room correction in the bass without diddling with the rest of the range.

[mark1101]

Audyssey is for multi-channel systems but it will create filters for 2-way as well. I never tried to use it for just bass. I'm not sure you can do that.

[Deang]

"Those are the guys that fix something like this with a cabinet project, network tweaks, a room full of symmetrically placed treatments that appear to have been engineered, and $689.00 worth of new tubes from Brent Jessie."

- People please ignore this statement, especially the part about network tweaks. Mark has clearly gone to the dark side, and visual representations of the sound are what you need when you can no longer hear anything. For crying out loud, look at what he subjects his hearing to. I say sell the Cornwalls IIIs and buy some nice RF-7 IIs and a killer sub. Keep the Emotiva and call NOS Valves - have Craig add a cathode follower to that new beast of his and be done with it. I never liked the sound of the C III, it's obviously bass heavy and using that dinky K-700 for the midhorn is a huge fail.

[Chris A]

Is it possible to limit Audyssey's control to the bass frequencies only?

Not on my unit. I turn off all Audyssey EQs after an Audyssey run; I use Audyssey only for setting relative channel gains and time delays--which it does extremely well.

Chris

[Boomzilla]

...I never liked the sound of the C III, it's obviously bass heavy and using that dinky K-700 for the midhorn is a huge fail.

I'm tending to agree...

[mark1101]

" Mark has clearly gone to the dark side, and visual representations of the sound are what you need when you can no longer hear anything. For crying out loud, look at what he subjects his hearing to.

Dean, pretty funny! But I'll be serious now. I have a ton of respect for what you have brought to this forum over the years. The few speakers I have left in my house with passives have YOUR passives because over the years my rather particular ears always told me they sounded very good. You are one of the few that I feel actually provides accurate and useful information here.

I'm surprised at your statement above suggesting that using measurments to diagnose a problem is for people with bad hearing.........and I have no idea what you think I subject my ears to...........but it's pretty darn clean and accurate.

Anyhow, I'm sure you didn't mean to tell everyone on this forum what you wrote above.

I stand by my statement that the OP's problem is a slightly overdriven cornwall and the best way to fix it is with some simple measurements to understand differences and peaking, and to simply EQ it down to satisfaction.

Your solution is to abandon the system and rebuild it........as you have stated above, and with no attempt to troubleshoot and correct. You state the cornwall-III is a failure. Just ridiculous. I'm very surprised at your statements.

[cfelliot]

The K-700 or the K-600 in the original Cornwall are of course below the performance of a bigger mid-range horn, but I find the Heresy III, with the exact same horns as the Cornwall III, a solid performer. In fact I would say that it very much out performs any Heresy before it. A fail? I think not with the Heresy. But with the Cornwall III, I think Klipsch should have used a bigger horn. The physical room is there, but the redesign was well before the Cornscala concept.

[Boomzilla]

...with the Cornwall III, I think Klipsch should have used a bigger horn...

+1 for CF! A larger midrange horn with a crossover frequency of 500 Hz. would have made the Cornwall 3 an AWESOME speaker. In any case, I'm back to the idea of letting my Cornwall 3s go. For their size, and for their price, they just don't do what I want them to. I could go off the deep end with mods, but why bother? The resale value stays highest if they're stock.

[Dennie]

...with the Cornwall III, I think Klipsch should have used a bigger horn...

+1 for CF! A larger midrange horn with a crossover frequency of 500 Hz. would have made the Cornwall 3 an AWESOME speaker. In any case, I'm back to the idea of letting my Cornwall 3s go. For their size, and for their price, they just don't do what I want them to. I could go off the deep end with mods, but why bother? The resale value stays highest if they're stock.

That sounds like a good idea. It's one of the reasons Klipsch makes more than one speaker! []

I use an AudioControl C101-III full octive EQ with a built in RTA.

It works magic in my room! .........

Dennie

[Boomzilla]

...I use an AudioControl C101-III full octive EQ with a built in RTA

Would that they still made those...

[Dennie]

...I use an AudioControl C101-III full octive EQ with a built in RTA

Would that they still made those...

I do not think so. But ebay can be your friend. [] CLICK HERE

These things originally sold for $1000!

Dennie []

[Deang]

Mark, I was just jerking your chain - you should know better by now. I was serious about him dumping the CIII's though. We got to A/B the thing against the RF-7 when it first came out (in Indy), and I just thought it sounded dead and bloated.

[mark1101]

I wasn't sure so I was being careful. Keyboards suck. You never really know how someone would be saying the words.. I never heard a CW-III but the build pics looked nice how they mated the parts. It sounds like the OP does not like his speakers which is fine. We've all changed 'em in and out.

[Marvel]

Mark, I was just jerking your chain - you should know better by now. I was serious about him dumping the CIII's though. We got to A/B the thing against the RF-7 when it first came out (in Indy), and I just thought it sounded dead and bloated.

I can't remember who it was whodid the demo for the Cornwalls at Indy, but they thought someone had messed with the eq in the room. I thought my HIIs sounded better. For me, it you are going to have something with that large a front facing you, you might as well go with La Scalas.

Bruce

[Deang]

Wow, I remember that Bruce - it was Mark Kaufman. I suppose I've really never heard a pair then.

[sheltie dave]

I don't see how you could have big Thiels in the room, and then have Cornwalls set up in the same room, and have boomy bass from the C3s and great bass from the Thiels. I have Thiel 3.6s and Cornwalls, and the Cornwall are 3.5 feet further outboard and 3.5 feet closer to the walls than the Thiels. You cannot set both sets of speakers up in the same location and expect great things from both. It ain't going to happen.

[Boomzilla]

And if room interaction, rather than the speaker itself, is the PRIMARY DETERMINANT of bass sound in the room (as I've understood you to say before?) then how could two speakers in the same locations NOT sound the same in the bass? If both speakers have the same -3dB down point, if both speakers both radiate spherically, if both speakers energize the room in identical ways, then your statement that one can't set both speakers in the same location and expect identical results is illogical.

Please explain.