How did you discover Klipsch speakers?

[dtel]

Yes 14 years, had to go back and look at pictures to see the date. Yes it was the first time I met anyone from this forum, they NEVER look like you think from talking with them.

 

I know your not angry,  it was a long time ago and you moved on to bigger and better, being one of the first two to buy Jubes, or the first, I can't remember, and that was a long time ago. 

[twistedcrankcammer]

32 minutes ago, dtel said:

Yes 14 years, had to go back and look at pictures to see the date. Yes it was the first time I met anyone from this forum, they NEVER look like you think from talking with them.

 

I know your not angry,  it was a long time ago and you moved on to bigger and better, being one of the first two to buy Jubes, or the first, I can't remember, and that was a long time ago. 

 

 

I don't know Eldon, I think I look exactly like the ******* you called me ??

 

Rog 

[TasDom]

Received a Bestbuy e mail blast in my junk folder for 50% off on some Icon speakers around 9 years ago. Had just bought a new TV so figured why not. I didn't know if my Pioneer receiver was capable and while researching, I discovered this forum.

 

Next thing I knew, the folks here had me selling the BB special, ordering RF-7II's, matching center, surrounds and going with separates (pre/pro & amps) I should have walked away then but all the Heritage and Pro speaker talk peaked my curiosity. Too much stuff to list since then and I hold this forum responsible.

 

Sad thing is I'd do it all over again... 

[dtel]

13 hours ago, twistedcrankcammer said:

 

 

I don't know Eldon, I think I look exactly like the ******* you called me ??

 

Rog 

No you don't, you just drive me crazy sometimes.  But you do seem to be doing better. 

[dtel]

13 hours ago, TasDom said:

Too much stuff to list since then and I hold this forum responsible.

And rightly so, I know exactly what you mean.

[artto]

It was 1973.

 

I had a pretty good stereo system for a young college kid.

 

Crown D-60/IC150, Thorens turntable w/B&O pickup, JBL L-100 speakers.

 

I also used JBL in my guitar/bass amps. I was a big JBL fan.

 

One day I decided I wanted to get a radio tuner to round out the system. Off to Hi-Fi Hutch because they carried McIntosh and McIntosh made one of the best tuner. They also happened to be the only Klipsch dealer in the Chicago area at the time. I had never heard of Klipsch.

 

At Hi-Fi Hutch, the usual sales person approach asking what’s my system like, etc. Then the guy says “Why do you want to spend that much money on a radio? If instead you use that money and trade in your speakers or sell them and put that toward a better pair of speakers you’ll have a much better sounding system.

 

HFH was also a JBL dealer so my attention turned to JBL L-200. The dealer says listen to these……….(Klipsch Cornwalls). I tried a few things that altered the sound balance, different preamp/power amp gain settings, EQ, etc. But no matter what I did, I couldn’t get the JBL to sound like the Klipsch. I could make the Cornwalls sound very similar to the L200, but not the other way around. The L-200 obviously had some sort of coloration that I couldn’t get rid of. I ordered a pair of Cornwalls on the spot (3 month wait back then) for little more than what the McIntosh tuner would have cost me. The rest is history.

[NBPK402]

In 1997 while stationed at Peterson AFB in Colorado Springs, I went to a shop called The Audio Library, and I heard some Khorns, Infinity Reference, and Cerwin Vega S1 or 2s (not sure which but they were the bigger ones). I liked all of the ones I listened to b ut they were way out of my budget. Then in 1979 while Stationed at RAF Alconbury, I went to RAF Lakenheath and saw the Cerwin Vegas again and picked up a pair of the smaller S ones. Before I left in 1980, I was at Lakenheath again, and got a chance to buy a pair of LaScalas off the floor that they had just put on the floor the day before, and sold the Cerwin Vegas. I still remember the demo... the rep was demoing some ESS bookshelf speakers with a Phase Linear 700 (they were cranking), and I asked if I could hear the La Scalas... Radar Love was playing the drum solo when he switched them, and I was standing only a few feet away. I had no idea how efficient they were nor was there much further I could have stood away...when he switched them I felt like someone had punched me hard in the stomach! I told the saleman I wanted them, and he got aporoval to sell me the pair for $1200...not sure if it was a deal or not, but there was no tax, and when I shipped out they were crated and shipped as my personal effects free.

 

I had them for a year or two and then did not have the space for them, so I sold them. I went through various speakers over the next 30 years until I found another pair for $500 (not in good shape). I kept them for a while and then started modding them, and eventually gave them to a friend.

 

Fast forward to 2016, and I saw Chris As post about the MEHs, and I now have 3 that will be ready for tuning soon.

 

Sent from my SM-T830 using Tapatalk

 

 

 

 

[Rivervalleymgb]

I moved to Hope in 1976. The rest is history!

[jimmytamp]

I was looking for a 5.1 system for my HT in 2008 and the shop I bought from has a complete Klipsch Reference 62 which I decided to get. Got my first 1981 Cornwall 1. I’m still having all my Klipsch till now.

[DizRotus]

My interest in hi-fi started in high school.  My father had built a mono system using kits from Heathkit.

 

In college I was exposed to the killer stereos owned by “rich kids,” but no Klipsch. The first Klipsch I heard were at Almas Hi-Fi in Birmingham, MI.  They had a room full of all things Heritage and McIntosh.  

 

A few years later, ~1975, I was assembling a system for a mobile DJ business.  I was all set to purchase a pair of Klipschorn Decorators for approximately $800 each from Hi-Fidelity Workshop ( @ClaudeJ1) in Royal Oak, MI to be powered by Crown.  Before I sealed the deal I decided to purchase four factory built Speakerlab SKhorns and a Dynaco ST-400 kit for about the same money as the Crown and Klipsch pair.

 

The Speakerlabs and Dynaco are long gone, but the appreciation of the high efficiency and low distortion of horns has seen me own every Klipsch original Heritage product over the years.  Like a disciple, I’ve exposed many others to Klipsch, especially through the La Scalas and Heresys I put in local school band rooms.

 

My brother and both my sons listen to Klipsch daily.

[DizRotus]

Double post.  Move along.  Nothing to see here.

[DizRotus]

On 6/16/2020 at 6:20 AM, Rivervalleymgb said:

I moved to Hope in 1976. The rest is history!

 

I wonder if the market penetration of Klipsch in the greater Hope community is greater than the national average.  I suspect it is.  Nonetheless, I’m reminded of Tim Cahill’s excellent interview of PWK in Rolling Stone Magazine, where he wrote:

 

“Most of the townsfolk don’t really know what all goes on at Klipsch and Associates, out there down the road a couple miles in the tiny rural town of Oak Haven. ‘Them hairy sons of ******* make radios huh,’ is a typical reply.”

 

 

[Dave A]

Back in 1981 an instrument tech from the Baton Rouge Exxon refinery invited me over to hear his stereo system. Meh, ok I guess and over I go. He had two goofy looking things in the corners of his living room, two more diagonally out from them , one chair, one coffee table and one receiver. So he puts on Toccata in D Minor and Mellancamps Crumbling down. The look on my face must have been priceless as he went out and came back with his db meter which read 113db and we could still actually speak and hear each other. About 22 years later I was going to Orlando for a welding job and decided for the heck of it to see if there were any Klipsch for sale there. Bought twp pairs of LS for $1800 and it has been downhill since.

 

  Oh, his system was a set of KHorns and LS's. He told me every once in a while people would break in to get his stereo but they never took the ugly big black box looking things.

[ClaudeJ1]

1 hour ago, DizRotus said:

I was all set to purchase a pair of Klipschorn Decorators for approximately $800 each from Hi-Fidelity Workshop ( @ClaudeJ1) in Royal Oak, MI to be powered by Crown.

Back in 1967, I moved to Detroit's "West Side" near Henry Ford High schools (where I eventually took Driver's Ed. Classes). I lived 1/2 block away from a public Library, and 4 1/2 Blocks from the Hi Fi Workshop's Original Location (which, I was told, had been visited by PWK many times). I had a Detroit News route by 1968 (early teens) and used to ride my bike with a bag full of newspapers by the Hi Fi Workshop 7 days a week. They had Walnut Klipschorns in the Window of the store where you could see the back side of these huge speakers, and they were usually playing classical music, unless someone was there specifically to hear other products with other demo music. I had been building bigger and bigger speakers throughout my teens, but it took me until 1977, at 23 before I got my first Bank Loan to establish credit, co-signed by my new wife at the time..............for $1,000.........in order to buy some Klipshorns Style C Birch Raw (KCBR), which are now owned by one of my brother's high scholl friends. I asked to buy them back, he said NO, but he would leave them to me in his will!!! LOL. Of course, this was about 10 years later and the Hi Fi Workshop store had moved to Birmingham, a rich Detroit Suburb on Woodward Avenue between Detroit and Pontiac.

 

Not sure if kids today still have newspaper routes in Detroit, but if the same model Khorn was still available (Baltic Birch Plywood, and it's NOT), they would be paying a little over $8,000 INFLATED to buy the same thing. I did sell them to my friend for $1,800 INFLATED about 20 years ago (Y2K), which is the same NUMBER of 1977 Dollars I paid for them, not including the former 4% Sales Tax, now 6% in Michigan.

 

What did I do with the money you ask? I bought another pair of WALNUT Oiled Khorns from my Brother as an "aesthetic upgrade" which I had for an additional 7 years, so I spend 30 years as a Klipschorn owner with a mono center channel LaScala, until I heard Jubilees and MCM PRO Klipsch systems, so I went for even BIGGER stuff since then, and more of it for Home Theater. What a great "Klipsch disease" to have for a lifetime, eh?

 

I have influenced the Klipsch speaker purchases of friends and family for many years. My kids (and my ex wife) have Heresys, friends with Cornwalls, LaScalas and Khorns (including Jubilees). Ex girlfriend with Fortes and KG surrounds, Chorus I, Chorus II, etc. heck I even had KG-2's in my CAR!!! Great disease, is it not?

 

[ClaudeJ1]

On 6/7/2020 at 12:08 PM, buckaroo said:

I first heard Klipsch speakers in a dealer showroom in the mid 1980's. A pair of Brand new LaScala pair. Wow!  At that time I ended up purchasing DCM Time Window pair. My first Klisch pair was the modest KG 2.2 model in the mid 1990's. Then I spent several years using various high end "studio monitors. In 2014 I bought a Heresy III pair. I have not changed out speakers since buying the Heresy III model...but I still love the sound of the LaScala the best.

 

Buck

When I was an Audio Engineering Society member, we visited the DCM offices in Ann Arbor, where Steve Eberbach (sp?) showed us the design philosophy of the "Time Windows" using the Philips tweeter with an 8" woofer. I was impressed with the way those were designed with the "cardboard reflex" bass loading. Later, I met a Ford Motor Engineer that had Khorn bass bins with Time Windows on top. Great combo, but I never heard it.

[ClaudeJ1]

On 6/14/2020 at 5:52 PM, Negatron said:

Fast forward to 2016, and I saw Chris As post about the MEHs, and I now have 3 that will be ready for tuning soon.

Since you have mentioned some non-Klipsch speakers, you forgot to mention the 3 Quarter Pies you built for you California Home Theater (which were a Klipsch MWM derived bass bin). You held down the "fast forward" button for too long. LOL.

[ClaudeJ1]

2 hours ago, DizRotus said:

 

I wonder if the market penetration of Klipsch in the greater Hope community is greater than the national average.  I suspect it is.  Nonetheless, I’m reminded of Tim Cahill’s excellent interview of PWK in Rolling Stone Magazine, where he wrote:

 

“Most of the townsfolk don’t really know what all goes on at Klipsch and Associates, out there down the road a couple miles in the tiny rural town of Oak Haven. ‘Them hairy sons of ******* make radios huh,’ is a typical reply.”

 

 

That was a great article, which influenced me very much.

[OO1]

1 hour ago, ClaudeJ1 said:

 

I have influenced the Klipsch speaker purchases of friends and family for many years. My kids (and my ex wife) have Heresys, friends with Cornwalls, LaScalas and Khorns (including Jubilees). Ex girlfriend with Fortes and KG surrounds, Chorus I, Chorus II, etc. heck I even had KG-2's in my CAR!!! Great disease, is it not?

 

to put it simply , when I first bought klipsch speakers , it was based on your posts  , so yeah , I got into klipsch speakers listening to your advice , tx Claude -

[OO1]

On 6/11/2020 at 11:51 AM, dtel said:

Very true they were the best kind FREE, I won them at a Pilgrimage, and to think when they pulled my name I was hoping for a T-shirt

 

right ,-they usually , say ,  the ones who expect it the least end up being the unexpected winners -  it's a karma thing  , well congrats on the Cornwalls  -

[OO1]

2 hours ago, DizRotus said:

 

“Most of the townsfolk don’t really know what all goes on at Klipsch and Associates, out there down the road a couple miles in the tiny rural town of Oak Haven. ‘Them hairy sons of ******* make radios huh,’ is a typical reply.”

the Townsfolk didn't know much about PWK's Radios back then ,  but the entire HIFI world did take notice , and it never stopped -