The dreaded speaker question...

sKiZo wrote:Parts Express has some interesting line arrays for a couple grand ...



180 drivers ... yikes!

And the powered subwoofs, xovers and dBX speaker management boxes are extra. But they sure look cool.

I second Bob's recommendation on the Tylers. I purchased a pair of the Linbrook Signatures when I purchased my Mk-3's and couldn't be happier. I'm not fortunate enough to live somewhere where I can audition anything so I did a lot of research. In your price range, you cold buy new from Tyler.

I nearly pulled the trigger on Bob's recommended Tyler Acoustics -- I couldn't find a bad word about them on the net.

Totems -- how I've drooled over those things.

Reference 3a MM -- Ultra High Fidelity magazine once rated these as among the best speakers under $80k, or some ridiculously stratuspheric price point. They run about $3k.

Are you at all willing to try your hand at building? It's by no means the black art it's reputed to be. Check out the frugal horn website for a number of DIY ideas. For under $5 or 600 you could build something like the FH-3, and I dare say you'll easily get astonishing value for money.

http://www.frugal-horn.com/FH3.html

Assistance on the DIYAudio forum is abundant and friendly, just like here. I've built two pairs of speakers now, and had no prior wood working skill.

By the way, DeePee99, your avatar is really "bugging" me. ;-)

Is that a Vibroplex?

73 de VE6IE

Tube Nube wrote:By the way, DeePee99, your avatar is really "bugging" me. ;-)

Is that a Vibroplex?

73 de VE6IE

Hi-hi.
Yep. Just about wore that puppy out working the nets on 40 aeons ago. More than a few of them from Alberta. Some of those guys had a really FB fist. Then got divorced from (among many other things) my S-line and 40-meter dipole, moved into town etc., etc. and my novice ticket expired. Studying for the general now; my how things have changed in the hamming world.

73 de KB7GTO.
BTW, QTH was Kingston, Idaho. My QSL card was a red, white and blue Idaho centennial auto license plate, kinda distinctive.
R

Might I suggest a set of CornScalas? They basically take the best of the Klipsch Cornwall and the best of the Klipsch LaScala and combine them into a really nice set of highly efficient speakers. They are a DIY speaker, but you can buy a set of cabinets and parts from Bob Crites and assemble them and finish them to your taste / décor. If you check out the Klipsch forum on AudioKarma, there are several folks who have built various flavors of CornScalas (they come in four different versions A-D). For more information:

http://www.critesspeakers.com/cornscala.html

Good luck!

-D

Donkeyshins wrote:Might I suggest a set of CornScalas?  They basically take the best of the Klipsch Cornwall and the best of the Klipsch LaScala and combine them into a really nice set of highly efficient speakers.  They are a DIY speaker, but you can buy a set of cabinets and parts from Bob Crites and assemble them and finish them to your taste / décor.  If you check out the Klipsch forum on AudioKarma, there are several folks who have built various flavors of CornScalas (they come in four different versions A-D).  For more information:

http://www.critesspeakers.com/cornscala.html

Good luck!

-D

Looks like one of the old Speakerlab projects. Whatever happened to those guys?

deepee99 wrote:

Donkeyshins wrote:Might I suggest a set of CornScalas?  They basically take the best of the Klipsch Cornwall and the best of the Klipsch LaScala and combine them into a really nice set of highly efficient speakers.  They are a DIY speaker, but you can buy a set of cabinets and parts from Bob Crites and assemble them and finish them to your taste / décor.  If you check out the Klipsch forum on AudioKarma, there are several folks who have built various flavors of CornScalas (they come in four different versions A-D).  For more information:

http://www.critesspeakers.com/cornscala.html

Good luck!

-D

Looks like one of the old Speakerlab projects. Whatever happened to those guys?

They're still around on Roosevelt Way in Seattle, although they don't do speaker kits any more (AFAIK). Bob has been specializing in Klipsch for many years, and came up with the CornScala idea on his own. His knockdown cabinets have a lot better fit & finish than the old Speakerlab kits.

-D

Stopped in Audio Classics tonight to pick up a cable, and in the corner was a pair of Tyler Acoustics.  It was minutes before closing time and the sales guy didn't know anything about them, said they rarely if ever auditioned them, took them in on trade and said they'd make "a great deal on them."  He said they've had them for three years.  I might take them home for a listen.  I don't even know what they are, but looking at the Tyler site, I'm pretty sure they're the D2X's.  The only thing, is if I liked them, I hate the rose colored wood, would certainly try to get them refinished.

EDIT: Likely the D2's, not the D2X's since they're at least three years old.

Make sure and comment on the "dated 80's look" of the rose wood as you hemmm and hawwww!

He's to,d you too much already in conceding not knowing about them and also having had them sit there. I'd start with a real low ball... $300, or so. If you start talking about "auditioning" then that might convey they're woth something.

For 3 or 400, even if they're wreaked, its a deal, and you can no doubt get them fixed up.

And, after all, they have to be restained, although, you probably want to say "painted", avoiding expensive words like "refinished" or "restained."

Please give us updates on this.

Tube Nube wrote:Make sure and comment on the "dated 80's look" of the rose wood as you hemmm and hawwww!

He's to,d you too much already in conceding not knowing about them and also having had them sit there. I'd start with a real low ball... $300, or so. If you start talking about "auditioning" then that might convey they're woth something.

For 3 or 400, even if they're wreaked, its a deal, and you can no doubt get them fixed up.

And, after all, they have to be restained, although, you probably want to say "painted", avoiding expensive words like "refinished" or "restained."

Please give us updates on this.

He's a good guy. I'll play stupid but he's always been very fair to me. I'm going back in in a few days to pick up my MAC1900 which is being cleaned/checked so I'll ask more. While I was there he showed me a VPI Traveler turntable at $1,299, new, that he said he could do "even better" on the price if I was interested. So I've been reviewing that now too. This stuff is starting to add up      

Here they are here on their website.  Never thought to look there.  Look like more than $400!!! But I bet you my left arm I can get them for a good price since I'm local and pick up my own gear. That's a major hassle saver for them, as they sell 90% of their gear over the phone or internet and have to pack it up and ship it, then take it back if needed.  On a side note, they have a minty Dynakit MKIII mono amp wrapped up, he couldn't even find a price on it.  An original one, not aftermarket.

http://www.audioclassics.com/detail.php3?detail=D2&nav=cat

Their original list price seems somewhat inflated as well. The new D2X's are $4,800 new.

For some reason I was envisioning a much smaller speaker. I like a good deal much as the next guy, but like you suggest, I wouldn't want to take advantage of people, especially if they've been decent to me.

I did a search on these speakers, and came across a forum discussion recommending updating the caps and resistors in the cross overs. Probably worth contacting Tyler himself to confirm what the original price was. I'd be interested to know the difference between the current D2X and the older D2 you're looking at. From the little bit I read, they sound like phenomenal speakers. And we've already heard a 1st hand account of the people and their some of their products from Bob L.

I'm excited for ya!

Here's a link to the GR Research forum where Danny Richie (who designed the crossovers for the D2) discusses upgrades.

http://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=114902.msg1199916#msg1199916

Odd that nobodyhere has mentioned the venerable Dynaco line of speakers, particularly the iconic A-25.
Some great reading on Greg Dunn's website here:
http://home.indy.net/~gregdunn/dynaco/components/speakers/
Over 1 million two-way A-25s were sold back in the 1970s, designed around Seas drivers and originally built for Dynaco in Denmark. They were the second pair of "audiophile" speaks I ever owned, having had to downsize from McIntosh ML-1Cs and I still remember how neutral and powerful they sounded. They were vintage Dynaco in elegant simplicity: the two-way crossover consisted of a 5 uF electrolytic cap, no coil, and a selector-switch to impose a little resistance to the tweeter.
Not much to go wrong with them either, because the 10-inch woofer surrounds were rubber and didn't rot like foam surrounds. The crossover capacitor can be replaced and upgraded for about $5.
In good shape they go for about $200 a pair -- twice what they cost new -- and can handle most anything a tube amp can dish out. I'm rebuilding a pair for the den. The original Seas woofer is no longer made and later iterations won't fit im the enclosure hole, but Seas makes a drop-in tweeter replacement.
Even at $200-$300 a pair they're a bargain and while I have not heard the larger A-35s or A-50s except in showrooms 40 years ago, those babies would rock, too.

Ah, the Dynaco A-25.  Wonderful speaker (no matter which iteration you have; there were several unannounced changes in its long life, even some with no change in model number; including moving the Aperiodic vent from top to bottom).  I never owned A-25s myself but my uncle had a pair and drove them with an ever-evolving sequence of amplification; from a Pioneer SX-1500 receiver to Kenwood separates to Marantz A-V gear.  They always sounded neutral; more live than their main competition when they were new, which was Acoustic Research.  ARs always seemed to sound rather distant compared to the A-25s.  After a while I figured out that I could make the A-25s sound distant too, somewhat like the ARs, by using a narrowband graphic equalizer to dial in a mild dip in the 750Hz-2000Hz range!

He kept his A-25s pristine until the day he died.  Somehow I hoped I'd get them but his daughter has them, now.  I did get my Dad's Dynaco A-10s when he passed on.  They have much the same sonic character as the A-25s but as one would expect from the smaller woofer, they are lighter in the low end.

Check out world design audio for their wd25 a speaker " based on " the famous dynaco.

I also seem to recall Bob posting plans here abouts, once upon a time. What a neat project it would be to build a set of these.

Tube Nube wrote:Check out world design audio for their wd25 a speaker " based on " the famous dynaco.

I also seem to recall Bob posting plans here abouts, once upon a time. What a neat project it would be to build a set of these.

There's a pair of 'em built, for a kilobuck, on AudiogoN:
http://app.audiogon.com/listings/monitors-seas-excel-ten-inch-dynaco-a25-clones-studio-monitors-speakers-loudspeakers-norway-mu-2013-12-30-speakers-90212-beverly-hills-ca

Think I'll stay with my St. Vinnie's find. Seems like a lot of A-25s ended up in Canada; I pulled up a half-dozen pairs for sale on Canuck Audio Mart searching for the Seas woofer.

There are tons of threads on repairs and tweaks on the DIY forums for the A-25 and its variants. Only drawback is that nobody makes a drop-in replacement for the original Seas 25-TV-EW 10" woofer. Madison Sound has one that's accoustically and electrical identical, but you have to do some wood butchering on the cabinets. Used drivers pop up on eBay and Can/US Audio mart; CAM's where I found mine.

Seas came out with a remake of the A25: http://seas.no/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=323&Itemid=277

Michael

A modern rendition:

www.madisoundspeakerstore.com/2-way-speaker-kits/seas-a26-10-2-way-kit-pair-based-on-the-classic-a25/

Gotta admit I'm a little tempted!

A couple of years ago, I was fortunate in coming across a pair of NOS, SEAS 25F-EW 10" speakers (I believe these were the same as used in the Dynaco A-25XL series). Along with the woofers, I also obtained a couple of SEAS H1189 dome tweeters and a pair of "prototype" raw birch enclosures with Scanspeak "aperiodic" vents already installed. All for a very reasonable price! After staining and finishing the cabinets with wipe on polyurethane, I installed the drivers and (after trial and error) settled on 6.8 mf capacitors in series with the tweeters. L-pad attenuators were used to balance the HF/LF levels. These are being driven by a new built Dynakitparts ST-35 amplifier and a new built Dynakitparts PAS preamp using one each of Roy's phono boards and TCLA line boards. I have been very pleased with the performance, having later added a Quadaptor and a pair of Dynaco A10 speakers in the rear. Here are a couple of photo links of the speakers:

https://s1096.photobucket.com/user/luddite3/media/MyDynaco/CopyofA25003.jpg.html?sort=3&o=1

https://s1096.photobucket.com/user/luddite3/media/MyDynaco/CopyofA25004.jpg.html?sort=3&o=0

Best Regards,
Charlie