The Folly of Chasing Nostalgia and the Reality of the Room

There are so many ways to go with this story, but I will try to make it readable at least. When I was in college a high end store opened in my city and I got to hear Apogees, Martin Logan CLS, Vandersteens, and Celestion SL600. I lusted after the Apogee and the Martin Logans. A few years ago a friend of mine asked me to sell his Magnepan 1.6 with Skiing Ninja mods. I got them to sound pretty good in my room, and I tucked that info away. Then two years ago I had an AVM amp fail due to a partially disconnected speaker wire, and I was unsure I could get them serviced. I bought a pair of Classe Omega monoblocks and was incredibly pleased with them, I had found an end game amplifier. I also realized I had the amps that could run a pair of Apogees or Martin Logans and way more power than my JBL 4365 really needed.

These events planted the seed and I sold my JBL, which is proving to me a mistake, and I located a beautiful pair of Martin Logan CLX ART. They delivered safely and I thought I found my end game speaker. I set them up and initial results were promising, amazing clarity and detail, with great focus. What I did not have was much front to back depth. I certainly could solve this problem, its in the set up. My problem was that I could not get the recommended distance off the front wall. I am at 4 feet, and most owners say 5 to 6 feet. I worked with isolation panels, diffusers, DSP settings on the preamp, toe in, spreading them out, pulling them in, closer to the wall and as far out as I could practically place them, Isoacoustics isolation feet, and I never could get the depth of soundstage of the JBL with their controlled dispersion of the horns. Over the last few months, I decided to admit defeat. I had let the nostalgia of my youth guide a purchase that was not compatible with the realities of my room. It is 15’ by 19’ but with a dining room on the side I cannot close off the pathway into it, so I am limited to that 4 feet of space off the front wall. It was time to admit defeat and close this chapter.

I put them up for sale but am discovering the reality that above a certain price point selling on the secondary market is far more difficult than with lower priced items. Of course, the logistics of shipping a large speaker plays into this scenario also. I was getting nowhere, and even priced them very attractively on my local marketplace and got some interest but no serious buyers. One day I decided to look at The Music Room and see what they had. A pair of JBL 4367 just got listed. Now the 4365 I owned were 3 ways, but the 4367 got infused with technology from the M2 and have a dual voice coil angular diaphragm for the main horn, and it became a two way losing the ultra high frequency horn of the 4365. So I filled out the form on the site, and we came to an agreement of a trade of my Martin Logan towards the JBL and the other associated costs were quite reasonable. A type of speaker I know works will be coming here, and in some respects should be an improvement.

So, this morning I am waiting for my best friend and his son to come over and we are going to wrap up the Martin Logan, get them in their crate, and prep for shipping. After that I will contact TMR and get a pick up scheduled. So far everything others have said of TMR is proving true, and they are an excellent resource in this hobby. I have bought a Halcro preamp once from them in the past and it was an excellent transaction, now I will see how things work as a seller. As I listen to these speakers for one last time, I hear things I appreciate but I am not going to miss them for one moment. This has been quite a disappointing journey, and one filled with no small amount of regret.

In the end the lesson I learned is never out think yourself. The physics of room size cannot be cheated. If you choose to try to do that, be prepared for a difficult time. Perhaps you will be able to, but there is a high percentage chance you will fail. While I am getting an incrementally better speaker than I had, i feel like I expended a lot of effort and money to make no progress at all. The only silver lining is that I am fortunate to be able to return to a combination that was excellent, and I did not recognize how special it was.