[vintagebob]

As of today, I guess I can be added to the list of Salkers. I've ordered four SongSurround IIs, one SongCenter, all with the RT upgrade, and two SongSubs, all speakers and subs to be done in bamboo and dyed a deep rose red similar, if not an exact match, to the red seen in the some of the Cocobolo and Rosewood veneers that Jim has posted pictures of in the past.
I guess I can pass the time while I'm waiting to shop for some cheap speaker stands, since I just spent my kids' inheritance on these speakers. 

Wow.  I can't wait to see these!   

[oneinthepipe]

I just spent my kids' inheritance on these speakers. 

That's OK, they'll inherit the speakers.

[mathgeek97]

As of today, I guess I can be added to the list of Salkers...
...since I just spent my kids' inheritance on these speakers. 

+1

Congrats!!!

[Nuance]

Congrats, darwin!

[Kinger]

Well my ST/RT's arrived today via FedEx and I have them set up in the house.  Will have more to say tomorrow along with some pictures hopefully, but right now I'm just enjoying the music too much to write more

[mchuckp]

Well my ST/RT's arrived today via FedEx and I have them set up in the house.  Will have more to say tomorrow along with some pictures hopefully, but right now I'm just enjoying the music too much to write more

Speaker porn is my fav. 

[vintagebob]

Well my ST/RT's arrived today via FedEx and I have them set up in the house.  Will have more to say tomorrow along with some pictures hopefully, but right now I'm just enjoying the music too much to write more

Dang!    I think you own the record for the shortest time from order to delivery (13 days).

Sounds like good times ahead for you.   

[taoggniklat]

Speaker porn is my fav. 

Its the only kind I am allowed...

[Kinger]

vintagebob - Without a doubt, I was a lucky lucky boy in not having to wait long for these things.  My hat is off to those of you who had to wait 45 days or more to hear the music Salk speakers can produce.

Pictures should be up tonight.  I'll warn you though, I'm no expert when it comes to photography.

[Kinger]

In writing an e-mail to mchuckp this morning telling him about my first experiences with the ST/RT's, I realized that I could probably share them here as well.....  If there is a more appropriate place to post this, please let me know.

First of all, the build quality of these things is nothing short of amazing.  Very very very smooth finish with nice rounded edges at the cabinet seams.  The satin black while shiny is not overly shiny like my NHT's Super Ones were and it appears to be MUCH more resistant to fingerprints and hand smudges.  (Which is awesome.)  The towel Jim includes with the speakers for cleaning is a nice touch.  At first I thought it was a crying towel for the magical sounds these speakers were going to produce, but then I thought that seemed kinda cheesy.  LOL  The machined front baffle is beautiful to look at although it's a little difficult to see the ridges on the plate from a distance due to the black blending in with the speaker finish.  I knew these things were gonna be tall, but when seeing them in person it still takes a little getting used to.  Granted, I'm a height challenged individual at only 5' 6", but the top of the speaker comes up to where my arm and shoulders meet.  In the family room they are definitely an imposing presence considering the stands I had before were so skinny giving the illusion that there wasn't much there.  With the big solid cabinets, the ST/RT's just demand more attention. (Rightfully so IMHO.)  The magnetic grills are an awesome touch.  So easy to take on and off with no fear of connections getting worn out over time and the magnetic field is strong enough that you are not worried about them falling off or putting them in the wrong place.  Initial setup is a 9' spread to the center of the plinths, the right speaker is 2' from the corner of the room and the speakers are about 10" out from the back wall.  The listening position is about 12' from each speaker so ideally I may need to put a chair about 9' from the speakers during really critical listening so that I have an equidistant triangle as spreading the speakers to 12' would have one into a corner.  Right now the speakers are toed in at just a slight slight angle.

Now on to the listening impressions......... 

Ok, first off, when they spoke their first words (via Jim's demo disc), I will admit I was a little concerned that I just dumped A LOT of money into a speaker that I didn't feel the overall sound blew me away.  The first track on Jim's CD doesn't seem to have a lot of recording volume and as such I was thinking that I didn't have enough amplification to drive these things to decent listening levels.  Then as I started flipping through tracks, I realized the first song just didn't have a lot of volume and subsequent tracks were much much better at conveying what these things were capable of. (Santana's cut on the disc for example.)  Now, when I say that these speakers didn't overly wow me, bear in mind that there was quite a bit of activity going on in the house at the time I was trying to hear them for the first time.  My kids were in the other room with the TV on and loud toys being played with while my wife was in the kitchen putting dishes away from the dishwasher so there were a ton of other distracting sounds.  Should have known that was going to happen, but like mchuckp and I have talked about before, it's hard to explain to people not into music that listening can be an active experience and music doesn't have to be treated as just background noise.  Sigh...........  One thing that became IMMEDIATELY apparent from this session however was that I was not lacking any bass from the ST/RT's.  When I hooked the ST/RT's up, I changed my receiver setup for the main speakers from small to large and also disconnected the sub so that I could evaluate the speakers with a full frequency range.  The bass output surprised me quite frankly.  While I don't think it would be enough for bass freaks or for HT buffs, it certainly was enough for my listening room with music.  The bass also wasn't the least bit boomy, but felt rather large and full sounding if that makes sense.  It just seemed 'musical' for the lack of a better word.  The impression I had read from another review on the web where the author felt like the bass just rolled around on the floor and couldn't be exactly pinpointed was pretty much exactly my experience.  Needless to say, the sub won't be getting turned on again in my listening room/family room for a good while.

Round 2 of the listening session started after the kids went to bed and my wife went upstairs for the evening.  While this listening session was clearly at a lower level than I'd like, it still wasn't bad and in a very quiet house you don't need much volume to hear all the details.  Up first, Jim's demo disc.  The first thing that struck me was how absolutely centered voices sounded even without doing any real fiddling with the speaker positions.  It was like having a center channel speaker turned on the voices were so locked in.  At the time, I was listening to the cut of Ray Charles with Natalie Cole and the first time Natalie jumped into the song I about fell off my couch.  Her voice was so clear and so detailed it took me by complete surprise.  What also caught me off guard was that up to this point Ray had been singing at about my 10:30 to 11 o'clock position and then when Natalie came in she was clearly at 1 or 1:30 to my listening position.  VERY VERY easy to pick out where the singers were in the recording studio.  I gotta be honest, due to time constraints I kinda skipped around on the disc a bit to see what I liked.  Next up was Santana again as I liked this song the first time through even with a loud house.  When his guitar came through what amazed me was the depth of the sound.  It wasn't like a thin guitar note, it was like the note had depth to it on the soundstage.  Very cool effect.  This was also the first time I could pick out where individual instruments were being played.  Cymbal off to my right and above the speaker for example.  Backing voices on this track seemed to be outside the left speaker.  At one point I even thought that the voices were coming from my kids and so I turned the music down just to make sure I wasn't missing something.  Took me a minute to realize the sound was coming from the recording.  Next up was Blue Man Group's recording at the end of Jim's disc.  Wow, again the bass response from these speakers was amazing.  The music just sounded so full and all encompassing in my room it wasn't funny.  Next up was Nils Loftgren (sp?) and his acoustic guitar piece.  Not sure what I can say here other than I don't think I've ever heard such a realistic sounding guitar.  The plucking of the strings just about raised the hair on the back of my neck.  The really high notes that were hit in this song were just so crystal clear while at the same time were so easy on my ears.  Typically really high stuff on the NHT's tended to hurt my ears a bit as it was almost a harsh sound.  It was after this session that I realized the money on these speakers had been well spent.

Round 3 of the listening session totally took me by surprise.  With all of the hype mchuckp had given me about Alison Krauss and Union Station, I had to give the disc he had sent me (Lonely Runs Both Ways) a go.  First of all, I had given this album a brief spin through Amazon's preview feature a couple weeks back just to see what all of the fuss was about.  In doing so, I quickly learned that the sound was "bluegrassy" and as such I pretty much wrote it off as I'm not a big bluegrass fan. (At least I didn't think I was.)  Anyway, I figured I'd give a song or two a try and then I'd move on to another one of my discs or I'd go back to Jim's disc.  An hour later I realized the disc was over and I had listened to the entire thing and wanted nothing more than to put it on again.  The beauty of Alison's voice just took me back completely and while I felt the disc sounded too 'twangy and bluegrassy' through my cheapo computer headphones via my PC, it was a TOTALLY different experience on the ST/RT's.  The strumming and plucking of the guitar also had me completely hooked and I just sat back and let the music wash over me.  Sorry for doubting you mchuckp and this album is definitely going to be on my continuing play list.

All said and done, I probably put a little over two hours through the ST/RT's last night.  At no time did I want to turn the system off due to fatigue.  Just wanted to keep playing song after song after song.

Pictures still coming...........

[Nels Ferre]

Despite what Jim says, get some more hours on them. They get much better!   

You don't miss the NHTs, do you?   

[Kinger]

Scary to think they could get much better than this........

Certainly don't miss the NHT's.  They have been banished to the basement.

[Nels Ferre]

My experience was that sometime after 200 hours or so the bass seemed to go even deeper and the bass output increased. I ended up moving the STs farther away from the wall which improved imaging slightly- they were already imaging champs straight from the box.

After living with them for nearly two years now, my favorite thing is that they let me hear exactly what the upstream gear is doing, but at they same time, always giving that special Salk sound that you are becoming accustomed to. Change the electronics and the sound can change dramatically.

[Kinger]

I may experiment with moving mine further out from the wall for extended listening sessions while the wife and kids are not home.  As these are in our family room it's not always convenient having them so far out from the back wall and that's why I went with the 10" spacing.  This could also be why I think I have some pretty good bass, but without pulling them out further I won't know for sure.

Improving what lies upstream of the ST/RT's is definitely next on the agenda as currently I'm driving them with a 8 or 9 year old Denon 1800 and a run of the mill Sony DVD player.  Next on the wish list, a dedicated amp so that I can just use the Denon as a pre.

[Nuance]

Great review/write-up, Kinger.  I am happy to hear the ST's are pleasing you.

I think moving them further from the front wall will definitely improve imaging, and maybe give more depth to the sound stage.  Mine are now 2' from the back wall and image like champions. 

I look forward to the pics.  Enjoy!

[Kinger]

Yep, definitely pleased with the ST/RT's so far.

Would love to move mine out further from the wall, but our room is somewhat narrow at 15 feet wide so putting them too far out from the wall really puts a crimp in room useability.

Without further ado, here are some snapshots from last night.  Keep in mind, I'm HORRIBLE with a camera and I didn't shoot much in the way of the cabinets because they are pretty hard to photograph without some natural light.  Plus, they are just satin black nothing super fancy

This first shot is how they arrived all snug and protected in the box.  Kudos to Jim and his crew for being able to send these things with zero damage.


Next up was getting one of them upright so I could move it.  Heavier than I thought it would be.



Then it was time to take the wrapper off.  Insert sexy music here.......



Gotta heed the warning Jim puts on the ribbon tweeters.


Fancy looking nameplate.



Love this touch.



Unbelievably smooth plinths before being attached.



I didn't know Jim included a towel for crying into when you heard the ST/RT's for the first time and were moved to tears.



Finally, the obligatory shot of the listening position with the ST/RT's in place.

[mchuckp]

Pretty sexy kinger!!!  Love the baffles.  Love the simple design.    Now how about some paint on those walls.

[oneinthepipe]

but then I thought that seemed kinda cheesy.

Cheesy stuff is OK here, IMO. We are probably really tough guys, but beautiful music just makes us a little more sensitive.       

"Musick has Charms to sooth a savage Breast, To soften Rocks, or bend a knotted Oak."  William Congreve  (1697) 

Great report.  How about some rigid fiberglass panels on those walls?      Who cares about paint? 

[Nuance]

^ word.  Acoustic panels can be "pretty."   

Things are looking good, Kinger.  Rock on!  \m/

[Kinger]

Funny you mention paint.......wife and I have been in this house for 4 years now and to this day we still can't decide on a color so that's why it still looks cream.

Something tells me that accoustic treatments are not gonna have a high WAF in our family room.  I'm sure if I finish the basement at some point and move the gear down there I'll have much more flexibility in that area.