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An Unofficial Klipsch Jubilee Buyer's Guide


Chris A

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20 hours ago, Chris A said:

 

 the current two-way professional version of the Jubilee with the KPT-KHJ-LF bass bins is not "going away" and that the price isn't going to leap from perhaps $10K with Xilica XP and good drivers (replacing the K-691s), to $35K (all USD)?

 

 

Chris , I had assumed  by error that the  KPT-KHJ-LF bass bins  were still around  in January 2021 ,  here's Mr Delgado's answer

Chief bonehead

On 1/13/2021 at 1:05 PM, RandyH000 said:

the older series is still around in the PRO industry  ---

Says who?

 

 

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Curious @Chris A do you know how much feedback the Crown D75(A)s have? I know they have a gain of approx 26dB. And also the 'Duke" that some have raved about has less gain which implies even more feedback.

So if one wants to decrease the amount of feedback in a given amp then first the open loop gain needs to be decreased?

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26 minutes ago, babadono said:

...do you know how much feedback the Crown D75(A)s have?...

 

I don't really know.  I'm using my ears as the measurement device in this case.  Also, I remember the subjective comments from the guy that did the "Duke" (Mark Deneen) 14 years ago were very complimentary of its basic performance before the "The Duke" enhancements.  Mark removed the "guardrails" from the amplifiers slew rate, and increased its power supply capacitor sizes rather dramatically.  So the difference between the stock version and the modified one is said to be in the extreme high end "sparkles".  Very slight differences in my estimation. (I only ended up modifying one D-75A amplifier because that difference was so slight.)

 

As a comparison to the D-75A sound quality, I'd put them at a subjective "A-" or even an "A" (with the the First Watt F3 I use being an A+--and I'm sure that there are people that will argue this comparison), while the FusionAmp 122 sound quality as a "C" or "D" (Hypex class D amplifiers), perhaps worse.  There was a difference on the Jubs/TADs with the FusionAmps which was audible--not an immediate "turn it off" reaction but rather "...what's that sound? It's strange...".   I had to listen for a while to put my finger on it, and also enlisted my wife's ears to verify what I was hearing--and she independently came up with the same assessment.

 

So as far as the D-75A's sound quality is concerned, they do quite well.  I'm presently using five of them in my pro rack (I use two of them to tri-amp the center MEH, one for the Jub bass bins, and two to bi-amp the AMT-1/Belle bass bin surrounds). 

 

Chris

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Here are Mark's comments.  Why he didn't post them in 2009, I'm not sure.  I don't believe he wants to do these mods for others nowadays, so I have no reservations about posting them here:

 

Quote
The schematic for 45 and 75 look the same. I did not try the mod on the D-75 though. If I were to do it, I'd have every confidence that it would work just as well on the D75, but there might be different tweaking of the little band-aid caps. I'd call it minor bench adjusting, but I can't foretell specifically what it might be. It might also be nothing different at all!
 
Obtain the proper schematics for the units you get. There are, if I recall, a few revisions that account for small differences made year to year.  
Here's the details of the mod:
 
CROWN MODS
 
 
Crown D45 Modifications
 
POWER SUPPLY
 
C8/C9 RAIL CAPACITORS: Mouser # 598-DCMC50V123 12,000uF @ 50V computer grade capacitor. Bypass to taste. These will "just fit" exactly in the space allowed. 
 
INPUT CIRCUIT
 
U100A-D Replace with Quad OpAmp Texas Instruments TL 084  Mouser# 595-Tl084CN Quad OpAmp 14 pin DIP (1 required). 
 
14-pin Gold socket per choice.
 
C101/C201 Black Gate "N/33" non-polar 33uF/16V from www.soniccraft.com
C103/C203 Black Gate "N/100" non-polar 100uF/16V from www.soniccraft.com
Other caps could be used here, but these are superb sounding and I know of no better alternatives. 
 
Remove Diode clamps D109/D209/D110/D210
 
R103/R203 = 1.5K 1% 1/4W
 
R153/R253/R154/R254/R255/R155/R256/R156 = 47K 1%, 1/4W**
 
 
C108/C208 = 82pF - nominal*
C105/C205 = 12pF - nominal*
C104/C204 = 8pF - nominal*
C102/C202 = REMOVE
C125/C225 = Remove
 
*These are starting values that may need tweaking on the bench to get perfect HF response with no ringing or undershoot on 20KHz square waves.
 
**This is only done if you want to raise the input impedance to drive this with a tubed preamplifier. If not, leave these resistors alone.

I don't use tube amplifiers, so that portion of the mods I ignored (the second line of 47K resistors). 

 

Since I didn't have a "bench" O-scope back then (2009), I couldn't tell you if I had everything dialed in well.

 

You can't buy Black Gates nowadays, IIRC.  They were NOS back in 2009 when I found a few (...for a price...).

 

Chris

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18 minutes ago, Chris A said:

Here are Mark's comments. 

Yes thanks for this. @Marvel also provided this to me...too bad it was after I pretty much did the same mods by trial and error(and using my EE skills as far as they go) on my D75s. Also paying attention to @John Warren 's mods to a D75a

R102/203 are the gain decreasing/feedback increasing. resistors. So far I have NOT done that mod. IMHO the TL084 is a ho-hum part change. IF increasing the input impedance for tube use the FET inputs MAY be a worth while change.

Vis a vis BlackGates... I just used Nichicon MUSE Bipolars... I have a hard time "hearing" capacitors.

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5 minutes ago, babadono said:

I have a hard time "hearing" capacitors.

I can identify with this statement.  Once you dial in the EQ (and especially if using FIR to correct phase at the same time), I'm pretty sure that no-one would be able to break 50% probability of correct identification in a blind trial.  Once you get the transfer function sorted out, then almost everything sounds like clones of each other.

 

Chris

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I have some brand new K402's (not even unboxed) with K691's  and I'm trying to figure out what Amp to use for them. Am I correct in believing that using a Xilica XP 4080 that a Crown D75 or D75A is almost as good of a choice as any ?

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6 minutes ago, Gnote said:

I have some brand new K402's (not even unboxed) with K691's  and I'm trying to figure out what Amp to use for them. Am I correct in believing that using a Xilica XP 4080 that a Crown D75 or D75A is almost as good of a choice as any ?

you should ask @babadono     he's the guru on  Crown D75's    ,  plus he owns Jubilee speakers - 

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The 402s sound Ok with my D75s. Really when you get the 402s dailed in with the Xilica the 402s sound so wonderful (to my ears) that just about any amp will do. I know some will say i"m nuts. But hey I'm also old so there is that also. Next I will be modding the D75s to be transconductance amps and see what that does.

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4 hours ago, Chris A said:

I don't use tube amplifiers, so that portion of the mods I ignored (the second line of 47K resistors).

 

I have Mark's least expensive tube preamp, the Merlin, so the Duke works great with it. Of course, that means it also works great with any of the various low impedance output SS mixers I have here (one Alesis 16 channel, a smaller Soundcraft 12 channel and larger 16 channel). I probably couldn't hear the difference between caps either, but it means one of two things (at least). First, my 2A3 amps were as good as or slightly better than the Crown, which those who dislike tubes probably wouldn't agree with or care to hear. Or the Crown is very good, so it matches the 2A3s.  In any case, I thought the Duke was close enough that I had no regrets selling off the 2A3 vacuum tube amps.

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On 4/30/2021 at 6:04 PM, babadono said:

The 402s sound Ok with my D75s. Really when you get the 402s dailed in with the Xilica the 402s sound so wonderful (to my ears) that just about any amp will do. I know some will say i"m nuts. But hey I'm also old so there is that also. Next I will be modding the D75s to be transconductance amps and see what that does.

I’m not being sarcastic, but wondering about Crown. Seems like a lot of people on the forum like them, maybe that’s my answer, but do they compare, especially on a k402, with mid priced class A or tubes? Does an active XO 402 neutralize amps and minimize differences?  I do love the idea of spending $500 on a new amp. I just thought Crown priorities were power and reliability, sound quality third.

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20 hours ago, VDS said:

I’m not being sarcastic, but wondering about Crown. Seems like a lot of people on the forum like them, maybe that’s my answer, but do they compare, especially on a k402, with mid priced class A or tubes? Does an active XO 402 neutralize amps and minimize differences?  I do love the idea of spending $500 on a new amp. I just thought Crown priorities were power and reliability, sound quality third.

Don't know how to answer this. Each one perceives differently what they hear. I will not tell someone what they can and/or cannot hear. I know lots of folks with Jubes use more expensive amps at least on the high Freq/402. But the MAIN improvement is the horn itself IMHO.

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2 minutes ago, babadono said:

. But the MAIN improvement is the horn itself IMHO.

I’ve read that before. Great horn, competent driver/amp better than marginal horn, great amp/driver, (very dumbed down paraphrasing).

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

HELP! I have just received one of the last pair of jubes and i bought an entire Mcintosh  set up and i need to decide today if we go mc462 bass and another mc462 for the horn or Mc462 for the bass and a mc2152 Tube for the horns. We like all types of music very loud and clear.  We have a professional audio wizard coming to dial in the xilica for us so that shouldn't be an issue. Please let me know if you think i should keep same amps or try the different amps. I'm getting mixed signals from people about not using the same amps top and bottom.

 

Thanks,
Jeff

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14 hours ago, Jeff Anderlite said:

...I'm getting mixed signals from people about not using the same amps top and bottom.

You can use what you want for amplification.  Generally, it's the high frequency channel that requires a higher quality low-noise amplifier.  I do not use the same amplifier model for the bass channel (a Crown D-75A)...as the high frequency channel (First Watt F3) with the TAD TD-4002 drivers that I use.  This is the configuration that I've used for well over a decade.  It works extremely well.

 

The only issue that I see is when trying to use amplifiers having high output impedance (like SETs: single ended triode tube-type amplifiers).  These actually change the SPL response of the loudspeakers, so in general, they will need in-room acoustic measurement to compensate for the changes in SPL response using the Xilica due to the higher amplifier output impedance alone.

 

In all cases, you'll likely need to measure the SPL response in-room using a calibrated microphone and a computer-based acoustic measurement app (like Room EQ Wizard or any of a number of bought apps).  Using the Xilica to dial-in at least the SPL response of the Jubilees is I believe required with Jubilees to get their performance up to their best.  Having someone come in to do that dial-in that knows how to do it is a good plan.

 

Note that the acoustic drivers do need a little break-in time (at least an hour using significant lower frequency drive signals to exercise the diaphragm surrounds until they break in) until their steady-state performance levels are largely reached.

 

Chris

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  • 4 weeks later...

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