How Do Horn Speakers Get Their Gorgeous Life-like Tonality?

[bonzo75]

Nice to know you are now an expert in Lamm and Wilson Audio XLFs ...
Or did you forget the smile?

Well, after listening to X2S2 with Lamm, then with the top Viva model followed by a CH stack in the same room, Dagostino Momentums, and the XLF with Spectral 400s (with Spectral pre) and VTL 7.5 mk3 with the S400 (or is it 450) in the same room, given that patterns repeat...

 

[Al M.]

Quick compares are done by you Boston guys. Did you read what I said? This extends to rooms where speakers have been set up for ages. Apart from comparing in same rooms. You should read properly and not misquote to your interpretation.

Fair enough. I was in particular referring to an above comparison where you could not hear spatial info from one speaker compared to the other in the same room. My bad if I misread.

But given that you are still with Schiit digital, I don't expect you to appreciate changes in recordings

Haha, you have no clue. If you ever hear my system -- you are invited -- you may be shocked how much it runs counter to your prejudices.

 

[microstrip]

Tang, at your place, I tried different recordings through the same speaker with different sources. Similarly, I have heard them in the same place with the same source, but changing the speakers this time from 65k Lansche to Devore orangutans. Nothing else changed. Every recording on the Lansche has the same stage, depth, etc. Only thing that differs is a compressed pressing sounds well, compressed, and a good pressing sounds more open. Same with a CH precision stack and Alexandria X2S2. Same like Lansche. LSO, CSO, BSO sound the same irrespective of their concert hall and the year of performance.(...)

You are extrapolating too much from your experience with a few systems with also very few recordings. IMHO you are mostly judging system matching, and extremely focusing on some micro details in detriment of others. The level of differences you refer involve a lot of training - you are becoming the Sean Olive of the 60's orchestras - we must congratulate you on this, but IMHO your comments are becoming too personnel to be of general use to valuate speakers to most audiophiles.

Telling that every recording played in the Alexandria X2S2 has the same stage, depth, etc. only tells us that the person who set the system did a very poor job. I have owned it for some time, but fortunately it is a speaker that is well known in the audiophile community, who has experience on it. It is usually considered an example of how large speakers can be chameleon like, having a 3D soundstage with a size that adapts to what is encoded in the recording.

IMHO if we want to compare speaker type we must focus on the best we have listened with each type, not look for the poor experience with one of them to highlight our favored.

BTW, can I ask why Rockport and Ghia, deservedly very praised speakers in the forum, never get your attention? Are they exceptions to the compression rule or are they just "etc" ?

 

[PeterA]

Quick compares are done by you Boston guys. Did you read what I said? This extends to rooms where speakers have been set up for ages. Apart from comparing in same rooms. You should read properly and not misquote to your interpretation. But given that you are still with Schiit digital, I don't expect you to appreciate changes in recordings

Well, I don't know what you mean by "quick". I recently did some A/B/A comparisons between two preamps, but that was easy with the same music and a remote control switching back and forth between inputs and plugging cables. Quick here meant over a few hours of listening and switch. For things like cartridges I take much more time and do very careful set up between switches as I have only one arm. Amp and cable comparisons are also done more deliberately and over time.

Comparing speakers is a much more involved task, which involves many factors including rooms, pairing amps, and set up. I've never been able to do that quickly.

 

[microstrip]

Well, after listening to X2S2 with Lamm, then with the top Viva model followed by a CH stack in the same room, Dagostino Momentums, and the XLF with Spectral 400s (with Spectral pre) and VTL 7.5 mk3 with the S400 (or is it 450) in the same room, given that patterns repeat...

Do you expect us to take this experience as meaningful and making you a Lamm /XLF expert?

 

[PeterA]

Telling that every recording played in the Alexandria X2S2 has the same stage, depth, etc. only tells us that the person who set the system did a very poor job. I have owned it for some time, but fortunately it is a speaker that is well known in the audiophile community, who has experience on it. It is usually considered an example of how large speakers can be chameleon like, having a 3D soundstage with a size that adapts to what is encoded in the recording.

I just heard Rockitman's X2S2 and his system sounded much different than it did when I first heard it five years ago. Before, yes, recordings did sound pretty similar, especially in terms of spatial presentation. But last weekend, the system was radically different. One of things that had changed is in fact the speaker set up and listening seat position. Set up seems to be very important with these speakers.

I now heard huge differences between the spatial information of different recordings. The system seemed to be much more transparent to the recording. I was actually quite surprised by how much the system had changed in sound, and of what those large Wilsons are capable. Truly astonishing.

 

[microstrip]

QUOTE="bonzo75, post: 540799, member: 5331"]
But given that you are still with Schiit digital, I don't expect you to appreciate changes in recordings[/QUOTE]

Sorry, but such disdainful comment only shows you do not have experience enough with digital. But yes, sometimes optimizing a system just using analog creates a poor system for digital.

 

[Audiophile Bill]

Hi Guys,

Just another data point fwiw (please accept there are some caveats) - the 2 most widely preferred rooms year after year after year at Munich high end show based on numerous forum(s) feedback are:

> Western electric / Silbatone
> Living Voice

What we have in common here is low powered SET/horn combination.

I find this interesting because they are achieving this consistently rather than a one off.

Fwiw - when I attended last, I also agreed with this assertion. Why? I found the musical presentation the most natural and authentic here.

Best.

 

[bonzo75]

Do you expect us to take this experience as meaningful and making you a Lamm /XLF expert?

If your definition of an XLF expert is one who realizes it requires more power...I guess we will wait to see which amps you settle down with. Btw, if you do insist on settling down with Lamms for XLFs, do try the Soulution preamp (apologies to David for making him throw up). It will give the downstream Lamm and the rest of the system much more drive, dynamics, separation, stage, as if some power has been added. I use the word "try" because I have not tried this combo myself, but have seen the use of the pre in such a context to improve those attributes where the downstream amp lacked power to drive the speakers.

 

[DaveyF]

Hi Guys,

Just another data point fwiw (please accept there are some caveats) - the 2 most widely preferred rooms year after year after year at Munich high end show based on numerous forum(s) feedback are:

> Western electric / Silbatone
> Living Voice

What we have in common here is low powered SET/horn combination.

I find this interesting because they are achieving this consistently rather than a one off.

Fwiw - when I attended last, I also agreed with this assertion. Why? I found the musical presentation the most natural and authentic here.

Best.

Isn't that interesting, I happen to know of at least two guys who went to Munich and stated that the absolute worst sounding rooms at the show were a) the room with the WE/Silbatone..and b) the Living Voice room.
One person told me that the WE room was so utterly veiled, slow, bland of tone color and basically with zero imaging, that he was super puzzled how anybody could listen to such dreck!! Shows how different folks have different listening priorities. ( different strokes for different folks)

 

[bonzo75]

You are extrapolating too much from your experience with a few systems with also very few recordings. IMHO you are mostly judging system matching, and extremely focusing on some micro details in detriment of others. The level of differences you refer involve a lot of training - you are becoming the Sean Olive of the 60's orchestras - we must congratulate you on this, but IMHO your comments are becoming too personnel to be of general use to valuate speakers to most audiophiles.

Telling that every recording played in the Alexandria X2S2 has the same stage, depth, etc. only tells us that the person who set the system did a very poor job. I have owned it for some time, but fortunately it is a speaker that is well known in the audiophile community, who has experience on it. It is usually considered an example of how large speakers can be chameleon like, having a 3D soundstage with a size that adapts to what is encoded in the recording.

IMHO if we want to compare speaker type we must focus on the best we have listened with each type, not look for the poor experience with one of them to highlight our favored.

BTW, can I ask why Rockport and Ghia, deservedly very praised speakers in the forum, never get your attention? Are they exceptions to the compression rule or are they just "etc" ?

I don't deny that the experience I referred to with 60s recordings is very specific and not relevant to many who haven't gone there, and might not, though I think they should (but hope not, to keep LP costs down). That said, previously when I auditioned without this perspective, I still ended up choosing horns for the reasons quoted in my first post on this thread - better tone, flow, continuity, dynamics, dynamic range, overall musicality, naturalness. Finding some of these recordings gave added perspective, and also helped some of those attributes stand out more.

 

[bonzo75]

Regarding Rockport, I don't have much idea. I heard the Avior in three different systems before, and did not like them. Never heard the Arrakis. Heard their other D'appolito MTM which was discontinued and much cheaper, and really liked it then among cones, with digital. Never tried with analog. It was the Grand Mira II (completely different from Mira II and Grand Mira). It had sideways and front firing woofers. One of the recent cones I like with digital is the B&W 802 D3, though not as much as horns. They have really made it much better. I have never heard it with analog though, will do so at some stage. The Zellaton, Stenheim, YG, are all excellent but not horns for me.

 

[bonzo75]

QUOTE="bonzo75, post: 540799, member: 5331"]

But yes, sometimes optimizing a system just using analog creates a poor system for digital.

Yes both have different gain requirements. I would expect a high probability of having different preamps at a minimum for the digital chain and the analog chain.

 

[Audiophile Bill]

Isn't that interesting, I happen to know of at least two guys who went to Munich and stated that the absolute worst sounding rooms at the show were a) the room with the WE/Silbatone..and b) the Living Voice room.
One person told me that the WE room was so utterly veiled, slow, bland of tone color and basically had zero imaging, that he was super puzzled how anybody could listen to such dreck!! Shows how different folks have different listening priorities. ( different strokes for different folks)

Hey

Isn't that interesting, I happen to know of at least two guys who went to Munich and stated that the absolute worst sounding rooms at the show were a) the room with the WE/Silbatone..and b) the Living Voice room.
One person told me that the WE room was so utterly veiled, slow, bland of tone color and basically with zero imaging, that he was super puzzled how anybody could listen to such dreck!! Shows how different folks have different listening priorities. ( different strokes for different folks)

Hi Davey,

Lol I think you stumbled upon the 2 anomalies. In all sincerity the consensus across many forums has always been in favour of these 2 rooms consistently. I think they did both have 1 “off” year though on consensus.

 

[microstrip]

If your definition of an XLF expert is one who realizes it requires more power...I guess we will wait to see which amps you settle down with. Btw, if you do insist on settling down with Lamms for XLFs, do try the Soulution preamp (apologies to David for making him throw up). It will give the downstream Lamm and the rest of the system much more drive, dynamics, separation, stage, as if some power has been added. I use the word "try" because I have not tried this combo myself, but have seen the use of the pre in such a context to improve those attributes where the downstream amp lacked power to drive the speakers.

The ML3 does not lack power to drive the XLF's in my system - the sound characteristics I am listening show at less than 2W - all my listening is power calibrated. I will address it soon in my thread. And sorry, no for me the preamplifeir for the ML3 is the LL1. I have tried a few others and did not like the matching, I do not expect the Soulution to be miraculous.

 

[Tango]

Sometimes, I question whether this forum should be renamed...: "The horn lovers forum"

Are there any members out there that aren't as enamored of these designs as I am???

Hi Davey,

I think there are only about three people from Europe and one people from America who like to write favorably about horns while most people like cones in this forum. It is a healthy international forum here imo.

Anybody hear the new Wilson Wamm's...I have a very suspicious feeling that if they did...it would be called 'The Wamm lovers forum'

Whenever WAMM or Vox Olympian is mentioned, we seem to automatically assume they sound heavenly given people who own them must have spent tremendous resource, time and efforts to set them up right. Nonetheless a few of us in this forum know for sure this isnt always so.

Sincerely,
Tang

 

[microstrip]

Yes both have different gain requirements. I would expect a high probability of having different preamps at a minimum for the digital chain and the analog chain.

I am not addressing gain. Digital recording is intrinsically different from analog.

 

[Tango]

Digital recording is intrinsically different from analog.

This is when tweaks are super.

Tang

 

[microstrip]

This is when tweaks are super.

Tang

Sorry I can't understand your comment. Can you explain what you mean more clearly? Thanks.

 

[Tango]

Sorry I can't understand your comment. Can you explain what you mean more clearly? Thanks.

I meant just that. Tweaks are needed to get top sound from digital.

Am I shifting the wind here.

Tang