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Rogue Audio Tempest II


Christina

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The Tempest is a great sounding amp. I never have liked the LaScalla however. If you use a pair of powered subs with them, then they are more tolerable but they are overall way to big and "honky" sounding for my tastes. Even after modifying them, they just didn't do it for me. You have to have a HUGE room and sit miles back before they sound decent at all IMO and with the addition of the subs they become even more bulky and expensive. So they are not for everyone. They work best in full scale, commercial theaters, not for smaller rooms in the average home.

The Tempest may be a little noisey on them also as those amps use 6SN7 tubes and I find that they all have some tube rush or develop it at some point if they don't have much when new. It is hard to find an amp that is not noisey on those speakers as they are just too loud in the upper mids. I guess you can tell that I really don't like the LaScallas, eh ;-)? I am a Rogue Audio dealer and so I have a lot of their gear here in the showroom. I don't have a Tempest at the moment but I do have a Perseus and Atlas combination which I really like and which is very similar to the Cronus. The Cronus is more affordable and should also be more more reliable than the Tempest as it has less parts and also uses more affordable tubes. I will try that with my Cornwalls and see how that pairs up. I suppose the Cornwalls could be seen as less efficient K-horns so they will be a bit fuller sounding than the LaScalla and also allow for closer seating.

In the past, I have found the best sounding amplifier for the LaScalla to be a Rega Brio integrated amplifier. No noise and very sweet sounding with the best tonal balance possible. I have the latest version of that here and also one at home so I will try it with the Cornwall also. I may decide to keep the Cornwall pair if I can get them in the house and the wife doesn't shoot me. I don't really see that happening though. I lack about 4 feet on that wall to really make it a good fit. It's doable but there is a window there in the middle of the wall and I don't like the idea of having a corner of a speaker or of the stereo stand in front of it. Not that big of a deal really I guess. I will wait and see what I think of them here with the Brio first. If they sound good here, they will sound great there as the showroom doesn't allow for very good bass performance or a far enough listening distance.

-Bill

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All Klipsch heritage speakers are pesky and require great care in upstream components and also benefit from some upgrades in the crossover department. Lascala's are the extreme end of this. Lascala's do not require a large room to sound wonderful in fact I've found the reverse to be true. But the upstream components have to be just right. No sub woofers required.........IMHO

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Hi,

I can't agree about the distance or frequency points at all. I do agree about the pesky nature of them but they simply do not go very deep at all and they are way to large for anything but a 20' or so seating distance. The same is true with the big Altecs. I could never get used to these speakers at any distance much closer. I have a showroom where it is possible to get 50' away from a speaker and at that point, the frequencies from the drivers converge nicely but much closer and they beam and blare big time. Getting only 8' - 10' back or so like most rooms require and you are way off axis of the driver/s of your choice ;-). I have a customer who has a pair of smaller Altecs with a coxially mounted horn HF driver and those sound pretty nice at about 10' or so. Vintage response, but nice. My favorite higher efficiency speakers are Tannoy Dual Concentrics. No problems at all with integration. They can also be too big for some rooms but for another reason; they have serious bass!

-Bill

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I'd love to get you in my room. I bet money you would be doing the mad search for a sub woofer[;)] and this mind you is with zero tone controls or EQ's. Then I would march you up to me second room with bone stock Lascala's and less effort to over all system/room tuning and you would say "see they sound like dung". Lascala's can and do sound excellent near field but you have to spend the time and energy to tune all aspects of the system. They are pesky buggers but can net you great rewards for your trouble. Both rooms are near field setups.

In large rooms Lascala's sound very thin and PA like without low frequency reinforcement. In that environment the low frequency reinforcement has to be fast and quick to have a prayer of working. Were talking big buck sub woofers like the new Reference or THX line to name a few Klispch models.

Craig

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FYI...on the Rogue Tempest II...I've got one that I'm using with CWIII's and happy with it. The amp has done much better since driving it with a Peach from Juicy Music...seems to give me a bit more "volume" and better stage definition then before. Hope that helps some...Hopkins

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