Is bigger always better with Klipsch Speakers?

[Dr Morbius]

 

I've always had the opinion that bigger is better.  Think of a car engine.  A large (strong) car engine will get your car up to speed easier than a small weak engine.  Would you prefer a V8 in your Chevrolet or would you prefer a VW engine in the same car?

 

Oh I love car comparisons.  So, would you rather have a big AMC 360 V8 or a dinky little 3.6L Pentastar V6?    The little one is either about equal or far superior to the big one in most every way.  Generally speaking, bigger is not always better.  How smart the final design is makes a difference.  

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You forget the big reason to take the 360 V8 over the 3.6 V6 is torque…………..and that says it all!

[wvu80]

I am running my CF-4's (108 pound floorstanders) near field from my PC --> AVR, with 15" sub in a medium sized mancave/converted bedroom.  The setup is far from optimal, but they still sound very good and are pleasant to listen to.

 

I would say bigger is better if you have the room for it, within limits.  The best thing is to get the speaker which fits the listening environment.

[Islander]

In most cases, yes, bigger Klipsch speakers are the better way to go.  The Jubilees are pretty big, but all reports indicate that the big 402 tweeter horn gets such a good grip on the air in the room that the size of the room is not that important.  They sound great in nearly every room, even small ones.

 

The only size limit I've seen is the recommendation that Klipschorns need at least 8-1/2 feet of ceiling height to sound their best.

[Paducah Home Theater]

You forget the big reason to take the 360 V8 over the 3.6 V6 is torque…………..and that says it all!

Eh, depends on what year and which carb. A 1976 360 with a 2-barrel carb has the same peak 260 ft/lbs that modern Pentastars do, except Pentastars can hit almost peak torque in as little as 2,000 rpm and stays pretty much flat to over 6,000 due to variable timing. A Pentastar would be every bit as good or better in the torque department as one of these.

I digress though, we're going to wreck this beautiful thread.

[Islander]

 

I've always had the opinion that bigger is better.  Think of a car engine.  A large (strong) car engine will get your car up to speed easier than a small weak engine.  Would you prefer a V8 in your Chevrolet or would you prefer a VW engine in the same car?

 

Oh I love car comparisons.  So, would you rather have a big AMC 360 V8 or a dinky little 3.6L Pentastar V6?    The little one is either about equal or far superior to the big one in most every way.  Generally speaking, bigger is not always better.  How smart the final design is makes a difference.  

 

 

Comparing old tech car engines with new tech ones shows how much engine designs have improved over the years.  As it happens, my vehicle has a 2012 Pentastar 3.6 litre engine, and I'm very impressed with it.  In spite of having 103 more horsepower than the 1998 3.8 V-6 it replaced (283 hp vs 180 hp), it uses about 25% less fuel.  Put another way, the 3.8 would run about 8 hours on a full tank in mixed city/highway driving, while the 3.6 runs for about 10-1/2 hours on the same amount of fuel.  That seems almost like magic.  The lovely snarl it makes on its way to its 6400 rpm shift point is just a bonus.

 

That said, those are apples and oranges, so the comparison is irrelevant to this discussion.  With Klipsch speakers of a given family (Reference, Heritage, Palladium, and so on), to allow us to say "all else being equal", it seems clear that bigger is almost always better.

 

Can you name a pair of Klipsch speakers of a single family that show the smaller speaker sounding better than the bigger one?

[JJkizak]

I went big in 1965 and never looked back.

JJK

[derrickdj1]

I like speakers that fit the room.  Smaller room, smaller speakers and vice versa.  Large speakers in a large space can sound amazingly good.  The same can be said for bookshelf speakers in  a small space.  I started my Klipsch fascination due to small bookshelf speakers.

[moray james]

I agree with the bigger horn concept, but I don't see bigger always better as a whole with speakers for smaller rooms.  If I put my 19s in my office, I wouldn't expect good things from that.  There's a reason speakers are designed for different purposes.  Small studio monitors on a desk may be able to create a sense of space better than a gigantic speaker in that same space.

 

As far as tone controls, I don't know that I agree.  I took my Quartets out of a sub-optimal place and put them in a location where they can shine.  Why would I get speakers that are made for a large room to do what they do best, shove them in a tiny location, and then suck the life out of them by taking away their bass extension or some other part of their response?

Obviously you need to consider the application. No matter what the loudspeaker a design style that does not suit the situation is not going to be of use that is self evident. Horns are your friend and they can be used to great advantage. Using wide dispersion horns in a small room is not going to be much of a plan not a lot better than using dome tweeters but there would be some improvement. We are not discussing desk top monitors here right now. Why you would choose to suck the life out of your system using a low quality EQ system would be beyond me as well. I would choose to use an EQ system that was capable of equal to or better than performance levels of my system that only makes sense. To argue that using EQ is a bad idea simply because your experience with EQ is only with low quality units is not an argument, it is simply not logical. All of the very best sound that you have ever heard be it live or recorded has for argument sake been fed through some form of EQ and many other types of electronic processing. So there is only the argument of not using poor low quality EQ and no one is going to disagree with you on that count. Properly used EQ minimizes problems (some times it can even fix them) and can even help you to deal with some room issues. Room problems are not going to go away because on their own but you can help to mitigate them by using directional horns so there are fewer room reflection to deal within the first place.

[Eldavis]

I have k horns on one side of the room and cornwalls on the other with fortes on top of cornwalls. I run all three with 9090db. The efficiency is better bigger. I can listen to different types of music independent but nothing beats the horns

[dtel]

I started my Klipsch fascination due to small bookshelf speakers.

 

I did the same thing, I got sucked into that whole sub-satellite theory for HT, added on a bigger room and it did not sound nearly as good.   

[Jim Naseum]

They physics reason for loudspeakers to get "bigger" is that bigger can play louder

This is what most people think but the truth is something total different. It's the size of the sound not the volume, almost any midsize speaker can get stupid loud but it will still sound like a midsize speaker.

I didn't know the difference either until I heard large speakers, or certain large speakers. We use large speakers but rarely go over 50-75 db, but the sound is huge.

I presume you mean the projected sound field that you perceive? Up and down, left to right, and front to back?

If so you sure don't need physically large loudspeakers. That effect has nothing to do with the size of the loudspeaker. It's a artifact of dispersion, placement and room.

Sent from my SM-T330NU using Tapatalk

[Krispy Kirk]

"Can you name a pair of Klipsch speakers of a single family that show the smaller speaker sounding better than the bigger one?"

 

The Family?  The classic Heritage line.  I have always held the opinion that the Forte (I or II) sounds better than the corresponding vintage Chorus (I or II).  It might all be a result of better room-coupling or some other physics black magic.  Or it might just be a case of the (slightly) smaller speaker actually being a better design.  We could debate it for hours...

 

When I had an opportunity in 1990 to finally buy myself a pair of man-sized Klipsches (we're talking everything from the Quartet up to the Cornwall), I chose the Forte II.  I've never regretted it.  No, they're not "huge" although I've had friends mock me for owning "coffin-sized speakers" but they have proven most compatible for the wide range of rooms I've put them in.  Everything else would've been too small or too big.

[nitrofan]

Fish that's the funniest thing I've heard in a long time. Great one

[bobdog]

 

I've always had the opinion that bigger is better.  Think of a car engine.  A large (strong) car engine will get your car up to speed easier than a small weak engine.  Would you prefer a V8 in your Chevrolet or would you prefer a VW engine in the same car?

 

Oh I love car comparisons.  So, would you rather have a big AMC 360 V8 or a dinky little 3.6L Pentastar V6?    The little one is either about equal or far superior to the big one in most every way.  Generally speaking, bigger is not always better.  How smart the final design is makes a difference.  

 

As a Jeep nut, I'll take the 360 any day.  While I would not build a 360 or even a 401 these days (The Gen. IV GM V8s offer too much), They will destroy a 3.6 with only a little bit of effort.  You can not look at HP numbers from the days when the AMC engines were so handicapped by IM garbage that they could barely run and compare them to modern day engines.  I have built a 401 that was scary powerful and a 360 built the same way would be almost as good.  I have driven a couple of JK Wranglers with the 3.6 and they were very underwhelming.  If they put the Hemi V8 in one I would be headed to the dealership the next day.

[dtel]

I presume you mean the projected sound field that you perceive? Up and down, left to right, and front to back?

 

Yes and no, yes of course it's the sound field you perceive, it's all I can go on. It is as you describe but more, the midrange can not really be pinpointed, the bass is leaving the bass bin which is 6' wide which gives a completely natural sound

 

With the midrange I think part of it is the driver on the horn is large and with the horn design being very wide and tall it (appears) to sound more open. not from a particular spot at all. Normally you could blindfold someone walk them in a room and they could point accurately at the speaker. It's not quite as easy with a large speaker.

 

With the bass, the bass bins sound completely effortless, being a folded horn helps, also there rated for (I think ) 250 wpc and I use less than 1wpc usually so the driver is barely working so there is no strain and extremely low distortion.

 

Now this could possibly be done with a much smaller speaker but it would require a really good speaker with great placement with a room to complement. 

 

Just my opinion      I have had many speakers but nothing like this kind of sound, also the room is our living room, and far from perfect for listening so there is not much I could do with the room.

[mattSER]

Can you name a pair of Klipsch speakers of a single family that show the smaller speaker sounding better than the bigger one?

Imo, the RB-75 sounds better than the original RF-7. Also, I've heard more than once somebody say that they prefer the KLF-20 over the KLF-30.

That's really about it though.

[derrickdj1]

 

Can you name a pair of Klipsch speakers of a single family that show the smaller speaker sounding better than the bigger one?

Imo, the RB-75 sounds better than the original RF-7. Also, I've heard more than once somebody say that they prefer the KLF-20 over the KLF-30.

That's really about it though.

 

 

I like the KLF 20 over the KLF 30 also.  Different strokes for different folks, lol.

[Islander]

"Can you name a pair of Klipsch speakers of a single family that show the smaller speaker sounding better than the bigger one?"

 

The Family?  The classic Heritage line.  I have always held the opinion that the Forte (I or II) sounds better than the corresponding vintage Chorus (I or II).  It might all be a result of better room-coupling or some other physics black magic.  Or it might just be a case of the (slightly) smaller speaker actually being a better design.  We could debate it for hours...

 

When I had an opportunity in 1990 to finally buy myself a pair of man-sized Klipsches (we're talking everything from the Quartet up to the Cornwall), I chose the Forte II.  I've never regretted it.  No, they're not "huge" although I've had friends mock me for owning "coffin-sized speakers" but they have proven most compatible for the wide range of rooms I've put them in.  Everything else would've been too small or too big.

 

The Forte II may be one of the rare exceptions to the bigger-is-better general rule.  I have not heard a pair of Forte IIs myself, but everything I've read about them is impressive:  natural sound with no odd peaks or dips in the FR, and bass response that doesn't need a sub, plus they look pretty good, too.

[Mallette]

There's Klipschorns, and everything else.  There is nothing that beats a Klipschorn in size, price, and performance.  PWK said it, I hear it, that settles it.

 

Dave

[twistedcrankcammer]

 

Small studio monitors on a desk may be able to create a sense of space better than a gigantic speaker in that same space.

Some of the best sounding most accurate speakers are relatively tiny studio monitors with traditional boring designs, sitting in a heavily treated room. Seems to fly in the face of all things Klipsch but it seems to be true. People are paying stupid piles of cash for them too. Why is that?

My current fun project is very similar to the Vapor Arcus, those things are $6,500 each. 13 grand for two relatively small bookshelves. There's no way they don't sound awesome.