Maryland PolkFest '08

shack

No point in starting my own thread. Jesse pretty much covered it.

The only thing I have to add is that if you missed the party at Al's house, then you missed the essence of Polkfest. It appeared that only about half the turnout on Friday showed up on Saturday. The stuff at HQ was GREAT...but...Polkfest is all about getting together with other Polkies (and non-Polkies) and eating, drinking, BSing, and listening to great gear. That is what was happening at Al's. If you COULD have been there but CHOSE not to come for whatever reason...SHAME ON YOU! Legit reasons are few and far between and girlfriend and/or spouse factors DO NOT QUALIFY! You should have been there. The group was well behaved and STILL had a great time! Of course, Russman and Doro setting off his truck alarm parked in Al's driveway at 3AM and Hoosier21's epic battle with the tomato plants in Al's back yard (It rivaled Doro's fight with the bush down at Troy's) were the sort of things that can become legend...and will be remembered at future Polkfests.

Thanks to Matt Polk, Al and Hedy and EVERYONE at Polk for a GREAT TIME!

shack

brettw22 wrote: »

I also have to thank ESAVINON for doing one hell of a job in picking my ticket out of the raffle box......I'll snap some pics of that setup when I get it all set up at home.........

My $600 (plus the poster) offer to take the rig off your hands still stands!

Jstas

shack wrote: »

If you COULD have been there but CHOSE not to come for whatever reason...SHAME ON YOU! Legit reasons are few and far between and girlfriend and/or spouse factors DO NOT QUALIFY!

I'm sure those that weren't there for those reasons were more concerned about the significant other putting out again in their lifetime. I mean, as "beautiful" as some of you guys are, I don't think you can replace the affections of a person of a more feminine nature. Judging by some of the photos of the significant others I've seen here, the SO's win out. Polkfest just can't compete!

Eric W

Great pics and great captions! Hope you all had a great time. I'd like to clarify some pics

DarqueKnight wrote: »

Introduction


Figure 25. Llanor Alleyne of Residential Systems magazine, Rebecca Day of Electronic Home magazine, and
some random unknowns.

That would be Steve Kahn- Polk Project Manager (looking at camera)
and Matt Lyons- Engineering (who gave the facility tour)

Figure 31. At the end of Day One festivities, Al Ballard, Polk's VP of Engineering, invited us to his home for Day
Two festivities. Name another company where you find such genuine hospitality and such extreme corporate
generosity.

Al is actually the VP of Marketing. Stu (in the "How to speak balmer" video at the beginning of the day) is VP of Engineering.

SCompRacer

It was great to see the level of commitment Polk has for delivering quality products from design to implementation! Matt is a wonderful man and has assembled a highly competent team of enthusiastic people to accomplish this goal. As Jesse previously mentioned, I also enjoyed seeing old friends and meeting new ones.

Thanks to Hedy and Al for the get together the day after the tour. It was a great way to end Polkfest 2008.

Highest marks!

George Grand

Al is a big, powerfully built man with a very distinctive and stately countenance. I don't know if anyone else noticed something that I did. There can be a presence in his stare when he is just looking at someone and not saying anything, that is reminiscent of the look that Charles Bronson manifested many times in the Death Wish series of movies.

Little something I picked up on.

dorokusai

Eric - Raife caught those mistakes and I just didn't have time to correct them.

heiney9

George Grand wrote: »

Al is a big, powerfully built man with a very distinctive and stately countenance. I don't know if anyone else noticed something that I did. There can be a presence in his stare when he is just looking at someone and not saying anything, that is reminiscent of the look that Charles Bronson manifested many times in the Death Wish series of movies.

Little something I picked up on.

Me too George!! When people get out of line on the forum we could just them a pic of Al with that stare.

Helluva nice guy, but I wouldn't want to be on his bad side.

H9

heiney9

I agree Mr. Prez, at some points it was just too overwhelming. All the good will, great conversations, opinions, sharing, etc. I too will write something once it has all set in. I am so glad I attended and any poor impressions I had based on the written word on the screen were quickly erased when meeting everyone face to face.

There is no substitute for meeting face to face and talking and interacting with people. It was great to meet everyone and the generosity and the genuineness of the Polk staff, Al and Hedy and especially Matt was really, really cool. As well as all the fellow Polkies. It's something special that shouldn't be taken for granted. :cool:

H9

Jstas

dorokusai wrote: »

Eric - Raife caught those mistakes and I just didn't have time to correct them.

I'm thinking that some names with faces in the pictures might be a good idea. Most of the people that were there met before but quite a few who couldn't make it don't know anyone from spit.

Maybe some captions with names of members would be in order?

kenreau

DarqueKnight,

Semi-unrelated to this thread. Great pics of the 2008 Polkfest. I'm new to the forums and had no idea this took place. I think that is a great event and camaraderie.

The unrelated part. I did a search for Parasound Halo JC1's and your system profile came up. I'm planning to purchase these amps and noticed we both have the same Salamander a/v cabinetry. It looks like a really tight fit and that was a big concern. Looks like you made it work and have a fantastic system. If you wouldn't mind, I would like to hear more about the JC1. Could you send my a pm?

Thanks,
Kenreau

nadams

it's interesting to me that Matt's LSi/SDA setup is toed in quite a bit, whereas the original SDAs were always meant to be set up parallel with the wall. Of course, we're talking a completely different design implementation, but I just found it interesting.

Face

heiney9 wrote: »

Sadly no............:D;). Have you seen the photo of the x-over he used for his SB 100? It was about 5 feet long and about 2 1/2 feet deep. :eek:

Here you go.

janmike

Is that a beer in your hand Russ?



Figure 41. In lieu of banning, a misbehaving forum member submitted to 40 lashes with a wet cable from Doro.[/QUOTE]

RuSsMaN

Incredible time for everyone. I almost felt a little misty Thursday night, thinking how far this 'thing' has come, and how much it's grown over the years. I loved seeing you guys oogle at Matt and his gear, and getting to talk shop with him in an intimate setting.

My favorite part? The tour was great, but nah. Matt's house, tough to beat, but nah. The afterparty at Al's? Almost.

GEORGE GRAND CAME TO POLKFEST.

THAT was my favorite part.

Cheers,
Russ

Jstas

RuSsMaN wrote: »

Incredible time for everyone. I almost felt a little misty Thursday night, thinking how far this 'thing' has come, and how much it's grown over the years. I loved seeing you guys oogle at Matt and his gear, and getting to talk shop with him in an intimate setting.

My favorite part? The tour was great, but nah. Matt's house, tough to beat, but nah. The afterparty at Al's? Almost.

GEORGE GRAND CAME TO POLKFEST.

THAT was my favorite part.

Cheers,
Russ

Stunning, wasn't it?

cfrizz

Amen to that Russ! It was a terrific surprise to finally get to meet & hug George!!!!

I had a terrific time saying hi to those I met at PF2005 & get to meet new Polkies this time! You guys are just great.

Mark & I had a terrific time and we would like to thank Polk HQ & Al & Hedy for thier hospitality across the board.

Anytime PF is held at HQ, Mark & I will be there.

BTW, CONGRATS to Brett on your big score! Do let us know how it sounds when you get it all set up.

shack

POLK MAKES A DAMN GOOD SUBWOOFER!

I have owned Polk subs in the past and have always been disappointed. Not because they were bad...but they were average and there were much better choices available elsewhere. I think that was/is a consensus with many here on the forum.

NO MORE! (IMO)

I had several opportunities (as did everyone attending) to hear the DSWmicroPRO series of subs. I was very surprised and very impressed. These subs are on par with comparable products from SVS, HSU, Velodyne, etc.. Before PF 08 I would not have considered purchasing another Polk sub or even recommending one to someone else. I have changed my mind in both cases.

I doubt if the time, effort and $ will be recouped because they converted one person (me) to purchase one of their products...but hey...it's a start...:D.

Good job Polk!

DarqueKnight

Eric Wong wrote: »

Great pics and great captions! Hope you all had a great time. I'd like to clarify some pics

That would be Steve Kahn- Polk Project Manager (looking at camera)
and Matt Lyons- Engineering (who gave the facility tour)

Thanks. Who is the professorial looking guy in the middle in figure 25?

Eric Wong wrote: »

Al is actually the VP of Marketing. Stu (in the "How to speak balmer" video at the beginning of the day) is VP of Engineering.

I caught that after re-reading, but I couldn't go back and edit.:(

Jstas wrote: »

I'm thinking that some names with faces in the pictures might be a good idea. Most of the people that were there met before but quite a few who couldn't make it don't know anyone from spit.

Maybe some captions with names of members would be in order?

The original post is already at the 10,000 character limit. Maybe the mods can edit the post and exceed the character limit. Otherwise, the pics can be copied to new posts with new captions.

SDA SRS 1.2

Thank you for the great photos and write-up Raife! I especially like the one of you and Matt with our beloved SRS's. I am still kicking myself for not making the time available to attend, but I will definitely do so for the next one at Polk HQ. I would like to ask Matt to sign my Owner's Manual and pose for a similar photo with the SRS's. It just blows me away that Matt and the others at Polk take the time and go to the expense to do this - even for those of us with 20 year old speakers. Thanks also for allowing us to put some faces with the names we see here on the forum. THANK YOU!

Robbie

nadams

I, too, was looking forward to hearing these subs. I've never had the experience of hearing one of the old PSW series, but the general consensus on these forums was that you were better served to look elsewhere.

While the subs were not the focal point of any of the demo's, they were present in almost all of them. I was truely impressed. From music to explosions, they covered the whole gamut with ease.

DarqueKnight

nadams wrote: »

it's interesting to me that Matt's LSi/SDA setup is toed in quite a bit, whereas the original SDAs were always meant to be set up parallel with the wall. Of course, we're talking a completely different design implementation, but I just found it interesting.

The reason why SDA's should not be toed is is that the dimensional drivers are set into the cabinets at a shallower depth than the stereo drivers. This produces an offset which is equivalent to a 20 degree toe in. Therefore, additional toe in messes things up. This is explained in detail in Matt Polk's "Designed-In Stereo" original SDA paper that was published in the June 1984 issue of Audio magazine.

A dual pair of LSi's, of course, would require some toe in.

George Grand

Don't tell me that man can't make a sub-woofer. The sub section of his downstairs home rig almost made me piss myself a couple times.

nadams

I never noticed the difference in mounting depth! I'll have to take a look at my drivers when I get home.

heiney9

DarqueKnight wrote: »

The reason why SDA's should not be toed is is that the dimensional drivers are set into the cabinets at a shallower depth than the stereo drivers. This produces an offset which is equivalent to a 20 degree toe in.

This is almost always overlooked. I remember telling Ben when he first joined and wanted to build his own SDA's that there was this issue with the dim drivers and how they were mounted in the baffle.

Nadams, I also think Matt's set-up was active as well as passive. With the active portion, critical driver location isn't as necessary as it is with a purely passive set-up like the std. SDA we are all used to.

His vision is to incorporate both the active elements of the Surround Bar 360 and passive elements of older SDA's into a new SDA type product. Whether that is ever realized is anyone's guess; atleast beyond the prototypes and one off projects.

H9

heiney9

The dual MicroPros running at AL's house were superb. They do have a tendency to "walk" around the room if they are on a slick surface.

Both had 20lbs of led shot on top of them and during several songs the led shot vibrated right off.

Those impressed the hell out of me and if I ever do my dedicated theater room I can now purchase Polk subs with confidence.

H9

DarqueKnight

nadams wrote: »

I never noticed the difference in mounting depth! I'll have to take a look at my drivers when I get home.

I mispoke earlier, the difference in depth is between the tweeter and stereo drivers. This is from figure 3 on page 89 of the SDA SRS review published in the November 1985 issue of stereo review:

"The bass/midrange drivers are recessed relative to the tweeters so that their common acoustic plane, and thus the effective axis of radiation, is shifted by an angle of 20 degrees relative to the listener."

This review can be downloaded from the polksda.com website.

m00npie

The Dual 3000's has moved to the top of my short list for my office rig.

chargerman426

I will just echo the points of some others but polkfest was great. This was my first polkfest and I'm happy that I went. I got to meet and talk to some great people. I was exsidet to talk to the man that desind my speakers on go this as well as others opions on what to do with my 2 psw404's . I'm looking forward to going to a polkfest in the future and seeing everyone agin.

dorokusai

I told you so.....