Natural Sound

spiritofmusic

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I'm finding Peter's final destination fascinating.
My first proper stratospheric hifi experience was Klipshorn corner horns, at an audio show in late 80s.
They were so superior to all the earthbound box spkrs and panels playing elsewhere.
Music just appeared in the room, seemingly no artifice.
I'm not sure why I didn't follow up on them and track towards a purchase a decade later when I was in a position to afford to buy them, and house them.
All I can say is, the memory of them decades later is still w me.
And the three or four most striking audio experiences I've had since, where the literal drag factor of every other box spkr is not apparent, has been horns.
Ive heard a fair number of horns demos that have also been failures.
But successful horns implementations are so superior to everything else, it's almost laughable.
Indeed one of the strongest impulses on hearing a great horns demo is to laugh incessantly, or at very least get facial rictus from inane grinning for the whole session.
 

microstrip

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Al M.

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I'm finding Peter's final destination fascinating.
My first proper stratospheric hifi experience was Klipshorn corner horns, at an audio show in late 80s.
They were so superior to all the earthbound box spkrs and panels playing elsewhere.
Music just appeared in the room, seemingly no artifice.
I'm not sure why I didn't follow up on them and track towards a purchase a decade later when I was in a position to afford to buy them, and house them.
All I can say is, the memory of them decades later is still w me.
And the three or four most striking audio experiences I've had since, where the literal drag factor of every other box spkr is not apparent, has been horns.
Ive heard a fair number of horns demos that have also been failures.
But successful horns implementations are so superior to everything else, it's almost laughable.
Indeed one of the strongest impulses on hearing a great horns demo is to laugh incessantly, or at very least get facial rictus from inane grinning for the whole session.

Well, if that is so, Marc: why don't you have horns then?
 

jfrech

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Wow, Peter ! Big Move and huge congratulations. I now need to get back up the Boston area soon !
 

MadFloyd

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I heard Peter's new system the other day. I guess it sounded ok. I mean, if you like natural sound and all.

I'm kidding. It was a lot more than 'ok'.

I am highly impressed with the Lamm electronics. I've owned Lamm hybrid amps in the past and I could not get a clean sound out of them in the high frequencies (perhaps that was due to the speakers I was using at the time) and added a Lamm preamp but the sound didn't work for me (at the time) and I sold it. I then heard the ML2.0 driving horn speakers (albeit with a non-Lamm preamp) and was extremely impressed; so much so that I started hunting for a pair of ML2.0 amps but could never find them (and research seemed to indicate that the ML2.1 and ML2.2 weren't as good). I eventually acquired Doshi tube electronics - which gave me a taste but wasn't the same. So I was pretty excited when I learned Peter was getting ML2.0s and I would get to hear this amp again.

Visiting Peter was almost surreal. Everything had changed - heck even the room seemed to be larger. The following is a bit of a cut-and-paste job from an email to Peter and local audiophiles:

Between the electronics and the speaker (I'm leaving the turntable out of it because I can't speculate on what it brings to the table - no pun intended) what I heard was perhaps the best wooden-based instrument tone I have ever heard - or at least in a long while. I heard wonderful timbre, fantastic body, great transients with deep bass and a great flow.

Acoustic bass had punch on every note with weight and no excess decay or blurring. It was like the bass player was in the room. Cello was great and Ray Brown's bass bowing on the Almeida/Brown recordings was the best I've ever heard it: the high notes remained 'thick' and large with a highly beautiful tone and the low notes were authoritative with great texture. I get great detail on this with my CH amps and I get nice tone with my CATS but I heard a combination of both yesterday. Oh, and the Almeida guitar was also the best I've ever heard it. I'm very envious!

I thought the horn section on Art Pepper was also the best I've ever heard it. Previously it was always too thin and metallic or thick and sluggish but yesterday it had body and sounded effortless and not congealed.

The soundstage is huge. I never realized Peter's room was 16 feet wide (also envious!) and with the speakers in the corners it was a wall to wall, ceiling to floor presentation that did wonders for orchestral music.

Congrats Peter. What a carefully planned and well executed journey!
 

andromedaaudio

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"I think natural tone may be one of the hallmarks of vintage systems."

I totally agree. I love Lamm components.

Peters upgrade thread is " unfortunately " most llikely over . :)
A LL1 sign pre with a top power amp / Set is most likely hard to beat .
And if you dig the vintage horns , you probably dont get any better as what took david 2O years to search for / assemble .
 

jeff1225

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And dont forget the natural sounding paper cones used in most horns .
A lot of modern speakers today have the perfect piston /non flexing /hard membranes philosophy .


A lot of Them miss the natural dampning paper provides causing listening fatigue .
I agree with this comment 100%, the best bass I've heard is with paper drivers. I'm also not surprised that Wilson has "rediscovered" AlNiCo to use in their latest midranges.
 
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assessor43

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XMAS in April! I like it! Great setup! You will enjoy that for years. There is a sound from vintage speakers that has to be heard to fully understand why they are so important and just so right sounding, especially with golden age recordings which are IMO, the best ever made.
 

andromedaaudio

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I agree with this comment 100%, the best bass I've heard is with paper drivers. I'm also not surprised that Wilson has "rediscovered" AlNiCo to use in their latest midranges.
Wilson has moved from Focal ( fiberglass composite ) bass drivers to all paper in their big speaker line up .
But for the real low bottom end " impact " paper doesnt cut it ime.
I dont think the subsonics have paper in them i d have to check it .

Ps come to think of it paper cones ( made of wood pulp ) and wooden cabinets are a large part of speakers .
I use HPL ( paper sheets drenched in phenolic resin ) kharma uses it as well in their exquisite series.
Music and paper/wood are entangled . :)
 
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spiritofmusic

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Peter, there seems to be a consensus that there are v few horns setups in US, even fewer really good ones. You're move in this direction is finally gonna allow quite a few horns skeptics/agnostics/curious to finally have a situation they can properly judge the benefits. As long as any digiphiles can abide LP for the session.
 
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spiritofmusic

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Peter, can I make one musical recommendation.
Try and acquire a copy of Larry Coryell/John McLaughlin "Spaces" on Vanguard Records.
The second track, featuring duelling acoustic guitars, was something beyond on Audiophile Bill's horns, this song totally nails the superiority of SETs/horns when executed correctly.
 
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Ron Resnick

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Music and paper/wood are entangled . :)

I think there is at least some truth to this.

I do not think it is mere coincidence that the bodies of stringed instruments are made out of wood, and that some of the most natural sounding speakers (Bionar, Tune Audio Avaton, Tannoy Westminster, PBN M2!5 Jeffrey T Special Edition) I have heard also are made out of wood.

I do not think it is mere coincidence that the mouths of brass instruments look like horn drivers, and that some of the speakers which I think most naturally and realistically reproduce the sounds of brass instruments use horn drivers.
 

Ron Resnick

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Wilson has moved from Focal ( fiberglass composite ) bass drivers to all paper in their big speaker line up .
But for the real low bottom end " impact " paper doesnt cut it ime.
I dont think the subsonics have paper in them i d have to check it .

I think the Wilson Audio Thor and Wilson Audio Master Subsonic use 15" and 12" paper drivers, respectively.
 
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Steve Williams

Site Founder, Site Owner, Administrator
Fabulous story Peter. I enjoyed every detail nd am tickled that you went with Lamm. As you know I too own the 3 Lamm Signature components and together the sound to my ears is as natural as it gets.

It was my owning the Lamm electronics that brought me to David as he and I were AFAIK the only Lamm Signature owners on WBF and I too made a one week pilgrimage to Cedar City to learn all about David's philosophy and that also changed my progress in the advancement of better sound from my system

I to have made changes rot my system that I never thought I would do and I too am a strong proponent of the inexpensive Ching Cheng power cords. I have them in my entire system except with my amps (which are 32 wpc) where I use MasterBuilt Ultra.

I so happy for you Peter. David IMO is truly one of the most knowledgeable audiophiles I have ever met. He helped me find my new listening chair but what I really credit David with is convincing me I can use my Wilson speakers with near field listening to take my room out of the equation. It took e years to finally come to grips that he was right. I won't ever listen as far back as I did my entire life.

I also know what you mean about straightening the speakers rather than toe in. This is all deja vu to me and a great lesson in ddk 101

Kudos and much enjoyment Peter and welcome to the Lamm club
 

rbbert

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Music and paper/wood are entangled . :)
At another forum a while back I started a thread on whether or not "exotic" (i.e., other than paper, silk or other organic materials) drivers were a necessity in a speaker with SOTA aspirations. Unsurprisingly there was not a consensus ;)

Another potential topic thread with some relevance to this one would be the relationship if any between speaker "efficiency" and dynamic realism; again I suspect there would not be a consensus. I think Caesar once started a thread along this line but can't remember the opinions expressed.
 

Ron Resnick

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rbbert

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I also know what you mean about straightening the speakers rather than toe in...
Although it appears his current speakers have quite a bit of "toe-in" :D (FWIW mine have no toe-in)
 

Ron Resnick

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Another potential topic thread with some relevance to this one would be the relationship if any between speaker "efficiency" and dynamic realism . . .

Audition experiences enjoyed while tagging along on KeithR's loudspeaker journey led me to a greater appreciation for the connection between high sensitivity loudspeakers and dynamics and "jump factor."
 

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