Klipsch RF-3 or Forte II

Just edited my post. I meant to say I am looking for a ported center speaker from Klipsch. I was going to purchase a Heresy speaker to use as a center until I saw that it is sealed too.

Picked up a pair of Klipsch Cornwall i CBR speakers tonight. Can someone post a pic of how to connect the speaker wire to im guessing the screws on the back panel?

you have a terminal block with two nickle plated machine screws each with a slot in the head so you need a straight blade screw driver. when looking at the back of the speaker the machine screw to the right is the positive terminal. These terminals actually work very well especially if you connect a spade to your wire and they sound good to. I have seen adapters on Ebay which are a spade with a female banana. Install the spade and plug in a male banana. enjoy your listening. best regards Moray James.

Thank very, very much Mr. moray

OK thanks to Moray for helping me with connecting these speakers. I have them both up and running at this time. My initial thoughts are as follows:

Highs are a bit tinny. Not as clean as the Fortes. Highs sound very good and clear on some tracks, but a bit nasaly on others.

Mids: This is not even close. Fortes by a mile. Fortes sounded very balanced with great separation between the highs and a prominent midrange. Highs and mids seem "blended together" with the Cornwalls.

Bass: In my humble opinion, the bass on these Cornwalls is immensely more powerful at all volume levels in comparison with the Fortes. My ears don't detect any lack of depth in comparison to the Fortes, though I could easily do some measurements which will surely show the Fortes were digging deeper in my room I'm sure. I had the Fortes at +6 on my tone controls to give me satisfactory bass.

I have the Cornwalls at -2 on my tone controls just to keep the bass under control . Bass is awesome with the Cornwalls in my opinion.

Overall the Cornwalls project a much wider and more immense soundstage than the Fortes to me. The Forte's soundstage was very narrow with anemic bass in my opinion.

However the Cornwall's immense soundstage sounds boxy and not tonally balanced. I will give them a few more days. But I'm not sure these are keepers.

The cornscala has the better midrange than either the forte or the cornwall while retaining the bass of the latter. But as you've already mentioned, that speaker is too pedestrian for you.

Yep

My gut feeling tells me the KLF-20 or even possible the KG 5.5 is going to be the sweet spot I'm looking for with my room. Both have slender footprints and both have very good reviews online.

If you check out any KLF series take some tools along to remove the woofer and a mallet to whack on the baffles. You need to make sure that the adhesive on the baffles (front and back) are solid. I have had three set of KLF20 and all three had loose baffles. KLF 20 cabinet is a Forte cabinet turned sideways. Happy hunting. Best regards Moray James.

Connected the Cornwalls to my hometheater pc which has a superp sound card and listened to a few songs today. I must say these speakers sounded great. Highs were much improve and separation was a bit better.Bass was immense as always. However I already had a prospective buyer on the line today and after some haggling, the Cornwalls were sold. So now I'm on the prowl again. I love the chase!

I'm gonna chime in with the 5.5's again . Well worth a listen . Good luck .

Thanks Zebra. I'm looking feverishly but I've only found a pair of KG 5.2s available. I will keep up the search until I pounce on a pair of KG 5.5's or KLF 20's.

On a side note nobody seems to want my RF-3's. I have not gotten one single offer on them. The KLF series 10 and 20 usually sell within one day of posting on craigslist. And they usually go for 450-500 locally. I'm not saying they are best by any form of the imagination. But there must be some magic to them with their cult like following around here.

If I had it all to do over again, knowing what I know now, I'm not sure (Moray will want to strangle me for saying this) that I'd get the KLF20's again.

Now that mine have been repaired\modded, I don't intend on ever getting rid of them. They are the nicest speakers I've ever had, and although I've heard better systems, these KLF20's can hold their own in any friends' house I may visit.

But the damn baffle issue is not a quick fix, at least not in my case. And partly because I've never worked with wood, had to go buy the clamps, wood, glues, no proper tablesaw or even a proper shop. Worst of all, again, was my lack of experience with wood.

I spent weeks (after work, in the garage and on the PC researching) working on these two cabinets. I think it would also have been quicker in the long run if I had just removed the baffles instead of working thru the holes.

At any rate, my point is that alot of time invested and I probably have about $1200 into the speakers.

Then again, Moray swears these modded KLF20's will hold their own against some speakers with 5X the cost or more. I can't comment on that, as I mentioned in a previous post, my experience with true high-fi in the real world is nada.

I just wanted to make sure you knew the baffle details- if you haven't already, find and read that post I added to with my KLF20 modding details.

Here it is

Have fun, it sure sounds to me like you are going about this the right way - IMO, you just have to try a variety of speakers to find out what really works for you. Too many people buy a set, decide they love them and you couldn't pry that set out of dead hands, they are so set on them - but they've not listened to others in their system? That's nuts!

Buy, try and sell - it's alot of work sometimes, but worth it in the long run.

Well done.

The KLF20 is a really good speaker and Dingman ir right easier to remove both front and back baffles install your brace work clean out all the original hotmelt adhesive and re install the baffles with white wood glue stronger than the original will last for ever.

I still think that a KLF20 turned into a two way is the way to go. Great woofers and a KLF10 horn would be very nice with a real driver like a EV DH1506. Or as I have done experiment with Karlson K-Tubes for free making Karlson K-Tubes out of paper and tape they sound astounding and can be made up in minutes. I used a CF3 network to build a Karlson version of the CF3 guess you could call it a KF3. Best regards Moray James.

I inquired about a pair of CF-4 speakers in Memphis, TN but sadly they were already spoken for. Still searching. Though I hate waiting. Grrrr.

Found a pair of Klipsch CF-3 speakers but the owner's price is on another planet. He is asking for $1250. Not going to happen.

diamonddelts said:

Found a pair of Klipsch CF-3 speakers but the owner's price is on another planet. He is asking for $1250. Not going to happen.

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$1250!?! Wow. I'd sell mine for that price in a minute. Don't think it's going to happen though. I assume that he was, at least, selling version 1s.

cubdog

Yes sir he was selling version 1.

diamonddelts said:

I come from a background where we do regional get together events to compare the most popular higher end pro speakers, diy builds, as well as conventional brick and mortar/ID brands.

And these are events frequented by people of all income backgrounds(average to multimillionaire) as well as sound reinforcement and electrical engineers who have a wide range of experience with value, design, and performance.
It's easy to rave about a speaker when you don't have a proper frame of reference and you have not directly compared them to other top designs in a group setting.

I've also attended may double blind listening tests for amps so I'm not even going to go that route with the many unfounded assumptions people place on what they think their hearing (warm, cold, sparkly, etc).

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diamonddelts said:

Picked up a pair of Klipsch Cornwall i CBR speakers tonight. Can someone post a pic of how to connect the speaker wire to im guessing the screws on the back panel?

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:scratch2:

Lol. Touche Jim. But new age designs and high end, high efficiency speakers are my thing. Vintage is a lesser known territory for me. Hence why I've decided on a fun vintage adventure for my bedroom because it takes me out of my comfort zone. I was not even born yet when the 1984 cornwalls were released. None of the speakers Ive used from my generation used that type of connection.

To be fair most of the older vintage guys always get the same "what the hell" expression when they see my subwoofer for instance and have no idea how to connect my subwoofer which has speakon outputs.