Kef LS50 anyone hear these?

Ah the Peanut Barrel. The Geology Department's home bar. I find it strange Grand Rapids has more audio stores than Houston. Which, to my knowledge, is just about zero.

 

Yes I love ole EL still. And Peanut barrel looks the same. Still has the 3 dart boards up front and the outside area. Once a week I got to Flat Black with my son and he checks out vinyl then we eat at Peanut Barrel and shoot some darts.

 

I am older and never really did care about flashy looks of drivers. I know they did it to wow people with the GOLD drivers and glossy black and omission of grills. Lots of people like seeing speakers with covers off, so many they are starting to save money on grill omissions and at same time pleasing people that don't like grills. Me I'm old crusty fuddy that still likes grills and women with just a tad bit of clothing on .

 

I prefer the more traditional box-y look too (on speakers, not women!).

 

I called them twice today no one picks up. Three strikes they out no excuses.

The Harbeth 40.1 looks to be the one I would want for sound I've been missing from smaller speakers. No idea on price.

Oh just found an online price. 13,490 and they will give me 50 cents trade in for me kefs.

Don't think my wife would like me spending that much on speakers.

 

It's a side business for them, so they're not "in the shop" - I think it's all appointment based. Their website says "Please leave a voicemail, we will promptly call you back." They've responded within minutes every time I emailed them, so that's also a good way to reach them.

I think the 40.1s are in the $13k range.

 

For what its worth this is a pretty good review on the Salk. I go with the flow if it were meant to happen they would have picked up. Salk picked up during a house closing with the attorneys in the room, scored some points w me there. Soundsmith way down on me list now. I was going to buy two carts over 1k in carts and told them so. 4 phone calls 4 emails etc. I get a referral back to the web pages which lacked the info on which to order. So I take that money and go buy speakers, they don't seem to want to sell products.

 

Yeah, Jim is a good, no-nonsense, super knowledgable guy. His customer support is going to be pretty phenomenal based on a few stories he shared the day I was there. I think you're going to get along w/ him well.

 

Norman you definetly are no noobie, sounds like you have some good life experience.

I think I'm a little nuts, I've been pretty sick the past 5 years (getting better) and I stopped paying attention to things. My mother and sister sold off my gun collection in a garage sale for 500.00 (like 20k worth of guns) and they acted like no big deal I don't hunt anymore so don't need them. Same thing with my boat motors etc. All my old stuff sold for dirt. I only have my boat because it was in the marina for 6 years and they did not know about it.

I got a bit irritated so I went out and bought two English pellet guns for me and my son for 5k. Lol, pellet guns for 5k and I'm agonizing over speakers which I will no doubt will use much more.

 

Yeah they are the speakers I would really really want. Sadly I'll probably never have that kind of dough. My wife would probably stab me if I spent that much money on speakers.

 

I have a pair in my home theater in the living room. I think they're watching me.

 

Sorry to hear you were sick I hope you're better. Jeez that's pretty rough selling off all your stuff like that. That's not right I'd be pretty pissed. Those must be some pretty awesome pellet guns! Laser sights?

 

If you like the sound of coherent drivers such as KEF and Tannoy, you should like Omega Loudspeakers as well, they are single driver (which other than an electrostatic type panel you can't get more coherent than that, but they don't have the bass weakness of electrostats). Some of their towers only take up about as much room as a bookshelf and stands.

They are very efficient and can be driven with only 2 watts, and since they are a single driver there is no crossover that can color tones and/or effect the first watt theory and the bulk of the budget goes into the outstanding drivers and cabinet build quality. They are hand made in the USA and Louis (the owner) even designs his own drivers which are also made in the USA (and is fairly unusual at the price point of Omegas), so nothing is outsourced to China, etc.

They start off at $795 for a set of his 3i monitors with Cherry or Walnut Veneer and go up to $2995 for his top of the line Alnico XRS floor standers in any finish. Also, since Louis is a custom builder, he can work with any ideas you have in mind, for instance you can add active subs to most of his floor stander designs. If you go to his website make sure to look at some of his Outlaw designs which gives you an idea of what he can do with custom builds.

If you have the room, floor space and budget I recommend the Alnico XRS or 7XRS with a frequency response of 44-18 kHz. In a smaller area I would recommend 3 XRS. There is an outstanding review by John Darko on the Alnico XRS (aka 6 Alnico XRS) here.

I'm very pleased with the performance of my Omega RS7 speakers and hooked on the cohesiveness, speed and transparency of single driver loudspeakers.

 

The cans I want to pick up cost as much as the LS50.
Picking up cans won't help me save up for speakers.

 

I had a chance to audition the little bookshelf Omegas, and did not like them at all. They were beam-y and just unpleasant sounding.

 

The Super 3Desktop Monitor? What amplification were you using? Although that was not my specific recommendation as that particular speaker (Super 3 Desktop) has been known to be fairly amp dependent, but I have never heard it described as "beamy" ... transparent yes, lack of coloration as compared to the LS50 yes, but beamy = no. It's an interesting observation though if they were in fact paired properly, as the RS5 driver is one of his most revered and there is a good review of the Super 3 Desktop here.

His bigger models such as the Super 3 XRS are not as picky amplifier wise, but I would still recommend tubes for the overall sonic picture.

Perhaps you were not hearing them with an optimal amplifier pairing as I've read observations from a person who actually owns the Omega 3 XRS (same RS5 driver) and also own a pair of KEF LS50s and Harbeth P3ESR's (the P3ESR's are arguably one of the most revered bookshelves out there) and has stated on a few occasions that the 3 XRS are as good if not better all around performer than both the Harbeth P3ERS's and KEF LS50 (with a slight nod to the highs of the Harbeth and the LS50's coming in last). You can read his observations here (about halfway down the page).
At any rate, we all hear differently so I can't argue with your perceptions.

 

Every geology department has a home bar, ours at UT was Crown & Anchor. After a grad student gave a tech talk on their thesis or dissertation their advisor would take them over there and buy the first pitcher. I drank many pints of beer and ate many cheap burgers there. Once I even at both lunch and dinner there.

As for Houston, it used to have some high end audio stores but during the dark days of the 90s when the oil price was low most of them went under. Here in Austin we have few but I'm shocked that with Houston's recent prosperity there aren't any, might be a good idea for someone to open one.

 

Yes, Omega Super 3T's, paired with a restored Fisher 400.

 

Oh they are very nice guns with real walnut stocks Bunshell scopes accessories etc Very accurate and no noise. Women have ZERO appreciation for stuff guys like. The guns to them are dangerous, to me they were something I grew up with hunting with my dad. Some were from 1911. The guy that got them must have been grinning ear to ear as he drove away thinking Cya Suckers. I did come unglued when I found out but I was simply outnumbered by the irrational women. I well I'm over it (sort of )

Not to whine too much here, also had 8k worth of boat motors and aluminum boat lift that the marina was going to give me 3k for . Had them at a neighbors garage up north. She just told me she sold here place and forgot about my stuff. So new owner got it free. Women driving me nutts. So hmm I'm out like 20 plus 3k plus 5k for my new guns.

 

I think that guns are dangerous too, and I'm a guy. And I'll bet that some women enjoy shooting.

 

so are knives, cars, people etc. The issue is people. But don't get me going on this topic lets stick to speakers.

 

I was reacting more to your rather sexist comments than commenting on the contentious issue of guns.

I appreciate your frustration with what happened; I would be angry too. But the same point could have been made by saying "the women that I live with have ZERO appreciation for the things that I like." See the difference?

 

Nice lava lamp! Very popular in the system room pics. They must have some anti-static capability.

 

Yeah, anti-static capability. That's it!

 

Mu

They make the music much more fluid, rounding out notes and open up the soundstage in all directions. I've found mine works particularly well just left of center. Green lava in clear liquid's resulted in the most pleasing sound in my setup, my ears becoming much more sensitive to the micro dynamics in each recording.

Bill