My wife made me do it!

[TLS Guy]

We had invited friends over for dinner at our Eagan town home. It was the season finale of Downton Abbey which everyone wanted to watch. We only had a small Sharp Aquos LCD screen, and the audio was work around vintage Quad to my last recording location monitors.

So my wife wanted a bigger screen. So the evening before we went to Best Buy at their Richfield headquarters and bought a 50" Panasonic Plasma Vierra.

I mounted it on the wall Sunday morning with the help of my son in law.

My wife never got the hang of the vintage work around. She was happy for TV with the fairly large speakers either side of the Sharp screen for watching TV.

However with brilliant modern design with wafer thin screens and a very thin bessel and puny speakers firing right into the wall. The result is lousy sound and very poor speech discrimination

So that led to the purchase of a Marantz 7701 pre/pro.

The speakers were driven by a pair of Quad 303s. The speakers have four chambers. The drivers are Dynaudio 17 W EX and Scanspeak tweeters. The mid/woofers are each in their own sealed enclosure, so one can not drive the other.

Inside each cabinet are two Morel 9" sub drivers forming an isobarik coupled cavity subs. There is one sealed cavity and one ported cavity. F3 points for these band pass subs are 27 and 90 Hz.

One problem was encountered due to the fact that the Marantz will not work in 2.1 mode due to a software glitch unless you select a non existent speaker in the speaker set up.

So I decided to beef up the power and add a center channel.

I made ready three Quad 405 IIs. I only use one channel in one for the center speaker.

The center channel speaker is one full range 4" JW Mk II module in a small sealed enclosure.

The match to the mains is very good indeed. The Audyssey tones match just about perfectly. Speech is very natural with no shout and excellent speech discrimination. I think the lack of any crossover contributes to the excellent speech discrimination.

Audyssey set the crossover for the mains at 60 Hz and the center at 100 Hz. It set the top end of the sub to roll off at 120 Hz. This is optimal as it does not upset my design acoustic roll off of the mains. I'm astonished how good Audysssey is at figuring these issues out. The frequency response correction is awful and is disabled. It turns the whole rig into a nasty shouty sibilant mess. In my view Audyssey is only any use for setting levels, distance and crossovers and nothing else.

Peripherals are Comcast xfinity DVR Panasonic BD/internet streaming player. Sony Google TV player. This has a Google Gold browser. It also has the BPO icon. I have a season ticket to the BPO Digital Concert Hall and it takes me there without opening a browser.

I'm very pleased with this unit and the remote is a masterpiece.

My wife just loves this system and has no trouble operating it. I have enabled the power amps to switch on from the 12 volt trigger.

The sound of this system is excellent. I now have to be careful not to get carried away, as there are four adjoined units in these condo units!

My wife is not finished with me yet. We have a small second bedroom we have furnished as a sitting room. She wants a small flat panel in there. I will run it as a zone 2 I think. Since you can't get far form the speakers, I think I will build a pair of JW Mk III drivers and build TLs for them. A situation like that is an ideal application for full range drivers.

I snagged a Quad 909 for a very good price in eBay this morning and I will use that to power the top half of the mains.

 

[96cobra10101]

Nice setup man. Btw, your weather up here is killing me. Beautiful all day, and then around 7, I was going to go out for a run and it was freezing. WTF?

 

[internetmin]

Congrats! You must be loving that Panasonic Plasma.

 

[lsiberian]

I'm not sure I've seen you talk about the feet of those speakers before.

My wife watches Downton Abbey. It seems the BBC is showing America how to do proper television again.

 

[internetmin]

It seems the BBC is showing America how to do proper television again.

That's funny.

 

[TLS Guy]

Nice setup man. Btw, your weather up here is killing me. Beautiful all day, and then around 7, I was going to go out for a run and it was freezing. WTF?

I bet.

This is what we are up against here.

It was only 9 above here this morning. I had to have a contractor open up the culverts a couple of days ago, but last night it froze running white water! I hope I don't have to pay to have them opened again.

We have snow forecast for this afternoon and tonight and snow and ice for most of next week!

There were half a dozen swans in the middle of the lake this morning wondering why they could not poke a hole in the ice on April 5. They were having quite a natter about it. Fishermen tell me there is over three feet of ice on the lake and it is still increasing because of the cold night.

We have not gone 24 hours without a severe freeze for over four months now.

I have booked the docks and lifts to go in May 5, but I'm starting to wonder if the ice will be off by then. Global warming indeed, I guess climate change now so the lunatics can have it both ways. As far as I know climate has always been highly variable, but only now is it a reason to worry and let vested interest steal vast amounts of money from the public. A fill third of the electricity bills here are now down to these fanatics. Our Coop tells you how much of our bills every month are due to this lunacy.

Minnesotans voted in democrats and now we have the idiots adding insult to injury to add solar mandates and lots more, which will add more to the bills. You should have seen what the CEO of our cooperative had to say about is in the members monthly magazine.

We will all have to go into overdrive writing letters and going to the legislature.

The worst of it is that this nonsense is causing real energy poverty here, which is actually tragic.

 

[TLS Guy]

I'm not sure I've seen you talk about the feet of those speakers before.

My wife watches Downton Abbey. It seems the BBC is showing America how to do proper television again.

Actually it is an free enterprise ITV production. The BBC are tied up with pedophile and sex scandals right now.

 

[TLS Guy]

I'm not sure I've seen you talk about the feet of those speakers before.

My wife watches Downton Abbey. It seems the BBC is showing America how to do proper television again.

They are not feet but castor wheels, as I used them on location and it is much easier to push speakers rather carry them.

As I said in the other post, Downton Abbey is an ITV production.

 

[Irvrobinson]

Global warming indeed, I guess climate change now so the lunatics can have it both ways. As far as I know climate has always been highly variable, but only now is it a reason to worry and let vested interest steal vast amounts of money from the public. A fill third of the electricity bills here are now down to these fanatics. Our Coop tells you how much of our bills every month are due to this lunacy.

Minnesotans voted in democrats and now we have the idiots adding insult to injury to add solar mandates and lots more, which will add more to the bills. You should have seen what the CEO of our cooperative had to say about is in the members monthly magazine.

We will all have to go into overdrive writing letters and going to the legislature.

The worst of it is that this nonsense is causing real energy poverty here, which is actually tragic.

I'm surprised, TLS Guy, that as a man of science you are not a believer in global warming. How else does one explain the dramatic reduction in the ice pack around the North Pole? All of the models I've read about also predict more extreme temperature swings in the temperate zones.

Regarding the renewable energy mandates, however, I couldn't agree with you more. The only thing green about renewable energy are the subsidy dollars lining the pockets of those companies that are invested in renewable energy equipment and production. Solar is bad, but wind power is the worst. Around here, mile after mile of pristine land is now dedicated to undependable, overly expensive power that kills birds, makes noise, and wrecks the view. And for every megawatt of wind or solar power you build you need another megawatt of back-up power in coal or gas turbines, for when the wind doesn't blow or the sun doesn't shine. And then there's the problem of extending the transmission grid to the areas with windmills, that are usually not where the grid currently is.

Most people don't realize that if we just upgraded the big hydro projects we already have, like Grand Coulee and Hoover, we could add gigawatts for practically nothing. No one wants to talk about the massive efficiency of hydro-power though, we'd rather spend billions on solar panels, windmills and ethanol. Ethanol, ugh.

 

[Rickster71]

Nope...not surprised at all.
The planet is gonna do, what the planet is gonna do.

Global Temperature Trends Since 2500 B.C.

 

[Grador]

Seriously guys, a global warming debate here?

TLS, is there no end to the amount of systems you have?

 

[Irvrobinson]

Seriously guys, a global warming debate here?

But Dad, he hit me first!

 

[internetmin]

Seriously guys, a global warming debate here?

TLS, is there no end to the amount of systems you have?

LOL. Priceless.

 

[TLS Guy]

Seriously guys, a global warming debate here?

TLS, is there no end to the amount of systems you have?

Cobra was blaming us Minnesotans for his cold weather in Florida.

As far as the systems, that's what happens if you are an audio hoarder, and can't resist a bit of gear on eBay that needs TLC. Wouldn't want it to fall into the wrong hands would we now? Much too good to go to waste!

 

[Bryceo]

Looks good

 

[96cobra10101]

Cobra was blaming us Minnesotans for his cold weather in Florida.

You must have misunderstood me. I'm in MN. One of my clients has a chain of restaurants up here and I've been upgrading his network security. As for global warming, meh. To many natural things that cause weather patterns. We are spinning in orbit around a ball of fire at a couple thousand miles per hour after all. But we also need to quit trashing the place, too.

 

[Bryceo]

But Dad, he hit me first!

Takes a real man to step up and blame others good job

 

[TLS Guy]

You must have misunderstood me. I'm in MN. One of my clients has a chain of restaurants up here and I've been upgrading his network security. As for global warming, meh. To many natural things that cause weather patterns. We are spinning in orbit around a ball of fire at a couple thousand miles per hour after all. But we also need to quit trashing the place, too.

Yes, I did misunderstand you, I had no idea you were up here. My neighbor here winters in Florida, and he has been complaining about the cold down there of late. Where are you in Minnesota at present?

 

[96cobra10101]

Yes, I did misunderstand you, I had no idea you were up here. My neighbor here winters in Florida, and he has been complaining about the cold down there of late. Where are you in Minnesota at present?

I was all over, From Mankato up to Wyoming, but mostly in the Twins. I stayed at The Commons by the University of MN. Pretty nice place. Unfortunately, I'm on my way to Fargo right now. I'd rank Minneapolis in my top 5 cities I work in.

 

[TLS Guy]

I was all over, From Mankato up to Wyoming, but mostly in the Twins. I stayed at The Commons by the University of MN. Pretty nice place. Unfortunately, I'm on my way to Fargo right now. I'd rank Minneapolis in my top 5 cities I work in.

Fargo has not flooded yet, but they are in high gear getting ready. I think the Red will start its rise next week. NOAA will have a further flood forecast Monday I expect.

If you don't work Sunday's I'm at Benedict, which is only 90 to 100 miles from Fargo. You are welcome to come out tomorrow. It is an easy journey, Fargo to Detroit Lakes, and then on to Park Rapids, then to Walker, we are 8 miles form Walker. The North County woods still have not lost their winter glow. It's a very easy journey and you are welcome to come.