O.K.. maybe, "... like Stereophile did in its flawed testing of the Klipschorn A6 --
outside, no corner, in a driveway, on a furniture dolly!"
Atkinson
: "Note that I haven't plotted the response below 350Hz
in fig.5 ...," but he
did plot it in
figure 4 in what he describes as "free space," presumably
outside, no corner, in a driveway, on a furniture dolly! Not surprisingly, he finds the response to be down about 13 dB at 30 Hz with
no, or nearly no, boundary gain and
no room gain, two things a Klipschorn, even the new ones with the closed backs, require. The marketing copy says that there is no need for the new Klipschorns "to fit
tightly (some advertising copy says
snuggly) in a corner." Some versions say it needs to be "in the
proximity of the corner." None of this wording means
outside, no corner, in a driveway, on a furniture dolly! Atkinson also finds that the bass is down about 7 dB at about 42 Hz. Again, no surprise with the speaker in "free space." More typical tests in an anechoic chamber, tucked into an artificial corner, show it at -3dB at 60 Hz, and fully recovered at 42 Hz (at the 0 line). In a room corner, a French magazine reported - 2.5 dB at 35 Hz. Because
a subwoofer (preferably a horn loaded one to compliment the clean, tight, snappy bass of a Klipschorn)
is needed with these speakers, crossing over at 80Hz or, maybe 60Hz, so response below 40 Hz is not too important, IMO.
I am quite familiar with the Heyser review. I liked him. Paul Klipsch liked him too. Heyser's computer assisted result showed the Klipschorn bass incredibly flat down to 40 Hz. Some questioned his results, because the bass was just too flat, but he was such a revered expert, I wonder if it might be about right. The mids and treble were about 10 dB peak/trough, as advertised.
View attachment 228378
My corner. It looks conventional (but is secretly extra strong) and the minimum ceiling height is 8.5 feet, sloping up toward the back of the room at 11' 10."
Well, with the direct-to-disc version of
Fanfare for the Common Man I have, the timpani, tam-tam, and bass drum with the Klipschorns
alone will throw my desk out of square, and flap pants legs in the wind they produce, even though (with Audyssey Flat) the system is flat to only about 30 Hz. Pretty gut wrenching. If I engage the subwoofer which comes in at about 60 Hz, and goes down to 16 Hz at about +2 dB, the Death Star explodes magnificently. It seems to lift the couch at 13 feet from the speakers.
At the moment, I can't seem to get my room curves to paste, but they are elseswhere on Audio Science Review, perhaps in the thread on the Klipsch sound. Had I been able to print them, I would have criticized them on the grounds I was using just 1 microphone. Below, in Khorn range, but
not covering subwoofer range, is the result of averaging 8 microphone positions, with Audyssey Reference, which rolls off the treble by about 4.5 dB at 15K. The bass has been boosted by about 6 dB. This ordinary average probably isn't as good as the proprietary "fuzzy" amalgamation Audyssey does, but it's what I have.