TurboTravis 25 Posted September 15, 2016 Posted September 15, 2016 Other than the Stroker (see below), I'm running a M400T Cube and 6 Realistic Mach Ones (the older 4024s). Recapped and what not. I grew up dreaming about the Mach Ones, mostly why I have these. I'm ready to step up the sound quality. Any suggestions guys? The Cube is a perfect match running 3 Machs on each side at 2.66ohms. The Cube seems to really shine when it's loaded to 4ohms-2.66ohm (never tried 2ohm) per channel. I would like to keep the Cube, so if something out there was 4 ohms it would be a plus. Any ideas guys? Would not like to sacrifice much volume but definitely increase SQ. Prob asking too much! -Travis
pindrop 330 Posted September 15, 2016 Posted September 15, 2016 Sooo you want better SQ and the same volume of 3 sets Mach 1's from one cabinet? /yetanotherforum/uploadfiles/20160915063329162.jpg Welcome to to the site!
Ar9Jim 6,512 Posted September 15, 2016 Posted September 15, 2016 Hi Trav.. You have a huge choice of speakers.. The vintage speakers can be a great value although many times they need some restoration.. Many guys around here have Carver speakers, Many also enjoy Polk Audio especially the SDA series.. Myself, I have been an AR guy and there are several others around.. If you find speakers set up for bi-amp (4 binding post each speaker) then you have more options for changing your system around and trying new things.. You can also get great subwoofer/sat systems.. I prefer large cabinet volume, acoustic suspension, floorstanding types with lots of power on them, but I'm kind of old and that's how it was done back in the day.. Carver made the big power we were after at a price we could conceive and own someday.. If you have any vintage hi fi shops in your area, you may find some speakers to try.. Enjoy the search, it can be a lot of fun!! I suggest reading reviews of the most awesome speakers you have heard of, that were somewhat mass produced.. Flatter frequency response in the bass region cost money in general, but is worth paying for imno.. Shipping can be costly, but I used Uship before and it went well and didn't break the bank (read driver feedback before choosing). Sometimes electronics from dry climate areas can be in better condition than humid salty areas.. Guess that's all I've got.. Think of the ones you dreamed of in your youth and make that dream a reality.. Not sure it gets any better than that.. Hope this helps.. Enjoy.. 1
Daddyjt 9,612 Posted September 15, 2016 Posted September 15, 2016 Right off the top of my head, I'd say vintage Klipsch - Heresy, La Scalla, etc - would be a great match to the cube. If you plan to add more power (say a 1.0t or 1.5t, or a larger TFM) in the future, then I'd keep my eyes open for some vintage Infinities (Kappa 9, 8, 7), or any variant of the Carver or Polk that are bi-ampable (I know true bi-amping requires an active x-over, - I'm just talking about running one amp (cube) on the highs, and the other on the lows, via the double binding posts). Let your ears be the judge - everything else is just marketing and/or opinion!
Magnaryder 757 Posted September 30, 2016 Posted September 30, 2016 If the cube can run a 3-4 ohm load try the Spatial Audio Hologram M3 or M4s. They do everything well and I've not seen or heard of anyone nuking a driver. And...they love power. The drivers are built to pro standards and can handle whatever your cube can throw at them. Currently priced at $1695(M4) and $2195(M3) in Turbo dress. TurboS versions are more. ray 2
Ratamahatta 437 Posted October 2, 2016 Posted October 2, 2016 What is your budget? Those Mach Ones were good back in the day but you can certainly do better. If you want better and keep loud I second Klipsch. You can upgrade those as well.
maytag 853 Posted October 2, 2016 Posted October 2, 2016 What is your budget? Those Mach Ones were good back in the day but you can certainly do better. If you want better and keep loud I second Klipsch. You can upgrade those as well. One can dream...Only seventy pairs available. $16,000 per pair http://www.ebay.com/itm/Klipsch-70th-Anniversary-Klipschorn-Australian-Walnut-Pair-/291832888288?hash=item43f2987be0:g:1~4AAOSwTZ1XnNsT 1
MORE CARVER'S PLEASE 99 Posted October 4, 2016 Posted October 4, 2016 Hey Travis, So hear is my 2 cents at ya..... Yea I'm also going to steer you towards the Klipsch "Heritage" line speakers.... I've been a huge Klipsch fan for 25+ years. I've owned quite a few of there speakers. I had some Mach One's in the house for awhile but never really put alot of power in them. Was selling them for someone and just made sure they worked. If you looking to stay about the same size as your Mach One's Look at the Klipsch Heresy..... I don't think the heresy will be a upgrade, the Heresy lacks bass.... and that Mach One has a 15" woofer the Heresy 12" woofer... Next, Klipsch Forte'.... look for the Forte' II..... The Forte' has about the same foot print as the Heresy but taller, it will kill the Heresy in over all sound out put...... The forte' II will put out bass you can feel.... Next, one of my favorite.... Klipsch Chorus I's or II's..... both will shake the walls of a house given enough power.... These things will put out chest pounding bass, esp the II's.... the I's are no slouch... both are rated @ 101db's with 1-watt 8-ohms and both are rated at 1000 watts peak. These are like pro-audio speakers with a living room look. One guy on the Klipsch site refers to the Chorus as "a wolf in sheeps clothing" Just a few watts will get them bumping....But when the power needles on my TFM-55 start jumping past that 300+ watt range it's like a wall of music hitting ya.... You can feel the bass in you chest... I ran two M400 t's bridged for awhile on my Chorus I's.... one weekend I was pounding the Chorus hard for a few hours and one one of the cubes shut down.... man it was roasting..... so was the other one.... The TFM-55 will run cool all day long.... I just think it was too much for those little cubes... Next, another one of my favorite. and was my 1st Klipsch I bought some 25+ years ago and still heave them.... The Klipsch LaScalla.... It will put out huge sound... a really great sounding speaker... great highs, good bass but not chest thumping like the Chorus.... Some of the Klipsch guys mod the bass bins. I have not... Your M400t will sound great with the LaScalla I tell ya.... 10 watts in them and they will fill a room with music. 104dbs 1-watt @ 8-ohms Next, Klipsch Cornwalls IMHO there just OK.. I had a pair for a few years... had good sound... but I liked my Chorus better.... I wish Klipsch would have brought back a ChorusIII instead of the Cornwall III... Next, most of any of the Klipsch Pro-line of speaker..." KP"-201- ""301- ""362- ""320 just to name.... The Klipsch Pro-line of speaker Rocks... Jump on the Klipsch forum and post.... Post your location and see if there are any members that will let ya check out there speakers. I've seen it happen before. Hey if your in Md come on over.... and I'll sell my Chorus II's Good luck in your hunt... MCP :-) 1
MORE CARVER'S PLEASE 99 Posted October 4, 2016 Posted October 4, 2016 I forgot one The klipschorn..... Well I've never owned them or even heard them.... but they have the same drivers as the LaScala's and Bells... Never owned a Klipsch Bell either....... MCP :-)
BarryG 2,853 Posted October 4, 2016 Posted October 4, 2016 Hey MCP, still need to hear your klipsch setup! Will call you soon! Barry
MORE CARVER'S PLEASE 99 Posted October 4, 2016 Posted October 4, 2016 Hey MCP, still need to hear your klipsch setup! Will call you soon! Barry looking forward to it Barry my man..... I hope to have the JBL's up and running in the next few days... MCP :-)
onelasttime 4 Posted October 6, 2016 Posted October 6, 2016 The idea of spending good money on a set of Realistic Mach 1's today seems silly! The surrounds are going to be rotted the voice coils are probably not prsitine 50 years latter, the cones are likely not that great either. You have caps in the cross over's that likely need to be replaced etc....Everything old is not that great and also most things 40+ years old need a lot of repairs to make them fully functional. Speakers are just as much mechanical as electrical. People romantisize speakers for some reasons. Paper and foam and rubber does not age that well. In fact transistors adn resistors age much better than paper, foam and rubber do. Even if the speakers are NOS or NOB a 40 year old speaker is still a 40 year old speaker. I can see wanting to keep the enclosure though since some of these old enclousers especicaly on truly high end stuff is often a work of art!! When I am bidding on old gear on ebay for example no matter how nice something might look I always keep in mind that a lot of gear will need to have new capacitors, sold solder joint repairs and an alignment at the minimum. If you do not keep that sort of thing in mind you end up over paying for something that while never used is still old and degraded. By the time you add in the cost of parts and an alignment you could have bought modern gear of equal or better quality that needed nothing. I own 6 different 2 way radio's that are either NOS/NIB or close to it. I am recapping all of them because the youngest one is from 1998 and oldest one is from 1966. I will have to send them out one at a time though for an alignment. People over pay all the time on Ebay because they either do not think this far ahead, are ignorant to how cosmetics mean nothing to time with regard to capacitors and such or they just had to have an item no matter the cost and allow themselves to over bid. So guys keep in mind old gear even if it has never been used likely will need work if you want it to sound like it did when new. The worst thing you can do to electronics is not use them that shortens their life more than useing them does! Using a piece of gear with dry old caps in it is a recipe for disaster because often IC's and discrete devices not made any more will be taken out by a failing $0,10 capacitors or $0.03 carbon resistor. Do not let romantics cost you money chasing after a sound that will never live again becasue no one makes them like the used too. It is not enough to own old gear the gear has to be electronicaly and sonicly as it was when it was first built 30, 40, 50 years ago and that is impossible to do. Instead chase after a sound not how the sound was produced or the brand of gear used at that point in history to produce that sound. No matter what you do purist will never accept any substitutes and will always insist the new thing is not as good and the young up and coming generation will not be able to afford your gear. As usual the old fat men with money will get the all the toys and the people in the middle will be the ones hunting down vintage gear and restoring it with modern parts attempting to capture what once was. 2
Ar9Jim 6,512 Posted October 6, 2016 Posted October 6, 2016 Onelasttime, You make many good points that are certainly fact as to the lifespans of materials and things.. We all have our reasons though for approaches to vintage gear and the desire to own it.. I restore old tube amps using the vintage circuit designs but with modern parts. My goal is not to bring back something that will never be, but to use the vintage design and optimize it with the low noise, closer tolerance, better imho parts of today.. Many times its the design and designers work that we want to hear. IIRC there are only 3 basic amp circuits (correct me if I'm wrong anyone) that all are versions or tweaks of.. Its the same with speakers. Although the materials may fail and need replacement at considerable cost, the design lives on. Companies change designs often and not always for the better.. Many times the best work from companies are in their past and the new products are not as good.. In the case of my tube amps, I could buy a China made tube amp that may or may not sound just as good, for the same money as my restomod vintage amps.. But these are the work of Americans like our grandfathers and American designs in many cases.. There is some romance in there and some pride in history, that can cause us to overpay to pristine examples, but the same can be said for anything especially cars.. As far as collector cars they were not that good when new, compared to today's cars but people restore them and enjoy them none the less.. I would like to have some modern American tube amps but this close to retirement I'll stick with vintage that are easier to afford.. It's fun to restore old amps and when listener comments on the wonderful sound, its awesome to say " it was made in 1962 USA" Most cannot believe it.. If you enjoy playing with vintage gear and can repair/restore yourself that's great.. If you have to pay a shop to do it for you it would be tough to justify imho.. 6
loner_t 2,568 Posted October 6, 2016 Posted October 6, 2016 If you enjoy playing with vintage gear and can repair/restore yourself that's great.. If you have to pay a shop to do it for you it would be tough to justify imho.. The Techs and DIY'ers on CS are much better than shops. I had much rather trust vintage gear to folks on CS than in a shop. This is not intended to disparage any shops that repair vintage gear. Both have different goals, one has 'love' written all over it, while others may have some financial overtones. Vintage gear does take some BST, but the nostalgia has it's own value for an aging population segment that wants to capture their halcyon days. My sons do not give a shit about the behemoths I have in my basement at 80+ lbs. They are happy with a iPhone6/7. I enjoy the iPhone in the car rather than drive my racks in the back of my car. 4
Daddyjt 9,612 Posted October 6, 2016 Posted October 6, 2016 A big part of the reason we go for vintage speakers, is the apparent retreat by almost all manufacturers from the mid-fi market. If you want current production speakers, it seems as though you are constrained to either very cheap entry level models, or very high end (expensive) models. Take a $1,000 in 1990, which due to inflation, is about $2,000 now. In 1990, that $1,000 would buy you a seemingly endless variety of GREAT speakers – Polk, Infinity, Klipsch, NHT, Carver, Mirage… And these were QUALITY speakers – solid cabinets, quality components, reasonable warranties, and all sold in stores where you could listen to different models, and make an educated buying decision. Now, take $2,000 today. There is a veritable vacuum at that price point in the speaker market. It seems that current production models fall in the “less than” $500 price point, or the “greater than” $5,000 price point. The sub $500 speakers offered don’t appeal to many of those that frequent sites such as this, and a lot of us can’t afford the $5,000+ models. HOWEVER, for $2,000, I can buy 2 or 3 sets of vintage speakers, perform the necessary updates/repairs, and have multiple sets of QUALITY speakers that will now last several years into the future. And that is to say nothing for the fun along the way, and the pride in knowing that I have preserved something great for future generations. 8
kve777 6,888 Posted October 6, 2016 Posted October 6, 2016 I'm using a pair of Klipsch KLF10's on my garage system. These sound more like Mach One's, especially in the bass department, Lascala's and Belle's can be light on deep bass and take up a lot of floor space. K-horns not only need space, they need corners, too. Speakers in the KLF, KSF, etc. families have great deep bass and precision, more in keeping with the OP's intent. Easier to find, too.. Cabinets may need reinforcing, but that's an easy fix. I got mine on CL for $50.00, so the good deals are out there! 2
Magnaryder 757 Posted October 7, 2016 Posted October 7, 2016 A big part of the reason we go for vintage speakers, is the apparent retreat by almost all manufacturers from the mid-fi market. If you want current production speakers, it seems as though you are constrained to either very cheap entry level models, or very high end (expensive) models. Take a $1,000 in 1990, which due to inflation, is about $2,000 now. In 1990, that $1,000 would buy you a seemingly endless variety of GREAT speakers – Polk, Infinity, Klipsch, NHT, Carver, Mirage… And these were QUALITY speakers – solid cabinets, quality components, reasonable warranties, and all sold in stores where you could listen to different models, and make an educated buying decision. Now, take $2,000 today. There is a veritable vacuum at that price point in the speaker market. It seems that current production models fall in the “less than” $500 price point, or the “greater than” $5,000 price point. The sub $500 speakers offered don’t appeal to many of those that frequent sites such as this, and a lot of us can’t afford the $5,000+ models. HOWEVER, for $2,000, I can buy 2 or 3 sets of vintage speakers, perform the necessary updates/repairs, and have multiple sets of QUALITY speakers that will now last several years into the future. And that is to say nothing for the fun along the way, and the pride in knowing that I have preserved something great for future generations. I spent the last 4 years looking for a set of speakers to round out my rig. I've owned 5 different sets of Carver ALS, speakers from Snell, Fried, Energy, Alesis and several homebrews to no avail. Nothing really floated my boat. "IT" was always missing. I tried different alignments, several subs and still no it. Damn! What is wrong here? I had several conversations with guys who have opinions I respect asking what am I doing wrong? The word that kept coming up was SYNERGY. F1nut has used that in many of the conversations I've had with him. Look for the Synergy young Padawan he said. So look I have. I took a close look at my rig and it's strengths and weaknesses. This takes balls. I have some serious donero it my V20 and the Fosgate Signature tube pre. So what do they bring to the party? Hmmm. Well great depth, air, delicacy and decent slamm. And all those tubes have a lushness you have to hear to believe. I have a great phono cart and when I get it up and running my Rega 3 with the SME arm will hold its own in the analogue arena so what can I do on the digital end?Among comes Yggdrasil. Everything I'd read says this DAC has to be heard to be believed. It recovers details from CD you haven't heard before. So off I go to hear it. There were some other VERY expensive DACs in the room but none recovered the music the way Yggdrasil does. If they're not letting me hear all off the music they're a nonplayer. Now I could have purchased the Gungnir but all reports say it's a little warmer and I felt my rig was warm enough. It was a great call. Yggdrasil brought my tubes into sharp focus. Now to speakers which is the point of the story. I needed something that added nothing. At CF 10 11 or 12 Mark Lucas brought a set of OB speaks he had built himself. Mark is one of those guys with huge smarts and alot of skills and brings them to the table. I listened to his rig and it really shined in all the right places. Remembering Marks rig I began to look and to think out of the box. Or perhaps lose the box. I stumbled across PAP and Spatial Audio. Spatials creator Clayton Shaw has been around the block a bit in the OB camp and has some serious chops when it comes to OB speaks. I haven't found anyone who has his Hologram line that doesn't sing their praises. I did my due diligence found some owners I came to trust and pulled the trigger. This one went over the fence! You should have seen the look on Bob's face after spending some time with them. Priceless. Bobs words "the M3s have no right sounding this good for the money. "I think that pretty much says it all. I do t know what you have to spend .... but.... if you have the dosh you should put an ear on the Spatial Hologram M3s. Highly recommended.ray 2
kve777 6,888 Posted October 7, 2016 Posted October 7, 2016 I'm sorry I didn't get to hear those at CF'16, Ray.
BarryG 2,853 Posted October 7, 2016 Posted October 7, 2016 I'm sorry I didn't get to hear those at CF'16, Ray. Me either, I wish I had! I don't know how I missed them! Barryg
BobSmi57 25 Posted October 7, 2016 Posted October 7, 2016 I listened to Ray's system at Carverfest, as well as Mark Lucas' home-built open baffle speakers. They both sounded very nice. Open, nice soundstage, and very good detail. Bob
Maddmaster 1,001 Posted October 10, 2016 Posted October 10, 2016 Hey MCP, still need to hear your klipsch setup! Will call you soon! Barry I'd like to check them out too. Barry PM when you plan on going if you don't mine me tagging along.
BarryG 2,853 Posted October 10, 2016 Posted October 10, 2016 I don't mind at all ! Maybe next Saturday! I'll be taking an m-500t for him to try with one of his speaker pairs!
massastan 50 Posted October 10, 2016 Posted October 10, 2016 Try adding an external crossover (Ashly 4001), EQ (dbx 2215), and an RTA (Parts Express 390-800). Disconnect the internal crossovers and drive the drivers individually or by level. You have enough amps to drive your speaker levels individually with the best amp for each job. Then tune the system and set the sound/response profile to the room and your preference with the RTA's db meter function for each speaker, then EQ with the octave analysis function to set/level the profile. Look at your drivers and enclosure design volumes and port size to determine the type of damping, using online box design apps, they provide which can only be influenced by the crossovers damping setting. Choose the amp which has the necessary damping factor. Tweeters and high mids do not require a high damping factor, whereas low mids and subs require a high damping factor. 1
rogocolo 1 Posted October 13, 2016 Posted October 13, 2016 I like Advent Speakers with my Carver Amps. I post about them and their sonic clarity on classicspeakerpages.net. I have the 3-way and 2-way configurations. I parted with my Carver Amazings IV this summer. I could never get the sound correct out of those beasts. 1
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