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harbeth shl5plus or audionote an-j or an-e

thebiglebowski said:
I had both J's and E's on lead and sand filled AN stands. Tried the E's in and out of the corners but they just boomed like crazy, I had a chat with Peter Q at AN and he agreed my room at 16x12 was probably too small for E's

Bought some J's and they worked perfectly and are probably one of my favourite speakers.

IMG_0573 by The Biglebowski, on Flickr

Untitled by The Biglebowski, on Flickr
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My old J's in the top picture. I replaced them with a pair of AN/E SPe Sig HE.

My room is small, and by necccessity I have to have the speakers back in the corners. I get no hint of boom from my E's. I moved the J's on as I wasn't getting enough bass from them for my listening tastes
 
Cyclopse said:
Was this the P3ESR?

The specs say they are 50 watts programme.

Regards

Cyclopse
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The baby Harbs, l ran them with my SONY TA-F770ES:) they sounded great, then when plugged in to my Virtue Audio Sensation Tripath jobbie (44wpc) that sounded amazing, however more power and that probably been it for me, the sound was that good.
 
thebiglebowski said:
Get yourself a nice set of AN-j Hemp and buy brumjams OTO SE Sig and you'll have a fantastic setup.
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Amen to that!......however I was very impressed with the sound from HL5 Plus and the Hegel integrated at Sound and Vision last month. I think the Harbeths are very dependant on he positioning in the room, where the J's are happier in a normal home environment.
 
now thanks for that , i am agonising a bit over that becuase its not so easy to have a home demo on them . having bought some tannoy recently i am also following this thread and tom and others have some sage advice on the audionote , he says this amongst other advice

"AN Es/HEs - For me the biggest issue is the pseudo low bass you get from the lightweight flexible cabinet design (it's designed to resonate). Can work in some rooms but but rear ports make placing difficult in many rooms. The recommended corner placement can be very hard to achieve and in any case often ends up sounding muddy. I've had four pairs on home demo of ever increasing expense (and weight - due to the amount of silver involved) up to about £12k retail, and the ever more expensive single ended amps to drive them, and personally I think a better result can be had at a fraction of the price from Tannoys - almost any of the Tannoy dual concentrics - and a decent push-pull valve amp. Don't get me wrong I have heard them sound good (and musical) but in my view there are too many caveats to recommend going down that route. As Adey says even the pricey ones can be coloured. "

http://theartofsound.net/forum/show...o-Note-AN-E-and-Tannoy-Canterbury-GR-(battle)

the an-j/lx are reasonably affordable and i am sure they would sound good with the otto .

so for past week been playing with these harbeth hl5plus , at times they are simply amazing . listening to chopin is beautiful . they really get your feet tapping and are compelling to listen to . imaging has been a bit tricky but last night i moved them to facing forward with a tiny toe in and they just snapped into place....woah...where did that soundscape suddenly come from! but in this room with few furnishings they are still a tiny bit forward . on one big forum a good number of the harbeth users [ a lot of them using 40.1 i think] have tried naim and harbeth with excellent results

so changed the links to chord sig links and changed the interconnect to a rfc mercury and we shall see how we go . the harbs are certainly very close to my last verity audio rienzi speakers although they don`t of course have the bottom end of the bigger rienzi
 
yep, hifinutt, the harbeth are seductive. I also been tempted to sell them but afraid ill regret it. im in the same boat as you. Tannoy offer more tactility in the bass, but doesnt have the same midrange. its all tradeoff and it sucks :)

FWIW, I prefer to have my shl5plus directly toed in such as the tweeters point directly in my ears or even pointing my nose, so quite a bit more toe in then your setup. this combination I found gave the best imaging.
 
yes i would totally agree with that sumation re the tannoys , incredible bass but not quite the same midrange as harbs .
 
One very important aspect when considering AN speakers is whether the bass driver has a (grey) paper or (blue) hemp cone.
This changes the characteristics significantly.
The paper cone is more coloured and sounds as if it has more bass. These models can boom if tight into the corners.
The hemp ones are noticeably cleaner, less characterful, and to my ears definitely need to be tight in to corners.
However, reading through the thread, it is clear that you really like the Harbeths.
On that basis I'd stick with them.
(Or am I spoiling the fun of trying something new and different...... :))
 
thanks rms really appreciate that re hemp and yes thats the one i would go for

, i think the harbs are just slightly too forward in the loft so they will probably go
 
My suggestion, which is rather self-interested but not, I believe, without merit, is that you scrap the AN idea and go with Tom's mainfesto that you've quoted above. Take a total Tannoyista road for a while; modern in the loft and vintage in the living room. Perhaps you could even have Eatons in both rooms, or perhaps some Chatsworths downstairs. Now here is the self interested bit. You turn the living room into a permanent comparative laboratory, with a revolving door of numerous Tannoy models, comparing all of them to your modern Eatons and writing an extensive Tannoy journal for all of us to learn from.

Is that too much to ask?
 
hifinutt said:
For me the biggest issue is the pseudo low bass you get from the lightweight flexible cabinet design
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It's not resonating in the low-bass, but upper-bass and lower-midrange:

506ANEfig2.jpg

Audio Note AN-E Lexus Signature, cumulative spectral-decay plot calculated from the output of an accelerometer fastened to the cabinet's side panel 8" from the top (MLS driving voltage to speaker, 7.55V; measurement bandwidth, 2kHz)
Read more at https://www.stereophile.com/content/audio-note-e-lexus-signature-loudspeaker-measurements

Here's the SHL5+ for comparison:

615HLS5fig2.jpg

Harbeth Super HL5plus, cumulative spectral-decay plot calculated from output of accelerometer fastened to center of top panel (MLS driving voltage to speaker, 7.55V; measurement bandwidth, 2kHz)
Read more at https://www.stereophile.com/content/harbeth-super-hl5plus-loudspeaker-measurements
 
Elephantears said:
My suggestion, which is rather self-interested but not, I believe, without merit, is that you scrap the AN idea and go with Tom's mainfesto that you've quoted above. Take a total Tannoyista road for a while; modern in the loft and vintage in the living room. Perhaps you could even have Eatons in both rooms, or perhaps some Chatsworths downstairs. Now here is the self interested bit. You turn the living room into a permanent comparative laboratory, with a revolving door of numerous Tannoy models, comparing all of them to your modern Eatons and writing an extensive Tannoy journal for all of us to learn from.

Is that too much to ask?
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ah thanks ... the thought had occurred to me , some juicy stirlings and kensingtons on ebay !!!

just need to sell some stuff to fund it all !!!
 
just an update , and thanks to all who helped decide . Big thanks to crimsondonkey who lugged these over and helped set up in loft room . sounding very good indeed , using with naim supernait 2

you can see my beloved verity audio rienzi next to them which i had to sell to pay the bills !!! these are now in a very happy house in barnsley

this is at reference fidelity place

IMG_0194 by https://www.flickr.com/photos/158267783@N02/, on Flickr
 
Real wrench letting these go, even worse when they sounded so good in Phil’s loft. Already regretting it!

Anyway nice to see them go to Phil who will undoubtedly enjoy many happy hours listening to them.

Just wait till you get a decent amp driving them ;)
 
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