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Cornwall IV


tipatina

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5 hours ago, pzannucci said:

Yes I find it odd that folks listen to the speaker reviews (any audio reviews that play sound so you can hear how good something is) on youtube.  Unless something is blatantly bad, even then you might not know it, the reviews "listen to this" is questionable.

It is silly. There is a program for Firefox called "Youtube  video and audio downloader" that can give you a variety of ways to download from YT including audio only but so far all that I have played is decent but not great.

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On 1/5/2020 at 1:49 PM, jjptkd said:

 

KPT-310 HF on the 902's that you posted can be ordered separately yes.  part number 1015154

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On 1/3/2020 at 12:07 PM, ClaudeJ1 said:

I have not argument for all this. I agree. My ONLY point was about the influence of the flared ports being overblown by marketing mentality. No more, no less.

 

 

I've had Roy tell me in private that he doesn't agree with something or that marketing is blowing smoke, but this aspect wasn't one of them.  He said that he tried various combinations and when cranked up those flared ports actually had the lowest measured distortion, he seemed to think it was a good idea.  I agree that with low to moderate volumes, at least my best guess is that you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference.  

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On 1/6/2020 at 11:11 PM, MetropolisLakeOutfitters said:

 

I've had Roy tell me in private that he doesn't agree with something or that marketing is blowing smoke, but this aspect wasn't one of them.  He said that he tried various combinations and when cranked up those flared ports actually had the lowest measured distortion, he seemed to think it was a good idea.  I agree that with low to moderate volumes, at least my best guess is that you'd be hard pressed to tell the difference.  

Yes, of course. It's all about airflow. So with a cranked up 5 string bass guitar hitting that low B not at 31 Hz., cranked up on a Cornwall, there is potential for "port chuffing" as a MEASURED IM distortion, no question. So if you are going to modify and upgrade a Cornwall, charge 50% more for it, you had better TWEAK UP everything you can. I do not disagree with what they have done. Sound unheard, and my experience with "the bigger the horn the better the horn" with my 3rd pair of K402's, I would guess that the BIGGEST improvement would be in the MIDRANGE definition, where we live. I have a few friends that heard the C IV and they were blown away by the midrange detail. So, between the bigger horn, the new driver, the new tweeter, better balancing network, I will STILL say, without hesitation, that the Flared Ports are the LEAST of all the improvements made to the C IV, as compared to the network, drivers, and horn improvements.

 

That being said, I lived through the evolution of the American Quality Improvement in Cars after the Japanese kicked Detroit's collective butts. I drove cars off the line as a member of the UAW, then in my late 20's I ended up working in Automotive Electronics Engineering and eventually working as a Quality Engineer/Manager. The best summary is the Japanese kicked our butts in the Quality area by doing 1,000 things 1% BETTER.

 

So the new Cornwall IV has done at least a DOZEN things, including the ports, WAY better than just a measly 1% on cars, it's more like 50-100 percent better, including the ports, but that contribution to the total is still single digit based in comparison to the rest of the improvements.

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2 minutes ago, billybob said:

Think Jack Bruce...

He played a 4 string for most of his career. But lots of bassists play with subharmonic synthesizers (like Stanley Clarke) to hit those super low notes, or Geddy Lee using Taurus Bass Pedals for Limelight (which shook Cobo Arena when I hear them after the Power Windows Album)

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36 minutes ago, ClaudeJ1 said:

He played a 4 string for most of his career. But lots of bassists play with subharmonic synthesizers (like Stanley Clarke) to hit those super low notes, or Geddy Lee using Taurus Bass Pedals for Limelight (which shook Cobo Arena when I hear them after the Power Windows Album)

Should be thinking Moog then.

Jack was the first I remember playing 5 string. He had one at the Royal Albert Hall concert in 05 if memory serves me correctly.

Thanks for the other examples to which am not hip to.

Play bass myself and you are into bass notes on the low side have noted by your writings.

Thanks again...

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1 hour ago, billybob said:

Should be thinking Moog then.

Jack was the first I remember playing 5 string. He had one at the Royal Albert Hall concert in 05 if memory serves me correctly.

Thanks for the other examples to which am not hip to.

Play bass myself and you are into bass notes on the low side have noted by your writings.

Thanks again...

Jack played a 6 string bass in the early Cream days before he switched to a Gibson EB-3 with Marshall Amps. He graduated to a Hartke fretless bass later for the 2005 reunion at the Albert Hall, but that was 4 string.

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41 minutes ago, ClaudeJ1 said:

Jack played a 6 string bass in the early Cream days before he switched to a Gibson EB-3 with Marshall Amps. He graduated to a Hartke fretless bass later for the 2005 reunion at the Albert Hall, but that was 4 string.

Yes now recall the nice wood fretless. Do recall his Hartke

Amps too. Thanks for the trivia

also. Was not trying to be

about flippant the synthesizer

Comment. Like electronic music

like unto Kraftwerk. Moog it seems got superceded over time.

Thanks again for helping me sort

the history.

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On 1/5/2020 at 9:17 PM, dwilawyer said:

My review. 

 

Natural

 

My tune, featuring @dtel's wife and @MetropolisLakeOutfitters Cory

 

 

Hey if you turn your phone 90 degrees you get almost real life and not a truncated slot of life. Just sayin. Seeing this reminds me to ask what ever happened to the free standing Walnut tweeters?

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I don’t blame Roy for not wanting to divulge competitive information, but I’d like to see a disguised comparison between the Cornwall III and IV illustrating the change in both frequency response and distortion from say 30hz to 1000hz. Of course there’s a product line to market, but I’m still thinking......3/4 Klipschorn and 4/5ths LaScala.....

 

I know there’s a lot of chat here about flared ports, woofer location and the new midrange, but what do we know about the crossover especially concerning the woofer and midrange. Extreme slope? 

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22 minutes ago, BeFuddledinMn said:

I don’t blame Roy for not wanting to divulge competitive information, but I’d like to see a disguised comparison between the Cornwall III and IV illustrating the change in both frequency response and distortion from say 30hz to 1000hz.

 

To my ears, the IV sounded noticeably better than the III.

 

As an engineer, I am curious about the details.

 

As an audiophile, I don't care about the details. 

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2 hours ago, BeFuddledinMn said:

I don’t blame Roy for not wanting to divulge competitive information, but I’d like to see a disguised comparison between the Cornwall III and IV illustrating the change in both frequency response and distortion from say 30hz to 1000hz. Of course there’s a product line to market, but I’m still thinking......3/4 Klipschorn and 4/5ths LaScala.....

 

I know there’s a lot of chat here about flared ports, woofer location and the new midrange, but what do we know about the crossover especially concerning the woofer and midrange. Extreme slope? 

 

Exactly. Let's see some actual test data. Loan/ship a single CW III and IV to @Chris A to test. Or a on line audiophile/review source/magazine. As far as trade secrets, how many manufacturers are building something similar to the CW anyway? How many home loudspeaker manufacturers today are employing horns and compression drivers?

 

No doubt the IV is a better version, and most everybody expects it to be when they listen to a pair. But just how much better? Test data is objective, a listener's review opinion is subjective.

How can this hurt Klipsch? Seems to me objective performance data like this would be a great promotional tool for the new model IV. I bet Klipsch engineers have done extensive testing III vs IV.

Why wouldn't you want to actually quantify the improvements/performance data, old model vs new?

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1 hour ago, polizzio said:

Why wouldn't you want to actually quantify the improvements/performance data, old model vs new?

Because people who want to afford $6,000 for a pair of speakers are a minority within a minority of people who don't care about deeper technical details. Dealers have to sell on the sound and looks, but it's mostly an EMOTIONAL reaction to the music that sells it, IMHO.

 

Besides, the Cornwall is the greatest "compromise" loudspeaker originally done by PWK, about 14 years before the landmark paper by Neville Thiele "Loudspeakers in Vented Boxes" was published by the Audio Engineering Society. PWK was able to design a box that used the exact same drivers as the Klipshorn, which was a top notch engineering feat to begin with. That being said, some would argue that the Belle Klipsch and LaScala are the greatest "compromise" speaker with their shorter bass horns, but this is beyond the scope of this thread. PWK always said the optimum size for a speaker was a Klipshorn.

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1 hour ago, ClaudeJ1 said:

Because people who want to afford $6,000 for a pair of speakers are a minority within a minority of people who don't care about deeper technical details. Dealers have to sell on the sound and looks, but it's mostly an EMOTIONAL reaction to the music that sells it, IMHO.

 

Yes, key word being EMOTIONAL.

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20 hours ago, polizzio said:

Exactly. Let's see some actual test data. Loan/ship a single CW III and IV to @Chris A to test...

 

Thanks for the vote of confidence. :blush2:

 

Much of what I've learned about loudspeaker tests I've learned on my own via reading, taking measurements, and listening closely (something that I think even some loudspeaker design engineers don't really get enough time to do).  The sparse comments that Roy has made here and in person about loudspeaker tests and performance have served to guide my efforts and learning.  I'm still learning.

 

20 hours ago, polizzio said:

...As far as trade secrets, how many manufacturers are building something similar to the CW anyway? How many home loudspeaker manufacturers today are employing horns and compression drivers?  No doubt the IV is a better version, and most everybody expects it to be when they listen to a pair. But just how much better? Test data is objective, a listener's review opinion is subjective...Seems to me objective performance data like this would be a great promotional tool for the new model IV. I bet Klipsch engineers have done extensive testing III vs IV...

This argument actually goes back at least 67 years (1951)--when the RIAA was formed and the member companies then refused to set any loudspeaker or audio electronics standards--and the Audio Engineering Society goes back even further, and they, too, failed to set standards for loudspeaker performance that are anything more that cursory. 

 

The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) and European Broadcasting Union (EBU) both have pretty good standards for testing loudspeakers, and if you go back 25 years you'll see Klippel white papers that apparently started the drive toward standardization of all kinds of loudspeaker tests--most notably nonlinear distortion tests (nonlinear here means the distortion changes with output SPL).  Klipsch owns at least one Klippel test rig (according to Klippel).  These are not inexpensive pieces of equipment, probably in the range of $7k to $65k (US) depending on all the different testing modules/equipment that you can use.  Klipsch design engineers have the data from these test rigs available to them and likely make use of at least some of it--as well as their largest competitors (Harman/JBL, Meyer, etc.).  Many smaller loudspeaker manufacturing concerns use third-party testing houses to test their loudspeakers to create useful engineering data.

 

In the commercial cinema environment, the customers generally don't buy equipment unless EASE data is easily available to compare competing loudspeakers.  Klipsch has posted this data for their professional cinema models in the past--although the last time I looked, they made it only available to those potential cinema customers by request.  I have a few of these EASE data files for the cinema products from a few years ago--and they're pretty extensive in terms of SPL/phase response, polar coverage, etc.

 

So...there are customers out there that demand data--and get it, just not in the consumer marketplace unfortunately.

 

20 hours ago, polizzio said:

..No doubt the IV is a better version, and most everybody expects it to be when they listen to a pair. But just how much better? Test data is objective, a listener's review opinion is subjective.  How can this hurt Klipsch?...Why wouldn't you want to actually quantify the improvements/performance data, old model vs new?

 

Unfortunately (yet again), there are so many poorly informed "audiophiles" (candidly, that wouldn't know the world's best performing loudspeaker from a Bose 901...and no, the Bose 901 has never been a good loudspeaker by engineering standards--it's pretty awful).  What this means is that unscrupulous competitors can use the data posted for consumer loudspeakers inaccurately and in rhetorical (i.e., marketing) arguments--and not for engineering or informed consumer use--as I've advocated and tried to expand on in this forum. 

 

To give you a data point on how much consumers (even in this forum) don't use the data that's made available to them, last week I made a post of the kind of data that I think is relevant for home hi-fi consumers to use (i.e., not so much the measurements that I'd pick for commercial cinema, which are subtly different).  There were no comments or questions on this post, even though I think it is important enough to discuss--at length.  

 

Rich Place ( @rplace) has started a thread to discuss these type of measurements in context of DSP crossovers, but note that these same measurements are also important for exclusively passive crossover users--perhaps even more so, since they typically won't become aware of these important measures, thinking that ignorance is bliss (...it isn't, by the way).  I thank Rich once again for his willingness to "dive into the deep end...without floats" and ask beginners questions for all others who are not asking those questions. 

________________________________________________________________________________

 

As far as the Cornwall IV, I can see some of why a lot of people like what they're hearing--mostly midrange and tweeter driver/horn overhaul and I can only guess what Roy did with the crossover (although if someone were to open up a Cornwall IV and take a picture of the crossover--or perhaps even post a schematic--it would be much less of a mystery).  I do congratulate Roy on the CW-IV design as being Guttenberg's "Loudspeaker of the Year".  That's saying a lot, since there are so many factors (and so many non-technical ones, like the art of making loudspeakers that consumers will like--rather just make them accurate reproducers).  The original Cornwall design seemed to be PWK's upgrade from the Heresy (model "H"), and Roy has taken that design and really done something with it--enough to get real notice.  If there was a time that Klipsch could use that added reputation boost, now is a good time.

 

Chris

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