Free Pair of Alpair 10.3M in 10.3m Pensils

[silverhairbp]

You didn't say what the issue was.

jeff

That was by design. And I hate to mention it because my sensitivity does not necessarily mean it will bother others. But I can hear cone breakup, particularly on brass instruments. Not terrible, but out of character with the rest of my system.

 

[mudihan]

mudihan,

Just a few points that I failed to provide as we were trying to stay dry in the rain....

I recommend using the same speaker wire inside the cabinet. It's quite good.

I suggest getting different nuts for the biding posts. The ones that come with the posts I gave you often fail before adequately tightening the posts in place.

The speakers have not been used for years. I would go through a complete breaking process as if they were new drivers. Soft music for the first 100 hours with very little bass, then gradually increase the level and the bass over the next 300 hours.

The wool felt cabinet lining works good to reduce internal reflection. You will have to add loose stuffing above the internal brace to tune the bass to your liking.

No refunds of any of the $0,000.00 paid for these speakers. ;-)

Good luck and please post your thoughts and results on this forum.

Best to you,

Bill

Noted.

Yes of course, I will report back on the sound. I just unpacked my amp and separate linear power supply (both of which I made myself) from boxes. I will start doing the burn-in tonight -- until i get some metal speaker grills from Parts Express, I have to be extra careful not to have my toddler son touch the drivers.

 

[chrisb]

Bill, in that case you might well find the A10P’s softer top end more to your liking. I ran a pair myself for a while in the CFS enclosures as front mains in my HT rig. The deeper bass response I heard from the A10.3 in Pensils is almost moot in the case where you select the LPF to LFE channel at the THX standard of 80 Hz ( or above).

mudihan- if youve already stated, could you remind us again which amp that’d be?

 

[mudihan]

Bill, in that case you might well find the A10P’s softer top end more to your liking. I ran a pair myself for a while in the CFS enclosures as front mains in my HT rig. The deeper bass response I heard from the A10.3 in Pensils is almost moot in the case where you select the LPF to LFE channel at the THX standard of 80 Hz ( or above).

mudihan- if youve already stated, could you remind us again which amp that’d be?

I typically will make/mod an amp specifically for a pair of speakers, so I may eventually have a different amp for the Alpairs. The one I have right now on hand (I just endured a major move) is based on LM4780, i.e., it is basically a chip amp, though I have applied a few of my tweaks to "max it out" by my standard. I would say it is a very neutral and transparent amp. In comparison to a NAD T773 that I use to run bi-amp/tri-amp duties, the NAD sounds veiled and slow, even when I have by-passed its pre-amp section to just use the power amp section straight -- though a signal would be well-amplified by the NAD, the amp makes me feel that I am miles away from the source.

The power supply for the chip amp is linear regulated and can supply 7A per rail (+/- 27v). Despite the general consensus, I always found that chip amps play better on regulated/cleaner power.

I cannot say that the chip amp would be the perfect fit for the Alpairs, but I do hope that its neutrality and transparency will help reveal Alpair's strength and weaknesses.

 

[mudihan]

OK, just listened to them for about an hour. Initial impressions are:

Clarity is superb!
Coherence and transition from one frequency range to another is great!
I do not find the highs to be bright -- if any, I thought the very top end was a bit too mild.
There is a surprising amount of bass!
There appears to be a bit of a midrange dip/suck-out.
Upper bass is a bit too rounded for my taste.

I will let them play softly every night for a few days. Overall I am very impressed.

 

[silverhairbp]

mudihan - I was using the 10.3M Pensils with all Herron Audio equipment (even a one-off DAC). Top high end equipment. I didn't necessarily find the speakers bright, just cone breakup on brass instruments. Midrange suckout? Yes, but not objectionable. Just recessed. I did notice a lot of differences in bass depending on room placement. But tonal characteristics will vary from room to room and placement within a room. My personal preference is nearfield which helps through the midrange. YMMV.

chrisb - I may give the 10P a try. It's all about cone breakup. If the 10P has cone breakup. then it's off the short list. Will the same large version 10.3 Pensil enclosure work OK? (That's what I had / mudihan has.)

BTW, mudihan is quite the gentleman.

 

[mudihan]

mudihan - I was using the 10.3M Pensils with all Herron Audio equipment (even a one-off DAC). Top high end equipment. I didn't necessarily find the speakers bright, just cone breakup on brass instruments. Midrange suckout? Yes, but not objectionable. Just recessed. I did notice a lot of differences in bass depending on room placement. But tonal characteristics will vary from room to room and placement within a room. My personal preference is nearfield which helps through the midrange. YMMV.

chrisb - I may give the 10P a try. It's all about cone breakup. If the 10P has cone breakup. then it's off the short list. Will the same large version 10.3 Pensil enclosure work OK? (That's what I had / mudihan has.)

BTW, mudihan is quite the gentleman.

Thanks. I mentioned potential brightness because that appears to be a few others' impression when compared to 10P.

I will play with room placement and internal filling with respect to the bass.

Thanks again for being this generous and accommodating!

 

[chrisb]

The brotherhood of the travellling Pensils.

 

[Bigun]

I found there to be no brightness issues and treble dispersion was surprisingly good. I could not imagine finding another driver of the same size that would be better but everyone has their own tastes. I didn’t drive them hard, which means that I have no experience of possible bad behaviour near their limits. They were built for a friend who’s enjoyed them for several years. He particularly likes the good imaging performance. He used a SE SV811 amp but recently a SE high voltage SIT amp loaded on an output transformer. Internal speaker wired with Ag coated Cu in Teflon sheath.

Again, the one thing to experiment with is the stuffing, it allows you to tune a bit the mid-bass.

 

[chrisb]

And of course starting with the standard placement re rear/side boundaries, toe-in angle relative to main listening position and even minimal acoustic treatment of primary reflection surfaces - including ceilings- can fine tune what you’ll hear in-room.
I always prefer to leave correction via electronic EQ / room correction to a minimum.

 

[mudihan]

mudihan - I was using the 10.3M Pensils with all Herron Audio equipment (even a one-off DAC). Top high end equipment. I didn't necessarily find the speakers bright, just cone breakup on brass instruments. Midrange suckout? Yes, but not objectionable. Just recessed. I did notice a lot of differences in bass depending on room placement. But tonal characteristics will vary from room to room and placement within a room. My personal preference is nearfield which helps through the midrange. YMMV.

chrisb - I may give the 10P a try. It's all about cone breakup. If the 10P has cone breakup. then it's off the short list. Will the same large version 10.3 Pensil enclosure work OK? (That's what I had / mudihan has.)

BTW, mudihan is quite the gentleman.

Hi silverhairbp, do you recall roughly to what bass hz was the cabinet tuned? Thank you!