System Pic

TNRabbit

I've posted a pic of my 2 channel system under System Showcase, if anyone gives a ****....

http://www.polkaudio.com/forums/showcase/view.php?userid=88717





:)

nikolas812

Nope!









Nik

Conradicles

Sweetness.

leroyjr1

Very nice.....

engtaz

Sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet

hearingimpared

Wow that is some tube amp.

george daniel

Gary,, are those the AL III's that were at CF last year?

thsmith

nice

treitz3

Joe, you could have heard it had you been able to make it to this year's Carverfest. Don't anybody ask the Rabbit when the last time he actually listened to his rig though. No, no, no. Wouldn't want to do that now.....

treitz3

george daniel wrote: »

Gary,, are those the AL III's that were at CF last year?

I'll answer that. Yessiree!

Face

How do you listen with all that stuff in the way?

treitz3

Hehe. He uses his headphones. Those are just for looks.

danz1906

engtaz wrote: »

Sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet

What he said-Very nice system!

george daniel

treitz3 wrote: »

I'll answer that. Yessiree!

I thought so,, just watching him set em' up was an education,, I still remember those "cannon shots",, great googlamooglies.;)

DarqueKnight

Nice. Up to now, I didn't know Carver made speakers that looked like that. I thought all of his speakers were shaped like Apogee's. Just from looking at the pics, I would have thought they were Martin Logan's.

Is there a screen and home theater speakers elsewhere in the room or did you downsize from a home theater system? I noticed you are using a 7.1 pre/pro.

treitz3

He had a HT setup DK and if memory serves, he sold the speakers. Don't know about the TV. Just FYI, he purchased those speakers like that. The previous owner whitewashed the oak and it turned out pretty nice looking. When he got it, he also upgraded the sub to an Infinity if I'm not mistaken. BIG difference in sound. Carver never made a pair like that particular one but they are the ALIII's.

Retro152

Very nice "Polkless" setup.:p:D j/k......looks great.





Pat.

messiah

f'N sWEET!!!

TNRabbit

george daniel wrote: »

Gary,, are those the AL III's that were at CF last year?

treitz3 wrote: »

I'll answer that. Yessiree!

Yep; same ones. In that pic, the metal was still ugly...I've since painted it all black down the center. They were painted for CF last year, so you saw them in the current form.

TNRabbit

DarqueKnight wrote: »

Nice. Up to now, I didn't know Carver made speakers that looked like that. I thought all of his speakers were shaped like Apogee's. Just from looking at the pics, I would have thought they were Martin Logan's.

Is there a screen and home theater speakers elsewhere in the room or did you downsize from a home theater system? I noticed you are using a 7.1 pre/pro.

treitz3 wrote: »

He had a HT setup DK and if memory serves, he sold the speakers. Don't know about the TV. Just FYI, he purchased those speakers like that. The previous owner whitewashed the oak and it turned out pretty nice looking. When he got it, he also upgraded the sub to an Infinity if I'm not mistaken. BIG difference in sound. Carver never made a pair like that particular one but they are the ALIII's.

That is my two-channel setup; I'm also running a Klipsch RF-12d sub with them to supplement below 40 hz (although the speakers are pretty good down into the 20s). I've run this setup in 5.1 with Realistic Minimus 7 speakers ganged in parallel form for the center/surrounds for multi-channel SACD and it sounds AWESOME~that's what george was talking about with the cannons (1812 Overture, multi-channel SACD). I'm running the 7.1 prepro strictly for 2 channel now, although I use it's internal bass management system to bi-amp the AL-IIIs off 4 of the 7 channels in the amp (800 watts into 4 ohms, so each speaker gets 400 watts to each ribbon AND each woofer). LOTS of headroom!

I had a complete Klipsch RF-83 H/T system I was running off a Sunfire Ultimate Receiver, but sold off all but the sub to supplement payments to my lawyer (long story involving an ex).

I know about "all the stuff"--the pool table is in the middle of the room & kind of a PITA, but you have to make concessions when you move in with someone~ I though she was a helluva sport just for letting me set it all up AND my drum set in the other corner--

mantis

Looks like a pretty nice system you got there. Nice tubes.

TNRabbit

The tubes aren't in my system; just a pic of what I'd like one day~

CoolJazz

You could hear those cannon shots...even outside...very nicely!! :eek:

Learned something new about Rabbit from that room pic though. That chair looks like some kind of perverted torture device!

CoolJazz

thuffman03

I like the color of your ALIII's. Nice setup!

jacob.simpson

TNRabbit wrote: »

I've posted a pic of my 2 channel system under System Showcase, if anyone gives a ****....

http://www.polkaudio.com/forums/showcase/view.php?userid=88717





:)

Very nice set up, and i do care a ****






























(Shot)

Hawkeye

I live about 4 miles from Gary. We've been trying to get together for a session for at least 5 months now. Opposing work schedules makes it very difficult.

One of these days Gary! I'm dying to get my ears on your gear.

Gordon

jacob.simpson

Hawkeye wrote: »

I live about 4 miles from Gary. We've been trying to get together for a session for at least 5 months now. Opposing work schedules makes it very difficult.

One of these days Gary! I'm dying to get my ears on your gear.

Gordon

A review write up also be a welcome;)

disneyjoe7

Nice, I sure that sounds great.

reeltrouble1

OK Ok, now everyone line up and all together on 3

1

2

3

TUBES RULE

so dump the sunfire and get those tubes glowing

RT1

TNRabbit

How about my own review? I wrote this a few months ago & recently dusted it off and updated it:

The model pictured in my system pic is custom finished in bleached/pickled oak. The original finish was available in honey oak or black only.

LENGTHY PREFACE: I purchased these babies on eBay in February 2007 for about $850.00 with less than 200 hours total use on them (claimed by the first & only owner). I attempted at that time to use them with a cheap Onkyo amplifier which failed miserably (it would heat up & shut down within 5 seconds of turning the speakers up to anything louder than conversational volume). For a while, I thought I there was a problem with the speakers. I checked them for continuity/resistance with a multi-meter & found no issues. They sat for a while until I acquired a Carver M1.5t amp which had the "oomph" to drive them better, but one channel began overloading (turned out to be shipping damage to the output transformers), so at that point I was really wondering whether I had wasted my money. My initial observations from the M1.5t amp session was that the speakers sounded somewhat "muffled" to me and had muddy sounding bass. Later experimentation with that amp on a pair of Klipsch KLF-10 speakers led me to the realization that the muddiness from the bass had been imparted by the AMP, not the speakers.

Fast forward to the purchase of a Sunfire Tube Control preamplifer & Sunfire 300x2 amp. This combination sounded LIGHT YEARS ahead of what I'd hear from these speakers to this point, although I still couldn't shake the "muffled" sound from the ribbons. I played this combo for about a month at relatively high volume levels and the sound began to open up & become more natural ("burn in" time). These speakers need god-awful amounts of power to really come into their own! That said, however; the more I played them the better they sounded at low volumes. This is one of the VERY few speakers I've found keeps its composure & flat response from very low volume levels to incredibly high volume levels.

I was still a little concerned about a perceived "boominess" in the lower bass of the AL-IIIs at this point & decided to go with jimmyneutron's Infinity woofer upgrade, but went one better and used the Infinity Kappa 10.1 Perfect woofers over jimmy's Infinity Reference 1030 woofer; I'd used the Perfects in my car audio system for quite a while & was extremely happy with them. In fact, the Perfect 10s share a closer sensitivity level with the original AL-III woofers, making them more suited for the correct match. The experiment worked out famously as i found the bass to be much more agreeable to my ear.

I've since replaced the SunfireTube preamp & 300x2 amp with a Sunfire Theater Grand IV preamp & 400x7 amplifier, which has the juice to really put a hurtin' on the AL-IIIs if you're not careful. I couldn't be happier with the AL-IIIs at this point. I've experimented with speaker placement a lot and found it to be CRITICAL to getting an impressive soundstage & is the difference between having the Sonic Holography sound weird or sound GREAT.

I began bi-amping these speakers using 4 channels of the 400x7 and am actively separating the upper/lower frequencies via the bass management system in the TG-IV.

---

Some specific observations about the AL-IIIs:

- Use plenty of power to drive them. Remember when choosing an amp that these are FOUR OHM (overall) speakers, with dips down to around 2 ohms at some frequencies. They have to be the most inefficient speaker I've ever heard, but when you run lots of clean power into them, they sound FANTASTIC!

- Allow for a relatively long, moderately-high volume break-in period (took me months, but consider the amp issues I had).

- AFTER BREAK-IN with a sufficient amp, the soundstage on these speakers is almost a religious experience. They absolutely require a moderately large room setting and proper speaker placement to get the best sound. Mine currently reside in a 11x12 room and it quite simply doesn't do them justice. These are LARGE speakers (a full 6 feet) and require "room too breathe." They were MADE for Sonic Holography; it sounds magical through them! Bob Carver recommends (he personally told me) a "dead" room end at the speaker location & somewhat "live" room end at your listening position. The best is to have them out away from the wall behind them at least 4 feet & your listening position closer to the opposite wall. I also highly recommend having them at least 4 feet from side walls as well for the best imaging. It is possible, however, to get a good image in small room with proper treatments & placement, albeit more difficult.

- The connection hardware on the back is of a nice quality & very robust. You can really crank 'em down on the connectors. It's also nice to have the option of bi-amping/bi-wiring with the four posts. There are separate 4-amp slo-blo fuses for ribbon/woofer, but they are mainly to keep from frying the crossover potentiometers (the weakest link in the system).

- I wholeheartedly recommend the Infinity Kappa Perfect 10.1 upgrade. While you're at it, think about upgrading the wires inside the speaker/crossover (very small for a speaker capable of handling up to 600 watts continuously). The Infinity Reference 1030 is not a good replacement as it is too inefficient and drops the response off too much for my taste.

-You absolutely need to biamp these speakers for best effect. I'm currently running the ribbons thru two channels of my 400~7 amp and the woofers thru two other channels, separating the upper/lower frequencies via the TG-IV bass management system. This gives me 800 watts available power into EACH of the ribbons/woofers. MORE than enough to blow fuses!

- My personal preference/room required settings for the three potentiometers on the back of the AL-IIIs are as follows (your preferences/requirements may vary)

- Low: full maximum
- Midrange: one notch above "Room Average Flat" setting
- High: one notch below maximum

- Except for the very lowest of bass notes, the response on these speakers is outstanding. I've played around with a Klipsch RT-12d subwoofer below 40 hertz & it does help supplement the bass down to below 20 hertz. I've found there to be very little material in that range in most music. If, like me, however--you enjoy the impact from the occasional notes you "feel" rather than hear--it's a nice addition.

-Bela Fleck & the Flecktones bassist, Victor Wooten, plays some ULTRA LOW notes on the song "Flight Of The Cosmic Hippo" from their CD of the same name and these speakers really shine on that song. Also, the Telarc SACD version of the 1812 Overture is a MUST LISTEN with this system! I wouldn't have thought one 10" woofer in a small, ported enclosure could produce the extension that it does, and generally without sounding muddy even at monstrous power levels (600 watts+).

- I owned a complete Klipsch RF-83 surround system ($6,400.00 retail), and, while fantastic for HT and many music applications, I found myself doing my critical two-channel listening on my "old" AL-IIIs....