@Timmeh, Take more time to play around w/ your Klipsch RP600 speakers, keep playing with their positioning and your seat until you find just the right combo you enjoy. Move them closer and further away from the walls and adjust the toe in or out as is your preference. Also add some books under them to adjust the height and see what difference if any that makes. Then come back and tell us about your adventures.
My own RP600’s stay firmly planted in my bedroom, doing double duty as both music and Television speakers played through a now discontinued Klipsch powergate amplifier. I could swap out the Streamer, Dac and amp but i choose not to. Why? you ask. Because they work well in that location and for whatever unexplainable reason have perfect synergy w/ this silly little amplifier. I honestly now think it really has something to do w/ the room dimensions after reading about your own experience. The bedroom is 24w x 16d x 9h and they perform very well within the dimensions of this room. Another added benefit is that when used w/ the TV, despite the distance that my lounging position in bed is from the location of the speakers they are above average performers in their role.
Take your time, enjoy your own pieces and get to know them w/ your equipment. I am hoping you too will find them admirable performers. Happy listening always.
The issue with Danny’s Upgrades generally, is he doesn’t just replace parts with higher quality parts, but rather moves crossover points and retunes speakers to his specific preference.
Speakers are often designed to not measure flat, and even things like cabinet resonances (which are more universally considered bad) can be a part of a speaker design.
Danny makes good stuff, but unless you specifically want something that sounds like what Danny makes you should think hard about “upgrading” a speaker you love.
I’m with you! The thing with the RP600m though is that it’s cheap enough to try and see if there is an improvement. Better quality components yield better results, but the thing with his stuff is that if you notice, his videos NEVER give any listening notes or impressions of the improvements outside of measurements. Being flat is not the end game.
As you state, there are a lot of speakers in which the cabinet design is part of the sound signature.
Why buy any speaker just to have him tune it to his preference at all? Just buy his own stuff at that point. If it was “broken” then it wasn’t for you and your suited taste in the first place? imho. How I see it is every company has their own idea of what is the sound they like or aim for. Letting this guy near any speaker ( that isn’t his) is totally defeating the purpose of that from what I have seen in his channel.
In my case I like my 600 and if I want more or an improvement I think I’d be better serviced by what’s next from klipsch or similar from another company that has that character is how I feel about it.
The thing that irks me is how he improves everyone else’s design. I might be presumptuous about his work but that’s just how I felt coming away from his channel when I was looking for info for my 2 ch system.
I will and I am doing so. The thing is I went ahead and bought 2 Monoprice stands. I should have found a way to elevate them a bit more to hear how it sounds but I just got annoyed trying to find stuff to put them on for more height and went ahead with some measurements and the rule of thumb of the tweeter being at eye level. Ordered 32 inch stands and now hoping I don’t regret it lol. Feeling like I should have stuck with the 28" ones.
They were also intended to work with my pc where I do most my relaxing rather than the living room but man do they just come together in there so that’s where they’ll stay. I am now torn between working on getting a nicer amp for them out there since I still want a better system hooked up to my pc. I would love to get subs but thinking that is better left alone for now because I did some shopping around and the prices I got after shipping was atrocious to say the least and I don’t want to skimp on the subs since I won’t change those I feel.
Yeah I understand that seeing a guy just draw up some measurements and make decisions based on that can come off not so good. But if he isn’t a grifter and the customers like the result then it’s all good imo.
As for the “why buy his upgrade instead of getting a better speaker” question, I think it appeals to people who’ve owned their speaker for a while, like it, and don’t really want another speaker. Or if you’re anal about parts quality.
I understand the concerns of him changing the sound by adding dampening materials or changing the xover freq but I think at that point it’s the customers decision to decide if they agree with him and buy/not buy.
For a headphone comparison, it’s a bit like buying a Lawton tune up kit for a th900 or 610 or Denon or something. It tries to address peakiness or unevenness in the response, and if you feel like those headphones have that problem, then it’s a worthwhile purchase. Otherwise if you don’t find that to be an issue and already like what those headphones are doing, it’s probably not worth buying. Basically the same with the GR kit, if you already love what the 600m does, it’s likely not worth your time, but if you have some of the same qualms GR does, then it makes sense
I assume the question is really about low powered tube amps.
They are relatively high efficiency and they have reasonably well behaved impedance curves which become more important with transformer coupled tube amps. so short version is yes.
In practice it’s going to depend on the power of the amp into the load, the room size, how it’s treated and what you listen to.
40 wpc will drive almost anything short of esoteric driver (midrange ribbons etc.).
You’re not restricted to particularly sensitive speakers at that power level, you just need to avoid the very insensitive ones.
I’d consider low powered tube amp to be < 8wpc.
FWIW, You’d probably be fine with a 3-5W amp on say RP-600M’s or similar, what you can end up with (with the wrong lower powered amp) is the amp having difficulty controlling the speakers, leading to an overly soft sound that would work well for say soft Jazz, but would struggle to produce the necessary macro dynamics for other genres.
My experience with tetrode/pentode based amps is I generally prefer ultralinear, but they actually don’t change the character as much as you might expect when triode strapped.
I have an Elekit amp here that I modified with a switch to swap between Triode/Pentode strapped and Ultralinear, it rarely comes out of ultralinear mode.
No ultralinear generates the same power as Pentode strapping, triode strapping usually significantly less.
In a Tetrode or a Pentode, you have multiple grids, that are there to allow them to be more linear over a larger range, in practice the difference between ultralinear and the other modes is how much of the output anode voltage you feed back to the second grid.
Which in turn impacts gain.
Triode Strapped is basically all of it
Pentode Strapped is basically none of it - second grid directly to B+
and Ultralinear is using a usually 25-40% transformer tap to feed a portion of it back.
Triode Strapped can sound a bit sweeter, with somewhat reduced dynamics, but IME the impact is marginal, Pentode strapping is rarely if ever used.
Note if you triode strap, you don’t need a transformer with an additional input tap, which makes sourcing a transformer considerably easier.
I’m trying to get my Forte IV’s figured out. I know they’re horns but they seem to have an issue with center imaging. They have an extreme stereo thing going on.
I’d try with getting the speakers closer together or toeing them in (probably this option looking at your room). My heresy’s get a little hazy unless they’re toed in.
