Old is new – and even better!

This month, some unusual and fascinating news, on the theme “Old is new – and even better!”

Last March 8^th through the 10th, Allnic Audio hosted a room at Seoul Korea’s annual audio show. What was unusual for this, or any, audio show, is that Allnic’s KS Park and his partner, SJ Lee, showed off three large VINTAGE speaker systems. They consisted of the JBL Hartsfield, a large Tannoy coaxial model, and the Altec VOTT A5, better known as the world famous Voice of the Theater. What made this unusual presentation more than just a museum of audio display was the introduction of Kang Su Park’s brilliant constant impedance network as the speaker crossovers.

The network operates on the same principles as Mr. Park’s world’s first constant impedance attenuator, found on the Allnic L-8000 and L-10000 pre-amplifiers. A great idea for a new application of this ground-breaking technology! Incorporated into the speakers, these networks eliminate phase anomalies and allow the individual speaker drivers to operate in their correct bandwidths, crossing over on a gentle 6 db slope. The end result is to take famous commercially designed speakers, such as the Altecs, meant for use in theatres and other very large scale venues, and have them create a holographic, linear and intensely satisfying near field presentation.

KS Park’s networks design wowed the Korean audiophiles. The room was packed from morning till night. Special attention was focused on the cloned JBL Hartsfields. The drivers, horns and woofers were all originals from the late ‘50s and early ‘60s; the big cabinets were the clone items and featured Mr. Park’s Magic box network system. In the case of the Tannoys and Altecs, equal fascination was evident from the crowds’ enthusiasm.

Also at the show, Allnic Audio presented the incredible L-10000 OTL/OCL preamp driving the 200WPC M-3000 Mk2 monoblocks. Judging by the traffic jams in the room, the demonstrations were a great success!

Witnessing this phenomenon, I contracted Gary Fisher Speakers of Pennsylvania to put together a pair of the Altec A5s.

Gary built new, well-constructed cabinets to house the Altec 416B and 288-16G compression drivers with the 1005B horn.

During the build, we shipped Mr. Park’s constant impedance network to Mr. Fisher to install on this project. Upon receipt of the constant impedance network, Gary expressed serious skepticism about the Magic boxes’ ability to take the industrial sound of the Altec speakers to a level of performance beguiling enough to work its way into a serious audiophile’s home. His email to me on examining these networks was graphic: “I say bullshit” were his exact words!

Well, I’m happy to report upon completion of the speakers and installation of KS Park’s “magic boxes”, Gary’s next comment was, “I owe you an apology, and I will have to eat crow on my previous comments.” Gary says now that visitors entering his workshop and auditioning our A5 project say they have never heard these industrial speakers ever sound so beguiling.

Suppliers of Gary Fisher speakers have repeatedly insisted upon opening the magic boxes to try to reverse engineer Mr. Park’s creation. As simple as these boxes look, though, KS Park assures me that reproduction would be challenging indeed.

The speakers’ expected arrival in Kelowna is mid-May. Because of Gary Fisher’s reaction, I have also procured a pair of Altec 9848 and JBL Olympus speaker systems to mate with these new inventions from KS Park. More to report at end of May!

]At the same time, the ALLNIC ZL cables continue to garner praise and sales internationally from those willing to gamble on the strength of the designer. The competition in the price point between modest and expensive is challenging. However, feedback we are receiving from many of our customers is that because of their outstanding performance, the ZLs are replacing cables that cost upwards of four or five times the money. In some cases, people are expressing utter shock about how good these ZL cables really are. Here’s a typical customer comment, on a trial with the ZL-5000 power cords:

I don’t understand why it is so good. It’s almost like other cable companies are doing it wrong.

Recently, another customer called me after receiving his pair of MU-7R interconnects. He said:

You described it properly. It was edgy and thin for the first few hours but bloomed shortly after, offering speed, weight, articulation, and a fantastic sense of holographics. Magnepans are not known for doing bass, but man, this is remarkable – do I have bass!

We love customer satisfaction!

Stay tuned for more adventures soon – and enjoy your music!