Jacco,
Not to cannibalize the thread but I have owned the KSA-250, KSA-100mkII and the Class-AB, KAV-250a ....
I have sold all and kept the KAV-250a. It just sounds better... the problem I have with it is that it is a fifi man's Krell... apart from that, I cannot fault it's sonics....
Note to Al: The emails not coming were not DIYaudio's fault... My ISP's Junk folder was catching them... I have since redeemed them
Not to cannibalize the thread but I have owned the KSA-250, KSA-100mkII and the Class-AB, KAV-250a ....
I have sold all and kept the KAV-250a. It just sounds better... the problem I have with it is that it is a fifi man's Krell... apart from that, I cannot fault it's sonics....
Note to Al: The emails not coming were not DIYaudio's fault... My ISP's Junk folder was catching them... I have since redeemed them
Not to show my naked bum/tt,
but i've witnessed a range of Krell's,all KMA models, with exception of the KSA80.
Controlled bass and clear highs are fine, but for voices i found the old rigid bias models nicer.
I do not care much for thumbing low tones, unless they're in my van. The voice frequency range is my thing, probably why i like electrostats as much as i do.
Must be the floating bias thing is my guess(plateau, my foot)
Each to his own, a lot of people find class AB Mosfet output stages ok, in my book they're horrible.
I meant full active regulated rails, separate +/- rails for main and driver board. The regulator discussion has been held on the Leach thread for quite some time.
I've got a box full of small fully resin encapsulated 30VA toroid transformers( bought +30 for a $/pc)
Maybe compare this with one that has constant current sources,as i have spare boards.
UPS delivered 10lbs of components today;
for the Krells, 2 high power Leach amplifiers, 4 lower power Leaches, and all the remaining goodies for some Alephs and Zen's.
Got my old Philips laboratory working station set up to go: things to solder.
but i've witnessed a range of Krell's,all KMA models, with exception of the KSA80.
Controlled bass and clear highs are fine, but for voices i found the old rigid bias models nicer.
I do not care much for thumbing low tones, unless they're in my van. The voice frequency range is my thing, probably why i like electrostats as much as i do.
Must be the floating bias thing is my guess(plateau, my foot)
Each to his own, a lot of people find class AB Mosfet output stages ok, in my book they're horrible.
I meant full active regulated rails, separate +/- rails for main and driver board. The regulator discussion has been held on the Leach thread for quite some time.
I've got a box full of small fully resin encapsulated 30VA toroid transformers( bought +30 for a $/pc)
Maybe compare this with one that has constant current sources,as i have spare boards.
UPS delivered 10lbs of components today;
for the Krells, 2 high power Leach amplifiers, 4 lower power Leaches, and all the remaining goodies for some Alephs and Zen's.
Got my old Philips laboratory working station set up to go: things to solder.
i found the old rigid bias models nicer
At the dutch VAD hifi show a week ago i spoke to Mr. A.J. van der Hul (yes, the cable man) and he also liked the first Krells more then the later generations.
But everybody's ears are different.
Now busy with the case for my KSA50 monoblocks, more practical in my livingroom.
Hopefully they are ready before Jacco's deadline on Christmas...
Loek
At the dutch VAD hifi show a week ago i spoke to Mr. A.J. van der Hul (yes, the cable man) and he also liked the first Krells more then the later generations.
But everybody's ears are different.
Now busy with the case for my KSA50 monoblocks, more practical in my livingroom.
Hopefully they are ready before Jacco's deadline on Christmas...
Loek
Re: i found the old rigid bias models nicer
How is "The Cable Guy" doing ?
Loek,
you've seen the dump i live in.
I need to get the roof closed before Christmas, best chance i have by that time is to have boards and heatsinks playing on a wooden panel.
Here's a little something for the Guru: picture of the fan arrangement on top of the heatsinks.
loek said:
How is "The Cable Guy" doing ?
Loek,
you've seen the dump i live in.
I need to get the roof closed before Christmas, best chance i have by that time is to have boards and heatsinks playing on a wooden panel.
Here's a little something for the Guru: picture of the fan arrangement on top of the heatsinks.
Attachments
Yep.
Forgot to mention, i'm placing the amplifiers under the floor.
Floor heating, so to speak.
Both the diningroom, living and the study have loudspeaker cables running under the floors.(done before i arrived here)
Which is why i am very pleased with Sylvain's soft start circuit, that has a remote switch-on option.
Forgot to mention, i'm placing the amplifiers under the floor.
Floor heating, so to speak.
Both the diningroom, living and the study have loudspeaker cables running under the floors.(done before i arrived here)
Which is why i am very pleased with Sylvain's soft start circuit, that has a remote switch-on option.
Hi Walter.
It was nice to see the enormous vinylplayers(clearaudio) and big-tube amplifiers.
Also a beautifull CDplayer from perspex material.
Look at www.hifi.nl.
Hi Jacco, hat-off how you can make time for your audioprojects beside your family and maintenance outside.
But in between you also has invented a new way for housewarming i see.
Years ago i was in the uk at a friends place and he made concrete horns for his loudspeakersystem under the floor.Very impressive sound coming out of 2 holes in the wall.....impossible in my appartment in the Hague.
The amplifier was a little DIY tube amplifier.
The cable guy is doing very well, looking(running) after all the hifi shows in the world and in between designing new stuff.
Walter, what is your clone status?
Hoping to make a little advance this weekend with mine, the wife is gone playing bridge the weekend.
Bye, Loek
It was nice to see the enormous vinylplayers(clearaudio) and big-tube amplifiers.
Also a beautifull CDplayer from perspex material.
Look at www.hifi.nl.
Hi Jacco, hat-off how you can make time for your audioprojects beside your family and maintenance outside.
But in between you also has invented a new way for housewarming i see.
Years ago i was in the uk at a friends place and he made concrete horns for his loudspeakersystem under the floor.Very impressive sound coming out of 2 holes in the wall.....impossible in my appartment in the Hague.
The amplifier was a little DIY tube amplifier.
The cable guy is doing very well, looking(running) after all the hifi shows in the world and in between designing new stuff.
Walter, what is your clone status?
Hoping to make a little advance this weekend with mine, the wife is gone playing bridge the weekend.
Bye, Loek
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=57856
Loek,
ask Walter Burkhard to show you some pictures of his home, his home is/are the horns.
Loek,
ask Walter Burkhard to show you some pictures of his home, his home is/are the horns.
Emailed Welborne again today...
Still waiting.
Edit:
I wonder if Welborne is now monitoring this thread...
Just rx'ed.... Funny, I never hear from them until I post....
From: "WLabs" <wlabs@ix.netcom.com>
To: "Troy St.Germain" <stgrab@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: welbornelabs # 11834
Date: Tue, 1 Nov 2005 10:30:05 -0700
Hi Troy
Yes, the manufacturer has informed us that our next delivery has shipped and we are expecting it this week.... probably tomorrow or Thursday. So we will be able to ship the balance of your order within the next few days.
Thanks for your patience.
Ron
Welborne Labs
E-Mail:
wlabs@ix.netcom.com
Welborne Labs Website:
http://www.welbornelabs.com
----- Original Message -----
From: Troy St.Germain
To: WLabs
Sent: Tuesday, November 01, 2005 9:24 AM
Subject: Re: welbornelabs # 11834
Hi Ron-
I have 20 people waiting on these parts, any idea when I can expect them?
Thanks again,
Troy
Still waiting.
Edit:
I wonder if Welborne is now monitoring this thread...
Just rx'ed.... Funny, I never hear from them until I post....
From: "WLabs" <wlabs@ix.netcom.com>
To: "Troy St.Germain" <stgrab@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: welbornelabs # 11834
Date: Tue, 1 Nov 2005 10:30:05 -0700
Hi Troy
Yes, the manufacturer has informed us that our next delivery has shipped and we are expecting it this week.... probably tomorrow or Thursday. So we will be able to ship the balance of your order within the next few days.
Thanks for your patience.
Ron
Welborne Labs
E-Mail:
wlabs@ix.netcom.com
Welborne Labs Website:
http://www.welbornelabs.com
----- Original Message -----
From: Troy St.Germain
To: WLabs
Sent: Tuesday, November 01, 2005 9:24 AM
Subject: Re: welbornelabs # 11834
Hi Ron-
I have 20 people waiting on these parts, any idea when I can expect them?
Thanks again,
Troy
For those interested: John Atkinson's comparison of the KSA-50 and the KSA-50S... (Note: I think these guys are a little biased in that every new amplifier is better than the previous... )
KSA-50S vs KSA-50
The original KSA-50 has only unbalanced inputs, so for the comparisons I hooked it up with 10' lengths of unbalanced AudioTruth Lapis fitted with RCA jacks. The '50S was auditioned in balanced mode so I wouldn't have to plug and unplug RCA connections, with all the potential for blowing up speakers and amps that that entails—hey, I own the B&Ws and one of the amplifiers, okay? The balanced 'S was 3.8dB more sensitive than the unbalanced '50; again, levels were matched to well within 0.01dB at 1kHz.
Listening to the original '50, which I haven't fired up in almost six years, brought the memories flooding back. The soundstage was wicked big; the bass was wicked deep; the amp was wicked GOOD! In the "Christe Eleison," from the Mozart C-Minor Mass's "Kyrie," Barbara Hendricks soars to a glorious climax. The old Krell allowed me to hear her voice lighting up the surrounding acoustic in a delightfully unambiguous way. And in the opening of the "Kyrie," the pulse of the dotted rhythm pushed the pace along.
The new Krell was significantly better than its predecessor in one important way: that gloriously liquid quality I noted earlier made the earlier Krell sound a little "electronic" by comparison. Hendricks' voice acquired a rather phlegmy edge via the older amplifier; the '50S presented it with a significantly more natural character. The original KSA-50's high frequencies were also grainier compared with the KSA-50S, and slightly sibilant. The new amplifier had altogether a more civilized, more neutral sound, I found. But when it came to the soundstage, the Dresden walls weren't illuminated to the same extent as they had been with the old amp.
And the new amp lost something of the sense of pace. It wasn't that it couldn't boogie at all, but when it did so, it was definitely in a more mannered way. Despite the more natural, less grainy presentation of the vocal, the combination of bass guitar and kickdrum on "Tell Everybody I Know," from the killer Keb' Mo' album, for example, could officially be classified as "polite" through the '50S. Perhaps as Krell designer Dan D'Agostino and the rest of us baby boomers get older, so does the sonic character of Krell amplifiers keep pace with our shifting desires.
Conclusion
While the Krell KSA-50S's bass is not quite as awesomely kick-*** deep as the earlier KSA-50, its midrange is one of the best I have heard from a solid-state design. Its imaging and soundstaging are also both first-rate. The KSA-50S is one civilized-sounding amplifier. And perhaps that's also my only real criticism: that it has lost some of the slam, the "Wham, Bam, thank you, Dan!," that characterized the original KSA-50 (footnote 2).
The KSA-50S is undoubtedly a contender, but its sonic character makes it essential for you to audition it in the context of your own system. Recommended—but news we've just received from Krell could make this moot. Apparently the KSA-50S might be discontinued in September, due to lack of demand: Krell customers appear to be more prepared to spend the big bucks for the bigger amplifiers. Given the '50S's sweet sound and massive power delivery, I feel that this is a pity.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Footnote 2: One comparison I had wished to do for this review was to hear how the $3300 KSA-50S sounded against the tubed Conrad-Johnson Premier Eleven A power amplifier ($3495) that Wes Phillips likes so much. (See his Follow-Up elsewhere in this issue.) Time constraints meant that this comparison was not possible; it will follow next month.—John Atkinson
)KSA-50S vs KSA-50
The original KSA-50 has only unbalanced inputs, so for the comparisons I hooked it up with 10' lengths of unbalanced AudioTruth Lapis fitted with RCA jacks. The '50S was auditioned in balanced mode so I wouldn't have to plug and unplug RCA connections, with all the potential for blowing up speakers and amps that that entails—hey, I own the B&Ws and one of the amplifiers, okay? The balanced 'S was 3.8dB more sensitive than the unbalanced '50; again, levels were matched to well within 0.01dB at 1kHz.
Listening to the original '50, which I haven't fired up in almost six years, brought the memories flooding back. The soundstage was wicked big; the bass was wicked deep; the amp was wicked GOOD! In the "Christe Eleison," from the Mozart C-Minor Mass's "Kyrie," Barbara Hendricks soars to a glorious climax. The old Krell allowed me to hear her voice lighting up the surrounding acoustic in a delightfully unambiguous way. And in the opening of the "Kyrie," the pulse of the dotted rhythm pushed the pace along.
The new Krell was significantly better than its predecessor in one important way: that gloriously liquid quality I noted earlier made the earlier Krell sound a little "electronic" by comparison. Hendricks' voice acquired a rather phlegmy edge via the older amplifier; the '50S presented it with a significantly more natural character. The original KSA-50's high frequencies were also grainier compared with the KSA-50S, and slightly sibilant. The new amplifier had altogether a more civilized, more neutral sound, I found. But when it came to the soundstage, the Dresden walls weren't illuminated to the same extent as they had been with the old amp.
And the new amp lost something of the sense of pace. It wasn't that it couldn't boogie at all, but when it did so, it was definitely in a more mannered way. Despite the more natural, less grainy presentation of the vocal, the combination of bass guitar and kickdrum on "Tell Everybody I Know," from the killer Keb' Mo' album, for example, could officially be classified as "polite" through the '50S. Perhaps as Krell designer Dan D'Agostino and the rest of us baby boomers get older, so does the sonic character of Krell amplifiers keep pace with our shifting desires.
Conclusion
While the Krell KSA-50S's bass is not quite as awesomely kick-*** deep as the earlier KSA-50, its midrange is one of the best I have heard from a solid-state design. Its imaging and soundstaging are also both first-rate. The KSA-50S is one civilized-sounding amplifier. And perhaps that's also my only real criticism: that it has lost some of the slam, the "Wham, Bam, thank you, Dan!," that characterized the original KSA-50 (footnote 2).
The KSA-50S is undoubtedly a contender, but its sonic character makes it essential for you to audition it in the context of your own system. Recommended—but news we've just received from Krell could make this moot. Apparently the KSA-50S might be discontinued in September, due to lack of demand: Krell customers appear to be more prepared to spend the big bucks for the bigger amplifiers. Given the '50S's sweet sound and massive power delivery, I feel that this is a pity.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Footnote 2: One comparison I had wished to do for this review was to hear how the $3300 KSA-50S sounded against the tubed Conrad-Johnson Premier Eleven A power amplifier ($3495) that Wes Phillips likes so much. (See his Follow-Up elsewhere in this issue.) Time constraints meant that this comparison was not possible; it will follow next month.—John Atkinson
I have handed off my A2 heatsinks to my machinist friend, who will be machining up the transistor bars and top and bottom plates. I am thinking about adding a tripod base just to sex it up a bit.
I have a KSA-50S in my main system now, so I will be comparing the finished monoblock in two configurations: one of the two will be built up for stereo or bridged monoblock use, the other as a straight bridged monoblock. I will compare the amps one to one and one to two. I think that with good parts selection for the feedback paths and resistors in the signal path that the new amps are going to outclass the 50S in just about all respects. Is it possible to use an ALW Super reg for the front end? I seem to recall there were some voltage limitations.
I have a KSA-50S in my main system now, so I will be comparing the finished monoblock in two configurations: one of the two will be built up for stereo or bridged monoblock use, the other as a straight bridged monoblock. I will compare the amps one to one and one to two. I think that with good parts selection for the feedback paths and resistors in the signal path that the new amps are going to outclass the 50S in just about all respects. Is it possible to use an ALW Super reg for the front end? I seem to recall there were some voltage limitations.