Legacy Speaker Owners Assistance Request

Having reviewed the Helix, Focus/Focus SE and Whisper for Dagogo.com I have some familiarity with the brand. :)
I have used the Whisper in reviewing with a large assortment of amps including but not limited to Jeff Rowland class D, VAC Phi 200, Pass XA160.5, Pathos Classic One MkIII (two units in Mono mode; currently for sale), Cambridge Audio Azur 840W, and Wells Audio Akasha and Innamorata, etc. All of these have been reviewed; if you wish to see the character of them you can read the reviews. I have done two write ups of the Whisper which you may enjoy at Dagogo.com.

I am not hard core HT, but listen to stereo about 98%+ of the time, so my comments on setup are to be weighted. I do use different amplification for the surround system; I also use the Magnepan MGMW for the Mid and Rear surrounds. So, I do not have absolute consistency with surrounds in either amp or speakers. However, I watch a movie perhaps once a month, if that. I put the bulk of my money into the two channel experience.

If HT is critical to you I would strongly consider similar brand for all amplification, as the amps do carry a sonic signature and house sound. I would put the bulk of the money on the two channel amp and quite a bit less on the surrounds. The center I would put a good amp on since the nature of the human voice changes dramatically with a good center/amp.

The advice regarding the efficiency of Legacy speakers is true. I have used all kinds of amps with the Focus, Whisper, etc. If you go with tubes you may encounter a lot of tubes throwing off a lot of heat and longer term maintenance costs. Solid state would give you less issues potentially of biasing, tube replacement, etc. I have put together many systems with a tube amp, i.e. VAC, up front with the mains and solid state with all the rest. My perspective on this may conflict with some ardent HT fans, but once the system is set up and you get accustomed to the sound it becomes "natural" to your ears. I am quite sure the surround could be vastly improved, but with budget considerations and emphasis on the mains I am content with the "mix and match" system. However, as I said, optimally you will want consistency.

Note that if you do work with different brands/genres of amps you can massage the sound of the center/surrounds with cabling to suit. So, while I suggest that the optimum would be one brand/house sound of amp, you can do wonders in matching tonality etc. with cabling. I would strongly suggest you begin with one full set of cables if possible, especially for the center speaker and mains, and work from there.

Finally, the Wavelaunch processor will allow you to integrate the Focus and Whisper with ease in a fashion much more deft than simply putting two different passive speakers together. For instance, if there is a difference in output between the two amps you can adjust the level of the Whisper via the processor to match the Focus SE. No problem. You can even tweak the filters a bit to get the various frequencies to sound the way you want. It's one of the speakers which allows pretty much total control, so one is not as dependent upon the "perfect" matching of amps as with other speakers.

If you wish to converse further, perhaps considering your other system components, feel free to contact me. :)

Tom, in my use class D amps have been superb at transients and clean, but lacking somewhat in fullness and tonal richness that good Class AB amps have. I requested specifically that the Whisper I have not use internal Class D amplification so that I could use whichever amp I chose to drive the bass. I have never regretted that decision. I recommend to anyone considering the Whisper that they strongly consider an outboard amp for the bass. Bill D. prefers the convenience and ease of setup etc. of the Class D internally, especially since some customers do not want to mess with yet another amp/cables for the bass. But I wanted complete control over which amp I used for the entire speaker and I am very happy with the results. I spent enough time with the Helix and its onboard Class D amp for the bass that I felt I would prefer the flexibility of my own amp choice for the bass with the Whisper. Some individuals are not so senstive to the nuances of the lowest bass, but I always wish to have complete freedom in working with all frequencies when system building.

You're doing a lot of 5.1, so you will definitely put much more emphasis on continuity of the amps with the surrounds/center than I have. With that much surround play I would attempt to get same brand for amps for all channels.

Conducting direct comparison with my Whisper DSW between passive X-over mode and active x-over/processor mode the fully active speaker is superior. It costs a fair bit more to realize its full potential, but you can start with relatively inexpensive multi-channel amp or a couple stereo amps (if you use the internal class D; if you opt for external bass amplification like me, then you're looking at 6 channels of amplifiction) and upgrade them over time.

The HD will be a relatively plug and play thing if you don't want to mess with the processor much, and it will cost less. To push the speaker to ultimate perfomance you will need to do the active speaker top to bottom and more channels of amps. If I recall correctly, I was able to get as good or better sound with less expensive amps from the fully active mode. I would not obsess overly about Mono/Stereo as the quality of the company's amps is at least as important, and often more important than if the amp is mono/stereo.

You may wish to hold off on the room correction for all the other speakers until you run the rig for a while. You may find that you are content without it all. I have heard some correction which left me thinking it was not so impressive.

I haven't heard Doug D.'s latest Coda amps in my room, but they sounded quite nice with Legacy at shows. The Wells Audio Innamorata (and the lower cost Akasha for the price point) have sounded excellent on a variety of speakers including the Whisper.

Currently I'm using a Musical Fidelity CDT-1 Transport- I asked MF to demo it and ended up buying it - with the Eastern Electric Minimax DAC Plus (reviewed), which I have rolled discrete opamps from Burson and DEXA's NewClassD offerings (I wrote an Audio Blast article about discrete Opamp rolling). This flexibility has allowed me to take Redbook and Sonos sources and obtain very high sound quality. I can adjust any components and speakers to suit my taste. Adding in power cord and digital link selections I have a dozen ways to present digital signal to the rigs I build for two channel.

There's a hundred ways to do digital!

Tom, glad you are finding the conversation helpful.

Over the years pretty much the listing of amps above; I tend to work with pairs of stereo amps especially if they can be bridged to Mono. I do so because some of the speakers I use are only single wire capable and others are bi-wire capable, and the Whisper is tri-wire/tri-ampable.

I used the Cambridge Audio Azur 840W a fair bit for the bass; I had two of them and bridged them to Mono, something like 800+ wpc. But they throw off a lot of heat, fyi. I'm currently looking for a new amp for the bass.

I have two Innamorata which are superb, and I thought of buying an Akasha just for the bass for the Whsiper; that's a sizable outlay primarily for one task as it would not be needed for any other installation. I am considering options for an alternative class D amp which could be stout enough to use as stereo amp for other speakers, perhaps 500wpc to 1,000 wpc. I would also consider monos.
It's been a couple years since I did some serious comparisons of Class D and it's about time again. That may sound contradictory to my statement about not wanting to be locking in with a class D amp for the bass, but I need flexibility in cables and for other rigs. Based on sound alone I would not hesitate to add the Akasha simply for bass, but I have to consider varieties of systems and other utilization.

Regarding speaker cables, the two brands I have used the longest are WireWorld and Clarity Cable. If I use WireWorld I typically will use a mix of the silver and copper cabling. I place passively networked cables in the same category as power conditioners/filters; in my experience they alter the signal in some respects which might be considered beneficial, but also damage it as much as help.

Tom, whichever amps you buy, most will be well within tolerances for impedance that you can switch them from Bass duties to M/T duties. Be sure to try them out both ways; you may be very surprised by the results.

Also, do not believe the notion that with a processor you can mimick the precisely same sound as a different amp/brand, i.e. that you can put an el cheapo amp on the bass through the processor and get as good of sound as if you used a premium amp. I have conducted the tests and the quality of the amp shows itself even when a processor is used. If you like the sound quality of an amp, you likely will enjoy it used for the bass. You may get good quality with an active x-over and an inexpensive amp, but you will not get the same quality as with a finer amp.

My experience in cable has consistently been that more total gauge, i.e. 10, and copper conductors yield the best sound for the money. I find that the better sounding cables are superior across the frequency spectrum, not only for bass. Silver conductors have been tricky, potentially excellent in some cases, but overall thinner sounding.

If you are doing longer interconnect runs you will probably want to work with amps having balanced connections. I strongly recommend you use XLR/balanced interconnects for the longer runs, so your amps receiving the longer runs of interconnects will need to have XLR inputs.

More circuitry means more signal degradation. You may wish to consider a dedicated preamp for two channel listening.

Tom, I'm glad you're enjoying the process of building the rig. It is terrifically gratifying when one hears the result.

You don't have to switch the wiring with the 5.2 processor; just feed the two channels of the stereo pre into the inputs of the 5.2, but make absolutely sure the main L/R inputs are calibrated for the level of the stereo preamp feeding them! It's not hard to do. One way to ensure you never have an accident is to put the volume down entirely every time you use the stereo preamp when finished. Also, check that it is down before starting up any video, surround music, etc. There is slightly more degradation of the L/R when doing video but the benefit by not having to rewire to hear stereo music is important too.

I do that very thing; whatever I have as my stereo preamp for music I feed into the main L/R of the 7.1 Outlaw processor for surround AV. Works great!

I use 10 Ga for all drivers and typically have achieved superior sound across the frequ. spectrum by doing so.

Sounds like you're getting closer to your goal.