Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

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Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by jajo »

Ever since Fredrik released his first Tundra amplifier, I have been curious to try them in my own system. My only concern was power. I like to play loud, and movie soundtracks can be very demanding to the amplifier.

I recently replaced my speaker system with speakers from the JBL PRO CINEMA line - the same kind of speakers that are mounted behind the screen in commercial cinemas. They are huge and extremely sensitive (99dB, 1W @ 1m). A perfect match for Tundra Mono 2!

Said and done, yesterday Fredrik arrived at my place with four boxes, each containing a Tundra Mono 2 to power my 3 JBL 3677 Left/Center/Right and my JBL 4645C subwoofer.

Image

Image

To be continued...
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by DelNaja »

Hi jajo,

Well, I'll be following this with interest, to be sure.
Thanks for posting!

On a personal note, watching movies has never been as much fun, and involving, as with a pair of Monos!
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by rowlandhills »

Is that a Tundra Stereo at the bottom powering your surrounds?
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by lejonklou »

No, four TM2's.

One for left, one for right, one for center and one for the sub.

The four surround speakers are still driven by the 7 channel class D Nuforce amp in the middle.

I would have brought two stereo Tundra's as well if I had any, but they're currently out of stock...
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by jajo »

Part 2: Review of my speaker system (before Tundra Mono 2)

I guess JBL PRO is pretty unknown to most people on this forum so I will start by reviewing them. Please note that this part of the review is entirely based on the performance while using the Nuforce power amplifier. The Nuforce is one of the best 5+channels poweramps I have tried. The musical performance is a step up from Linn 5125 and the overall sound is a lot more "hifi".

I am using three JBL 3677 as left, right and center speakers. 3677 is JBLs smallest cinema array speaker designed to be used in smaller commercial cinemas (a lot larger than my room though!). It has two drivers - one compression driver+horn for the higher frequencies and a 15 inch woofer to handle bass and midrange. The reason why I chose this speaker is because of the quality of the drivers, especially the woofer. It is one of the most popular woofer to be used in DYI projects and it is known for being very natural, musical and powerful.

3677 is cheap, you can get them for 500-600 dollars brand new. It is also a very popular speaker to clone, and you can easily build one at half the price if you do it yourself.

The sound is far from cheap. What this speaker lacks in looks, it delivers in sound. Between 80hz and 15khz, this speaker is extremely neutral. No coloration or character whatsoever. What becomes very obvious that the limit is in the quality of the source. You can easily enjoy the benefits of a Klimax DS with this speaker. In fact, I have never heard the difference between Majik DS and Klimax DS as clearly as now.

When the 3677 is used without a subwoofer they sound a bit on the thin side. They are not made to reproduce any content below 80hz. So, what is the 15 inch woofer doing? A lot... What really strikes you is the quality of the midbass. This speaker can really reproduce the real sound of kick drums and bass guitars. It is quite addictive.

Horn constructions tend to sound a little harsh or "honky" in the higher frequencies, but this is not the story with the 3677. It is actually quite the opposite, I find these horns to be less ear fatiguing than the average speaker.

What are the drawbacks with the 3677 (other than the most obvious: size and looks)? This is not a traditional hifi speaker. The treble rolls off quickly over 15khz and if you are a big fan of "detailed sound", this is not for you. 3677 plays the music without the small fireworks and sparkles. The music feels live and you don't think much about the sound but if you listen for it, you will not find those micro details that you hear when you listen to systems like Linn Exakt.

When Fredrik had his first listen of the 3677, this was pretty much the first thing he noticed. "Something is very right here, but it sounds odd!" was one of his first impressions. And he also commented on the lack of bass - the subwoofer was not turned on. We listened to a few tracks in FLAC through a Majik DS and then I turned on the 80hz crossover which sent the bass content to the subwoofer.

This is really when the 3677 is transformed into a full range speaker. My subwoofer, JBL 4645C has an 18 inch driver and a huge port. It can deliver an extreme output down to ~22hz and just like the 3677 the sound is very neutral. Now, with the added bass extension, music became even more enjoyable. Fredrik commented that it felt live and how it feels like the instruments and artists would be playing in the room. I agreed. Overall, it was a very nice sound and the musical performance was good. Not "the best I have heard", but enjoyable.

The quality of 3677+4645C becomes just as obvious when you are in another room. It feels like there is a concert going on in the other room and it is very easy to follow the music from a long distance.

Also, the 3677+4645C is awesome at low volume levels. You really don't lose anything while lowering the volume, much thanks to the high sensitivity of 99dB.

Now, we decided that we had heard enough. We were both extremely excited to replace the Nuforce amp (powering L/C/R) and the Crown XTI2002 (powering the sub) with Tundra Mono 2. Would it be powerful enough to drive the speakers without clipping? Would it sound better?

To be continued...
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by Azazello »

Hi jajo!

What is your impression of the performance of those JBL's compared to the 242's you replaced with them? Did you ever compare in the same system?
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by lejonklou »

jajo wrote:Also, the 3677+4645C is awesome at low volume levels. You really don't lose anything while lowering the volume, much thanks to the high sensitivity of 99dB.
I have heard this claim before and have always wondered why high sensitivity would result in a good and/or "realistic" sound at low levels. Can anyone explain the physics behind it?

In any case, that's how this 99 dB sensitivity speaker system behaves. At high levels: Very smooth on the ears (and I have problems with tinnitus, so this aspect is very obvious to me) yet sooo physical - a very addictive "in your bones" feeling.

And then at low levels - even very low - these physical qualities somehow remain. It resembles how a really good aktiv system can perform at low levels - and then some more in the same direction.

I have been investigating 15" woofers. I didn't know I needed an 18".
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by Music Lover »

Are you using a digital filter before the signal is sent to the sub amp?
No filtering before the signal is sent to the L and R-speaker amp I guess
It's all about musical understanding!
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by jajo »

lejonklou wrote: I have heard this claim before and have always wondered why high sensitivity would result in a good and/or "realistic" sound at low levels. Can anyone explain the physics behind it?
Not me, for sure. Sensitivity might not even be related to this. I've just experienced that speakers with low sensitivity requires more volume to reach me as a listener. Especially when listening from another room.
Azazello wrote:Hi jajo!

What is your impression of the performance of those JBL's compared to the 242's you replaced with them? Did you ever compare in the same system?
I never compared the JBLs with my 242s. I actually owned another set of speakers (M&K S-150) between the 242 and JBL. I loved my 242s and I think it is one of the best speakers Linn ever built. My ears are quite sensitive and I found the aggressive midrange in the 3K-array to cause ear fatigue, especially with movie soundtracks, which is why I had to replace them.

Sound-wise, the 242s would excel in "hifi" while the JBLs would be more like going to a great gig. The JBLs would have a flatter frequency response while the 242s would go lower in bass and have a more protruding midrange. The midbass in JBL would crush 242, making voices and instruments more realistic.

Tune dem-wise, it is impossible to know for sure without making the comparison. My gut feeling is that the JBLs would be the winner. 3677 makes tune dem so easy and they really grow more than any speaker I ever owned when something is improved earlier in the signal chain (more about that later!). But again, just guessing here. I am having more fun listening to music now than I did with 242, and the music is easier to understand.
Music Lover wrote:Are you using a digital filter before the signal is sent to the sub amp?
No filtering before the signal is sent to the L and R-speaker amp I guess
The signal to L-C-R is filtered at 80hz. I have compared this many times and always found it to be better to filter the non-fullrange speakers than pushing them to play bass that they cannot handle. Bass below 80hz is handled by the subwoofer, which is superior at doing this. The filter is most likely digital (in my ADA Suite 7.1HD).

/ Jacob
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by matthias »

I like this thread, it is very refreshing. There is a life outside the Linn cage.

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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by Ozzzy189 »

matthias wrote:I like this thread, it is very refreshing. There is a life outside the Linn cage.

Matt
My thoughts too, really good read.
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by Music Lover »

jajo
When can we read part #3 in this very interesting review?
It's all about musical understanding!
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by Azazello »

I just HAVE to get my hands on a pair of 3677's!

The question remaining is what kind of stands I'm going to use..?
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by moog_man »

matthias wrote:I like this thread, it is very refreshing. There is a life outside the Linn cage.
+1 to that, too.
It also helps enormously that jajo is generous with the details.
Two of the most exciting discoveries for me in the past 18 months have been the introduction of Tundra Mono and hearing a pair of PMC fact.12s on the end of a Naim system. Akubariks are polite boarding school gents compared to those bad boys.

Greatly looking forwards to Pt.3. And, eventually, implementing the 3 Tundras into the front section.
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by jajo »

Part 3: Connecting the Tundras

Me and Fredrik had great fun listening to the JBL system through the Crown/Nuforce amplifiers. Especially from the kitchen. It sounded live, like a concert was going on in the other room. We were both super excited to hear what would happen when we connected the Tundras.

At this point, the system played so well that I was sceptical that the Tundras would make a HUGE difference. I had a feeling they would be better. But not that much. I mean, it already sounded very good!

Anyway. We disconnected the Nuforce and Crown. I had the pleasant experience of unboxing the Tundras. We connected the cables. We powered everything on. Fredrik adjusted the idling current. It was all set.

We both sat down in the cinema room and I started playing the same song we listened to with the Nuforce/Crown amps before disconnecting them.

The music started.

Disclaimer: The next part of this review is going to be ecstatic. I have rewritten this text several times, trying to be objective and not use too big words. But. Damn. What follows is my honest impression.

I was no longer listening to a pair of speakers. I was no longer thinking about the frequency range. I was no longer missing any hifi qualities. With Nuforce/Crown, the JBL system was a speaker system. It was playing music in a way that was sounding "live". With Tundra, it wasn't sounding live. It was live. It is hard to explain, but from the first tones, I was moved away from my cinema. I wasn't listening to a stereo anymore. I was there. With the artists, and their music touched me in a way that was brutal. It was instant.

When the first track had played, I looked at Fredrik. I could see that he was blown away, just like me. I paused the music.

-"What just happened???"

We started talking about hifi. Because that was the easiest thing to talk about. I realised that everything I thought about how my speaker system sounded was just not valid anymore. "Rolled off treble", "Not sounding very hifi", "Where is the bass?". The hifi qualities were all there now - but also the last thing I cared about. In the same way that you would never say "Great song, but I was missing some treble and hifi details" if someone sang to you in real life. In reality, you don't question how it sounds, because it is the reality. If a sound is missing, it is missing because it is not there. And you know it. I got the same feeling from my speakers with the Tundras.

-"Play that song with The Police!", Fredrik told me.

I played the song. We had just heard it with the Nuforce. And this time, we just enjoyed the show, not analysing the sound. We played many more tracks and no matter what we put on, it was a truly addictive experience, like hearing the song for the first time.

Swapping the amps to Tundra Mono 2 is the biggest improvement I have ever experienced in a hifisystem, ever.

With the support of the JBL 4645C 18 inch subwoofer (also powered by a Tundra Mono 2), all instruments and voices had incredible depth and physical presence.

Gobsmacked, we decided to turn off the lights, turn on the projector and move on to multichannel sound (movies).

I booted up my cinema server, loaded a playlist containing both commericials and trailers, just like in a real cinema. The first commercial was for Volvo, and the music in the background together with the images of a car driving in the landscape sucked me in. I felt like I was in that car, driving in this landscape.

I was touched by a commercial!

Fredrik laughed. I think he felt the same. Then some trailers, which made me want to see those movies so bad. And then we played lots of clips from movies, and no matter what we put on it was hard to stop watching. Actors felt incredibly real. Jokes were funnier. Scary scenes were scarier. Dialogue had never been easier to understand.

Both me and Fredrik were mostly silent during the entire evening. We just watched the movie clip after movie clip. We both got very emotional from time to time. No need to talk about what we were experiencing. It was just so obvious.

When time was 04:00am, we both felt that it was time to go to bed and get some sleep. Time had been running away. And although I have been playing with hifi/cinema for almost 15 years, I had never in my whole life had the kind of experience that I had that night.

Would it be the same the next day? What happens when the Tundras are breaking in?

To be continued...
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by Ozzzy189 »

This thread is so fantastic to read, I and many others are finding it riveting viewing. If those tundras are not run in expect a huuuuge improvement after a week. I've just Googled your speakers, 35kg each, Omg they're heavy buggers aren't they?
Sagatun monos into a home cinema system, is that something do able?
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by Nature »

What sources did you use during this session?
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by beck »

I want to be at this gig! :-)
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by jajo »

Azazello wrote:The question remaining is what kind of stands I'm going to use..?
Ozzzy189 wrote:Omg they're heavy buggers aren't they?
Oh yeah! They are huge and heavy. Two people are required to carry them safely. Finding a speaker stand that can take their weight is going to be tricky I think. The best way is to construct a custom stand (which is going to require quite a lot of experimentation - 3677 is VERY sensitive to installation).

Maybe I need to write a few words of caution regarding the speakers. They are not built to be used in a normal living room, so expect more tuning than your average speaker to get them playing at Linn performance. When I installed them the first time, they sounded really bad and I was almost thinking in terms of "What the f**k have I done?". Then I started tweaking the position, I completely rebuilt the shelf they are standing on behind the screen. All was quite easy thanks to the speakers being so revealing and sensitive to tweaking. They also required lots of break in (loud music playing when I was not home for a week). If 100 is the index of a speaker performing at its best, I'd say they were 15 from the beginning... The sub was better right out of the box, probably because they only play a smaller part of the music.

My room is heavily acoustically treated (almost like a studio) which suits these speakers great. I have no idea how they would work in a "normal" room. But since they are so easy to "tune", I am sure it can be great if done right.
Ozzzy189 wrote:Sagatun monos into a home cinema system, is that something do able?
Cinema soundtracks are a tricky load. Very loud, especially in the LFE. And although these speakers are very sensitive, Tundra Mono has limits. I will cover more about this in Part 4. But I am sure you already get the feeling that this is working better than expected :-)
Nature wrote:What sources did you use during this session?
Music was played with a Majik DS, first generation (!!!). I had a Klimax DS in my room just a few days before and the difference between Majik and Klimax have never been bigger (using the Nuforce/Crown combo). I just cannot imagine how great it would be to listen to Klimax with Tundras connected... Oh wait, that is what I am going to do. And I will post my impressions as Part 5 of this review :-)

Movies are played with my own movie server (probably the only movie server developed with tunedem!). It is using an old version of XBMC (now known as Kodi) with hundreds of tweaks. Operating system is Linux. It crushes every bluray player I have ever compared it to. And it plays music quite well.

/ Jacob
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by rowlandhills »

Ozzzy189 wrote:Sagatun monos into a home cinema system, is that something do able?
I know that the Sagatun and Sagatun Mono can both be grouped so that they can work as a six or even eight channel volume control. You'd still need something to do the multichannel decoding though.
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by Ozzzy189 »

rowlandhills wrote:
Ozzzy189 wrote:Sagatun monos into a home cinema system, is that something do able?
I know that the Sagatun and Sagatun Mono can both be grouped so that they can work as a six or even eight channel volume control. You'd still need something to do the multichannel decoding though.
That's what I was wondering, how would the multi channel stuff work? Some kind of processor?
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by bugi666 »

Author mentions dedicated movie server based on Linux - so maybe decoding is done there? Otherwise, you could you not use any BR player with analogue outs like Oppo?
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by lejonklou »

I can vouch for the quality of Jajo's streamer, as in the past I had the opportunity to tune some of its parameters. A perfectly calm and flicker-free picture meets a dialogue where you can really understand what they're saying and sense the mood of the person speaking, in perfect lip synch (don't under estimate how even the tiniest amount of lip synch can ruin the illusion). Add to this the embrace of truly musical sound effects and enviromental sounds, like when the main characters walk on a busy city street and then enter a creaky wooden door leading into a small, almost empty bar where some chaps chat quietly in a corner and the bartender is washing glasses under running water. The door closes behind you.

It's an emotion rollercoaster machine that is constantly evolving and in comparison any BR player I've tried is so boring you just want to go do something else.

The decoding is done in the ADA preamp/processor, a task it seems to handle very well. The ADA also sets the volume digitally, but this task could easily be replaced by Sagatun preamps and the ADA set to fixed level out.

I'd love to try this. Four Sagatun Mono's and two stereo Sagatun would handle all 8 channels. Six more shelves in the engine room would be necessary and frankly I'm not sure Jajo dares to try it. (he he)
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by jajo »

Ozzzy189 wrote:Sagatun monos into a home cinema system, is that something do able?
I read "Tundra Monos" (need to sleep more). Here is a more correct reply:

My processor (ADA Suite 7.1HD) can be used as a pure decoder by disabling the volume control. It could then be connected to 8 Sagatun Monos (or 4 mono and 2 stereo to reduce the number of boxes).

But just like Fredrik wrote, I am honestly not sure if I dare to do this... :O

/ Jacob
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Re: Tundra Mono 2 in a Cinema?

Post by per »

How do you take the audio signal from the HTPC to the ADA?
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