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The Fives have been run with everything on the shelves now, includes using units that were not even candidates for the shootout. Most have done nicely with the speakers but, each has in some small way unbalanced the sound, some emphasized the bass, some the mids and some the high end. Different units also affected the dynamics. Then the usual coloration, instrument and voice shifts. It seemed like I needed to look outside for something that would take the best of each and bring it together. None were bad but in toto the exercise told me I had slipped back into that audiophile mode. My equivalent of alcoholism.
I even started thinking of looking for another Sherwood S5000II and having it gone through just to give it a shot.
Anthony Newman Romantic Master works for Organ, a recording of the River Organ at The Episcopal Church of the Holy Trinity in NYC. This has been a nasty for the amp's and Fives. With some the bass and impact of a big pipe organ was not quite there. With others it was very much there but the higher range seemed slightly overwhelmed by it, especially in the more complex passages. A couple lost all the sense of the air of the pipes while at least one brought it out too much. About 6 minutes into the recording there is a sustained note with tremolo. With the big Sony and Sherwood it came through with ease. Others had not hint of the tremolo, it was too smeared and with on it was there, then disappeared, I suspect the power supply just could not keep up with the demand for as long as needed.
Another issue for me, at least was the sound stage. With allocate them, the biggest of sitting center of a massive church pipe organ seemed off. Not tall enough and wide enough, wide enough but not tall or the opposite. With some it seemed I was closer to one section of pipes and with other setups closer to the other section. I suspected it was mic'd somewhere in the center.
Using Holst, The Planets I am presented with a challenge. My Canadian mix includes presentations from Berlin, Slovakia and, Pretoria. Not bad but having to reconcile several orchestras is a further challenge. The passages that should relax and distress sometimes do not and with complex passage the entire presentation can just fold the cart and die. One day I have to get a better recording. The one advantage with this recording is that if there is some weakness down stream it likely will give you some unhappy listening somewhere during the listening experience. With each amp, it showed how good it can be as a test recording. Without going into detail, only one amp got through the torture test relatively unscathed.
I won't bore you any longer with this tale. None of the units were clear losers though a couple did not stay in the test very long as they were clearly being outclassed. Most surprisingly was the H-K 630. Even with the less that seller preamp section I thought the power amp section would,do be strong enough to carry it. I could have thrown on the outboard preamp but decided it would be unfair. The Philips 785 was even more surprising. As magical as it is with the ADS L300 speakers it and the Fives did not hit it off at all. I think each unit that made it through for many would be a keeper. It boils down to individual taste and listening priorities.
Not in this round of testing of the larger one I have been doing was a loner, sitting quietly, unassuming on a shelf in a corner. I knew it was there and it not even considered as a possible contender. I had even tried a JVC briefly early on, that is disregarded this little guy was in my eyes for this testing.
Last night not long before closing. For the night I looked at it again and against every fiber in me said what the heck, it might as well go through the hookup and have its self respect totally destroyed. Put it in system and put in the organ cd briefly, switched to the Fives and, hopefully,do on; so.ething is terribly wrong. I listened for about 10 minutes to get a taste of the organ and that sustained note. Almost perfectly done. Not too dominate, tremolo there the entire time with not waver or loss towards the end. Overall balance as to seating seemed about right. Sound stage horizontally and vertically very good. At this point I stopped as I was tired, and began to think I had ear fatigue or something.
This morning I went through each recording with just the Fives. As I went through my rough notes for each combination with the Fives, I discovered the little orphan did not have the same bad points and even bettered most of the good points. I have not even switched to the Wharfedales at this point as the Fives are Singing so well. One thing that has struck me as interesting has been the volume level where the speakers have opened up. With every amp, I clearly had to have them at a level above my target of a polite level that would not disturb the next door neighbor in an apartment. The Fives opened up up nicely at a level with this unit above the Wharfedales and Heresy IIs bit, not by much. The criteria as to music level was met.
When you read comments about the Fives, they vary. Many coated them to the AR3a and suggest they fail because the bass is not as pronounced. Other think the mids are too forward, etc. The general consensus is there is an imbalance in the overall frequency range that is there downfall. I do not understand this as many of these same persons prefer the AR but, do not find a similar problem while those few detractors find the bass overpowering the mids and highs. In this I agree and never have cards for the 3 series though admit they are a powerful speaker that can be impressive. The Fives on the other hand even back when we sold them never garnered that type of praise. We found them to be unassuming and could be in the right system just lost as a component and the music takes over. Here, I am finding it again. The bass is not over whelming the other ranges, it is not too forward, not too bright. With complex passages and this amp things do not get mashed up and fail. Okay, what is this orphan?
The KLH Twenty-Seven. Yep, that brainchild of Kloss from the same period as the speakers. Back then there was an assumption that it was used to voice the KLH speakers in development at the time with the Sixteen amp but, no one at KLH would ever confirm it. I do not remember pairing them back then in systems or displays so this is a new experience. In fact though Framers was a full line KLH dealer I do not remember them even carrying the receiver. Maybe the Wellesley store had it because of its different market but, Peabody, Boston nor Hanover had it. Tech also did not stock it. I remember Audio Lab in Cambridge did display the receiver, tuner and amp as it was the only store where I ever saw all 3.
At this point I am going to out on a limited and say I believe our suspicion as to the amp or amps used in voicing at least the Five was the Twenty-Seven and Sixteen. I would venture a guess the Twelve, Six, Seven and others of the period were also voiced with them. The synergy between the receiver and Fives is too great to assume otherwise.
At this time, the KLH pair will stick as a final choice as pairing. I am playing these recordings with the Wharfedale W70s as I type this missive and so far not has arisen to suggest it may not be as good a match to them. It seems to maybe even doing better in presentation and negating the issues that showed with the other units on the W70s. If this turns out to be correct, the the KLH Twenty-Seven could become my main unit and the fight then concentrates only on whether the Fives or W70s become the speakers in that system. When that happens, everything else kicking around will go to a new home.
Don Brian Levy, J.D.
Toronto ON Canada
Follow Ups:
The KLH Twenty-Seven did not play all that well with the Wharfedales. It seems to collapse and restrictions the music as the volume increased but the amp was well below clipping.In the end, to run both sets of speakers it came down to the Philips 797 and 796 and Sherwood S9500c amp and S3300 tuner. The Philips in the end did better overall but, although it seems strange, I decided to go with the Sherwoods for now. Hard to explain the reasoning as I am not quite surely myself. It just might be the difference in the perceived quality based on the looks, The Sherwoods look like the quality is there while the Philips look like a cost accountant created or authorized the dial scale, faceplate and cabinet and wanted to save every penny he could. The outside certainly does not track with what is under the hood and sound.
Added into the system the Radio Shack LED power indicator and at my listening levels the .002 watt and at rare times the .004 lights flicker when using the Wharfedales and the same with the KLH Five. I thought subjectively they seemed close to being about the same efficiency. Also added a cable from the line output from the computer audio card to the amp and listening to some nice old time radio through the system. May not be the best audio but, it beats not having any. I have the system set up to also allow me to plug in my BlackBerry Playbook that I suspect has a better audio chip as it is about 12 years newer. I still have room for one more hi-level input through my switchbox so, good to go. No more room for more speakers.
In the future when the need to go small becomes more real it may well come down to the small Philips 785 and ADS L300s and the KLH Fives and KLH Twenty-Seven. Anyway I am tired.of all this.rotating and settling down.to.one set of components permanently wired.
Don Brian Levy, J.D.
Toronto ON Canada
Edits: 08/04/14
There is a pair available locally that I could pair with my Fisher 400 or Eico HF81.
IMO they lack the necessary clarity and response to be primary speakers. They'll also limit your system if those amps have been rebuilt and updated with higher quality parts. FWIW, I feel the same way about quite a few of the "classic" speakers from the '60s and '70s, including AR3As and the like. For sure, not everyone will agree. :)
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Buy Chinese. Bury freedom.
New England sound speakers were designed around two goals: 1) as flat a frequency response as possible and, 2) voiced to replicate a symphony hall such as Avery or Boston. The designers were mostly musicians who lived and breathed in these halls and sought to replicate them. When in them finite detail sought by those more inclined to the West Coast sound is less present. The West Coast sound originated with consumers wanting what engineers used in the studio where detail is more important than flat response they are engineering the sound. It is a matter of personal choice. I have almost always found the West Coast sound fatigued me and some nothing like the live original performance of live orchestral performances and even the few rock concerts I have attended. Admittedly, I grew up attending a lot of classical concerts in Boston and NY so, it is where I picked up my ear.
Don Brian Levy, J.D.
Toronto ON Canada
Just to be sure I'm clear on this point, speakers like the KLH with the fried egg tweeter, the AR3a (the best of that line IMO), early Advents and numerous speakers with phenolic ring tweeters nearly all fall into a group that never sounded "real" to me. This has little to do with highs and lows (I get your point about West VS East); the problem is mids and vocals. Later designs such as the magnetic planars, original ESS with the Heil AMT and a few others (I'm trying not to go into the extremely expensive, more esoteric models such as large electrostats here) all produced a more realistic sound. One of the best under $1K was the Genesis 44, although it was woefully inefficient. Like yourself, I have a reasonably good ear. I've played many musical instruments in my life, including piano, trumpet, baritone, guitar and electronic (Hammond) organ. I also worked in the audio business when the KLH, AR and other brands were new, and I must have heard hundreds of pairs of each in many different environments. They're not bad, but in blind tests I can immediately tell I'm hearing a speaker in a box. That level of fidelity simply doesn't qualify when audiophile-grade reproduction is being discussed. :)
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Buy Chinese. Bury freedom.
KLH with a fried egg tweeters? I must have missed that model. I know the early Advents and the Wx0D and Empire series Wharfedales used them but never noticed them in any other company company's model. Advents and Wharfedale has some pretty nasty correspondence when Advent came out with its design. I suspect it may have dissuaded other companies from the design.
Don Brian Levy, J.D.
Toronto ON Canada
"KLH with a fried egg tweeters?"
I thought I'd seen those under the KLH wire mesh driver cover. Maybe I am thinking of the Advent tweeter as you say. It's been a long time. :)
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Buy Chinese. Bury freedom.
That was the 2nd series Advent tweeter. The 1st was the same tweeter without the grill and short lived more die to being too fragile to standpoint to inquiring fingers and minds than the official reason.
Don Brian Levy, J.D.
Toronto ON Canada
Grab them. They go head to head with the Six and you can think of the as a Five without the midrange drivers. Maybe a better deal than the Six as I think the Six is selling at a premium due to all the traffic about it competing against the original Advent.
Don Brian Levy, J.D.
Toronto ON Canada
Based on KLH 6 2 way
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