AudioCircle
Other Stuff => Archived Manufacturer Circles => AV123 => Topic started by: TONEPUB on 15 Oct 2007, 04:40 am
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Got a chance to hang out with Mark S. at the RMAF show
and spend a good amount of time listening to the LS-9's.
While it was obviously under show conditions, I was intimately
familiar with the excellent Red Rock amplifiers ($40k per pair)
as we had them in for review last year, so it wasn't much of
a stretch. They were playing vinyl through the Grand Prix Audio
Turntable (which is also coming our way for review very soon)
and the sound was killer!
I can go on record as saying I was never a fan of the line
source design, until I heard the LS-9's. These could very
well go down in history as one of the best values in high
end audio ever!
And I forgot to mention, I heard the five times more
expensive Ephiphany speakers at CES this year and they
weren't even in the same league as the LS-9....
No comparison at all.
Mark has promised us a review pair, and we can't wait!
Those of you who stopped by the room, know what I'm talking
about....
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Jeff,
I must respectfully disagree and say that this room was a disappointment.
The Red Rock amps were not a good match with the LS-9's.
The highs were rolled off and the bass was lacking in drive and authority.
I think that a better amp matching could have let the LS-9's and Grand Prix Audio Turntable really strut their stuff and let everybody hear what they are capable of.
I think this was a case where all of the excellent pieces didn't gel and produce the results everybody was hoping for.
BTW, I did think the LS-6/Dodd combo down the hall was better overall.
George
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Don't the epiphany speakers use the BG drivers as well? So... we're just looking at the difference between neo8's and neo3's for the mids/highs?
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Well, perhaps they were playing different material....
I was certainly intrigued enough by what I heard to
be interested in reviewing them.
I never judge anything by show sound.
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Sorry but I have to agree with Zybar on the LS-9 room, underpowered, not the case with the LS-6's.
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Zybar and Martyo are spot on here. A very brief session late in the evening with Gary Dodd's battery pre and 120 amps on the LS-9's hinted at what's REALLY possible from them. The show gear, while surely very fine stuff in it's own right, just didn't seem to be a great match for them.
The LS-6's sounded very good, though, in a much tighter room. The monster Dodd amps really strutted their stuff in there - WOW!
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Very Interesting. Having heard the LS-9's and LS-6's side by side, I can assure you that the 9's are a notch up from the 6's.
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Very Interesting. Having heard the LS-9's and LS-6's side by side, I can assure you that the 9's are a notch up from the 6's.
I don't think anybody was trying to say that the LS-9's were inferior to the LS-6's, rather that how they were setup at RMAF caused some of us to prefer the sound of the LS-6 based system over the LS-9 based system.
George
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Sorry to be misunderstood. I meant that it was interesting that the implementation of the two systems made such a difference.
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The LS-6 room sounded better than the LS-9 room. I think the Dodd amp played a significant part. :wink: The blue amp is indeed looking very good :drool: :drool:
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Well, perhaps they were playing different material....
I was certainly intrigued enough by what I heard to
be interested in reviewing them.
I never judge anything by show sound.
Jeff,
If you don't judge anything by how they sound at the show (which makes perfect sense), why did you make the following comments in your first post up above?
"While it was obviously under show conditions, I was intimately
familiar with the excellent Red Rock amplifiers ($40k per pair)
as we had them in for review last year, so it wasn't much of
a stretch. They were playing vinyl through the Grand Prix Audio
Turntable (which is also coming our way for review very soon)
and the sound was killer!"
"These could very
well go down in history as one of the best values in high
end audio ever!"
"And I forgot to mention, I heard the five times more
expensive Ephiphany speakers at CES this year and they
weren't even in the same league as the LS-9....
No comparison at all."
Sure sounds like a lot of judging to me... :wink:
I am not trying to say you are wrong and I am right, or vice versa.
We all hear differently and we all have different biases and points of view...
I am genuinely curious why when I posted a dissenting opinion to your's, your first reaction was to say that you never judge anything by show sound.
Anyway, I hope that both Danny and Mark sell a ton of LS-9's and that they are a great success.
George
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On the other hand, different people do have different ears, see this quote by Jason Victor Serinus from Stereophile, he's talking about the LS-9 room:
"Nevertheless, what I could hear was so inviting that my appetite was whet to hear them in my own listening room once they become available in a month or so. "
You know what, I wouldn't buy anything recommended by Jason in the future. :lol: :lol: :lol:
For full text see:
http://blog.stereophile.com/rmaf2007/
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I guess I should have said "I'd never make a final judgement based on show sound..."
However I am curious, if basically the LS-6 is just fewer drivers than the LS-9
how could the LS-6 sound "so much better than the LS-9"
I'm just not a fan of Dodd electronics. That doesn't mean they are bad. The difference
between what I heard (again on the ten minutes I sat and listened with unfamiliar material)
between the two wasn't all that big.
And last but not least, why are you out here on the AV123 forum arguing about
this in the first place?
The whole point of saying what I said was to help generate a little bit of
excitement for something I heard that I think is a great value, like everything
else I've heard from AV123.
I guess no good deed goes unpunished....
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I couldn't say as I wasn't at RMAF but, I have heard both the LS-6 and the LS-9 and both sets were VERY impressive. It sounds like to me the LS-9's were mismatched with the amp(and I think that is what George is saying as well) they were paired with, or could it have been the room? Maybe a little of both, who knows, but I know what I heard when I listened to both sets, great music. I still have ZERO doubts about my pair!! :thumb:
John
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While I saw a lot of gear that was quite good, that would have probably suited a lot
of different musical tastes, the LS-6 and 9 both struck me as offering up an awful
lot of value for the price asked.
Whether they are your cup of tea or not remains to be seen.
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I'm surprised the amps weren't tried before the show to see if the system had good synergy.
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To clear a few things up, and ignoring the very real phenomenon that two or more otherwise excellent audio products may simply not "play well together"...
The LS-6s were in the GR-Research room powered by Dodd electronics and a modded Lite DAC-60. This room was small, but one of the better treated rooms in the show. I suspect that the room treatments alone very easily account for many people's preference at the show of the LS-6 over the LS-9.
The LS-9s were in the Red Rock Audio room which, while bigger, was not treated nearly as extensively (as far as I could tell). As this was the 1st pair of LS-9s seen in public, I can't imagine that there was any way to test them with the Red Rock amps prior to the show.
Having spent many hours listening to the prototype LS-6s at their current home in Fort Worth in one of the best rooms and systems I've had the privilege to experience, I can very comfortably state that neither LS speaker showed to their full potential at the show. Of course, many of us aren't lucky enough to have a room and system that will show many (most?) speakers to their full potential.
If nothing else, RMAF confirmed for me that I would take a lesser system in a better (treated) room than a better system in a lesser room, as I heard many speakers that I know to be excellent that showed to less than their full potential, regardless of the upstream equipment. This isn't a criticism of any manufacturer... acoustically treating a hotel room is probably about as challenging as it gets, and is only made more difficult by the fact that a manufacturer probably want to show their flagship product at a show, which probably has the most bass, which is the hardest thing to treat in a small room. I've come to the conclusion that the best thing I can take away from a show is a list of gear that I want to hear in my own system in my own room.
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Very well said and what I would expect most people would understand, hence my failure to understand this statement by 95bcwh:
You know what, I wouldn't buy anything recommended by Jason in the future.
I would take the reviewers comments as the exact opposite, being made by someone with a good ear that knows he's only hearing a small portion of what that product is actually able to do under the correct circumstances. :dunno:
John
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I completely agree with the room treatment concept!
However, I am always dissapointed at how critical everyone is about show sound.
Think of how long most of you have taken to get your systems dialed in...
Just the fact that their gear gets there intact, up and running is amazing.
I think John's post is very insightful and shows what all the mfrs are all
up against.
Steve Hoffman told me once that he's heard so much gear in different
situations that it's pretty easy for him to hear past the room variables,
etc. I know that after having a few hundred things pass through our studio
I'm definitely getting better at that and really look forward to a full evaluation
of these speakers in my (treated) room with my reference gear and recordings.
I still think the LS-6 and 9 will turn out to be one of the best values
to come on the market this year, regardless of whether they happen
to be your flavor or not...
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Sorry for the confusion. Although I fail to understand why you failed to understand me :lol: :lol:
Now, do I think that the LS-9 is a bad speaker? Hell no...I think it is one heck of a speaker!!!! :drool: :drool: :drool:
But being that "one heck of a speaker" does not mean that you put it in any room, pair it with any $40k electronics, will give you "good sound". Just look at the $250k Marten Design speaker on the show this year and last year, to me they were the biggest disappointment of the show.
I came out of the LS-6 room very impressed with what I heard, to make that big LS-6 sounded good in that little room is not easy. I came out of the LS-9 room disappointed because I was expecting the LS-9 to beat the LS-6 but it was the other way round.
Now, you have a reviewer (or reviewers) that came out and said something like:"Wow....the LS-9 room sounded really good, and hardly anything else could compare." There're two explanations when I see comments like this:
(1) The reviewers genuinely like the sound he heard in that room, then I will take it as he and I share completely different taste, the reason why he like that sound is exactly the reason why I dislike that sound. So, I wouldn't want to buy anything that he recommend.
(2) The reviewers is not being honest, i.e. he is "hyping". While it is okay to "hype" as this is a free forum, it is also okay for people to challenge the "hype". What kind of world will we be in if we disallow any criticizm or disagreement with what we say?
Very well said and what I would expect most people would understand, hence my failure to understand this statement by 95bcwh: You know what, I wouldn't buy anything recommended by Jason in the future.
I would take the reviewers comments as the exact opposite, being made by someone with a good ear that knows he's only hearing a small portion of what that product is actually able to do under the correct circumstances. :dunno:
John
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People have differing opinions on what they hear in specific setups and pieces of gear....what a shocking result.... :wink:
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Amen brother! Can I have an amen!!?
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I did not say that "hardly anything else could compare" to the LS-9...
We can argue all day about whether the LS-6 room sounded better or
worse, it really doesn't matter in the big picture. I was probably listening
to different things than you were..
Also, I did not mean to imply that a forty thousand dollar amplifier guarantees
good sound. What I DID say was that I was very familiar with the sound
of the Red Rocks because I had them here for six months to review.
Not having that familiarity with the Dodd amplifiers in a ten minute listen
made it much harder to make a snap judgement.
What I was trying to get across, as all reviewers (pretty much all listeners)
have built in is some kind of bias. That's why we choose the components
we do as reference components. I happen to be somewhat biased against
line source speakers, having spent a lot of time with Epiphany and a few
others at some good freinds homes over the past five years.
I was excited enough by the LS-6 and 9 that rather than poke my head
in the room and say "I don't like line source speakers", I was impressed
enough to hang out.
I'll obviously have a much more detailed analysis once I've lived with
the LS-9's for a few months, going back and forth between my three
reference systems.
The post could have easily said that I was very impressed with the LS-6
and LS-9...
So I still stick by my enthusiasm for the speaker and think it is an incredible
value... If you want to call it hype, so be it.
All of this stuff is such a personal choice, I can't tell you what to buy, I can
only relate what Im enthusiastic about... It's up to you to make the final choice.
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Amen!!
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Sorry for the confusion. Although I fail to understand why you failed to understand me :lol: :lol:
Now, do I think that the LS-9 is a bad speaker? Hell no...I think it is one heck of a speaker!!!! :drool: :drool: :drool:
But being that "one heck of a speaker" does not mean that you put it in any room, pair it with any $40k electronics, will give you "good sound". Just look at the $250k Marten Design speaker on the show this year and last year, to me they were the biggest disappointment of the show.
I came out of the LS-6 room very impressed with what I heard, to make that big LS-6 sounded good in that little room is not easy. I came out of the LS-9 room disappointed because I was expecting the LS-9 to beat the LS-6 but it was the other way round.
Now, you have a reviewer (or reviewers) that came out and said something like:"Wow....the LS-9 room sounded really good, and hardly anything else could compare." There're two explanations when I see comments like this:
(1) The reviewers genuinely like the sound he heard in that room, then I will take it as he and I share completely different taste, the reason why he like that sound is exactly the reason why I dislike that sound. So, I wouldn't want to buy anything that he recommend.
(2) The reviewers is not being honest, i.e. he is "hyping". While it is okay to "hype" as this is a free forum, it is also okay for people to challenge the "hype". What kind of world will we be in if we disallow any criticizm or disagreement with what we say?
95bcwh,
Your statements confuse me; first off the reviewer didn't say anything close to "Wow....the LS-9 room sounded really good, and hardly anything else could compare." What he said was and I quote; Truth be told, these huge speakers need more than 50Wpc to shine. Nevertheless, what I could hear was so inviting that my appetite was whet to hear them in my own listening room once they become available in a month or so.
This indicates to me that even though he sensed something was amiss in that room he still had a good enough ear, or maybe enough experience, to realize these speakers are capable of producing great sound under different circumstances and he would like to explore that further.
I could go on but I feel I may be wasting your time as well as mine. I just don't feel the reviewer was "hyping" these or any other products, but that's just me and I am a little nutty! :wink:
Regards,
John
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Zybar and Martyo are spot on here. A very brief session late in the evening with Gary Dodd's battery pre and 120 amps on the LS-9's hinted at what's REALLY possible from them. The show gear, while surely very fine stuff in it's own right, just didn't seem to be a great match for them.
The LS-6's sounded very good, though, in a much tighter room. The monster Dodd amps really strutted their stuff in there - WOW!
I think Tom's quote hear also suggests that it just wasn't a room treatment problem. Would have loved to have heard that. If the amps would have swapped rooms, I'm thinking the results would have been significantly different. Maybe not so much in the small room, but in the big room w/ the 9's.
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I agree, the Stereophile dude hints at that in his remark about 50 wpc amps. Though I know many would disagree I'm old school and believe in more power!! Grrrrrrrr(in my best Tim "The Toolman" Taylor voice)!!
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Zybar and Martyo are spot on here. A very brief session late in the evening with Gary Dodd's battery pre and 120 amps on the LS-9's hinted at what's REALLY possible from them. The show gear, while surely very fine stuff in it's own right, just didn't seem to be a great match for them.
The LS-6's sounded very good, though, in a much tighter room. The monster Dodd amps really strutted their stuff in there - WOW!
I think Tom's quote hear also suggests that it just wasn't a room treatment problem. Would have loved to have heard that. If the amps would have swapped rooms, I'm thinking the results would have been significantly different. Maybe not so much in the small room, but in the big room w/ the 9's.
Not being personally familiar with any of the equipment or speakers (yet), this was only speculation on my part. It may not have been a simple "more watts is better" issue either, as some seem to think, or clipping (soft or hard). Even at the modest levels they were played during several visits to the room, the bass didn't have the flow/drive and the top end didn't have the air and pristine transparency I thought I was hearing with the Dodds. Especially when it's at the "first watt" kind of levels, I'm thinking equipment synergy. I know I definitely preferred the Dodd electronics on the LS-9's, irrespective of room treatments.
Some people seem to have twisted these observations to the extremes. This is splitting hairs about very good vs. great as perhaps determined by factors other than the speakers themselves, in show conditions. As many have said, "show conditions" means you get what you get on a best effort basis and unfortunately hope for the best.
These are speakers you need to invite into your home and show them a good time. They will likely do the same for you. Just ask Art, who HAS lived with the LS-6's on a daily basis (lucky dog) :-)
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I stand by my quote above....rooms, room treatments, amps, pre's, sources, cables, recordings, equipment synergy, lack thereof, mood, time of day, level of alcohol intake, ambient interference....I just can't understand how these variables can affect listening experiences and some of us arrive at different impressions of a particular piece.... :wink:
Oh yeah, I left off hearing levels, age, personal sonic taste and biases....
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I stand by my quote above....rooms, room treatments, amps, pre's, sources, cables, recordings, equipment synergy, lack thereof, mood, time of day, level of alcohol intake, ambient interference....I just can't understand how these variables can affect listening experiences and some of us arrive at different impressions of a particular piece.... :wink:
Oh yeah, I left off hearing levels, age, personal sonic taste and biases....
well actually, that's the whole point...
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I too did not feel that the pairing of the Red Rock amplifiers with the LS-9's was a good one. :roll:
I don't know if it was simply due to the demands of the multiple driver arrangement on the amps, back EMF from the drivers, or what.
We did run the smaller Dodd 200 watt mono blocs that Gary had sitting on display in the GR Research room after hours on Saturday, (and although there was a biasing issue with one of the Dodds and a possible bum output tube) it became immediate apparent that performance issue was simply a case of improper matching of components driving the 9's.
Only a few people got to hear this impromptu session, but it was enough to better highlight the true nature of what the LS-9's are capable of.
There were a lot of rooms at RMAF where you had to factor in elements of mismatched components, room acoustics and so on, but I'm with Jeff on this one wholeheartedly, you can despite these deficiencies, often extract what the true potential is, particularly with experience.
In my case, I have owned and extensively listened to the flagship offerings from GR Research prior to the LS series line arrays, and am very well exposed to the capabilities of custom and proprietery designed GR Research drivers. I'm also familiar with the capabilities of line arrays, and as such, was able to not judge them at "face" value under these particular circumstances.
Knowing all this, I know that the LS-6's in the GR Research room were not even showing all that they were capable of. They still had plenty to go.
Bottom line, knowing what I know about the GR product line, and how the LS-6's were at RMAF. I heard enough to know what the LS-9's are capable of, and it unfortunately fell quite a bit short in the Red Rock room.
Despite this, after attending RMAF with the intent of seeing how the 9's stack up against what everyone else had to offer, I have no reservations about the LS-9's being my top choice for cost no object speaker.
RMAF solidified it for me.
This is the speaker for me! :P
I can hardly wait to get my pair! :wink:
Cheers
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The Red Rock amps sounded very good but I think they were not the best match to show off the true potential of the LS-9 speakers. I think the LS-9 speakers needed more power to show off their ability to produce the dynamics I believe they are capable of.
The LS-6 speakers had ample power from the Dodd amps so I think they were able to better demonstrate their potential.
Either of the speakers is an excellent choice, and represent a tremendous value. Too bad my low ceiling in my basement will not allow me to own either of these fine speakers; however, my listening room will not preclude me from trying the Emerald Physics. :D
Greg
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well actually, that's the whole point...
Exactly! :thumb: