Thinking about setting up a high end audio system

[Howard]

Originally posted by: Blurry
Hmm yes, it is still possible for me to return the Gallo's

*heck - I haven't even opened them yet because I didn't want to connect them to my *dad's Denon receiver - I was waiting to get an amp and pre-amp the whole time.

One thing I'll admit is this: they are smaller than I thought. At the store where I was demoing them, they seemed pretty tall next the media rack with all the equipment.

Now my living room has a relatively high ceiling - so I was beginning to think I should get something bigger.

To be honest, I'm starting to think that getting the Gallo's was a rushed decision - I bought them mainly because I thought they looked pretty cool without too much regard for their SQ.

Also, the store I bought them from hooked them up to some Arcam equipment.

So I'm wondering again - if I increase my budget a bit - what can I get, speakers wise, for $5000?

You just need to keep in mind that what you're looking for in the end is satisfaction.

 

[EvilYoda]

Yeah, Blurry, slow your roll Don't start inflating your budget just "because". Get out there, spend a good couple of weeks/months auditioning. Familiarize yourself with as many different manufacturers as you can...find some Quads, Magnepans, Martin Logans, Zu's, Dynaudio, Sonus Faber, KEF, B&W, M&K, Dali, Vienna Acoustics, Focal, Thiel, Canton, Klipsch Heritage, Legacy, Totem, JMLab, Revel, Von Schweikert, Usher, etc. (I'm stopping, my brain's hurting).

Learn what you like and then seek that out - what do Danish speakers sound like, what do English speakers sound like, what do German speakers sound like, etc.

Develop an audition CD or CDs that contain music that you know very well instead of something that the dealer has sitting around. Don't be afraid to tell them "I'm not here to buy, I'm here to audition".

I love listening to new speakers, I'm getting carried away here

 

[cheesehead]

Originally posted by: Project86

Mid-fi as defined by whom? Salesman? People in "the industry" whose magazine or website is kept afloat by companies who sell astronomically priced gear? That's certainly not the attitude of the Audio Engineering Society. Show me a proper double blind test where someone was able to tell the difference between a decent receiver and their ultra high end amps..... Or a nice Burr/Brown like the Onkyo uses compared to an ultra hyper expensive DAC 5000 special edition mark 4.

I'd have to disagree. I've never been a huge fan of HT-style receivers for hi-fi listening, although I've never run into any particularly high-end units.

On the other hand, the majority of hi-fi stereo receivers don't actually have any digital parts at all outside of a "digital pot" in the volume control. Some just used a motorized pot.

Originally posted by: Howard

A lot of class D designs have noise problems

What?

[/quote]

There was a big to-do about it at a local AES convention, though I'll be danged if I can remember where the article was. Of course, someone's going to come along later and disprove it...

The big issue, though, is that while building a mind-bogglingly powerful class-D amplifier is relatively cheap and easy, building an ultra-high-fidelity amplifier is not. For example, I'm not a fan of the cheap Tripath class-D amps (I've owned a few), and while I'm told the B&O or Hypex amplifier modules are terrific, you can build a 100WPC amplifier of negligible distortion for $40 in transistors and chips. (Please see LME49810 reference design). As a result, you can get a wide variety of pretty good class A/B amps, but the cheapest Rotel using B&O Icepower technology - the RB-1092 - is over two grand.

And running an inductor in series with an already complicated LCR filter (the crossover) is a bad idea. Remember, inductance increases in series.

 

[sdifox]

Originally posted by: Blurry
Hmm yes, it is still possible for me to return the Gallo's

*heck - I haven't even opened them yet because I didn't want to connect them to my *dad's Denon receiver - I was waiting to get an amp and pre-amp the whole time.

One thing I'll admit is this: they are smaller than I thought. At the store where I was demoing them, they seemed pretty tall next the media rack with all the equipment.

Now my living room has a relatively high ceiling - so I was beginning to think I should get something bigger.

To be honest, I'm starting to think that getting the Gallo's was a rushed decision - I bought them mainly because I thought they looked pretty cool without too much regard for their SQ.

Also, the store I bought them from hooked them up to some Arcam equipment.

So I'm wondering again - if I increase my budget a bit - what can I get, speakers wise, for $5000?

return the gallos then. You should be able to do better in price/performance ratio.

You still need to post dimension and setup of your room.

When I was shopping for my speakers, it was a 3 month process

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

Originally posted by: EvilYoda
Yeah, Blurry, slow your roll Don't start inflating your budget just "because". Get out there, spend a good couple of weeks/months auditioning. Familiarize yourself with as many different manufacturers as you can...find some Quads, Magnepans, Martin Logans, Zu's, Dynaudio, Sonus Faber, KEF, B&W, M&K, Dali, Vienna Acoustics, Focal, Thiel, Canton, Klipsch Heritage, Legacy, Totem, JMLab, Revel, Von Schweikert, Usher, etc. (I'm stopping, my brain's hurting).

Learn what you like and then seek that out - what do Danish speakers sound like, what do English speakers sound like, what do German speakers sound like, etc.

Develop an audition CD or CDs that contain music that you know very well instead of something that the dealer has sitting around. Don't be afraid to tell them "I'm not here to buy, I'm here to audition".

I love listening to new speakers, I'm getting carried away here

IIRC Focal and JMLab are the same company now, and are produced solely under the Focal name.

Listen to as many of those brands as you can to start off with. The more the better.

Originally posted by: sdifox

Originally posted by: Blurry
Hmm yes, it is still possible for me to return the Gallo's

*heck - I haven't even opened them yet because I didn't want to connect them to my *dad's Denon receiver - I was waiting to get an amp and pre-amp the whole time.

One thing I'll admit is this: they are smaller than I thought. At the store where I was demoing them, they seemed pretty tall next the media rack with all the equipment.

Now my living room has a relatively high ceiling - so I was beginning to think I should get something bigger.

To be honest, I'm starting to think that getting the Gallo's was a rushed decision - I bought them mainly because I thought they looked pretty cool without too much regard for their SQ.

Also, the store I bought them from hooked them up to some Arcam equipment.

So I'm wondering again - if I increase my budget a bit - what can I get, speakers wise, for $5000?

return the gallos then. You should be able to do better in price/performance ratio.

You still need to post dimension and setup of your room.

When I was shopping for my speakers, it was a 3 month process

X2

Look at Focal (yes I <3 them) 836's or look into the 10xx series (1027 is $8k/pair, and 1007 are bookshelf), B&W 8xx or 7xx series, Paradigm (although I wouldn't personally buy them for high end audio, entry level they are decent though), Klipsch (some love them, some don't. I would stay away personally though), KEF, Salksong, Mirage, etc.

Return those speakers, and just take a few hours a week (or a whole day if you can) and go audition speakers. Listen to them with tracks you know very well (orchestral, female vocals, etc are the most telling of the speaker IMHO). The more time you spend with them, the more the speaker will reveal of it's characteristics.

Once you have narrowed down speakers to 3 or so, start the process with pre-pro/amp choices. Start with what the associates suggest, but don't go with that immediately. Check out Krell, Arcam, Boulder (IIRC out of your budget though), Bel Canto, Bryston, etc paired with the speakers to see what sounds best to you. Then go with that and don't worry as much about budget.

Here's how I would spend a $10k budget:
~$6000 for speakers (2.0 floorstanding)
~$4000 for source/amp/prepro which I would spend
--~$2000 for amp
--~$1000 for pre-pro (although could get away with less due to only 2.0/2.1 system)
--~$1000 for source (CD/DVD/etc whatever you use), but if you could spend more here do it

 

[Howard]

Originally posted by: Cheesehead

Originally posted by: Howard

A lot of class D designs have noise problems

What?

There was a big to-do about it at a local AES convention, though I'll be danged if I can remember where the article was. Of course, someone's going to come along later and disprove it...

The big issue, though, is that while building a mind-bogglingly powerful class-D amplifier is relatively cheap and easy, building an ultra-high-fidelity amplifier is not. ... As a result, you can get a wide variety of pretty good class A/B amps, but the cheapest Rotel using B&O Icepower technology - the RB-1092 - is over two grand.

I'm not sure why you are equating the market price of a commercial product with its actual R&D and production cost.

And running an inductor in series with an already complicated LCR filter (the crossover) is a bad idea. Remember, inductance increases in series.

What practical effect does this cause?

 

[Muadib]

I'm listing speakers that I would get in your price range, with a dealer in your area.

First up B&W 803S They sell them at Audio/FX You should be able to get them for somewhere between $5400 - $6000 a pair.

Martin Logan Vantage are next. They are carried in several dealers in your area, including Paradyme They go for about 5k.

Last up is the Magnepan MG3.6/R They can be seen at HT Electronics, but you will have to look up the address as they don't seem to have a website. These are also in the 5k range.

All 3 dealers are in the Sacramento area, so you have no reason not to check them out.

 

[sdifox]

Op where is the room dimensions I asked for? without those we can't properly recommend speakers!

 

[Blurry]

sorry! Too many comments tend to make me lose track of what's important

My living room is roughly 24' x 22' and the ceiling reaches to about 12 ft.

 

[EvilYoda]

Originally posted by: Blurry
sorry! Too many comments tend to make me lose track of what's important

My living room is roughly 24' x 22' and the ceiling reaches to about 12 ft.

That be a freaking huge room. Maggies!

 

[cheesehead]

Originally posted by: Howard

And running an inductor in series with an already complicated LCR filter (the crossover) is a bad idea. Remember, inductance increases in series.

What practical effect does this cause?

In theory, in a conventional parallel crossover, this will act like a low-pass filter for the tweeter and an additional low-pass filter for the woofer, rolling off the treble and causing a dip in response near the crossover point. In practice, real-world crossovers are just plain weird - anything could happen. I have a sneaking suspicion that this is why early class-D amplifiers were not very popular.

Of course, output inductance is a function of switching frequency, and a really high-end audio amp can switch fast enough that no inductor is required. Maybe class-D really has moved on from the T-amp. Having read over my posts, I'll admit I'm unfairly biased against it. However, until you can listen to an amp yourself, I wouldn't recommend buying a lot of the class-D stuff on the market - while any idiot (even me!) can cook up a good class A/B amplifier, it takes serious chops to do a good class-D amp.

That said, if you have big, power-hungry, low sensitivity speakers like Magnepans, a class-D amplifier works very well indeed, if only because you get a lot more amp for your dollar.

Originally posted by: Howard

I'm not sure why you are equating the market price of a commercial product with its actual R&D and production cost.

I'm equating the market price of a commercial product with the market price of other commercial products. For $2,500, you can get almost anything you want.

Originally posted by: Muadib
I'm listing speakers that I would get in your price range, with a dealer in your area.

Solid advice all 'round. Especially because you've actually got the room for 'stats or Maggies. (Though if you want the maggies, a nice servo-sub a la' Velodyne might help.)

 

[sdifox]

Originally posted by: Blurry
sorry! Too many comments tend to make me lose track of what's important

My living room is roughly 24' x 22' and the ceiling reaches to about 12 ft.

how far away from the walls can the speakers be, both side and back?

Do you need to fill the room with sound?

do you have wife acceptance factor?

What kind of music do you listen to and what kind of sound do you like? do you like punishing sharp treble or something mellower?

what do you think of this? do you have local Tannoy dealer? IF so, have you listened to them?

Tannoy Kensington
http://www.tannoy.com/Resident...il.aspx?pid=135&sid=27

here is another possibility


Sonus Faber Cremona M

http://www.sonusfaber.com/docs/products/CREMONA_M.pdf

Vandersteen 3a Signature

http://www.vandersteen.com/pages/3alit2.html

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

Maybe I have never listened to a proper setup of Logan's (or in a room big enough for them to properly fill them), but they are way too directional and as soon as you are off axis they don't sound anywhere near as good.

I have never listened to a set of Maggies, and most likely should (especially with their $599/$1475 pair for their low end offerings).

I have always listened to traditional cone designs, and as of now prefer a cone to panel designs. I really need to spend some time with both of them in a proper setup.

 

[Project86]

One thing: if you happen to get the Tannoy Kensington (see link above), promise that you will only listen to them while wearing a tux and peering out the window in a creepy fashion, just like in the link.

I think the OP has been given enough good suggestions where the ball is now in his court. It's really just a matter of spending the time finding out what you want out of your setup. Just keep in mind what I said: there are no magical properties that make a $6k amp sound better than a properly designed $1k amp, or even a properly designed $200 amp if such a thing exists. If he had no idea which brand was more expensive or prestigious, I don't think the OP would know the difference between a McIntosh, Emotiva, Wyred 4 Sound, or Classe amp of similar power. Apply the same logic across the board with your entire electronics setup, and you should be good.

 

[sdifox]

Originally posted by: Project86
One thing: if you happen to get the Tannoy Kensington (see link above), promise that you will only listen to them while wearing a tux and peering out the window in a creepy fashion, just like in the link.

I think the OP has been given enough good suggestions where the ball is now in his court. It's really just a matter of spending the time finding out what you want out of your setup. Just keep in mind what I said: there are no magical properties that make a $6k amp sound better than a properly designed $1k amp, or even a properly designed $200 amp if such a thing exists. If he had no idea which brand was more expensive or prestigious, I don't think the OP would know the difference between a McIntosh, Emotiva, Wyred 4 Sound, or Classe amp of similar power. Apply the same logic across the board with your entire electronics setup, and you should be good.

You don't like the Kensingtons? I wish I had the room for it. I have always liked the Dual Concentric driver and the idea behind it.

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

Originally posted by: sdifox

Originally posted by: Project86
One thing: if you happen to get the Tannoy Kensington (see link above), promise that you will only listen to them while wearing a tux and peering out the window in a creepy fashion, just like in the link.

I think the OP has been given enough good suggestions where the ball is now in his court. It's really just a matter of spending the time finding out what you want out of your setup. Just keep in mind what I said: there are no magical properties that make a $6k amp sound better than a properly designed $1k amp, or even a properly designed $200 amp if such a thing exists. If he had no idea which brand was more expensive or prestigious, I don't think the OP would know the difference between a McIntosh, Emotiva, Wyred 4 Sound, or Classe amp of similar power. Apply the same logic across the board with your entire electronics setup, and you should be good.

You don't like the Kensingtons? I wish I had the room for it. I have always liked the Dual Concentric driver and the idea behind it.

And I like the Beryllium tweeter, and the idea behind it in Focal's.

Not many agree with me though lol

 

[spidey07]

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus
Maybe I have never listened to a proper setup of Logan's (or in a room big enough for them to properly fill them), but they are way too directional and as soon as you are off axis they don't sound anywhere near as good.

I have never listened to a set of Maggies, and most likely should (especially with their $599/$1475 pair for their low end offerings).

I have always listened to traditional cone designs, and as of now prefer a cone to panel designs. I really need to spend some time with both of them in a proper setup.

That's normal for planar speakers. They are a line source instead of point source. You have to be right in the sweet spot to really get the effect. Off axis sound is not nearly as good.

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

Originally posted by: spidey07

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus
Maybe I have never listened to a proper setup of Logan's (or in a room big enough for them to properly fill them), but they are way too directional and as soon as you are off axis they don't sound anywhere near as good.

I have never listened to a set of Maggies, and most likely should (especially with their $599/$1475 pair for their low end offerings).

I have always listened to traditional cone designs, and as of now prefer a cone to panel designs. I really need to spend some time with both of them in a proper setup.

That's normal for planar speakers. They are a line source instead of point source. You have to be right in the sweet spot to really get the effect. Off axis sound is not nearly as good.

I wasn't sure if Maggies suffered from that as well or not since they have a different speaker than the Logans.

I'll admit that on-axis they sound amazing, but they have a sweet spot that is VERY defined and once outside of it you get much worse sound reproduction.

 

[spidey07]

Electrostats are the worse because they just shoot a wave in a line. That's why logans have curved panels to try and help but the affect is still very pronounced. Maggies are the same but it's not that "have your head in a vise" effect.

Here are the only real cons with electrostats:
1) Must have room for them, away from walls
2) Very small sweet spot
3) Can be hell on an amplifier (mine dip down to 1.2 ohms)
4) Size of the panel dictates how low the panel can go, meaning they aren't going to be small to sound good
5) Less dynamic

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

Originally posted by: spidey07
Electrostats are the worse because they just shoot a wave in a line. That's why logans have curved panels to try and help but the affect is still very pronounced. Maggies are the same but it's not that "have your head in a vise" effect.

Here are the only real cons with electrostats:
1) Must have room for them, away from walls
2) Very small sweet spot
3) Can be hell on an amplifier (mine dip down to 1.2 ohms)
4) Size of the panel dictates how low the panel can go, meaning they aren't going to be small to sound good
5) Less dynamic

#2 is the serious downfall to electrostats IMO. That sweet spot is almost on the nanoscale size it's so small (ok exaggeration, but it is small).

#3 can be a downfall as well, because you need a high quality "upstream" from the speakers. That can be expensive.

#1 not many rooms have the ability to be away from walls enough to allow them to really shine (and it's even more difficult in store rooms)

Electrostats are great, but I'll take my point source over line source any day of the week . That is what is great about audio/video stuff (or can be hell, like telling my friend he could do much better than $350 Bose headphones and he doesn't believe it), is that it is so varied anybody can find their ideal speaker for their ears. From ultra-bright, to bass heavy, to electrostats, to exotic materials like Beryllium, to almost anything you want if you look hard enough.

 

[sdifox]

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus

And I like the Beryllium tweeter, and the idea behind it in Focal's.

Not many agree with me though lol

what no love for Usher?

 

[EvilYoda]

You should also explain that a speaker like a ML or Magnepan is inherently a bi-polar design, so the way that the sound fills the room will be different than an enclosed speaker (unless you're using something like an open baffle).

And for me, since 95% of the time it's just me and my speakers, I couldn't care less how small the sweet spot is.

 

[EvilYoda]

Originally posted by: sdifox

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus

And I like the Beryllium tweeter, and the idea behind it in Focal's.

Not many agree with me though lol

what no love for Usher?

Usher's rather new to the Be party. Their "Tiny Dancer" is quite impressive though, but I love the original Micro Utopia Be's...yum. If it wasn't so difficult to find a dealer, I very possibly could've gone with JMLab-Focal instead of Dyn.

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

Originally posted by: sdifox

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus

And I like the Beryllium tweeter, and the idea behind it in Focal's.

Not many agree with me though lol

what no love for Usher?

At first I was thinking, "God Usher (the artist) sucks...."

Then I realized you may mean speaker companies, and did some google searching. Their USA site bugged out on me, found their non-us hosted site and looked around.

I did know Focal wasn't the first/only company to use Beryllium, but they were the only ones I knew of in active production with a US presence. Apparently I was mistaken. I will have to take a listen to Usher's stuff sometime (their mid-range uses Be-oxide which is sweet IMO). They look better than the Focal 1037's though IMO.

Originally posted by: EvilYoda
You should also explain that a speaker like a ML or Magnepan is inherently a bi-polar design, so the way that the sound fills the room will be different than an enclosed speaker (unless you're using something like an open baffle).

And for me, since 95% of the time it's just me and my speakers, I couldn't care less how small the sweet spot is.

Yeah, if I was the same then I would agree and look into ML/Maggies. Unfortunately, between having people over on a regularish basis, living with my gf, having a small room, and my tendancy to move around and not stay in one specific "spot" during a movie (I like to lay down and change sides on a regular basis especially on a couch which means I go through 5-6 ft of spacing differences) line-source speakers are not for me.

Originally posted by: EvilYoda

Usher's rather new to the Be party. Their "Tiny Dancer" is quite impressive though, but I love the original Micro Utopia Be's...yum. If it wasn't so difficult to find a dealer, I very possibly could've gone with JMLab-Focal instead of Dyn.

I have never gotten the chance to listen to the Utopia line, but have listened to almost all of the 10xx line. The 1007 beats most towers I have heard in SQ. They are beautiful speakers. The 1037's are the most beautiful sounding speaker I have ever heard, and it would require some serious effort to displace them.

I wish I had a dealer close by that had Utopia series I could actually audition.

 

[sdifox]

Originally posted by: DisgruntledVirus

Originally posted by: sdifox


what no love for Usher?

At first I was thinking, "God Usher (the artist) sucks...."

Then I realized you may mean speaker companies, and did some google searching. Their USA site bugged out on me, found their non-us hosted site and looked around.

I did know Focal wasn't the first/only company to use Beryllium, but they were the only ones I knew of in active production with a US presence. Apparently I was mistaken. I will have to take a listen to Usher's stuff sometime (their mid-range uses Be-oxide which is sweet IMO). They look better than the Focal 1037's though IMO.

I am surprised Sonus Faber hasn't sued them yet.

Usher is a Taiwanese company. I don't know what is wrong with their US site either.


I wish I can own the Duntech Sovereign

or these babies: Tannoy Westminster Royal
http://www.audiogon.com/cgi-bi...pl?spkrfull&1238650756