Kickass Mullet
Posted by: Mr.Tibbs on 16 March 2004
I've now got a fully blown Mullet system, and it has never sounded better.
The front end, a relatively lightweight CDX / CDPS
The back end, a very heavyweight high-end pair of loudspeakers, the Ergo III's
Flat earth types everywhere look on in horror... Tibbs has lost it... but has he?
Take a moment and consider the facts in a little more detail, then decide.
What if I told you the top half of the E-III is basically a Super Kan, a small, solid sealed box with a paper cone mid-bass driver and a tweeter to die for?
Then instead of a steel stand, the Super Kan's sit on a very rigid and damped, sealed cabinet – that just happens to have a 10 inch woofer to bring real bass into the equation.
If this is Mullet, it sure Kan kick ass.
Mr Tibbs
Posted on: 17 March 2004 by smike42
Surely by that reckoning Briks Kan kick ass too yet my system got hyper mullet comments just a few months back before I hit the yellow brick road and got a CDS3 and a Supercap.
I'm happy anyway but you do need to try some serious power amplification with those excellent speakers you've built. Say a 300 or even a 500 to see what they can really do.
Smike
Posted on: 18 March 2004 by JeremyD
James,
To the best of my knowledge a 1980s edition of Hi-Fi Choice (I think), a well-known former forum member and you are alone in describing Kans as "honking". I owned a pair of Kans from 1987/88 to 1994, and there was nothing about their sound in the various systems and rooms that I tried them in that I would remotely describe as "honking".
Now that at least three people have used this description, I am really intrigued by it. Do you literally mean honking - e.g. like the horn of a Model T Ford - or do you mean something else? If the latter, would you be willing to describe it in more detail, perhaps with a few examples of its effect on music?
Posted on: 18 March 2004 by Rasher
I have heard this effect too. Not just from Kans, but from Intro's, Rega Ela's and other lower in the range Linn speakers. I sat with my dealer and he didn't understand what I was hearing, because he wasn't hearing it. I had dismissed it as just being me. "Honking" is the best description.
Posted on: 18 March 2004 by JeremyD
Hmmm...
I had wondered if honkiness had something to do with what I call an overdamped sound [because it gives me a feeling that the drive units are literally overdamped] but I don't recall Intros sounding overdamped.
Does it seem to be primarily a dynamic effect that harms the articulation of a sound? Or is it more a "coloration" that affects the sound tonally but not dynamically?
Posted on: 18 March 2004 by Mr.Tibbs
"Surely by that reckoning Briks Kan kick ass too yet my system got hyper mullet comments just a few months back before I hit the yellow brick road and got a CDS3 and a Supercap."
What was wrong that you felt it necessary to hit the yellow brick road? Surely you didn't succumb to the hyper mullet comments? The point I'm making is that there are plenty of pretty good systems out there, let down only by using speakers that are nothing special. I'm using a set of speakers that would retail for more than my CDX / CDPS, and the result is fantastic. Keeping my ES14's, and changing the CDX for a CDS3 would not (IMO) have brought as much fun to the party.
"I'm happy anyway but you do need to try some serious power amplification with those excellent speakers you've built. Say a 300 or even a 500 to see what they can really do."
The beauty with the E III's is, they don't need a big power amp to go loud or perform well. I'm not saying a 300 wouldn't be better, it certainly would, but the money would be better spent upgrading the CDX. Again, right now I can't see the need to upgrade anything.
"Mr Tibbs, I don't consider the CDX/PS lightweight by any stretch of the imagination. Certainly not in the context of CD3s and 5s."
James, all I meant was the CDX / CDPS is lightweight compared to the value of the E III's. The CDX / CDPS is a fine combo – the III's have proved that in no uncertain terms.
Mr Tibbs
