Anyone own the King Sound "King" speaker that can

The King has a built-in protection circuitry so that it will automatically cut output significantly if it's run too hard. Nice; you won't blow out a speaker. Mine have done that occasionally. However, you can run them moderately loud. I can run them about 88-90dB as measured from about 12 feet from the speakers, my listening position, without stress.

The bass is gratifying, extraordinary for a full range panel speaker. Driver coherence, texture of instruments and voices and tonality are all first class.

When set up well they are quite the experience! Many speakers are impressive, but not all that involving. The King is highly involving, as well as impressive. I don't care to reveal it publicly yet but I have running now an "alternative" rig which makes the King sound scintillating! It's an odd pairing but the results are astounding. I had two audiophile friends over this past weekend and they were as amazed as I have been.

Your room looks like it would be pretty well suited for the King, but check your amps to make sure they can handle low impedance, about 2 Ohms.

Clio09, you may have been listening to the King II, which uses an outboard power supply. To my knowledge there is no separate bass amp; all the drivers are powered together.

The King II is at $10,500, which is not out of line with the original King and VAC power supplies at a total of $9,800.

They are quite different, with the King II having the same driver technology as the Prince II. It seems the integration of the King II's amp into the base of the speaker is not finalized yet.

Ha, should have revisited the posts. Jumping between too many conversations. I forgot that there was more than one Roger involved here in the situation. :) I thought that the setup mentioned was a bit too spartan for Roger Du Naier and the King, but in the past he has minimized demo setups somewhat.

The VAC/Kingsound/Cardas room at Axpona seems to have been one of the most well received. The King was in use, not the King II which was seen at CES. Use of a fine cable such as Cardas and the VAC Royal power supply would elevate the sound dramatically over past shows. People were finally beginning to hear what I have been hearing. However, if the speaker was not bi-wired and being used in a hotel room there still would be a very significant gap between what was heard and the speaker's full potential. The demo seems to have been more suited to the speaker's capabilities, and not surprisingly people noticed.

Being more technically correct, a working model of the King II was shown at CES; It is in development. The pic of the King II is in my Dagogo.com show report.
The original King is an extremely strong performer imo due to it being both ESL and line source. The bass performance is very commendable but improves nicely with the VAC power supply.

The King is a mature product; I do not know of any major revisions to it since I first saw it at RMAF 2008.

The King II is an actual speaker, an extension of the King concept, not a slight variation. It has never been presented to me as a fix, but as a further development of the technology. (The King does not have a sound which needs fixing, in my experience it is standard-setting for full range ESLs of that size/price, especially in the bass) It has the similar panel technology to the Prince II, and at the time of the show had an outboard power supply. The goal is that by Fall the power supply will be worked into the base of the speaker like the King. The King II also has an an optional/alternative traditional wooden latticework frame and wooden feet. I do not believe the King II is available yet.

I can see where if the speakers were moved about regularly a few bolts may loosen a bit. If I move the speakers I exert a lot of energy; I grasp them on their side trim and physically manhandle them, lifting them like a fork lift and walk with them erect until I place them down. Imagine holding a 100 pound weight out in front of you nearly at arm's length and walking twenty feet with it! It's tougher, but puts zero stress on the panel. I do not walk the speakers at all to move them. I can see how things might loosen if they were walked to and fro several times as it might place an ever so slight torque on the metal frame. This is just conjecture.

I wonder if the high humidity of Singapore contributed to Kiwi's troubles sonically with the King. My understanding is that ESLs have a tough time in high humidity environments. It is conceivable that the humidity would influence the bass response. If there was a microscopic amount of condensation on the drivers that would be a significant variable, I would think - especially given the ultra-light nature of the driver and it utilizing nanotechnology in their coating. Maybe the speaker was turned into a giant Ionizer? Kiwi, did you notice the air fresher in the room after listening sessions? ;)

It's much to the Kingsound design's credit that even driven to the point of the drivers making contact with the stator that they weren't damaged severely! That would have toasted many other manufacturer's designs!

Upon occasion I see a review which the experience of the writer is nearly an inversion of what I have experienced. There are still some mysteries in the world, not the least of which is, "How can two people hear things so differently?" :)

Neal, what are some systems you have had set up with the King? Just curious to hear, and what your thoughts were about them. Which rig do you think most favors the King?

Neal, you sound like part mad scientist! ;)
Please let us know what transpires if you do the car battery PS. It would be interesting to compare a battery vs. VAC power supply.

Well then, I'll be very curious to see the result of the car battery experiment!