I recently took a plunge and thought i would share what I discovered. First I am an average bloke, and would not consider myself an audiophile. In fact I wear hearing aids. In the 80's and 90's I enjoyed a set of Klipsch Horns until we built a house that simply did not accommodate the corner configuration they need and I sold them.
Approximately 8 months ago I purchased a pair of ELAC 5.2 and pushed them with a vintage Kenwood KR-9600. They sounded surprisingly good for under $250. Unfortunately the K-horns haunted me.
I was able to acquire a set of Heresy II's that I went ahead and upgraded the tweeter and crossovers with Crites. Arguably these were equivalents to III's. Shortly after this my old battle ship Kenwood smoked the left power amp module. After considerable research I went with an Outlaw RR2160 based on the rave reviews but, also its internal capability to support 2 subwoofers with a built in crossover. I selected 2 SVS SB-1000 NON-ported subwoofers to compliment them and literally stacked the Heresy's on top of the woofers. After a lot of tweaking of both the levels and speaker placement I created a fantastic sound stage that sounded great. This set up produced a very clean, non-booming bass.
All was good until I read some reviews for the Cornwall IV. What caught my attention was the mid range. About 2 weeks ago I was able to get two brand new but, B stock Cornwall's. The blemish is a "blond" area on the bottom left side of one speaker. This is actually common with Walnut, but I guess many would consider it a blemish. If I was inclined I could put some walnut stain on it but, it really is not noticeable.
So. Wow. To be clear if I never had purchased the Cornwall's I would be very happy with the Heresy/SVS combination. That said, the Cornwall's are phenomenal. For me it was the midrange. The only way I can describe it is deeper/richer sound with an expansive sound stage. Though the SB-1000's can reach down to 24 Hz vs 34 for the Cornwall's, I did note that the Bass is more precise. For the set up I modified two wooden furniture dolly's by shortening them to 25.5" (Milwaukee from Home D for about $23 each). At 100 pounds per speaker this really facilitated walking the optimum speaker placement. For ME this ended up in corners about 6 inches from the back and side walls with a slight toe in. The room is 10 x 15 which gets me about 7' on center separation (Klipsch recommends 6 to 15 feet). The optimum seating distance is approximately 7' from the center line and centered between the speakers. With that said, one of the big differences is the image or sound stage. The Heresy's had a very focused and sharp area for the optimum listening area. Very small movement from this area greatly impacted the sound stage for optimum listing. Effectively this was a single person listening experience. The Cornwall's afford a much larger sweet spot and two or more can enjoy a great sound image.
Conclusion. It was worth the upgrade for both the enhanced midrange response and expanded listening area. Darn, youtube and great reviews I would have been very happy with the previous set up! Bottom line, any one want some great Heresy's and SB1000's?
Thank you!
Approximately 8 months ago I purchased a pair of ELAC 5.2 and pushed them with a vintage Kenwood KR-9600. They sounded surprisingly good for under $250. Unfortunately the K-horns haunted me.
I was able to acquire a set of Heresy II's that I went ahead and upgraded the tweeter and crossovers with Crites. Arguably these were equivalents to III's. Shortly after this my old battle ship Kenwood smoked the left power amp module. After considerable research I went with an Outlaw RR2160 based on the rave reviews but, also its internal capability to support 2 subwoofers with a built in crossover. I selected 2 SVS SB-1000 NON-ported subwoofers to compliment them and literally stacked the Heresy's on top of the woofers. After a lot of tweaking of both the levels and speaker placement I created a fantastic sound stage that sounded great. This set up produced a very clean, non-booming bass.
All was good until I read some reviews for the Cornwall IV. What caught my attention was the mid range. About 2 weeks ago I was able to get two brand new but, B stock Cornwall's. The blemish is a "blond" area on the bottom left side of one speaker. This is actually common with Walnut, but I guess many would consider it a blemish. If I was inclined I could put some walnut stain on it but, it really is not noticeable.
So. Wow. To be clear if I never had purchased the Cornwall's I would be very happy with the Heresy/SVS combination. That said, the Cornwall's are phenomenal. For me it was the midrange. The only way I can describe it is deeper/richer sound with an expansive sound stage. Though the SB-1000's can reach down to 24 Hz vs 34 for the Cornwall's, I did note that the Bass is more precise. For the set up I modified two wooden furniture dolly's by shortening them to 25.5" (Milwaukee from Home D for about $23 each). At 100 pounds per speaker this really facilitated walking the optimum speaker placement. For ME this ended up in corners about 6 inches from the back and side walls with a slight toe in. The room is 10 x 15 which gets me about 7' on center separation (Klipsch recommends 6 to 15 feet). The optimum seating distance is approximately 7' from the center line and centered between the speakers. With that said, one of the big differences is the image or sound stage. The Heresy's had a very focused and sharp area for the optimum listening area. Very small movement from this area greatly impacted the sound stage for optimum listing. Effectively this was a single person listening experience. The Cornwall's afford a much larger sweet spot and two or more can enjoy a great sound image.
Conclusion. It was worth the upgrade for both the enhanced midrange response and expanded listening area. Darn, youtube and great reviews I would have been very happy with the previous set up! Bottom line, any one want some great Heresy's and SB1000's?
Thank you!
