[R-390] New favorite listening speaker

[Tim Shoppa]

After some serious long-term listening to my 390A's, I've decided on
the ultimate listening speaker for SWLing:

  Electro-Voice EV4's.

These are mid-60's (? Lasnerian) vintage Hi-Fi speakers with 8 ohm
inputs and a midrange horn + tweeter and woofer with a crossover.
Most of the action when listening to SW is of course the midrange
horn with a little bit out the woofer.

Coupled to my 390A with a 600-to-8 ohm transformer, they are sensitive
enough that with the local gain cranked to 5 or 6 I get a real good
mellow sound out of them that covers most of the basement.

By comparison my metal bookshelf speakers (old Minimus 8's) no longer
sound very good at all. The EV4's are not as sensitive as the Minimus 8's
but the 390A's output stage can do a pretty good job of driving them.

I could see going back to the Minimus 8's for voice communication maybe
where maybe some tinniness helps. The EV4's are really mellow and
filling by comparison, with very little directionality.

I also tried a supposedly high-end PC-clone speaker system (two little
satellites plus a woofer) on the insistence of a local ham and it
sounded like total and complete crap to me. Of course I was biased
going into that test too :-).

My new favorite antenna is a two-turn electrostatically shielded (e.g.
in copper pipe with an insulating joint) 2.5ftx2.5ft loop in the
attic, hooked up to my 390A via Twinax. Far and away this is the best way
to suppress local QRM/RFI, even if it is not as sensitive as a longwire.

Tim.