[mojave]

In the next few weeks the GR-Research LS-6's will be present at two different audio events. On Saturday, April 13, there is a speaker shootout in Thornton, PA. Here is the link to the thread at AVS Forum:  NE Spring Speaker Shootout GTG. AVS member beastaudio will be taking his curly maple LS6's.

On April 27, there is an Audio GTG in Des Moines Iowa. I will be bringing my Palisander LS6's to that event. Here is a link to the thread at AVS Forum:  Central Iowa Spring Audio GTG.

The playback chain will be computer (JRiver Media Center) > DAC > amps > speakers. We will use balanced interconnects for the DACs  to the amps.

Here is what we will have present:

Seaton Sound Catalyst 12C (with a pair of JTR Captivator S2 subs)
JTR Speakers Noesis 212HT (with a pair of JTR Captivator S2 subs)
Salk Veracity HT2-TL (with a pair of JTR Captivator S2 subs)
Bamberg Audio Series 5 TMW (fullrange)
GR-Research LS-6 (fullrange)
SVS Ultra (fullrange)

We will use dual Mytek Stereo 192-DSD DACs for playback during the formal listening (about 1 hr per speaker) and a Lynx Aurora 8 DAC for playback during the blind listening.

Amplifiers will be Wyred4Sound SX1000 monoblocks and Digital Amp Company Cherry Plus monoblocks.

I will be arriving on Thursday night and helping with system setup, measurements, and EQ on Friday. Mark Seaton (Seaton Sound), Jeff Permanian (JTR Speakers), and Phil Bamberg (Bamberg Audio) will all be there on Friday as well. Saturday will be the actual day of the GTG. There will be about 25 people present. I'm really looking forward to this.

[mojave]

Danny, the room size is 17' wide by 35' long. I have quite a bit of leeway to pull the speakers out into the room. Where do you recommend I start with the LS6 placement for the Iowa Audio GTG?

[Danny Richie]

Danny, the room size is 17' wide by 35' long. I have quite a bit of leeway to pull the speakers out into the room. Where do you recommend I start with the LS6 placement for the Iowa Audio GTG?

That is a good sized room. If it were me I'd try to pull them 8 to 12 feet out into the room. That will give them sound stage depth and layering that will freak people out.

[mojave]

Thanks, Danny. I'm looking forward to hearing my LS6's in such a large room.

[Cheeseboy]

We pulled the LS9 out about 6 feet in Soundofrockets room and the depth reached all the to what we felt was the BBQ in the backyard. 

I'd love to hear the new monos from dac with LS6.  I have a cherry and it sounds wonderful. I'm looking to hear all about the ultras with line source.

[SteveRB]

...sound stage depth and layering that will freak people out.

love it.

[SoCalWJS]

That is a good sized room. If it were me I'd try to pull them 8 to 12 feet out into the room. That will give them sound stage depth and layering that will freak people out.

I would LOVE to hear LS speakers in a room that big with that much room behind them.    They're going to sound fantastic!

[Captainhemo]

I'd love to just hear some  period

Can't even imagine how cool they'd soound  in  a room  that large, bet  they will  sound  incredable

-jay

[Skiman]

Can't help but comment that this will be a bit of an apples vs. oranges comparison in several respects. First, the Seton Catalyst is an active, (in fact tri amplified) design, secondly both the Seton and JTR are to be paired with separate subs, and thirdly, the speakers that have the designers themselves present ensures that their respective speakers are set up optimally. I've attended the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest for quite a few years now, and have heard how Danny and his crew work wonders with the setup in a hotel room. 

[mojave]

I invited Danny, but he didn't have time.

An apples to oranges comparison is intended - especially when you have speakers of six different designs. This isn't intended to be a speaker competition, but a time to understand and enjoy the difference of various types of speakers. I'm sure they will all have pro's and con's.  The only consistent thing about this is that they are all being heard in the same room on the same day.

Just look at the different tweeters:

• 1" aluminum dome
• RAAL Ribbon
• B-G Planar Magnetic NEO8 in line source array
• Horn loaded coaxial compression tweeter
• 1" Coaxial Neodymium compression tweeter
• SEAS Soft dome tweeter

The Salks will also be paired with subs. I think the Seatons and JTR Speakers will be used with the subs in a mono configuration and the Salks will be used with the subs in a stereo configuration. If time allows on Friday, I will also have a setup for the fullrange speakers that includes subs so a back to back comparison of with/without subs can be made.

I'm not quite sure what will be available regarding room treatments. I offered to bring part of a GIK Acoustics room kit.

The speakers will all be setup next Friday with precise measurements of their final location taken with a Bosch laser distance measurer. This will allow the speakers to be setup the same on Saturday. A C.A.P.S Carbon music server with Red Wine Audio Black Lighting battery power and JRiver Media Center with be used for playback. JRiver allows for a separate zone to be created for each speaker setup with all necessary settings including any EQ. EQ will be permitted below around 150 Hz for the bass. Once speaker placement is optimized and EQ is setup, then on Saturday we just place the speakers, connect the cables, select the zone, and start playback of the music playlist. There will be about 25 minutes of identical music used for each speaker setup at the same dB level followed by 25 minutes of free play at various volumes.

[Skiman]

The Central Iowa get together certainly appears to have a better setup, particularly the amplification, than the NE Spring Shootout, where a Denon 4311 receiver was used. As an owner of LS9s, I know that they benefit from powerful, high current amplification. Mine are part of a home theater powered by a Gemstone Blue Diamond 7 x 200 (a clone of Simaudio). So, as a loyal LS owner, I want to see the LS6 shown in the best possible way, and it appears they will, powered by those monoblocks. Danny, of course, loves tubes.

While both get togethers are described as not being a speaker comparison per se, the listeners comments will be read by thousands, and will undoubtedly influence a speaker purchase. 

[Cheeseboy]

Imma very excited to hear all of the feedback from this event.  It sounds like its not about a shoot out but just hearing diffent speaker applications and the differences on each design approach and the results.  I wish I had a set of good bookshelf speakers to go to in another room after the line source spectical of musical prowess in the living room.   Something with less flare and more dark drama. 

[Danny Richie]

I just now got a change to follow along in the thread over there on AVS.

It sounds like many thought the LS-6's really excelled in all areas, but some reported issues that are not common to LS-6's. It sounds like the bass was on the heavy side and it might have negatively effected the mids. If the bass overwhelmed the room that is very possible. The LS-6 has a bass management system that can be easily used to balance the bass loading of the room and smooth out the response. There was no mention of it or its settings though. So I wonder if it may have been disconnected.

Other comments make me think there was placement and or room related problems that did not favor a large speaker like the LS-6. Something was definitely a miss in some areas as some of those observations or comments just do not fit with the character of the LS-6's.

[SoCalWJS]

I just now got a change to follow along in the thread over there on AVS.

It sounds like many thought the LS-6's really excelled in all areas, but some reported issues that are not common to LS-6's. It sounds like the bass was on the heavy side and it might have negatively effected the mids. If the bass overwhelmed the room that is very possible. The LS-6 has a bass management system that can be easily used to balance the bass loading of the room and smooth out the response. There was no mention of it or its settings though. So I wonder if it may have been disconnected.

Other comments make me think there was placement and or room related problems that did not favor a large speaker like the LS-6. Something was definitely a miss in some areas as some of those observations or comments just do not fit with the character of the LS-6's.

I hardly visit AVS anymore - where is the discussion at?

[Captainhemo]

http://www.avsforum.com/t/1460712/central-iowa-spring-audio-gtg-jtr-bamberg-seaton-salk-gr-research/180

[SoCalWJS]

http://www.avsforum.com/t/1460712/central-iowa-spring-audio-gtg-jtr-bamberg-seaton-salk-gr-research/180

Thanks for the link. I remember seeing this thread back when they were doing the initial planning and I was going to keep track of it, but as I said, I just don't go to AVS anymore unless it's to get feedback on a Bluray I'm interested or something about video.

Most of the discussions about audio rapidly spiral into the science (measureable) debate very quickly - not what I'm interested in.

I read through the thread briefly with the post GTG impressions and comments. Reading between the lines, I don't see any real surprises. I would have loved to be there to hear several of those speakers which I have never had the opportunity to listen to. I get the definite impression that most of those who commented primarily listen to HT at fairly high SPL's (some of the comments about the volume make me cringe and want to run for hearing protection. I love high SPL's myself, but +10 when the system is already 6db hot?  )
This is definitely going to cause a preference for certain types of speakers. They also talk about the vendors coming in early and finding the best location for their speakers (this raises an OBVIOUS question in my mind........). Several of the systems were run, at least some/most of the time, with multiple subs. Gee, I wonder if the bass response on these speakers was a bit more even?  Also noticed that the LS 6 owner bought the speaker boxes when AV123 went out of business. I'll have to look at how he built them out internally.

......but I'll admit, I'd love to hear a HT system in a room that big with a top of the line Seaton or JTR system with multiple subs 

[mojave]

I just now got a change to follow along in the thread over there on AVS.

It sounds like many thought the LS-6's really excelled in all areas, but some reported issues that are not common to LS-6's. It sounds like the bass was on the heavy side and it might have negatively effected the mids. If the bass overwhelmed the room that is very possible. The LS-6 has a bass management system that can be easily used to balance the bass loading of the room and smooth out the response. There was no mention of it or its settings though. So I wonder if it may have been disconnected.

Other comments make me think there was placement and or room related problems that did not favor a large speaker like the LS-6. Something was definitely a miss in some areas as some of those observations or comments just do not fit with the character of the LS-6's.

The GTG was a lot of fun, but I was gone for 3 straight days. I left on Thursday at 4 pm and didn't get back home until 3 pm on Sunday. Friday was probably funner than Saturday as we setup all the systems. Phil Bamberg was a great help in setting up and offered lots of setup tips.

The room had a concrete wall on the right, but just a framed wall on the left with 1/2" drywall so this affected the acoustics some. AVS member ALSFamily was at the Iowa GTG and the Lone Star Audio Fest the following weekend. I think he commented that the Bamberg speakers sounded even better at LSAF.

The Bamberg and LS-6 speakers sounded the worst with some of the songs. I think this is because they are so revealing. After the blind listening portion, Phil asked the audience which song sounded the best on all the speakers. Almost everyone mentioned "Keith Don't Go." Phil pointed out that since it is such an excellent recording it tends to sound well on most speakers.

I set the bass management to Small, but it still had too much bass. I've since measured with small and large and don't really measure much difference. I EQ the bass in my room so it doesn't really matter, but I wonder if something is amiss with the wiring. Both speakers do measure almost identical in the bass.

The bass manangment on the LS6's at the NE Spring Speaker Shootout were set to Medium.

Here is a picture of how it is wired:

Also noticed that the LS 6 owner bought the speaker boxes when AV123 went out of business. I'll have to look at how he built them out internally.

My build thread is here:  Mojave's LS-6 build. I never posted my Dodd preamp impressions with pictures. 

I had the LS-6s setup with subs on Friday, but on Saturday both David (the host) and I decided to run both the Salk's and LS-6's fullrange since there were those in attendance that were looking for two channel systems with just speakers.

[SoCalWJS]

Mojave = Desertdome??? 

So much for some of my theory - sorry about that. Followed your build and you done good. 

How did you think they sounded at the GTG?  I definitely agree with you that bad recordings can sound worse on the more revealing speakers - I'm still looking for decent masterings of some of my favorite old albums (no luck yet, but someday.... yeah right)

[ufokillerz]

Danny told me how to lower the resistance on the bass modules of my LS6 to decrease the bass, i forget the technical terms, but i still have too much bass hah. guess room problems are a hard fix, they are awesome speakers though

[S Clark]

Danny told me how to lower the resistance on the bass modules of my LS6 to decrease the bass, i forget the technical terms, but i still have too much bass hah. guess room problems are a hard fix, they are awesome speakers though

The LS series is not the easiest speaker to get right in a room, but they are stunning when right.  My LS9s are pretty close to right after several years, but I'm still tweeking.  I don't see how anyone could set them up quickly and do them justice (except for Danny, of course).