Klipsch KLF-20 vs. RF-7 speakers

I own KLF-20 and RF-7 Klipsch speakers. I've also had the Forte II Klipsch speakers and the KLF-20 were on the thin side compared to the Forte's that kind of really bugged me, nice sounding but thin compared to the Forte and RF-7 but I replaced the diaphrams with the Titanium kit and this helped the KLF-20's not be so thin sounding.

The RF-7's are smoother and all the way around better from top to bottom than both the KLF-20 and Forte II. I've heard the RF-7 sounding just ok, to absolutely stunning sound by just what it's run on, so the equipment you pick for it is very important as the RF-7 are very dependant of what sound you get with just how good of gear you run on it. Give the RF-7's the best quality and it will give you back stunning nirvana sound like no other, the RF-7's perform better than my 1995 Klipschorn's with imaging, resolution, and detail. The Klipschorn's have a larger soundfield but the RF-7's come darn close to it.

My KLF-20's are from 1996 and I've never had any problems with them and the build quality is pretty good for todays speakers but yes, the build quality on the RF-7's are better.

Klipsch speakers are not bright unless you put a bright source to them. The trick with any Klipsch speaker is to not put a bright source with them because Klipsch is VERY revealing speakers.

The sound from the RF-7's are stunning and the crossovers DO NOT need to be changed, run them with very good quality high current gear and you will get great quality sound. People who changed the crossover are doing it to tame down the sound when using it with bright gear. I don't recommend that because it takes out the "presence" that is so revealing and involving that the RF-7's have.

I suggest a mcintosh intergrated amp with tone controls, the best solid state and bass boost that works with these speakers hands down. Like the MC 6500 or 6900 even better with the 5 band eq to tame the mid's and up the bass slightly on these speakers, I had to do this with every klipsch I owned from the heritage which yes were slightly warmer all the way thru the current day Reference series. Tubes could help but normally will not have the punch for the bigger bass drivers in these designs, again in my experience, but I use them mostly for Rock and heavier faster stuff, but even the beatles benefit well from some re-balancing of these speakers with some slight tone control and solid power of solid state.

Thanks very much for all your helpful comments.
Good Listening!

Soundguy,

Interesting comment about "not upgrading" the original crossover that has possibly the cheapest parts possible. I run my KLF-20's and Chorus II's with an EAD CD-1000 mkIII and EICO HF-81 integrated tube amp, both of which I wouldn't consider "bright". Based on what I heard from both the 20's and CII's before and after I upgraded the crossovers, I can tell you for a fact that you have not heard Klipsch speakers until you've upgraded the crossovers. I would put money on that statement.

I'm curious, have you ever A/B'd Klipsch speakers that have had the crossovers upgraded? I have with both my 20's and my CII's and I will tell you that it's more than obvious how much of an impact upgrading the crossovers improves the sound.

It improved the sound so much, that I will come out and say that it improved the sound more than any IC, PC or spekaer cable I ever bought. That is saying alot for upgrading the crossovers no matter how you slice and dice it.

I would even throw out this offer to you, you ship your RF-7 crossovers to me and I'll upgrade them; I'll ship them back to you and if you don't like the way they sound, ship them back to me and I'll return back to their original parts; if you do like them, we'll work out a fair price.

If you want to see pictures of my work, I can email you pictures. I also do Polk, B&W, and other speaker crossovers. The fact is that the original crossover parts are 2 cent pieces of junk and they need to go.

Mike

Crossovers are the key to moving these speakers to another level... A friend and myself decided one week to take an already great pair of mint RF3's using Dual 8's and a horn tweet/mid, we built a real serious pair of outboard crossovers eliminating the internal monster cable harness, and the real cheesy 3 inch square computer grade crossover... We used Goertz 12 gauge ribbon inductors, Mundorf silver caps, and I think it was either Vishay or Eagle Resistor .. We called klipsch and they gave us the official schematic cause the speaker was out of production, so we matched all values to a T'... Unbelievable advances in everything, like adding tubes, and a new Source like a quality DAC. It had about a 3db increase in sound pressure cause the volume was now way lower on the same amp, and the Bass was literally like adding a solid 12" sub somewhere in the room, no joke. Beyond that the Control physically of the drivers was like a VISE, the 8's now bareley moved and sounded so much cleaner. It was worth the couple hundred no doubt, Plus in some of the klipsch 2 way or I guess might be 2.5 ways there are very few parts, it seems they are 1st order's, cause only had 6 parts total on each board and we built them still with the Biwire posts.. I also did this to a pair of Cornwalls, it helped but was not as dramatic cause due to the 3 way it cost a lot more to use the same caliber of components that we did with the reference series, the biggest difference and Mistake in this case we believe building the cornwalls was that we ended up with Simple Solen 14 gauge inductors and they were built physically with much smaller parts to get away from just building seprate cabinets for outboards.. That was a pretty big difference though.