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An Eureka Moment!

R

rabidlistener

pfm Member
Some years ago we moved house and when I reinstalled the system I decided it was time to replace my much loved/abused original Pro-ac Tablettes. Seeing as I did not have much money available for their replacement I was looking at a pair of Wharfedale Diamonds as I had fond memories of the first versions. Anyway they did not impress me on demo and I ended up taking a punt on a pair of gigantic, 55kg each, Chinese speakers after a short single speaker demo (the shop did not know how to wire them up correctly!) using a Be Gees DVD! These speakers are impecably finished and came with heavy duty speaker cable & white gloves all for the bargain price of $799 AUS (around 400 quid) - if they had a FEF or B & W badge they would have many times that price!

I have had great fun playing with them using various amps but they always seemed to be biased towards one channel. This annoyed me so much I eventually purchased an Advance Acoustic X-i125 amp which you can alter the balance via the remote control.

It did the job perfectly but recently I was thinking about scratching a 55 year itch (don't ask!) and decided to get some electrostatics. After a couple of attempts at purchasing some Martin Logans fell through I took another look at my existing speakers.

My LH speaker ( the one that seemed to be down on level) sits near a corner of the room whereas the RH one is in free space. I thought I detected a slight boom in its bass response so I bought a couple of sheets of acoustic foam to line the corner walls. Well its been the best $60 I have ever spent. Not only has it cured the boom but now I have both channels at the same level! The system sounds so much more focused and coherent also I can turn it up much louder than before.
 
nostromo said:
I'm really surprised they are better than the Pro-ac Tablettes.
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The Tablettes were amazing speakers for their size and I bought mine at the height of the Linn/Naim hedgemony - they blew Kans away. The Chinese monoliths sound so much better, play louder without distortion and give you that kick in the guts when the bass comes in.
 
No, it's A. It's pronounced "yureeka", not "ooreeka", so it's definitely A. Unless you're staying in an hotel.
 
A more useful pedantic passing comment* might be to suggest it’s unlikely that a few sheets of acoustic foam would make much discernable difference to bass response - you need several foot of depth to impact there. Far more likely it’s impacted upper mid and treble. Either way, if it’s fixed the issues you heard, all good!

* :)
 
I think "a" or "an" is used based on the sound of the word rather than the first letter.

eg. "an honest man" because of the silent 'h'
"a hardy perennial" . The 'h' is pronounced.
 
Craig B said:
Or shopping for vacuum cleaners.
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Hoo ver heck d'you think y'are, pontificatin' about cleaners?:D

Euan said:
I think "a" or "an" is used based on the sound of the word rather than the first letter.
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So do I, as that is the pattern of the indefinite article which is commonly used and flows linguistically. however, some words, like horrific can be 'an 'orrific scene' or 'a horrific scene', which follows this pattern.

As I have Diamonds and am familiar with ProAcs, I know which I'd take between Tablettes and Diamonds. Your Chinese 'behemoths', relatively speaking, are a totally different kettle of fish to your Tablettes or Diamonds and of course would give a bigger sound; would probably be more efficient too. If they're ported, they should be away from room boundaries (if rear ported, WELL away) and if treated equally in positioning, won't need foam or anything else Spikes or a low stand might benefit them, however, as they do for most speakers.
 
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Mike Reed said:
Hoo ver heck d'you think y'are, pontificatin' about cleaners?:D
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I just knew that you would chime in here, Mike.

The only problem with Eureka vacs is that 'Eurekaing' just doesn't work. Not only that, but one can hardly say that they were doing the hoovering with a Eureka.

Having said the above, for most of my formative years, I enjoyed doing the Electroluxing. Posh as we were, I wouldn't even let the maid touch the Electrolux 88. After all, it was my first push-car, and it had what I imagined to be a jet engine within!

74661512-614.jpg
 
sideshowbob said:
Surely it's "A" Eureka Moment? asked a passing pedant
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I thought long and hard about this but decided life's too short to worry about it



Mike Reed said:
Hoo ver heck d'you think y'are, pontificatin' about cleaners?:D



So do I, as that is the pattern of which indefinite article which is commonly used and flows linguistically. however, some words, like horrific can be 'an 'orrfic scene' or 'a horrific scene', which follows this pattern.

As I have Diamonds and am familiar with ProAcs, I know which I'd take between Tablettes and Diamonds. Your Chinese 'behemoths', relatively speaking, are a totally different kettle of fish to your Tablettes or Diamonds and of course would give a bigger sound; would probably be more efficient too. If they're ported, they should be away from room boundaries (if rear ported, WELL away) and if treated equally in positioning, won't need foam or anything else Spikes or a low stand might benefit them, however, as they do for most speakers.
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I'm originally from the East End so 'aitches' don't exist in my alphabet.

My speakers are 3 ft from the back wall and the LH one is a couple of feet from the side wall. They sit on spiked pavers and have their rear ports stuffed with drinking straws. (as per the Tablettes)

I am still trying to work out the relevance of vacuum cleaners - we have an over priced Dyson which replaced an Electrolux for which spare parts were no longer available.
 
rabidlistener said:
I thought long and hard about this but decided life's too short to worry about it
I am still trying to work out the relevance of vacuum cleaners - we have an over priced Dyson which replaced an Electrolux for which spare parts were no longer available.
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Eureka is a fine old American vacuum cleaner company (founded by a Canadian and now owned by a Chinese corporation).
 
Mike Reed said:
So do I, as that is the pattern of which indefinite article which is commonly used and flows linguistically. however, some words, like horrific can be 'an 'orrfic scene' or 'a horrific scene', which follows this pattern.
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But does anyone actually say 'orrific'?

It's only 'an' if the initial 'h' is silent, which is the case with 'honour', but not the case with 'horrific' or 'hotel'. Confusion arises with words derived from the French, where the 'h' is invariably silent, but where in the equivalent English word, it sometimes is, and sometimes isn't.

To check, try the word without the indefinite article. Would you say 'Which 'otel are you staying at?' Obvs not, unless you're pretending to be Hercule Poirot.
 
Mike Reed said:
So do I, as that is the pattern of which indefinite article which is commonly used and flows linguistically. however, some words, like horrific can be 'an 'orrfic scene' or 'a horrific scene', which follows this pattern.
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Right! Now it’s all clear. Actually, on second thoughts - pardon?

Joe Hutch said:
But does anyone actually say 'orrific'?
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I’m sure I remember someone like Lionel Jeffries saying ‘you are an ’orrible little man’ to (perhaps) Norman Wisdom in a parade-ground scene in a film (UK, 1950-something, B&W)
 
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Mike Reed said:
Hoo ver heck d'you think y'are, pontificatin' about cleaners?:D



So do I, as that is the pattern of which indefinite article which is commonly used and flows linguistically. however, some words, like horrific can be 'an 'orrfic scene' or 'a horrific scene', which follows this pattern.

As I have Diamonds and am familiar with ProAcs, I know which I'd take between Tablettes and Diamonds. Your Chinese 'behemoths', relatively speaking, are a totally different kettle of fish to your Tablettes or Diamonds and of course would give a bigger sound; would probably be more efficient too. If they're ported, they should be away from room boundaries (if rear ported, WELL away) and if treated equally in positioning, won't need foam or anything else Spikes or a low stand might benefit them, however, as they do for most speakers.
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Which would you choose? The diamonds?
 
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