"An eccentric Englishman living in the backwoods of Minnesota"
That's how his wife described Dr. Mark - better known as TLS Guy - and I don't think there's a single sentence that better describes him.
Being an audio enthusiast living in northern Minnesota - where somewhere around 80% of the population (women included) participate in deer hunting season annually - can be very lonely. So when I spotted TLS Guy on audioholics with a location about 8 miles from where I attended High School (about 1.5 hr from where I currently live) I was excited to say the least. I became even more excited when I saw his setup and was invited for a visit.
So after much anticipation my good friend Dave - from the twin cities - and I made the trip to Benedict, MN last weekend to meet Dr. Mark. Now to be completely honest I really didn't know what to expect. I'd read some of Mark's writings on the forums and some of his blog and he came across as a pretty normal (well for us anyway) guy. However as our email conversations got longer I'd become concerned that he may be "a bit off". I'm not sure what it was I just couldn't quite get a read on him, something was different. Well immediately upon arrival I breathed a small sigh of relief upon realizing Mark is English - it all made sense! We had a great time visiting with Mark and his wife and listening to speakers. I participated in my first ever tea time including Christmas Cake (more commonly known here as fruit cake) - did you know it's not customary to eat Christmas Cake with a fork?! Oops
Eventually it was time to get going and I got the bill for our day at Walberswick - writing this review
Now before I begin I'd just like to say I've never written anything like this before and I'm not certain I'm quite qualified for the task but I'm going to give it my best effort.
Background:
I don't have much of a long storied history in audio. In fact just 5 years ago I was listening to a cheap Onkyo HTIB system and loving it. I've moved at a rapid pace from that setup to where I am now though with an IB subwoofer using four AE IB15's and DIY mains using B&C DE500 on QSC 152i waveguide over AE TD15M
I've had several subwoofers along the way - SVS PB12-ISD/2 (dual 12" ported) -> 4 x eD 13Kv.2 (12" in sealed enclosure) -> a whole mess of sealed and ported eD's with a complicated crossover -> my current IB (not going anywhere any time soon!). For main speakers the list is shorter: AV123 X-LS -> AV123 X-MTM -> my current speakers. Also living in northern MN as I do I don't have a local HiFi store to visit and listen to speakers, aside from those that I've owned the only speakers worth noting that I've listened to extensively are my good friend Dave's Magnepan MMG's. I do have a decent working knowledge of DIY speakers (ever expanding) though and I like to think I have at least a reasonably discriminating ear.
If you’re not familiar with Mark’s speakers see the links below :
http://forums.audioholics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=42780
http://mdcarter.smugmug.com/gallery/2424008_RKGvb#127077317_Pufg7
The front speakers are a 3.5-way design using transmission line loaded mid and woofer. The surrounds (though not heavily featured in the links above) are a 4-way design also using transmission line loading for the woofers. If you haven’t figured it out yet Mark is a bit of a transmission line enthusiast! The implementation of the mains is complicated at best so I won’t go into it much here. I was stunned to hear that the rears are using a first order crossover for the top portion, per Mark this took a full 10 years to get just right and I can believe it!
Dave and I didn’t have a lot of well recorded content to bring along (especially not much that Mark would be interested in listening to as well). We did bring along a flash drive with some FLAC music files and my beloved copy of Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon SACD
We started with some music Mark likes to use to demo the room to guests. A very enveloping drum track from Kalevi Aho Symphony No 12 and a portion of Beethoven’s 5th. Both sounded excellent! I’ve always been stuck with my living room as my listening space so I’ve never experienced a really good surround sound environment. I do have surround channels but they’re crammed in the corners of the room near my listening position raised about 18” so not ideal. Because of this I especially enjoyed the Kalevi Aho piece as it used the surround channels heavily with drums circling the listening room. Next we listened to the Dark Side of the Moon SACD which also used the surround channels heavily. It also sounded fantastic with voices and noises swirling the listening room. We gave the digital files a short listen but most of the content we brought was too heavily compressed to really enjoy at the “spirited” levels we’d been listening
The thing that stood out the most for me through the listening was the clarity at high SPL. I like my music loud – really loud. In all of the speakers systems I’ve had the limiting factor as to how loudly I could listen has always been where the speakers start distorting to the point that it’s unpleasant. With my latest speakers I’m finding that the limiting factor isn’t always the speakers, at times the content is the limiting factor. It seemed in Mark’s setup invariable the quality of the material was the limiting factor on how loudly music could be played back enjoyably. This is what I’m striving for in my setup.
Another aspect of Mark’s speakers that stood out was the bass response. I’m used to four 15” drivers in an IB and this was four (very high quality) 10” drivers loaded in a transmission line. While playing the material I’m familiar with I only noticed the lowest of the low missing – in fact I’d wager that Mark’s mains play lower than most consumer subwoofers on the market. I did not hear anything offending in the bass region at all. The 10” drivers did a fine job - plenty of very clean output with no boom or overhang.
One interesting aspect of Mark’s theater is the center channel in the front. The mains are 3-way TL loaded using SEAS drivers but the center channel (and the surround left and right – not surround back) channels are using two coax drivers with the tweeter of one disconnected. I was interested to hear how this would blend with the other speakers. Well the center must have blended pretty well, one of the first tracks we listened to was just stereo and we didn’t even notice when it changed to surround with the center channel playing. It was very seemless and somewhat surprising.
The sound stage was wide and tall. During Beethoven’s 5th I commented to Mark how “big” the sound was. It was like the sound was just coming from in front of you rather than from those imposing monoliths of speakers in the corners. As I mentioned earlier the surround sound was fantastic. Track 2 of Dark Side of the Moon has tons of crazy sound effects including footsteps of someone running. In stereo they run from right to left and back again twice but in full surround sound they start at the front right and run by you to the right rear, then across to the left rear and up to the left front. This sounded great! I’ve listened to this in full surround at my house but it was nowhere near the same. In fact I prefer to SACD’s in 2-channel just because my room can’t do surround sound justice and it ends up coming out a muddled mess
The only possible criticism I could make (if you could even call it that really) was that the voicing wasn’t what I’m used to. My current speakers using a horn over a 15” have a bit of a weak midrange which I’ve found that I prefer when I tweak things by ear but Mark’s speakers sounded much more flat through the midrange which tends to sound a bit “dirty” to me.
The main speakers are impressive to say the least but the surrounds were certainly no slouch either. Many would be happy to call them their mains! In fact that’s exactly what they used to be for Mark, back around the time I was born… They still sound fantastic. I’m honestly not even sure if we ever heard the side surrounds as the sound seemed to just be coming from.
If you looked at the pictures in the links above you know that Mark’s got a TON of vintage gear in his listening room (and even more in the downstairs setup). What’s really spectacular is that all the gear you see is fully functional and, if you manage to enter the secret code of preamp settings, hooked up and ready for use. Mark gave Dave and I a history lesson on each piece in the wall and he really knows his gear! Most of it he has serviced himself. Behind the wall of gear is a very small workshop complete with oscilloscope, variarc, signal generator, etc. We didn’t get a chance to checkout the main workshop but will have to take a peak next time
That brings me to the most impressive aspect of our visit - Mark himself. Talk about a wealth of information! Mark is the real deal – what Dave and I aspire to be. He knew close to everything about all of the equipment on hand. From the history of the drivers used in his speakers to the inner workings of his Quad 909 current dumping amps to the details of how a ribbon tweeter works (I’m working with one on my next project). We were simply taken aback at all the knowledge. Dave and I had a conversation on the trip home wondering how to even begin growing a knowledge base to be able to even attempt to repair our own amplifiers or design a custom crossover. All throughout the house were pieces of gear with the distinctive “Carter” plate attached indicating they’d been built by Mark. We had an excellent time visiting with Mark and his wife.
