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In Reply to: Re: Wanting to trade the Stratus Gold already eh? NT posted by Frank25 on October 13, 2005 at 08:07:29:
Well Klipsch has decided to follow most of the rest of the speaker industry with slim towers so it's not surprising their speakers sound worse.Back when I bought my Wharfedale Vanguards (horns) Klipsch was everywhere and they had those speakers with two 10's and a big horn on top or ones that looked like 15s and a horn on top. Sure forget imaging and soundstage but they could really pound and they sounded more listenable than competing Cerwin Vega's (the D9 was $1k Cad and could absolutely pound 112db sensitive I believe and they were touted as the indistructable speaker in that you could put the speaker wire directly into the power socket and not blow them. They are fantastic party speakers -- but Cher's deepish voice can sound like she had a sex change so accuracy is not the D9's strength. Still for thunder factor it was untouched under 1k.
The Klipsch around the same price was less able to thunder but it sounded better and certainly rocks better than the panzy ass stuff being geared for home theater. Subs tend to sound like a big music slug slugging the music down. Or like most a boom and sizzle presentation. Good for a movie because who cares but we are highly adept at hearing the mismatch.
To illustrate
UHF magazine liked the Klipsch Kg4.2 (not the Kg4) in issue 39 so this is a while ago as a rocker. It was $1199.00Cad had two 25cm woofers one a passive radiator and a horn on top -- The panel liked it and noted that it could actually give the scale of a full orchestra. 95db sensitive.Over the years I have gravitated to sensitive speakers because they have a "life-like" presentation. The current crop of Slim Lines image better and may be better off axis, but it all sounds like constipated dreck -- as if it's trying to create a sound out of a funnel. Sure it sounds bad but sounding bad even when you sit 30 degrees off axis is not exactly a wonderous thing. Largely it's because it's CHEAPER to make and has high WAF factor.
The Klipsch kg4.2 has some frequency issues at 6khz and 2.5khz (spikes0 which will lean bright -- they noted that it was good at imaging.
Anyway it's a choose your poison and many speakers have traded micro and macro Dynamics, bass, volume capability, transients, decay, tonal and timbral accuracy in for imaging and soundstaging. The two things you now get instead of what you used to get are the two things that you have zero way of knowing is accurate or not and two things that in a live event you would never in a million years notice or care about. But they take up less space at the showroom so they can sell more.
It's not a surprise that older speakers are still selling or new manufacturers are re-making older designs. Even McIntosh has re-made one of their 20 year old amps -- and apparently it's their new (err old) flagship.
My Wharfedales are a decade newer use better drivers and is a 3-way (one midrange) in a slighly different alignment than the E70. The Vanguard was 40hz - 23khz (95db 8 ohm 175watts RMS)and use what looks like a Fostex Ring horn tweeter. Less bright than klispch tends to be which is one reason why I bought them. Front ports and work nice near wall. $2k in 1991 -- now you look at the feeble gutless wonders today for $2k-$2500.00 and I rll my eyes. Imaging and soundstaging -- trust a multi-billion dollar Company(Harman) to pull the wool over people's eyes -- very slick!
Follow Ups:
I don't get it. You have accused me and others of buying on the advice of magazines, often putting down magazines as biased. Yet you quote a magazine that has the biggest conflict of interest and flogs products shamelessly. Incidentally, I have never even bought a magazine and have never bought on the basis of any mag. As for the slimline designs and metal tweeters you often slag you don't know what you are talking about.
Was this post to you? This is a subjective opinion - you're welcome not to agree - as a fellow one here disagrees with me about the 3.3. No big deal -- you like what youlike just don;t expect the world to agree with you.Yes UHF has issues as well in that I don't agree with their opinions but generally speaking they're honest about their opinions and they're not funded by advertising. They sell stuff that is not available most places like hard to get Reference Recordings. They sell some cables and accessories and tough to get Vinyl. It's better than selling products and disguising them as reviews.
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