Pairing speakers with the right amplifier.

[Johnny Vinyl]

You have something better than high-end shops, Johnny - you have communication and fellowship with the designer of your speakers!!!! Yep, who knows better than the one that built them? I love the way you and Gary communicate! I think that's cool! I would ask him to chime in for suggestions.

Trust me ...I've very appreciative of Gary's input and he knows that.

I'm here - just MIA whenever my distributors drive me too hard when I'm on the road with them.

Thanks for the PM Gary, but right now I'm not ready to buy. I'm looking towards the end of the year, after a phonostage.

The other thing is this......Audio gear is lot more expensive in Canada, so many of the recommendations still fall outside of my 5K budget.

 

[thedudeabides]

Dude-Why was it an expensive mistake? Did you buy them new and return them with a beating or did you take a demo pair home and returned them?

Hi mep,

The latter. Shipping 250 lbs. from Wyoming back east is somewhat pricey. Especially when you pay for the round trip.

Oh the joys of audio.

GG

 

[garylkoh]

imo, the plastickyness is there with 'stats to some degree regardless of the power you feed them. I have SS on my CLS's because I cant find a tube amp that doesn't roll off the highs - and I've been known to like dark speakers. My little Raidho's don't care whether its tube or SS and they sound delicious either way.

Yes - that's right. When the impedance of the CLS goes down to close to the output impedance of the tube amp, it rolls off. Ribbon tweeters like on the Raidho, on the other hand are almost purely resistive and so the high output impedance on the tube amp does not affect it. To my ears, the slow roll-off of the highs sound plasticky - not like the plasticky of a cellophane, but the plasticky of softer plastic - if that makes sense......

 

[garylkoh]

The other thing is this......Audio gear is lot more expensive in Canada, so many of the recommendations still fall outside of my 5K budget.

Johnny, if Canadian, how about the old SimAudio W-8? That was a fabulous amplifier in it's days. It should be far below your 5K budget, and I can recommend you power capacitors to change out that will give it a new lease on life

Now that the Mk II version of my own Genesis amps are out, the smaller ones of the Mk I version should also come into the market at your budget and below.

 

[Atmasphere]

^^ Get a set of ZEROs to go between the amp and the speaker and you will have your highs back

http://www.zeroimpedance.com

 

[Johnny Vinyl]

Johnny, if Canadian, how about the old SimAudio W-8? That was a fabulous amplifier in it's days. It should be far below your 5K budget, and I can recommend you power capacitors to change out that will give it a new lease on life

Now that the Mk II version of my own Genesis amps are out, the smaller ones of the Mk I version should also come into the market at your budget and below.

I like SimAudio actually and have heard them many times paired with a variety of speakers. They come up occasionally on CAM, so I'll be keeping my eye out. I've not heard your amps Gary, but I suspect they would make for a wonderful match with your speakers. Do keep me posted.

 

[Johnny Vinyl]

^^ Get a set of ZEROs to go between the amp and the speaker and you will have your highs back

http://www.zeroimpedance.com

I think I get the reference, but can you elaborate a liitle?

 

[microstrip]

Yes - that's right. When the impedance of the CLS goes down to close to the output impedance of the tube amp, it rolls off. Ribbon tweeters like on the Raidho, on the other hand are almost purely resistive and so the high output impedance on the tube amp does not affect it. To my ears, the slow roll-off of the highs sound plasticky - not like the plasticky of a cellophane, but the plasticky of softer plastic - if that makes sense......

Yes, it makes sense. Are you referring to the bextrene of the old KEF and B&W speaker units from the 70'?

 

[garylkoh]

Yes, it makes sense. Are you referring to the bextrene of the old KEF and B&W speaker units from the 70'?

I'm not familiar with bextrene - but a quick google search shows that it's just a trade name for polystyrene. That should account for a plasticky sound - it would be harder like cellophane.

 

[microstrip]

(...) The other side of the problem is that electrostatics like ML's and SoundLabs get blamed for being "plasticky" because they are almost a dead short at high frequencies.

The impedance of the Soundlabs at high-frequencies depends on the treble level adjustment. As most of the time you have to attenuate the treble inserting some resistance is series with the toroid section the value is not so low as expected from a large panel electrostatic. BTW, once you set the treble level in Soundlabs, you should replace the potentiometer with an excellent
quality power resistors.

As an aside owners of speakers with variable settings should remember that many times the adjustments affect the impedance of the speaker. The Aida seemed to have a very friendly impedance, but once you switched on the backward speaker units and increased the bass level by one point it become much less friendly ...

 

[microstrip]

I'm not familiar with bextrene - but a quick google search shows that it's just a trade name for polystyrene. That should account for a plasticky sound - it would be harder like cellophane.

Gary,
Think LS3/5A - the most famous bextrene cone in audio history.

 

[garylkoh]

Ah! It was doped and damped wasn't it? I had a pair in the late '80's that was "all original"

 

[Atmasphere]

I think I get the reference, but can you elaborate a liitle?

The ZEROs are autoformers that have really wide bandwidth- to nearly 2 MHz. They are set up so you can load the amp at 16 ohms, with taps for 4, 3 and 2 ohms. With the 0.5 ohm impedance of the Martin-Logans, the impedance presented to the amps would be about 4 ohms at 20KHz if using the '2 ohm' tap.

FWIW the Sound Lab is quite a different animal! With the Brilliance control set to minimum, its impedance is about 3 ohms at 20KHz, with it set to maximum is about 1.5 ohms, at least it was up until about a year ago when the new backpanel was introduced. The old versions needed about 200 watts from a tube amp and about 600 watts if you wanted a solid state amp to play as loud as the 200 watt tube amp. Nowadays with the new backpanel you can do the same work with a 100 watt tube amp. They have gotten considerably more practical.

 

[esldude]

The ZEROs are autoformers that have really wide bandwidth- to nearly 2 MHz. They are set up so you can load the amp at 16 ohms, with taps for 4, 3 and 2 ohms. With the 0.5 ohm impedance of the Martin-Logans, the impedance presented to the amps would be about 4 ohms at 20KHz if using the '2 ohm' tap.

FWIW the Sound Lab is quite a different animal! With the Brilliance control set to minimum, its impedance is about 3 ohms at 20KHz, with it set to maximum is about 1.5 ohms, at least it was up until about a year ago when the new backpanel was introduced. The old versions needed about 200 watts from a tube amp and about 600 watts if you wanted a solid state amp to play as loud as the 200 watt tube amp. Nowadays with the new backpanel you can do the same work with a 100 watt tube amp. They have gotten considerably more practical.

Some of the older Soundlabs actually went to about .75-1 ohm at 20 khz. Always wanted to try some of those Zero autoformers. Just never did. With the price of them I just put that money toward bigger amps.

 

[microstrip]

Some of the older Soundlabs actually went to about .75-1 ohm at 20 khz. Always wanted to try some of those Zero autoformers. Just never did. With the price of them I just put that money toward bigger amps.

Yes, I owned a pair of those Soundlabs, still having the old wood cores. But I think no one could use them with the treble level at the maximum - they would sound terribly edgy! Typically you would add 2 ohms to this impedance, making it more tolerable.

I owned the first generation of auto-transformers, finished in nice wood boxes - they were sold by Atmasphere, I think mainly for the MA50's at that time - Ralph will correct me if I am wrong. Although they were useful to use the MA50's with typical 4 ohm speakers, they would degrade the sound quality of the MA50's, trading some magic in the medium and in the airy sound for a more controlled bass. I remember I sold them in Audiogon back to the US to Paul Speltz, who now manufactures the Zero's, when I got the MA2's to replace the MA50's.

 

[Atmasphere]

You ran Sound Labs with M-50s?

I imagine they just did not have enough power, autoformer or no. But I do recall back in those days the Sound Labs were easier to drive. Once they went to the toroidal high frequency transformer the speaker got a lot harder to drive due to an error in the crossover, which was not fixed until just last year. I know the MA-1s play them easily now but we've not tried the M-60 - yet.

 

[microstrip]

You ran Sound Labs with M-50s? (...)

No, the MA50 were used mainly with Quad ESL's , the old B&W 802 Matrix and later with the B&W Silver Signature SS25 - this last matching created some of the more holographic soundstage I have ever experienced - you could really touch the players. The listening Reference Recordings "The Soldiers Tale" was always a memorable session.

The SoundLabs needed the MA2's.

 

[puroagave]

No, the MA50 were used mainly with Quad ESL's , the old B&W 802 Matrix and later with the B&W Silver Signature SS25 - this last matching created some of the more holographic soundstage I have ever experienced - you could really touch the players. The listening Reference Recordings "The Soldiers Tale" was always a memorable session.

The SoundLabs needed the MA2's.

MA-1 driving Celestion SL700's also projected the most realistic walk-through type of staging I've ever experienced. I met Ralph eons ago when he opened his san diego dealer, Bruce was demoing with the cantate domino LP everyone present were gobsmacked. the back half of the room totally disappeared, what was left was a choir and organist - just brilliant. Bruce lent me the MA-1s and I could not recreate the same magic at home they simply did not have the drive to play soundlab A3's, regardless of where the brilliance control was set.

 

[LL21]

MA-1 driving Celestion SL700's also projected the most realistic walk-through type of staging I've ever experienced. I met Ralph eons ago when he opened his san diego dealer, Bruce was demoing with the cantate domino LP everyone present were gobsmacked. the back half of the room totally disappeared, what was left was a choir and organist - just brilliant. Bruce lent me the MA-1s and I could not recreate the same magic at home they simply did not have the drive to play soundlab A3's, regardless of where the brilliance control was set.

Those are amazing speakers! I owned the SL6sis...I bought a demo pair as my first speakers ever...kept them for over 10 years...great great speakers, and always liked the SL600si and SL700...would have loved to have heard the SL600si with the 6000 dipole subs.