Greetings From Rural North Carolina
I mentioned in my introduction last year I was going to upgrade my speakers from the B&W DM3000 speakers I bought in London in 1984. B&W was phasing out this series and replacing it with the early 800 Matrix series. So I listened to some of the 800 Matrix speakers available and preferred the DM3000’s particularly in the midrange. My ears told me the new (at the time) 800 Matrix’s were a step backwards, particularly in the mids. I’ve been happy with the DM3000’s but after 40 years living with them I wanted to see what was new and different, and better sounding.
My search (after much discussion with friends and dealers, and perusing various magazine reviews, and audio forums) led me to initially consider the following speakers:
Amphion Krypton 3x
Canton Reference 1
Canton Reference 2
DeVore O96
Graham (LS5/5 or LS5/5f)
Harbeth 40.3
various Fyne/Tannoy floorstanders
JBL 4367
Larsen 9
Monitor Audio Platinum 300 3G
Ophidian Voodoo
Spendor 100
Spendor 200
My criteria were a “magical midrange” (thank you, Phillip Hanlon), imaging and soundstaging (at least as good as Audio Physics speakers), wide dispersion, and a natural sounding frequency response. My ears were going to be the final arbiter, not test reports, specs, or reviews. And I was looking for a company that had been in business for at least two decades.
Almost none of these speakers were stocked by a dealer within a day’s drive, except the DeVore O96, the JBL 4367, and the Monitor Audio. So it was time to hit the road. Over the Spring, Summer and Fall I was able to audition all save the Canton’s (only dealers I found could order them but didn’t stock them) and the Ophidian Voodoo (no US or Canadian dealers). I was fortunate enough to audition the rest of my list. And (spoiler alert) the speakers I ended up bringing home were NOT on my list.
It was Fall last year and I was in Winston-Salem NC, about two hours from where I live in the mountains. I was ready to order a pair of speakers from the above list, but a new shop (Ember Audio and Design) had opened, and I decided to pay them a visit. Their owner, Chris Livengood, was the first person I’ve met in the retail audio business that actually knew more than me. I was humbled, and I filled him in on my 6 month+ quest. I like the BBC “sound” and was going to order a pair of Graham LS5/5f speakers the next day. They checked all the dots important to me and sounded extraordinarily like real music to me. And I shared this with Chris.
And then Chris said “let me play these for you since you seem to really like the Graham’s.” And I listened to a speaker I’d heard of, but was not on my list. And all I can say is I was shocked to hear something I liked even more than the Graham’s. And this is how I ended up owning a pair of QLN Prestige Five speakers. And I even added a QLN Prestige One for my centre channel. And with new speakers came new equipment:
QLN Prestige Five Speakers
QLN Prestige One Speaker
Two REL 212/SX Subwoofers
PS Audio Direct Stream P20 PowerPlant
Arcam AV41 Pre-Amp/16-Channel Processor
Surround Master V3 Analog Pre-Amp
McIntosh MC303 3-Channel Amp
Monolith M8125x 8-Channel Amp For Dolby Surrounds
Rega ISIS Reference CDP
Naim CD5Sx CD Player w/Flatcap Power Supply
Primare CD31 CD Player
English Electric 8S Ethernet Switch
Stack Audio SmoothLAN Ethernet Filter
iFi-Audio LAN Silencer Noise Filters
iFi-Audio HDMI iSilencer Noise Filters
Innuos Pulsar Streamer
Ferrum Goldensound Wandla DAC w/Hypsos Power Supply
Panasonic DP-UB9000P1K Reference 4K Blu-Ray Player
77" Samsung S95D OLED
Meze LIRIC II Headphones
Pictures will follow after we finish the kitchen remodel (It’s adjacent to the den).
Originally Posted by Vinyl Rules!
Greetings, all. I live in rural Appalachia with no good audio dealers near me.
I actually live in West Jefferson, NC, a town of approximately 1,100 hell-billies in a county with a slowly declining total population of about 21,000 hell-billies.
The major industries here are meth labs, covert weed cultivation, moonshiners (yes, it’s still a thing here), bluegrass music, gun stores, and NASCAR.
Believe it or not I actually chose to retire here from an extremely interesting (and stressful) career as a field operator for a well-known 3-letter agency.
Why? If you’re not in the drug trade virtually no one bothers you, and everyone leaves me alone (particularly if I mention my former employer). Owning 20 or more firearms is quite normal here. However, if one owns NO firearms they are viewed with great suspicion and ostracized.
In my former life I was an expert with most military firearms, light weapons, and explosives, so here I’m considered just a mostly-normal (I wasn’t born here) local when I show up at the local shooting range with a variety of weapons chambered in domestic and international calibers.
So, back to audio. I have pretty bad PTSD from my years in the field, and listening to good music is therapy for me – I haven’t found any meds that work as well as a skillfully-recorded classical symphony, or classic rock from the 60’s and 70’s, or good jazz, or good bluegrass, or Tuvan throat singing (https://youtu.be/qx8hrhBZJ98?si=jLP6izQVN4-XfHHo)
My current system uses B&W DM3000 speakers with a B&W HTM centre channel for the 20% of the time I view and listen to a movie. The DM3000’s were B&W’s TOTL domestic speaker in the early 80’s and they preceded B&W’s introduction of their 800 series of speakers.
Now, I have some investments maturing this summer and I’m going to replace the B&W’s I purchased in 1984.
I have a very short list of candidates for new speakers:
Number one on my list: Canton’s Reference (2015)1K (the ~ 300 lb. monster), followed by:
Graham Audio LS5/5f’s; and
Amphion’s newly updated Krypton 3x’s
I’ll likely purchase 3 speakers to use in an L-C-R configuration (but not Krypton’s as they are specific L and R speakers - Amphion advised me to use their top studio monitor as the “C” speaker if I select Krypton 3x’s for my front channels.
I feel like the new Canton 2023 Reference’s aren’t as good. The ~ 300 lb. 2015 Reference 1K is the one I’m chasing: The new 2023 Reference 1 is a different speaker design, and it’s much lighter, so I don’t think it will be as good.
In my room (24’ x 12’ x 8’), the B&W’s are flat down to 30Hz, and I have an 18” Hartley, and a couple of Bob Carver’s Sunfire subs for the infrasonics on movies.
Two of the three speakers on my short list claim infrasonic response (Canton’s 2015 1K’s and Amphion’s new Krypton 3x’s) and Graham’s LS5/5f likely comes close with it’s tower configuration, and I would love to get rid of my subs.
I’m very open to all thoughts, suggestions, and comments.
Kind regards,
Vinyl Rules!
