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Klipsch Forte III--Pleasantly Surprised

First off, I have to say that I always had significant bias against Klipsch speakers. I thought maybe some of the Heritage Series were possibly decent, but in no way audiophile grade.

I recently bought a pair of Forte’s in distressed white oak. They look super vintage and the grills are very tasteful. My impetus for the purchase was I moved to a house this past spring that has a dedicated music room for me, and I wanted to experiment seeking a bigger sound as the room is large (25 long x 15 wide x 10 foot high ceilings). My system is the following:

Winter: Primaluna Dialgoue HP Premium Integrated,
Summer: Schitt Freya, NAD M51
Constant Year Long: Bluesound Node 2, NAD M22 DAC, Manley Chinook Phono Pre, Technics 1200 GAE Turntable, AudioTechnica ART9 Cartridge.

I’m really enjoying the Forte IIIs out of the boxes. I haven’t even tried them out with with tube amps (only tube pre) yet. I thought they would be fatiguing and have tons of bass. The treble spectrum (midrange northbound) is sweet and doesn’t sound cupped. The bass is perfectly integrated but not as prominent as I’d expected. The soundstage is seamless and they are not fussy about positioning.

The other thing that surprised me was how much of the NAD M22 juice I can use. I thought that I’d never move volume much due to the whopping power of the NAD M22--not true. So this is making me curious--what will happen when I hook up my 300B tube integrated? I think it has 8W per side. Will I miss the NAD’s power? That’s going to be fun experiment.

And, it’s going to be super interesting to try the Primaluna integrated with them. I can’t wait to see if I like my KT150s or EL34 variants better.

I’m not going to give some glowing review because it’s too soon and I’ve learned some speakers may sound so so with one system and great with another and even more so with different rooms. There is, however, a big takeaway for me personally: I can use reviews as guides but you have to try stuff out in your room with your stuff to really know. I recently sold a near mint pair of KEF LS50s because my $500 Wharfedale Dentons just sang better with my Creek integrated in the specific room they are in (downstairs system). And that doesn't say anything about the KEFs--they are still amazing boxes.  



jbhiller

Showing 3 responses by mapman

mapman's avatar
mapman
22,846 posts
 
One thing I noticed when auditioning Forte III is they do recordings no favors. Big difference between good recordings and bad. That’s probably a positive thing in terms of a speakers ability to correctly render a recording. More so than most I would say. Does not mean they will always sound good though.
Did not get to do any a/b compares.

Streaming, especially streaming newer popular recordings can also be a very mixed bag on any system, I find, due to poor quality of many modern most popular recordings.

mapman's avatar
mapman
22,846 posts
 
I am a soundstage and imaging hound as people well know. That was surprisingly not an issue at my Forte III demo. Speakers were a few feet out from rear and side walls. Setup is everything with any speaker when it comes to that. I’ve even learned how to get my old school box design refurbed Ohm Ls to do that trick well  in recent years.
mapman's avatar
mapman
22,846 posts
 
I’ve liked them very much in the two dealer auditions I’ve had. No obvious faults so far. You can really hear the differences in recordings which impresses me. This with just a very modest AV amp only even.

They have a lot of competition at their price point and are fairly big and bulky. The big and bulky part is the biggest negative for me.

Once you get beyond a smaller room you cannot fairly compare sound delivered by  tiny but very high quality Kef ls50 and Klispch Forte.   Forte III would work well in my larger rooms while ls50 would require a powered sub or two.  I auditioned teh KEFs in there and the sound was thin and very disappointing.  Sounded great in my smaller room (12X12).
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