Color me puzzled. The Klipsch La Scalas sound bloody marvelous!
- Thread starter godofwealth
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Really , Why ? Perhaps you might expand upon your comment a little further .
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The Klipschorn is not just any speaker. It’s rated 105 dB in efficiency. Even one watt into a KHorn will blow your eardrums. It’s tailored for a SET amp. With my La Scalas, about the same efficiency, I’ve tried a variety of solid state amplifiers, from very pricey ones to Pass’ First Watt. Compared to any of my three SETs, they uniformly suck IMHO. But it’s just my opinion. If you like the sound of solid state amplifiers on a horn, knock yourself out. I don’t.
My old Pass Aleph 3 stereo amp sounded very good on my Vitavox corner horns, but not as nice as the Lamm ML2s. I have considered trying some FirstWatt SIT amps for the summer time because of heat. The Aleph 3 gets very hot, don't know about the SITs.
Well … It is known that PWK utilised modified Brook 10C Pre amplification and modified Brook 12A amplification during the design and voicing of the Khorn … the output tubes being 2A3 configured to run in Push Pull mode producing 5 / 10 Watts , the system appears to have been designated 12A-KI .
PWK utilised a number of disparate amplifiers over the years to run the Klipsch demo room KHorns, up to and including Adcom GFA 555 ( Solid State , 200W into 8 ohms ) , as far as I am aware Non were SET topology.
At one point Saul Marantz personally built a pair of mono tube amps specifically forPWK , they were Not SET amplification.
Up to his passing PWK ran with McIntosh for his personal home system , as far as I am aware McIntosh have never manufactured a SET amplifier.
From at least the mid 80's PWK used a Crown D75 to power the left/right Khorns and a BGW Model 100 to power a Belle center channel in the Klipsch demo room.
Of course most SET topology appears suited to drive transducers of such high sensitivity from a power output level perspective , however they are not the only topology that can be utilised imho .
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Curious. I owned Klipsch in the 70's and the LaScalla drivers were not time aligned [nor were the K-Horns]. Has that been remedied in the newer versions?
I've been running Klipschorns for some years now, in stock form the limitations easily heard. Certainly far more sense of performers in room vs. dynamic compression speakers, but timbre, tonality left me wanting. End result I wanted to retain best aspects of khorns while improving anomalies I heard. I ended up changing out all three drivers, Volti tractrix horns on mids, custom baffle on tweeters, with tweeter baffle I can physically time align tweet with mids. Also completely went over type A crossovers, with all point to point wiring, Jantzen inductors, Jupiter and Audyn True Copper Max caps.
So now I have khorns that image, have much better tonal balance, more natural timbre, even greater resolving/transparency. This while retaining that magical Klipsch Heritage sense of live performers in room.
I much prefer all tubes with the khorns, custom build 300B monoblocks with Duelund CAST, Texas Components TX2575 vs push pull or SS amps, prefer modded Coincident Statement pre vs Pass XP-22. These particular khorns, tuned exactly to my preferences will never leave me.
So now I have khorns that image, have much better tonal balance, more natural timbre, even greater resolving/transparency. This while retaining that magical Klipsch Heritage sense of live performers in room.
I much prefer all tubes with the khorns, custom build 300B monoblocks with Duelund CAST, Texas Components TX2575 vs push pull or SS amps, prefer modded Coincident Statement pre vs Pass XP-22. These particular khorns, tuned exactly to my preferences will never leave me.
Until (fairly) recently, I had 2 stereo systems: one with Magneplanar 3.7i's for when I wanted to immerse myself in detail; and one with LaScalas when I wanted, as they say, "to ROCK"! I can't think of two speakers more diametrically opposed than maggies and Klipsch, but I truly did love them both. And, depending on my mood or my motivation, either was the best in the world, for me.
As I have - uh - aged, I've decided to not subject myself to the 120dB peaks any more and I settled on one system with 30.7s. They are the loudest "good" speakers - or are they the best "fairly loud" speakers? I never heard the IRS, but I imagine it was both good and loud.
If I was young again and less concerned about ear bleed, I would own Klipsch Jubilees - I owned them briefly in my transitioning stage.
As I have - uh - aged, I've decided to not subject myself to the 120dB peaks any more and I settled on one system with 30.7s. They are the loudest "good" speakers - or are they the best "fairly loud" speakers? I never heard the IRS, but I imagine it was both good and loud.
If I was young again and less concerned about ear bleed, I would own Klipsch Jubilees - I owned them briefly in my transitioning stage.
Nice,
did the Jubilees go some way to addressing the issues you mentioned with KHorn's?
I still have and enjoy my La Scalas. Since it’s been beastly hot in the Bay Area, unless you live on the coast, I’m running mine with an Eversolo DMP-A8 server/DAC — the best bang for the buck in digital today — with a true digital Lyngdorf 2170 PWM integrated amp. I use RoomPerfect room correction and use a pair of massive REL G1 Mk2 Gibraltar subs for low bass. It sounds really nice. Not like my Soundlab G9/7c, which is my ultra reference loudspeaker, nothing in the world can touch the large SL, but the La Scalas are much smaller in size, quite a bit chunkier and I have mine bang against the back wall. They have a kind of old fashioned horn sound that goes well with certain types of music. Of course, they go loud, but I play mine at relatively low volumes. No plan to upgrade to the newer AL6 since I use RoomPerfect room correction. No interest in the Jubilees which look grotesque. The La Scalas are the nicest looking horn speakers in the world — they just look like furniture. The KHorns take less room, but you need corners and the frequency response is not as flat as the Scalas (as measured by Hi-Fi News and Record Review).
Sorry I have been off of here for a while.
Rob, The Jubilees are almost magical. Great dynamics and fairly deep (and very hard-hitting) bass, without the "boom and shriek" of the original KHorns (or Altec's VOTT, which I have also owned). 80 years of production OUGHT to yield some improvements - and they have/are.
I am often "amused" by how staunchly people defend what they happen to own, now. I have owned so many speakers in my life I'd have to sit down and write a list. And ALL of them have their merits. There were speakers that SHOULDN'T sound good by design, but did ((DQ10's, as an example. Seriously? a $5 piezo tweeter!) and there were speakers that were so cheap that they shouldn't sound good, but did (Radio Shack's Mach One). But EVERYTHING I have experienced fall into one of the two camps: "good" or "loud" - I have never experienced both from a pair of speakers. I think, but do not know, that the IRS probably did both. I had some Reference Standard 2.5's and some 4.5's and both sounded really good to me at the time.
Give the Jubilees an audition. They might fit YOUR bill.
Rob, The Jubilees are almost magical. Great dynamics and fairly deep (and very hard-hitting) bass, without the "boom and shriek" of the original KHorns (or Altec's VOTT, which I have also owned). 80 years of production OUGHT to yield some improvements - and they have/are.
I am often "amused" by how staunchly people defend what they happen to own, now. I have owned so many speakers in my life I'd have to sit down and write a list. And ALL of them have their merits. There were speakers that SHOULDN'T sound good by design, but did ((DQ10's, as an example. Seriously? a $5 piezo tweeter!) and there were speakers that were so cheap that they shouldn't sound good, but did (Radio Shack's Mach One). But EVERYTHING I have experienced fall into one of the two camps: "good" or "loud" - I have never experienced both from a pair of speakers. I think, but do not know, that the IRS probably did both. I had some Reference Standard 2.5's and some 4.5's and both sounded really good to me at the time.
Give the Jubilees an audition. They might fit YOUR bill.
Hi mate,
thanks so much for the detailed reply, i suspected the improvements would be as you described.
With regards to Danley sound multi entry horn, i think they are a brilliant concept and design!
The synergy horn is esentially a horn with 4 mid drivers firing from the side and a HF driver radiating from the horn throat, genius really, as it now become a point source. Super efficient, compact, excellent directivity etc, just need to cover low frequencies.
Tom is a very clever fellow, i think the SH50 is a model many people have tried to use in a home environment. Though i think they are designed as a far, or near field(can't remember)monitor so don't work so well in a lounge room.
The Tapped horn is something different, an enclosure design that lends to super efficient bass.
A couple of people have allocated considerable time and effort to implement the synergy horn in a domestic setting.
One of them is member here, can't find that this moment.
Also
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I’ll hold my opinion on the Jubilees till I see some measurements that justify their high price. The Kliipschorn measures rather poorly compared to the La Scalas. Interesting concept of a corner loaded horn. But it doesn’t really work. See measurements in Stereophile or Hi-Fi News and Recird Review. Many decades ago, Audio magazine ran a detailed set of measurements on the KHorn that showed the same erratic performance. The Jubilees are the same design except for the active crossover. If Klipsch wants to do this properly, they need to integrate DSP into the design.
BTW, i believe it absolutely possible to achieve good and loud!
It just requires great engineering, design and manufacturing which costs $$.
And then you will also end up with a speaker that is going to be large, no way around physics. Which almost nobody will buy,and or the wife won't allow such a monstrosity in the living room.
No point investing all that time, money and expertise into a product you can only sell to a very! limited market.
That's why we don't see many examples of such products.
IMO
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Look at these measurements of the corner loaded KHorn. It’s a train wreck. It doesn’t work. Perhaps with DSP it might. Like I said, let’s see if the Jubilees fare better.
www.hifinews.com
Klipsch Klipschorn AK6 Loudspeaker Lab Report
Lab Report Such is the difference in acoustic centres/path lengths of the drivers – between the treble and mid/bass horns in particular – that the wavefront from the former arrives significantly ahead of the latter, complicating the time-windowed response measurement. The step function at the...
www.hifinews.com
Agreed, Rob (and others). Like I said (admittedly just an educated guess) the IRS from the early 80's PROBABLY did both and, yes, it is quite LARGE: 4 columns nearly 8 feet high and 28" wide (bass) or nearly 4 feet wide (mids and tweets). I believe a pair had 12: 12" woofers, 24: ribbon mids, and 72: ribbon tweeters. So, their approached is make a good speaker, multiply it by 12 and - with a "Hoover Dam" amp to drive it - it WILL get loud. I wish I had made the effort to find and listen to it...
RE: the Khorn: I had never seen specs, before. And, I have no doubt the LaScala is better (which is, coincidentally, is what I owned). I guess if you're listening to System of a Down at full-tilt, it doesn't really matter that the response is erratic..?
Hence: my "own two systems" mentality.
Hence: my "own two systems" mentality.
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