Toxis' speaker reviews. aka a whole new love for the LSi's...

Toxis

I basically just want to ramble a bit here about how much I truly love the LSi's.

Yesterday, out of sheer boredom at work, I decided it's time to TRULY test out some speakers. I was sick of listening to all the speakers at work through miles of 18awg speaker wire and who knows how many switchers that totally degrade the signal. You'd listen to the LSi's and they just didn't have the life to them that I remember hearing.

So I worked with what I had. I took the preout of the Denon 3805 and ran it into a Harman/Kardon PA2000 amp (bridged to 100w x 2), all while using the Denon DVD3910 as the source unit via Digital Coax. Then I started grabbing speakers from my sound rooms and hooking them up direct. Again, no damn switchers!

I started this because some people I work with were saying how the new DCM DCM26's sound pretty damn awesome from a training they heard a few months back but I only had them running in a cheap sound room with JVC receivers. BLUH! Then I started just grabbing speakers that I wanted to hear (or when I had the time without being bugged by customers. UGH! haha).

DCM26 - If you haven't seen them, they're worth looking into. I have to give it to them, for an extremely inexpensive speaker, they sounded pretty damn good. We sell 'em at $189/tower. Silk dome tweeter, Glass Fibre cones (dual 6.5") with a true phase plug. They sound awesome for the price. Sure the bass was a lil muddy and there wasn't much depth to them but I'd put them up against any sub $500 set of speakers. Not to bad of a speaker!

Infinity Primus 250 Towers - Dear god. Total **** for the money. The bass was floppy, the midrange was bland and the highs were shrill. Sure they sound a tad better than the Polk R30's but they also cost over twice as much. Save up and go with the Beta 40's if you want Infinity!!! Twice the price, 10 times the performance.

LSi15 - This is where I said "Screw it, I want to hear some REAL speakers." I'm sure I don't really have to go much into how these sound for anyone here but yeah, they were amazing. They image, they have depth, they make the whole wall sound like it's creating the music, not these sexy towers up front. Only disappointment was considering they have dedicated 8" drivers, I feel the didn't get low enough. As discussed in another topic here, they claim to go to 30htz but I couldn't get them to do anything under about 55-60. I don't feel this was so much the amplifier here. 45 amps of power is quite a bit.

LSi9 - *droooooooool* Sound every bit as good as the 15's. I take that back. They sound better. They definitely had a wider sound stage, imaged even better (almost completely transparent, probably could if I had a better amp on 'em), and the bass was even smoother. I couldn't believe it. The bass on the bookshelves were BETTER than the towers with dedicated drivers. I have to admit, these puppies had me sitting there for over an hour (AT WORK!) just listening. I didn't want to stop. Enya, good god that was awesome. Some Blues, I could hear the resonance of the string guitar like never before. Classical, did they really have that many musicians playing? Audioslave, held their own and kept on rocking. They seemed like they wanted more. I played almost every form of music you could think of (except country... *shivers*) and they damn near made me shed a tear. Enya was what really blew me away the most. Her voice just envoked (sp?) me. The music was soft, smooth, clean to the umpth degree. I now know that I need a spot for a beautiful 2ch. setup with these puppies. Then I decided to add a Sunfire Super Junior sub to help with the low end and they meshed better than I could've imagined. That sub is amazing in it's own respect but teamed up with the 9's and there was nothing that I would've changed.

Infinity Beta 20 - A buddy at work owns these speakers and wanted to hear them on the same setup. "I know they're no LSi's but are the 9's worth the extra $500?" Soon, he agreed they were. For the money, very good speakers! They had a very clear, distinct sound to them. You could hear every detail. Props there. Now, let me tear 'em apart. The bass was non existant. The midrange didn't image at all or have any depth to them. Very flat sounding speaker. The tweeter was to bright for my tastes but was not backing down to the job one bit. They did have a very wide sound stage but didn't image inward at all. Kinda weird at first but gave you the impression you're listening to a bigger speaker than you were. Again, just to flat sounding after listening to the 9's for the past 20-30 minutes. We all got our fill of the Beta 20's so then we went back to the 9's and just started listening to more stuff (hence the rest of the hour).

That's all I had time to evaluate but unless someone in upper management tells me to move everything back to where it's supposed to be, I'll definitely do some more speaker evaluations over the next few days and give everyone more insight. FYI, we carry Polk, Infinity, Klipsch, Bose, JBL, Wharfedale and DCM. More to come...

ninerbj

Cool review Toxis!
Thanks for all the info...good to hear what you thought of the 9's and 15's.
I'm still sitting here trying to decide on two 15's and two 9's, or four 9's in my ht/music room {already own the LSiC}

WHAT WILL/SHOULD I DO??!!!??

Early B.

I'm still sitting here trying to decide on two 15's and two 9's, or four 9's in my ht/music room

How about a third option -- two 9's and two 7's. IMO, the 7's sound just as good as the 9's, although the 9's have a bit more bass, of course.

How large is your room?
You got a sub already? If so, what kind?
Will the speakers be used more for HT or music?
Any WAF issues?

Early B.

Toxis, where do you work? (I'm using the term, "work" loosely.)

dorokusai

Toxis - Thanks for taking the time to post your thoughts.

Ninerbj - I agree with EarlyB. If you have a quality sub, I think the LSi7's are fantastic for their size. If you have an average sub, then go with the LSi9's. You can't lose with either choice, so just get a good price.

ninerbj

How large is your room? 14x13

You got a sub already? If so, what kind? SVS 29-31

Will the speakers be used more for HT or music? 50/50
that's why I debate on the 15's

Any WAF issues? My wife has many issues...speakers is not one of them

ninerbj

*Ninerbj - I agree with EarlyB. If you have a quality sub, I think the LSi7's are fantastic for their size. If you have an average sub, then go with the LSi9's. You can't lose with either choice, so just get a good price.*

Mark,
I guess I never considered the 7's...due to the fact I may want to have a 2 channel room someday.
Then again...that would be a good excuse to join an SDA type club now wouldn't it!:eek:

Early B.

For a room that size, go for the 9's and 7's, or maybe even two pair of 7's! You already have a great sub for bass. Use the extra money you would have spent on the 15's for some SDAs. Now the 2 channel system you've been dreaming of is just around the corner.

ninerbj

Extra money I save?? Any extra money will be going towards up-grading amps to mono blocks from Odyssey...or that new Anthem D-1!
*drool*

audiobliss

Thanks for the review there, Toxis. If ya ever hook up any Klipsch RF-35s, I'd be interested to know how you think they compare to some of the Infinity and DCM stuff.

Where do you work? Besides being great on their employees y'all carry some great speakers I'd like to be able to demo at once. I'd love to compare Polk, Klipsch, DCM, and especially Wharfedale. Don't do any comparos just for me, but if you hook up any of these, I'd love to know your thoughts on them.

Toxis

I work for a place called Nebraska Furniture Mart here in Kansas City. I only sell home theater/video... well, and occasionally mobile audio.

I will make a point tomorrow to do some comparisons with Klipsch and Wharfedale. We only carry their Diamond line. I'd like to hear the Opus, or even the Pacific Evolution line. The PE line is exactly the same as the Diamond, just with a different cabinet. I'd be interested in finding the audible difference their cabinet designs are. I'm honestly NOT impressed with teh Diamond line as is, but I'll give it a good go on my lil setup tomorrow.

Tomorrow, pending customer interference haha, I'll do a comparison on the Klipsch RF-35, RB-75 (I'm curious to see how they sound. I know they like power.), Wharfedale Diamond 8.4's, and probably some more LSi9 music. haha I will also do a comparison on if the amp is bridged vs bi-wired. 45x4 vs 100x2. We shall see!!!

More to come!!!

Toxis

Now for the comments saying go with the 7's over the 9's (or that they sound about the same...), I highly HIGHLY disagree with that. On my wall, the 7's sounded like butt. I honestly liked the RTi6's over the LSi7's. They were midbass heavy (like they were trying to overcompensate for not having the extra driver) and the treble was far from clean. Everything just sounded muted. The easiest way I could explain it is if you took a good speaker, put it behind a curtain and turned it up to make the output volume the same. But I think I'll throw that in my regimine for tomorrow as well... 7 vs 9 comparison.

TroyD

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that maybe something wasn't right with your LSi7 demo.

Having spent a bit of time with both the LSi7's and 9's....they are both very similar IMO. Either one would be a fine choice for a dedicated 2ch rig. Obviously the 9's produce more bass but I think that for most applications, the 7's can more than hold thier own.

BDT

Toxis

Day 2: More evaluations... aka didn't feel like being a salesman pt.2 haha

First point at hand, Bi-wiring vs. Bridging. I was using the LSi9's (personally, I think they're the best speakers we carry) and the Klipsch RB-75's (for another angle/style of speaker) again on the H/K PA2000. I can honestly say that maybe this should be tried with a different amp. The output power seemed to be the exact same and the sound was so damn close to the other, it's hard to really say which was better. I feel bi-wiring it had a little smoother feel to the music, but just barely. Bridging the amp gave it a little more aggressive feel. Now again, these are just a touch different. Barely noticable and wouldn't say one's better than the other. It was that close!

Now let me get into some speaker evaluations... all bi-wired unless otherwise stated. Denon DVD-3910 hooked up via Denon Link to the Denon 3805. Preouts to the H/K PA2000 using Monster XP (16awg, all we had laying around that I could use) to the speakers.

LSi7 - I was honestly impressed! As I already stated, my previous encounters (on my switchboard) left me with a VERY sour taste about these speakers. But after having them hooked up to a dedicated system, wow! They didn't sound so nasty. The highs sounded every bit as good as the 9's, and imaged amazing. The midrange definitely left a lot to be desired though. Sounded great for what it was (a 2way speaker) but definitely left a void between the midrange and the tweeter. Plus, they didn't have as much midbass reproduction (given). I have to say that for $700 they are worth every damn penny of it! But if you have a few extra bucks, or if this is for your front speakers, I highly recommend spending the extra $200 for the 9's. They definitely fill out the sound where the 7's fall just short.

Klipsch RB-75 - Do not let anyone ever say Klipsch sucks. They're actually a great speaker line. If you ever get the chance to hear them hooked up direct, and not on some switchboard, do it. They will impress you (if you're used to hearing them on crap signal). They are extremely detailed throughout the frequency range. I was VERY disappointed in the low end extention though but I was starting to wonder if it's the lack of power. The bass was clean for what it could play. It just didn't get as low as you would figure from an 8" bookshelf. There was a slight hollow spot between the Tractrix Horn and the mid-driver. Other than that, they were very impressive. They'd be great for low volume listeners or extreme rock junkies. On a HT setup, they wouldn't do it for me. They're just way to damn aggressive. They'd rip you apart and just keep on running while you lay there motionless and holding onto a shred of life. Very intense. For the audiophile? eeeeeehhhhhhhhhhhhh, no.

Wharfedale Diamond 8.4 - This is the entry level of the Wharfedale speakers, but the biggest tower they have in the line. I honestly hope this is not a good representation for the company. If so, I will never recommend them to anyone. These towers have a silk dome tweeter and dual 6.5" drivers (one dedicated for midbass). First I started them off with a little Enya. The songs with basically just her voice didn't sound to bad. Definitely had a hard time with when she really started letting out that beautiful voice of hers, but the rest wasn't that bad. Now for the rest of the music? I about choked. It was brutal. Muddy, flat, detailed like a blown car speaker. I couldn't believe it. I had some decent expectations for these towers (considering I think they almost sounded better directly off a JVC receiver!). So I figured this just wasn't the music style for these speakers... so I moved on. Jazz. I'm sorry to the producer of this CD. I never meant such disrespect of your recording. Again, the music was just nasty. Didn't have detail what-so-ever. Everything kinda meshed together as if it was thrown in a blender. Male vocals, you couldn't tell when one word stopped and the next began. I can't believe these speakers do that well in sales over in Britain like they claim. But then again, we have Bose over here...which brings me to my next speaker...

Bose 601 (bridged amp, speaker doesn't allow biwiring) - HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I'm sorry, but hahahahahahahahhahahahaha!!!! It's no wonder Bose has discontinued this speaker. Total dog-****! Bass was exaggerated. No highs to be found ANYWHERE. Midrange... well it's a cheap CHEAP paper cone driver. I'm not even going to continue with this speaker.

JBL E50 - This just wasn't really my day for listening to good speakers I guess (hence why I started and ended with the LSi's, I almost lost my love for music). 3-way bookshelf with an 8" driver and two other things they call drivers. My god. Flat. Hollow. Muddy. Bright to cover some of the dirty midrange. I can say that the only song that impressed me on these speakers was a techno song with a VERY strong bass line. They all of a sudden came alive and you could hear every detail and the bass was STRONG! We all in the room dropped our jaw with disbelief it was the same lifeless speaker. So we put in some R&B to test the bass there. FLUB! As smooth as unchurned butter. The JBL rep has always said they try to make their speakers flat because that's "what the people want." Who the hell are they talking to? This is the point where I started to shed a tear. I couldn't take any more bad music or I was going to take a sabatical (sp?) from it.

Klipsch RF-35 (by request) - Back to a higher quality speaker. Whew! Ok... Well much like the RB-75's, these had extremely good detail and great midbass, there was still a small void (not quite as noticable in the 35's as the 75's) between the tweeter and the midrange. Not quite the mesh I was looking for. The bass was really non-existant. Surprising from dual 8's in a tower. Guess they design them to run with a sub. So I kicked on the Sunfire Super Junior and it definitely helped but they didnt' seem to blend well with each other. I think the Klipsch were way to detailed and aggressive for the mild and musical Super Junior. It definitely helped though. I'd have to say the same thing about these as the 75's above. Great for low volume detail listeners and rock junkies. Great speaker but not my taste.

LSi9's - Ok ok, so I already rated them but after all that, I had to see if maybe JUST MAYBE something was wrong with my ears today. Nope... everything was just as I remembered. Imaging, detail, smooth, soft, beautiful...from a friggen bookshelf. *drooooooooool* Yup... I love these speakers.

Now I want to take some time on my next day off and do some listening of some higher end equipment. B&W, Martin Logan, Theil etc. I will try to do that this coming monday or tuesday and report back then. But no guarantees there. I need to find someplace that will pay me to do this kind of thing... ANYONE HIRING?????

Toxis

Originally posted by audiobliss
Thanks for the review there, Toxis. If ya ever hook up any Klipsch RF-35s, I'd be interested to know how you think they compare to some of the Infinity and DCM stuff.

Where do you work? Besides being great on their employees y'all carry some great speakers I'd like to be able to demo at once. I'd love to compare Polk, Klipsch, DCM, and especially Wharfedale. Don't do any comparos just for me, but if you hook up any of these, I'd love to know your thoughts on them.

Well if you read above, I did some comparisons for ya.

The Klipsch definitely are a great speaker as are the Infinity and DCM. Here's my take on it. DCM is an amazing low end priced speaker. I would highly recommend them to anyone looking to start building a HT on a budget. They just don't compare to the Infinity Beta's and Klipsch Reference but they're also half the price!!! Between the Infinity and Klipsch, I'd really have to say it's personal preference from there. Both great speakers with a lot of technology. Personally, I'd go Klipsch first. Before today, I never would've said that. But being hooked up properly, they came alive. They seemed to have every bit as good of sound stage but I'd have to give it to Klipsch on their efficiency and detail. The Beta's have great detail yet seem to leave me wanting more where the Klipsch give me the impression they're giving it all they've got.

I hope this helps everyone. I'm what people call a self-proclaimed audiophile (just broke so can't afford the REAL highend stuff like I want). Anyhow, thanks for reading and I hope I've helped some of you who haven't had the chance to audition these speakers yet.

Mazeroth

I'm in a bit of a hurry but I did want to chime in real quickly...

I do 90% 2-channel music and own the LSi15s, LSi9s, AND the LSi7s

I've done numerous comparisons between all the speakers and for 2-channel music listening (true 2-channel with no sub) the LSi15 annihilates the 9 and the 7. I have a Crown XLS402A amp that feeds the LSis 400w RMS @4ohms, so they are getting every ounce of power they need. The 15, in a properly set up room, sounds SO much fuller than the 9s or 7s, and the mid-bass, midrange, AND high-end depth are just unreal. Going from the 15s to the 9s was a huge step down in my opinion, while the 7s sound BARELY different than the 9s.

NOW, if I was mainly going to be using the LSis for HT purposes and had a nice sub I would definately go with the LSi7s. Barely any difference between the two and will save you a few hundred bucks. Or if you want peace of mind knowing you got the best you could, do 9s up front and 7s in the rear and don't ever think you could have done better, because the 7s will do a FINE job as rear speakers.

Ok, the fiancee is yelling at me to get in the car

Frank Z

Toxis,
Great thread. It's nice to see you put so much time and effort into the comparisons. To bad that everyone doesn't have the opportunity to actually do a serious auditon of the various speakers available today. I'm sure you helped a lot people by taking the time write up your findings. Good for you!!

Toxis

Thanks Frank. Glad to see that people are getting some use from my time/effort.

As already stated, we carry Polk (full lineup), Klipsch Reference, Infinity (Primus, Beta and Prelude's on order), Bose, JBL Northridge, Wharfedale Diamond, and DCM speakers. If anyone wants me to compare some speakers (within reason of course), I'll be MORE than happy to.

Now if I can find a little easier way of doing it, I want to start comparing electronics... we shall see though!

audiobliss

Sorry for the long delay, I just got back from a week's vacation at the beach. I do appreciate your review/comparo on the Klipsch speakers. However, I think that the RF-35s have a lot of bass. Now, I could think that just because I've just stepped up from old bookshelves and haven't really listened to any other floorstanders. From that view point, they seem to me to have a lot of bass.

Anyhoo, thanks for all the great reviews!!

sbrst58

Originally posted by Mazeroth

---I've done numerous comparisons between all the speakers and for 2-channel music listening (true 2-channel with no sub) the LSi15 annihilates the 9 and the 7. I have a Crown XLS402A amp that feeds the LSis 400w RMS @4ohms, so they are getting every ounce of power they need. The 15, in a properly set up room, sounds SO much fuller than the 9s or 7s, and the mid-bass, midrange, AND high-end depth are just unreal. Going from the 15s to the 9s was a huge step down in my opinion, while the 7s sound BARELY different than the 9s.---


Sir,
Doesn't the LSi15 have essentially a LSi9 as the top portion?
How then could could you hear the 15s having such greater highs and mids than a 9?

Frank Z

I guess it's because the 8" woofer handles the lower frequencies. Therefore there isn't as much of a low frequency demand placed on the mids.

VR3

Audiobliss...

My guess is Toxis is comparing these in a large showroom.

Yours are in a bedroom

There will be quite a difference I imagine...

Nice comparisons, however (regarding the LSi7) - there are plenty of killer 2-Ways out there...

Thanks for sharing!

audiobliss

Originally posted by Vr3MxStyler2k3
Audiobliss...

My guess is Toxis is comparing these in a large showroom.

Yours are in a bedroom

There will be quite a difference I imagine...

Ahh.....I see.....

Mazeroth

sbrst58,

Just because the LSi15s LOOK like they have an LSi9 on top, doesn't mean they do...

The LSi9 has a 5.25" driver that takes care of bass up to 200hz, and does not play any mids or highs. The other 5.25" crosses over at 200hz and plays the rest of the mid-bass and midrange up to 2.4 khz.

Now the LSi15 has dual 5.25". One plays 150hz - 800hz, and the other plays 150hz to 2.4khz. This means the LSi15 has double the drivers from 200-800 hz, and a much supeior bass driver. Its 8" woofer does everything up to 150hz. Just by surface area math figures the bass driver in the LSi9 has 21.6 square inches while the LSi15's 8" has 50.2 square inches. That's 2.32 times the area on the driver for bass up to 150hz. That doesn't even take into account if the 8" has more excursion, which I'm sure it does.

You guys can have whatever opinon you want on the LSi9 vs LSi15 topic. I LOVE them both, I truly do. For 2-channel music I think the LSi15 has a distinct advantage over the LSi9. If I was more into multi-channel music or movies I would probably go with the LSi9s (or 7s, killer value) with a good subwoofer and save myself some money over the LSi15s. Either route, make sure you have some beefy amps because you're going to need it!

Tour2ma

I'll add a well done to Toxis' efforts here... Nice line up for a furniture store. Once upon a time Fingers had a decent line up in H-town... maybe they still do.

That said, it pains me to read about some at least very good, if not great, old names that appear to have fallen... namely Wharfdale and JBL.

Did not include Klipsch in the above in part due to the review being kinder to them and in part that I always felt that they suffered to some extent in the blending of their horns and conventional drivers. Still wouldn't mind adding a pair of original Hereseys to the collection though... little mighty mite there...

Early B.

Has anyone done a comparison between Lsi7's with a good sub (i.e., Hsu, SVS) and Lsi15's without a sub on 2-channel music?

I'm guessing the 7's and a sub will win hands down, especially when factoring in the price.

Mazeroth

Early, I have the LSi15s and the LSi7s and have tried both with my SVS 25-31 CS+ with 2-channel music. As I mentioned above, the LSi15s are in a different class if you ask me. Even without a sub helping them, I prefer the 15's awesome mid-bass and midrange clarity over the LSi7 + SVS. When listening to 2-channel music the 15s provide plenty of bass, and not too much like the producer had intended. With the 15s I keep my EQs flat, sit down, and smile