The Official Salk Sound Owner's And Discussion Thread - Page 255

Tom wanted a pair of SoundScape 10's to replace the bubinga HT3's in his main system.

He wanted a similar color finish, but really wanted to take things to the next level.

So we searched for a nice quilted maple to work with. We first dyed the entire cabinets solid black. We then sanded the surface. Where the wood was soft, the black soaked in and was not sanded away. Where the wood was hard, the sanding removed the black, leaving the white maple exposed.

We added a deep rose/red dye to the final topcoat. The result was a deep rose/red color with a lot of depth (contrast) in the black areas. This is a nice technique to get more contrast than would be available just dying the wood the final color.

We topped things off by hand rubbing the finish to high gloss. This resulted in one of the richest looking finishes we have ever done.

Here are some pictures...



And here is a close-up...



Happy listening Tom!

- Jim

Peter wanted a pair of SoundScape 8's and looked for quite a while to find just the right veneer. In the end, he settled on some bird's eye maple with some very unique figuring.

He wanted them in a smokey silver finish, but not so dark as to obscure the wonderful figuring of the wood.

Here are the results...



And a close-up...



These are currently on their way to Anchorage and Peter should have them shortly.

Happy listening Peter!

- Jim

Better hurry up and decide.
Congrats on the new speakers. They're gorgeous.

Thanks for the suggestions. Height and weight are the biggest factors. I could accommodate width more easily. I'm not as concerned with the risk of timber mismatch. There have been reports from others that have gone this route with success. Using the same tweeter is the biggest factor I think. One way that I can test, is see how poor the match is between the SS8's and my current Paradigm Studio 590 center. If that is reasonable, any Salk with the RAAL would be considerably better.

Kyle wanted a pair of Veracity HT3's in macassar ebony. But he didn't want "normal" ebony...he wanted something special.

After quite a search, he came across this batch and we went right to work.

Here are some photos...



And a close-up...



Happy listening Kyle!

- Jim

Just stunning. Me wanty

Simply stunning.
I've make my decision to go with Salk and email has been sent. Now for the waiting.

Songtowers - supercharged vs normally aspirated

Supercharging replaces the CA15 with a W15, understood.

The only Salks I've heard are my WOW1s with the W12, and they sound great.

What does the W15 provide over the CA15?

- digs deeper?

- what else, or is that all?

Thanks

Well, actually the W15 won't provide more slam. They will go a little lower, but their Xmax is shorter than the CA15's, so they really don't have more, or even as much, power handling. They are more precision machines than midbass machines.

So does this mean that ST SC have a lower sensitivity than normal ST; or does lower power handling just mean less dynamics (i.e. would they start to show signs of compression at lower power peaks)?

Also my bad; I mentioned CA15 whereas the ST uses the ER15. Now I am confused between CA/ER/W

Don't worry about the difference between the CA and ER 15. The only realy difference is a little flatter response for the ER. The W15 may have slightly lower sensitivity, but in an MTM that won't really matter. And the slightly lower power handling also won't be a real issue with two woofers going in parallel. I just didn't want people to think that the W15 had significantly greater power handling than the ER15. (or CA15).

It's got a very linear, low inductance motor including a copper phase plug and I believe more shorting rings. And with its magnesium cone, it really should be pistonic over its usable entire passband. The above should lead to better resolution.
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Due to the lower tuning frequency, i'd expect it to have more driver motion in the ~60-70hz region , but use a pair of quality subs and it should be alright. Thermally, I'd expect the W to outdo the ER or CA

Thanks. I think I'm going to upgrade to turbocharged SongTowers now. And the best part is the Salk shop is literally 1/2 hour away from my house!

My Soundscape 8 Review

I didn't want to do it twice so here is a link to our Zealand Forum

http://www.audioenz.co.nz/forums/showthread.php/14075-Salk-Soundscape-8-Review?p=170036#post170036

Hey all, I have a pair of Songtower RTS (LCY) in medium curly cherry for sale in Brooklyn, NY (upgraded to HT2-TLs). PM me if you are interested.

That's really the question for me now. Since I upgraded to the supercharged SongTowers and SongCenter my budget is shot. For now I'll be using just my Yamaha RX-V1700 until I can rebuild my audio war chest. Then I will likely get something reasonably priced like an Emotiva XPA-5 or something lightly used but still in my price range (suggestion here would be very much appreciated)
My wife has been *tentatively* going along with this. Convincing her we need new speakers wasn't the hard, but upgrading with a much heftier price tag took some doing. It may be a while before I can start hauling in more gear.

On a side note, I was able to place my order with Jim yesterday. Jim actually had me over to his house to discuss the ordering and building process and go over my options.
Jim is extremely easy to deal with. No hard sell or up sell at all. I don't think it would have mattered to him if I went up into the supercharged versions or if I went with a more economical speaker all together. He seemed genuinely concerned that I get exactly what I wanted.
He also showed me what his new website is going to look like...very nice, cutting edge stuff. Impressive.

My experience with Salk was the same. I've only read one complaint in a forum and it turned out to be bogus (someone had a chip on their shoulder I guess). Jim and crew should be proud of the company they've created. There aren't too may places where you get excellent products and reasonable prices along with outstanding customer service.

Jim's actively tried to downsell in our chats, because he honestly believes that what I wanted would be acheived totally with less expensive speakers.

He is pure awesome, that guy.

yup... repeating what i posted when i bought mine, my wife was all hot for ht-3's, and jim downsold me to ht2-tl's after we reviewed my room, setup and usage...

that goes a LONG way towards establishing "trust" in my mind, especially since i knew he wasn't downselling me simply because parts for the ht-3's weren't available (as has happened to others purchasing from less scrupulous sellers)...

although i'm in the (somewhat painful) process of swapping mine out for something different right now, it's certainly not due to the quality of the speaker and the sound it produces... btw, if anyone wants my ht1 on-walls and ht2c center, they are available...

I'll echo the above customer service comments. I was initially considering the Soundscape monitors, and Jim suggested the SCST, which is much less expensive. They were
great at making a custom sized center channel to fit in a narrow space I have to work with.

Shot in the dark, but does anyone know - and can put me in touch with - the poster "BigRedMachine" from audiocircle? If so could you PM me? Thanks.


edited to fix iphone spelling errors
Edited by madhuski - 8/28/12 at 5:27pm

Sorry for the off topic post, but I know we have Audiocircle members here as well.

I've not been able to access Audiocircle the past couple days from my laptop at home or my computer at work. I just get a message that says something like "site migration" or "site migration to Tokyo".

Anyone know what's going on?