Klipsch Cornwall IV

I found that putting them on Herbie’s Giant Gliders really evens out the frequency response and cleans up any muddiness in the upper bass and lower mids. Tiny changes in positioning--like a centimeter or less--in any direction also change the sound to a remarkable degree.

@simao , I think the upshot is that you need to audition in your space, with enough leeway to determine whether you can get them where you want them. The CW4 is an extremely resolving and well-balanced speaker that requires painstaking set up to reveal its capabilities. Dealer auditions will never do.

@wrm57 my space could easily accommodate the CW4s. It's just a matter of finding the circumstances to audition them at my place. 

Just order them from a place with a 60-day return, and figure to cost of return freight into your long-term investment in the sound you want. This way you’ll really know. That’s what I did. The trial is up next week but I’ll be keeping them, which I couldn’t say for sure until I spent a lot of time dialing them in. Just one happy CW4 owner’s opinion.

In reference to above.. there is no perfect speaker.  What I consider perfect, or at least near perfect, you probably would not, even given the same room and system because our hearing curves and tastes are different.   I would consider the X5 to be as perfect a speaker as I have ever heard.  Ozzy had the X3 and bought Cornwalls...   It depends on what you are after.  Some people love horns and simply couldn't live with any other type of speaker long-term.   Others cannot stand horns.

My preference is to always start with a tube friendly speaker design.  I cannot listen to SS amps.  I find them very two dimensional compared to a GOOD tube system.  A mediocre tube system is flabby in the bass, etc...   Given a tube friendly speaker you can put together all sorts of systems, roll tubes, etc....  You can tune it.   As I said above, the Cornwall IV is a completely different animal than previous versions.   I have them dialed in so I hear micro detail and a very 3D sound stage that is literally 10 -12 ft high and several feet wider than the speakers.  They will do that in a good room with a very good system driving them.  To me they image as well as any other top quality speaker I have had in here.

What you are seeing in the later part of this thread is that a dealer demo of the cornwall IV or any other speaker can turn you off them.  Most dealers don't have the speakers well placed.   I would never demo a tube friendly speaker with even that mac hybrid integrated.  You are listening to a solid state power amp driving a very efficient horn speaker that cries out for tubes.  If I were to demo the Klipsch heritage line I would certainly have a top notch all tube system in front and a really good source, not some iPad.  A top notch DAC.

Others will disagree with me and prefer solid state amps.  That's cool, that is what the hobby is about.   I can build anything, but I only build tube amps because that is all I can listen to.  Heck, I have serious preferences in capacitors, power supply topology, output transformer type, etc...  But those are mine.  Others have different tastes.  Same with speakers... there is no perfect speaker.   Given a budget you should try to hear a number of different designs and then hopefully demo something in your room with your system.  Not always possible I know....

I was surprised when the store employees started dialing in song selections from their iPads. There was a McIntosh turntable in the room and I had brought some vinyl, but at no time did the store emps ask about it or offer to play. They said they had a four song playlist that Klipsch recommended for a sound test. 


They also insisted on playing each track at huge volumes. Nothing wrong with that, per se, but there were no jazz or classical offerings. They seemed really excited to play The Eagles and, considering the demographic most likely to buy these, I'm not surprised. But it turned me off completely. 


Another listener suggested a Nils lufgren track and the 3D imaging was quite good, but every other iPad track was bombastic and one dimensional.