Now thats just hilarious...
I can assure you there are probably fewer speakers I have
not heard or owned!
However as with all things Linn, they split opinion and the real fact is that few people who have made up their mind about the older speakers have heard them operating correctly with
up to date drivers, amplification etc.
I am not a "front end first" fanatic as was the case in those days. Nor do I particularly like Linn (some of the newer stuff is rather horrible) but if you have a room that works with such designs (and most females would prefer we did) then done properly a Brick, Sara, Sara 9 Kan, Keltic, Keligh etc will absolutely demolish much of the more recent speaker brigade. This from someone who has invested many many many thousands in different and far more expensive brands over the years.
At the end of the day - it depends on what works for you in your room. Given you can actually save money on going and purchasing such equipment rather than just lashing out many more thousands then it would seem a good thing in todays rather austere environment.
One thing to note - all those considering such - the chap that made the tweeter for the Brick, Sara, Kan, first Kaber etc is still doing so. A ridiculously well made and put together, respected all over silk dome tweeter in three guises and he is doing very well thank you. Not something that can be said of many of the units that ended up in many "serious" speakers. Anyone with Apogee Caliper Sigs in the loft?
However, it is one chap making them mainly for quality reasons and I have noticed over the years how much of the criticism of the aforementioned speakers is usually over models that either have damaged drivers or are using whatever Linn could knock up or get hold of, if for example he took a holiday. It is why they eventually went through all the pain of making and specifying drive units from larger companies. Often with terrible results (first ceramic tweeter anyone - yet the third or fourth version was ok - ish?) When the big numbers in sales were required, he could not keep up. So they moved on and parted ways.
Get a pair that tickle your fancy and get hold of a pair of new tweeters from the man that does them best and they suddenly they really work. It is not expensive, they are better than or equal to pretty much any current tweeter and they can be made in several flavours that fit even far newer models. I can't really name him here but any search of the Linn forum will bring this topic up.
Even on models like Keltic or Kaber...
If they work in your room - and the active ones will, then you really do deserve to hear them properly rather than listen to anyone here pulling the trapdoor up because they have an issue with slick marketing or the LP12 is much too expensive these days and anyway they stole it and no one liked it!
Oh by the way - my earth is always round and while I have owned several LP12's the Roksan and the SME were far better decks.
I use my current set up with gosh horror, an Oppo 105!
But for old times sake I have a Rotel 965BX LE Discrete...
Along with amps from LesW and Linn and Naim and Krell...
Says it all really
Indeed. There are those who like their earth flat...and the others
I just tend to think that people who rave about Linn speakers haven't heard much else, or what they have heard isn't too clever.
I got rid of my Bariks when I realised they were comprehensively outclassed by a pair of 12" Tannoy monitor gold chassis in some floorstanding home made cabs a friend gave me. We're not talking opinion here, this was outright clear superiority, unless your criteria for hi fi reproduction prioritized a flat, unreal sound, a limited soundstage, sat-on dynamics and listener fatigue. Friends who knew my system concurred, visiting civillians said how real it sounded (comments the Bariks had never attracted) as did my other half who isn't interested in hi fi but seemed to be playing more records...
When I sold them I demo'd them, but I didn't dare have the buyer listen to them in comparison with the Tannoys. I know he'd have walked away.
Although Linn called the Bariks DMS (domestic monitor system) and PMS (pre menstrual sorry professional monitor system) I don't think they were ever used in a studio enviroment, or had a studio heritage, as do Tannoy or JBL. You have to ask why professionals shunned them, if they were such fabulous speakers?
