Klipsch RP-600M

In the latest Stereophile, Herb Reichert gives a rave review to these small affordable speakers. But he says "...it lent an extremely slight overdamped hardness to everything it reproduced".

Steve Guttenberg also raves but said: "The treble can be a tad bright at times, and that will bother some listeners more than others."

Anyone with experience with these speakers? I'm interested but the criticisms mentioned it otherwise very positive reviews sound pretty serious.

 

I just got mine a few days ago but posted some brief impressions here: Amp to improve my Klipsch rp 600m?

I don't hear the brightness, but maybe a little bit of the hardness (as I understand the terms). Not enough to spoil the fun, though. Will be trying some cheapo tubes to soften things up a bit.

 

Here is Herb's review:
Klipsch Reference Premiere RP-600M loudspeaker
and Steve's:
Klipsch Reference Premiere 600M, the Audiophiliac Speaker of the Year

 

I heard a well run in set and wondered what kind of crack guttenberg was smoking. stereophile class C rating FYI. not bad but not worth the raves. possibly they would sound much better with tube amplification. as it is there are better sounding options at that price range IMHO.

 

Man, Herb's on fire in that review. Really enjoying mine so far, I think he nails what they do well. Piano, in particular, is stunning. Listened to Jarrett's Koln Concert (24/96) last night it it just hung there between the speakers in crystalline clarity, the microdynamics of each strike really coming across.

They sound great on my Outlaw RR2160 but the TubeDepot TubeCube | 7 (w/ JJs) sweetens the highs (almost a bit dark at times, actually, especially with grilles on) and warms the mids while maintaining surprising dynamics (as long as I use the RR2160 as a pre to high-pass @ 80Hz to the subs).

Not a polite "audiophile" speaker, for sure, but I can certainly see where all the raves are coming from having lived with them for a while.

 

Talks about the speaker, but did not play the speaker. ??????

 

How would playing the speaker on Youtube at a low bitrate and you listening to whatever other garbage was in the recording chain and playing it back on a different set of speakers tell you anything anyway?

 

Review by Zero Fidelity:

 

He nails them as well. These are my first Klipsch speakers and I really hear none of the bad things I'd read about in the older models. If I'm hearing any horn coloration, I must like it.

 

Enjoy!
Here in Europe these USA speakers cost ~970 US dollars ≈ 9000 sek from a dealer here.
We need may get more bang for the buck to buy something that is on this side of the Atlantic Ocean.

 

Glad you’re enjoying your pair. Piano is one of the hardest instruments to get sounding right, that alone says a lot about these big bang for the buck loudspeakers. Like other Klipsch models, you need quality SS or tube amplification to get them to sound right, which can get expensive.

 

Klipsch knows how to produce a good product at a very fair price.

 

I got my pair up and running two days ago. I was little worried that they should be sharp in the horn but even without the grill and toe in aiming direct at the listening position there were no issues.
Seems that they scales very good and the better the electronic used the better they perform.
I am very satisfied but I have not tried them out with lower end stuff yet. The "base" were had not so low base extension but I do not care when I used 8x12' servo woffers. But that were precived with the book shelf speakers ~2.3 meter out in the room (=no support from the walls)
The best thing is that that the horn is so clean and airy that it does not interfere with the 6.5". The whole speaker remind me of a airy fast and transparent electrostatic (Maybe because of the placement that I got that impression.)

 

congrats on your speakers. I am using the previous RP line for a multichannel music setup ( RP 250 x4 with RC250) I know the tweeters were tweaked a bit for the newer models but not by much. But I agree, I hear no harshness/sharpness at all. In fact its a very powerful, clean setup. Listening to multichannel sacds sound unbelievably good. pics?

 

Thanks!
The tweeter is just the best part!
Yes I have nice pics but on my android OnePlus I can't copy a pic to then be able to paste it here. But if pictures are on a homepage then I can select some parts of a text AND a picture to be able to paste it in here. But I struggle with to be able to copy a picture to clipboard.. any tips and tricks?

 

You have to put his slight criticism in context - he is comparing them to FAR more expensive speakers. Check out this review where he pairs them with the Elekit TU-8600 300b SET...I'm about to pick up a pair and I have way too many speakers.

 

Got a new pair of 600’s a couple weeks ago for $400 delivered from a favorite out-of-state crack dealer. Can’t believe these do everything better than the RB-81’s that weigh twice as much, and retailed for $800 over 10 years ago with 8-inch cerametallic woofs and giant horns, but oh yes they do

 

I have this exact combo playing right now. I built the Elekit 8600 w/ Lundahl transformers two days ago - between this and the Klipsch speakers, I can't tell which is a better value. I have the exact system Herb Reichert had in his review, using the Chord Qutest as a DAC. The system is incredible, very articulate, fast, not harsh at all. Its very smooth, great dynamics, and excellent for low-level listening. Not the last word in imaging, but these speakers are excellent for its price point. Incredibly enjoyable, absolutely no buyers remorse here.

 

Nothing new but a good summary of why you can't judge a speaker over YouTube..

 

Sorry or the low light images. But i perfer that light insted of the flash light.

 

It's amazing to me that people think that they can, it's stupid. I'm not amazed that people post "sound demos", however, since they're going for views.

 

nice, looks like you have quite the collection of speakers there, and some furry friends to join you

 

Height from floor does matter. Switching from shorter 24" Transdeco stands (unfilled with sand) to taller 28" Pangea stands (filled with play sand) made the sound brighter with less bass. For my room and listening position I prefer the shorter 24" unfilled stands (slightly more bass and fuller sound).

Adjustable height stands would be nice to experiment with. Sonus faber once made adjustable height stands

 

Nice. Never thinking about that distance to the floor surface make a impact on bass. And of course it does! As the usual other room boundaries.
As seen on my pictures the RP-600m are ~2.5 meter out in the room and will not get any bass help from the walls. But on the other hand they will produce a more defined and less muddy bass. That you usually will get when the walls is "helping out".

Also I read a user review on Amazon that returned and gave one star rating. Because he heard box resonances. Yes when you play more loudly and you lay your hands on the sides of the rp-600m you will find that Klipch could have made a sturdier enclosure. But for this price they need to cut corners somewhere.
Those small vibrations of that large surface area 30x40 cm are most likely bass frequency region.
The as with the sidewalls enforcement of bass frequencies I also believe that any small enclosure vibration will MAYBE show up or when you are closer to a wall or in a corner.
I have not had any issues but then again I do not have the speakers close to any wall. So no issues there in that use case.

 

Many bookshelf speakers on stands get good results when mids/highs are at ear level, regardless of impact on bass output. Positioning away from walls helps the speakers image better and ultimately disappear in some cases. Many speaker cabinets resonate as part of their inherent sound, not necessarily a major flaw. Magico uses extensive aircraft aluminum braces inside for reinforcement within their Q-series speaker line to minimize cabinet resonance, however even a pair of their small and totally amazing Q1 bookshelf speakers costs north of $20 grand

Yes, I’ve listened to a pair of Magico Q1’s and they absolutely smoked my RP-600M’s, but not in the price to performance category!