I don't know if Thiel will look at it that way, Unsound. I'm not really sure if they're refering to the presence of DC current or what. I'm not sure what can actually happen at the speaker when an intermittent connection causes a fault or burst of noise in front of the amplifier (if this is what happened - as I said, the system didn't sound right before I started playing around back there, so I don't really know the sequence of events for sure, but the interconnect in question must have had the problem before I discovered it). Since the amp employs capacitor coupling, I don't know whether if a substantial DC output was the case, it could have implications for the amp. Anyone? I could see if a tech at Thiel has a take on this issue. |
Zaikesman, perhaps saying nothing might be prudent untill Thiel gives you their opinion . |
Well, I was mum about the circumstances when I spoke to Sherry, but I don't want to hook up a fixed speaker to bad amplifier either, and neither do I want to seem to come out with a bunch of additional late information based on what they tell me from diagnoses. I feel I trust them enough to make their decision based solely off of what their tech sees inside the speaker, but I can wait and see if there is some additional comment here first. |
Perhaps an independent evaluation of your amp might be in order? |
BTW, I'm not suggesting that you mislead the good people at Thiel, especially saint Shari. I just wouldn't offer them anything unecessary. |
You Thiel owners can thank me in part that your speakers don't have those stupid electronic bass EQ boxes(ala Bose 901) that the old Threes had. I had sort of an argument with Tom Thiel back in the late eighties and Las Vegas CES about the fact that the EQ box screwed up the sound. He claimed you could not detect the "sound" of the EQ in the system. I claimed that a child could detect it! They were talking to dealers about producing a larger model than the Three, and I insisted that they do away with the "box"! It took some convincing but at least I got them to consider that the box "might" degrade the sound. I think no one had ever brought it up to them before as Tom seemed very suprised by this sugestion. The short part is, no more Thiels with electronic bass EQ. You are welcome. |
Maxgain, you may be surprised to know that Thiel's latest offering includes electronic equalization though this time it's in the digital domain. As for me, I think Thiel's 3.5 was one of their best efforts, and that one came with an equalizer. Yes, the equalizer was discernable, yes it was the weakest part of the design, but, in the end the design was better for it. While it did add a burden to the amplification stage, it made for a better system over all. I for one hope that Thiel reconsiders the use of equalizers in future designs. IMHO, a sealed box with an equalizer is preferable to ports and passive radiators. |
You don't need an equalizer for a sealed box if it is done right. That is, if you don't mind big drivers in big boxes : ) Sean
> |
Unsound, I might use the downtime to have amps modded anyway, so this could happen. Sean, any thoughts about the question of the amp's part in this? Could it be guiltless on its own, but have passed a signal that damaged the crossover, and still be OK?
Maxgain, is Tom Thiel Jim Thiel's brother? I thought JT's brother only handled the cabinet-finishing aspect of the company.
Unsound already knows that I found my 2.2's superior in all ways to the 3.5's, but I don't really know whether part of that advantage can be laid at the feet of the 3.5's EQ box. I personally doubt that the speaker would have sounded any better to me without the bass boost, since the 2.2 had more articulate bass anyway, but I guess it's possible some additional transparency would have been audible. (It's always interesting to me that no one seems to feel that Merlin's BAM EQ module compromises their speaker in this way, and I believe that is a vented design.) Unsound, is the Thiel offering using digital EQ that you mention the subwoofer or another HT product? |
Sean, I agree with you re: sealed boxes sans equalization and extra size, how ever digital equalization may offer us a chance to "tune to the room" and do it with out the compromises that used to come the old fashioned analog way, what new compromises it adds is yet to be seen.
Zaikesman, yes it was the subwoofer that I was refering to. There has been rumous that Jim Thiel is considering many options for a furture state of the art project (read expensive) some of which include digital EQ, self powered and even omni directional. |
Yes Unsound I am suprised. It was just that they were talking about a higher priced speaker than the Three(whatever version it was at the time). I felt that at least the EQ that they used at the time degraded the overall performance.It suprised me that they were so dumbfounded that anyone said that they could hear the performance loss the thing introduced. Yes, the sound was bass shy without it but everything else improved dramaticly. At least they looked into improving the EQ for future use. Was there a CS5 at anytime in their line?
Yes, Tom is Jim's brother, but he did seem to have something to do with the development process. He was asking dealers opinioins of what they would like to see in a more expensive speaker from them in the near future. When I asked for one with no EQ he just stared at me in disbelief for a while, it was sort of uncomfortable. They beleived that it was totaly transparent. I didn't. Don't get me wrong, I like the people at Thiel and I like their products. |
Maxgain, yes there was a 5 (and 5i), it didn't use an equalizer but instead more drivers in a much bigger box as Sean suggested. The 5 was considerably more expensive. My favorite Thiels all seem to be sealed boxes. |
Maxgain, Thiel would seem to have learned much since those times - which is of course not at all surprising. Unsound, I hope if I go there and take the tour, that some of these issues of conjecture might be able to have a small amount of light shed on them. |
Zaikesman, I hope I can count on you to share what ever you learn. Good luck. |
Well, that would depend on whether, if I see JT and get to ask a question, he answers with "If I tell you that, I'll have to kill you".
:-) |
Maybe you can leave it in your will? |
Zaikesman, you ever get things working? |
Thanks for asking, Maxgain. Both I and the folks at Thiel were away over the holidays. Next week, I will arrange to bring the speaker to Lexington, Kentucky for crossover repairs and a factory tour at our earliest mutual convenience. Harmonic Technology will replace all the connectors on my set of Magic One Links with their 'new & improved' variety for $25 each plus shipping, or about $110. I believe I will probably take the opportunity to have my VTL mono's upgraded while the system is down, so who knows when I'll be with stereo again. To tell you the truth, I'm kind of enjoying not having the system imposing itself on my life on a regular basis. I find myself musing a bit these days about just chucking the whole rig once it's working again and returning to the simpler life...yeah, right. |
Z...go catch some LIVE music this winter. You'll be respirited I'm sure. Works for me! Ern |
Rest assured, I catch as much live music as I can year 'round, but there's a lot less I'm interested in seeing these days than was the case 10, 15 or 20 years ago. Part of that has to do with the venue situation where I am, but mostly is just because I'm not into a whole lot of what's being made today. Still, I probably average a show every month or two - not as much as I'd like, but as much as I can stand. C'est la vie. |
UPDATE: OK, here it is over four months after my speaker first went bad, and I'm finally back from Kentucky country with a supposedly fixed-up speaker (I haven't unpacked it yet, but of course it was tested by the factory before I left). It turned out to have *both* a bad woofer *and* a bad crossover, the former possibly a result of the latter. The rasping tweeter on the other side was swapped by me for the one in the dead speaker back when this all first happened, so I also got a new tweeter installed by the fatory.
As usual, Thiel service was great, and I got to take a factory tour, which I'll post about separately. I also found out that the problem with my 2.2's crossover is a common one involving an under-spec'ed resistor, and I'll make another new post alerting folks to that situation. Now I just have to make the resistor upgrade preemptively to the other speaker, and then get on with the business of re-breaking everything in again.
During the intervening time, I must say that I got very used to listening in mono (my amplification is monoblock, a necessity for this usage when you're talking tubes and only have one speaker available - a stereo tube amp cannot be run with one channel's output left unconnected to a speaker load). This is a little easier for me than for many of you, as I am a big listener to vintage 45's and mono LP's. I think I might actually wind up missing this, 'cause it does have its advantages, which I'll also post about in a separate new thread.
Anyway, after so many various delays in our being able to make this trip, my girlfriend and I did at least manage to turn it into a week-long vacation. Eastern and central Kentucky (Thiel is based in Lexington) have wonderful terrain, and the state maintains a particularly good network of large wilderness parks, many complete with extensive hiking trails, campsite facilities, and even several very nice (but inexpensive) park lodges. There are impressive gorges, mountain ranges, waterfalls, natural sandstone 'bridges', cliffs, caves, and other features of interest to visit, both in KY and in West Virginia and southwestern Virginia. Living in the DC area, I was already familiar with the better-known Blue Ridge and Shenandoah areas of the Appalachians, as well as the more distant Smokies of the Carolinas and Tennessee, but this area was new to me, and I will certainly be going back someday for more.
Of course, you know I scored my fair share of old vinyl in thrifts and fleas while I was there! And of special interest to sound freaks, we also visited what is billed as the world's largest all-wooden cathedral, the Buckhorn log church remotely situated in the small town of the same name. Built entirely of oak planks and beams (without even nails - all the joinery is wooden) in the rustic Scandinavian style by a wealthy transplanted New Yorker during the early 1900's, it has what looked to be about 40' high ceilings and contains a fairly large antique pipe organ moved from Philadelphia. We didn't get to hear the organ play, much less the choir sing - the church is unheated and doesn't open for regular use until later in the season - but talking and walking around inside the building it's clear this place has an amazing and unique acoustic. Too bad the man who admitted us told us when I asked him that no commercial recordings have ever been made there though. |
