Your personal best, Earth shattering speaker auditions that left you speechless

Discussion in 'Audio Hardware' started by The FRiNgE, Dec 3, 2016.

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  1. Tony Plachy

    Tony Plachy Senior Member

    Location:
    Pleasantville, NY
    OK, so I have been looking to upgrade my speakers so I am going to divide my answer into recent and past history.

    Right now I have been very impressed with the Magico S7 followed by the Wilson Audio Alexia.

    Past history going from ancient to about 10 years ago.

    1970's (IIRC) the AR LST - It did not look as good as other speakers, but it sure sounded good.

    Late 70's or early 80's (IIRC) Dahlquist DQ-10's - Looked weird, sounded great

    Late 80's 0r early 90's Apogee Scintilla - never heard a speaker sound so open. It was at Sound by Singer (S by S) before Andy moved down to Union Square

    2002 NYC Audio Show - S by S had a huge room with top-of-the-line Focal Grand Utopias, BAT amps and a dCS stack. Still one of the most realistic sounding system I have ever heard.

    Early 2000's (IIRC) NYC Audio Show Von Schweikert Audio had these huge 600 lb speakers that had an active subwoofer in each speaker enclosure. These things put up a wall of sound that was unbelievable.
     
  2. Drewan77

    Drewan77 Forum Resident

    Location:
    UK/USA
    A bit of a left-field reply which may be off topic, apologies....

    The first speaker audition that left me absolutely speechless was a time/phase coherent DEQX controlled horn system. I then purchased a DEQX processor, configured my 11 year old Shahinian Obelisks & when I played them back in my own system I swore out loud because they sounded almost unbelievably better (if anything, 'rave' reviews on the DEQX site understate what is possible). I now have a much more sophisticated 4 way system with two DEQX processors but nothing beats those first two experiences when I had no idea what was actually possible.

    In my experience, any speaker will only sound at its best with absolute frequency-phase-time coherence + acoustic/room correction. Even relatively humble designs can be made to sound pretty exceptional.
     
  3. Mike from NYC

    Mike from NYC Senior Member

    Location:
    Surprise, AZ
    in 1969 I heard the recently released LZ II played through Electro Voice Patrician 800s and their sound blew me off my feet as it did to several others. I never heard bass before like I heard it that day - simply incredible and floor shaking. Whole Lotta Love sounded like a different song as compared to when I played it through my AR 2ax's. I never knew a record could sound that good.

    Magnepan Tympanis at Lyric HiFi powered by Mark Levinson equipment in the early 70s. They played some Miles and each of us were quite stunned by the pure magic.

    At the NY HiFi show I heard the Radialstrahler MBL 101 X-treme and was once again blown away. I thought they were the best sounding and unusual speakers of the entire show and their imaging breathtaking. I only wish I had the room for their smaller brother the 101E.

    Few other speakers have left a 'good' memorable impression and many of the uber $$$$ speakers left me unimpressed although the 101s are hardly cheap.
     
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  4. The FRiNgE

    The FRiNgE Forum Resident Thread Starter

    This is why we should as audiophiles explore and upgrade. My second speaker purchase (1979) was a mistake, a privately owned speaker company from Waltham Mass. I was too enamored by their bass extension but overlooked inaccurate "hot" midrange. (was fooled by sales rep's choice of music ie: Linda Ronstadt "Simple Dreams" on Nautilus which is scooped in the mids) A good high end reference speaker can enlighten us to what's possible. Good indications are emotional responses and in some cases altered vitals .
     
  5. The FRiNgE

    The FRiNgE Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Speaker audition at a stereo shop will often be in a controlled room environment.
     
  6. The FRiNgE

    The FRiNgE Forum Resident Thread Starter

    True of large panel electrostatics, and flat ribbons, the midrange has a more visceral effect. The listener has this sense of being immersed in sound.
     
    ZenMango likes this.
  7. ZenMango

    ZenMango Forum Resident

    Location:
    Florida
    [​IMG]
    Well it's a small panel ribbon, but it sure gives me that great magical, open midrange. It's a compromise I can live with.
     
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  8. John Woo

    John Woo Well-Known Member

    Location:
    Singapore
    in the 90s where Bose first made inroute to our location, i went to check out their 5.1 system. the demo was some African drumming track,
    n the entire room filled with dynamic and livelike sound, i was like wow wow wee wee.... and stayed till the demo was over.
    then one of the staff tugged me gently n lifted the table cloth and pointed to me some kind of processor.... he told me quietly... that is a $50k processor driving the setup. i thank him for the "Revelation" n left the shop n never look back. i dun know about other places, but here we have a few shops doing the same, having some "secret ingredients" to make their gear sound just fantastic but when u buy their products n bring them home and sound becomes like a bicycle tyre that has a big puncture, flat ... a total letdown. so i m very wary of such practices as i considered this as dishonest tactic.
     
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  9. robertk

    robertk Forum Resident

    Location:
    Ecuador
    Kind of like a 2 or 3 stage answer depending.....back to the 70's;

    1. Khorns circa 1976 or 77. I'd driven quite a ways to buy some Heresy's. The shop played some khorns for me and even the Lascalas. They had a liberal trade in policy at the time and you got full cost if you upgraded in a year. I did just that & made the jump up.

    2. Went to a high end store in a big city a few years later--where you had to go to see high end stuff anyway. Beveridge speakers driven by Levinson. And some double Quads driven by Threshold, if memory serves. Went back a month or 2 while later & the Beveridge had stopped working, so they had khorns driven by Levinson amp & pre-amp, showing me my electronics were junk.

    3.pretty much a short while later, Maggies driven by Audio Research tubes and then Krell amps with the Infinty IRS And Infinity 4.5.

    Pretty much every time I heard newer and better, it became a case of save up $$ and out with the old and in with the new. But you did have to go to big cities to hear things---if you lived in small towns, you were out of luck for the real high end gear. Similar in some ways to the exotic automobiles distribution---Maserati's were not sold all over the place & you have to go to them.
     
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  10. mrz80

    mrz80 This page intentionally left blank

    Location:
    Gainesville, FL
    Three times:
    1) many years back, a set of Hales Audios (Signatures? Legacies? Can't remember the model - floorstanding MTM) at a high end shop in Bethesda, MD about 20 years back. Most incredibly lifelike sound, very easy to pick out which individual musicians in the orchestra were coughing or turning pages on the score between movements, marvelous reproduction of just about any music the salesdweeb ran through 'em. TOTALLY owned the WATTs/Puppies in the same showroom. Orders of magnitude better. To this day I don't think I've heard a better pair of speakers. Where oh where on EARTH did Hales get off to? :(
    2) The little baby Maggies, the SMGa - salesguy played a paino/violin duet... never heard more natural reproduction of either instrument on a loudspeaker before. Shoulda bought a set. If chamber music is your special thing, you've gotta have Maggies!
    3) When Roger demo'ed the XR-250s I'd come to look at - The bass extension and absolute clarity of the low end completely sold me on the speakers. He always considered the 250 the best smaller speaker he ever designed, and he's right. Even my notoriously tight-fisted wife agreed after 10 minutes of listening that they were worth whatever I'd paid for 'em :)
     
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  11. DPM

    DPM Senior Member

    Location:
    Nevada, USA
    Are you referring to Hales Design Group led by Paul Hales? If so, then I get where you're coming from. I've owned the Transcendence 8 towers, the matching center channel, the Revelation 3 towers, the matching center channel and the Revelation 1 monitors. I still use the the Rev. 3s as surround speakers in my home theater room, and the Rev. 1 monitors are still in use too. I gave my Trans. 8s to my brother and his wife.

    Hales was the speaker brand that made me fall in love with sealed box loudspeakers. Such a shame that the company went out of business back at the beginning of the new millennium. Paul Hales went on to work in the pro audio market (for QSC I believe) before starting a custom design home theater company.
     
  12. lonelysea

    lonelysea Ban Leaf Blowers

    Location:
    The Cascades
    In Taipei at the moment and got a chance yesterday to visit some high end audio shops. The first place had a pair of MBL Radialstrahler 101 E MKIIs near the center of the room, driven by gigantic MBL monoblocks using enormous Transparent Reference XL speaker cables. Upon walking in it was impossible to determine which speakers (there were several pairs on display) were delivering the beautiful sound of Classical music. The music was everywhere - like the small auditioning room was instead a large concert hall. I've never experienced anything like it! The gentleman there admitted that the speakers where best used for listening to Classical music and if I wanted something for Country (?!) I should audition the Rockports (Atrias, I think) they had. I hope to do so and report back with pics.

    The next place was an Audio Research/Estelon dealer. I listened to a mid-level (+/- $70,000) setup which included Estelon YB speakers driven by a 75 watt Audio Research tube amp, Audio Research pre amp and top-loading CD player (redbook only). Cables were Siltech. Sound was very intense and detailed - maybe too much so? I'm so used to my mellow, 20-year-old B&Ws that ten minutes in front of this system left me feeling a little tired! Impressive but maybe not my cup of tea...
     
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  13. The FRiNgE

    The FRiNgE Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Always fun, and never know what you'll find, thanks for sharing.
     
  14. Audionerd

    Audionerd Forum Resident

    Location:
    New England, US
    Hate to be "that guy," but it was my first real speakers/stereo I got when I was 14 years old, forever altering the way I listened to, heard, and felt music:

    An all-in-one unit (turntable/receiver/dual cassette decks) with tower speakers from Soundesign. I would crank those things up, completely distorted, with awful sound.... it was my introduction to rock and roll, and it was the best thing I'd ever heard.

    I can honestly say it changed my life. Still chasing that feeling after 25+ years. Now using B&W's to do the same thing, as it's what I can afford. And I still love rock :edthumbs:
     
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  15. The FRiNgE

    The FRiNgE Forum Resident Thread Starter

    yep! Just imagine yourself in front of a wall of Marshalls on 10!
     
  16. Audionerd

    Audionerd Forum Resident

    Location:
    New England, US
    Yep, on my bucket list!!
     
  17. Andy Boyd

    Andy Boyd Forum Resident

    Location:
    Seattle
    Klein & Hummel O-300 powered studio monitors gave the "clearest picture" of music I had personally recorded I've ever heard. More recently, Focal Sopra 1's knocked my socks off for realism, better than the larger Sopra 3's in a different room.
     
    The FRiNgE likes this.
  18. Tullman

    Tullman Senior Member

    Location:
    Boston MA
    I auditioned the Magico S3 and the Wilson Yvette speakers along with the B&W 802 D3 speakers. I really liked all three speakers but ended up with the Yvette's better bass was the game changer for me.

    Let us know what speaker you end up with.
     
    SandAndGlass likes this.
  19. BrokenByAudio

    BrokenByAudio Forum Resident

    just bumping this thread. I've been in the local the last couple weeks auditioning some speakers with a buddy of mine. I'd previously made up my mind I wasn't going to get into the Magico S3s even though I loved the sound--I've been desiring to downsize the cabinets just a hair for aesthetic purposes. So the speakers I'd committed to in my head was the B&W803D3s and of course they sounded quite lovely (second time I'd heard them but in a different setup). But then a few days later we went back in and demoed the Magico S3s (second time for me). I don't know if it was the different demo discs I took in but we were both totally blown away this time (all PS Audio upstream gear, including mono block SS amps. All cabling is JPS Aluminata). So now I'm thinking "Screw the speaker to room proportions..."

    My buddy is bent on going the extra mile and even though we haven't had the opportunity to demo them, is now leaning toward the Magico S3 mkIIs which apparently have anywhere from a one to three month ordering backlog. (The first pair the local dealer brought in for the store was purchased before it was even uncrated--all these things, along with stellar reviews, suggesting that the upgrade in speaker build justifies that rather elevated price increase--$28K list for base finish vs $22,600 list for base finish on the original S3.)

    We'll see where this goes.
     
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  20. Thomas_A

    Thomas_A Forum Resident

    Location:
    Uppsala, Sweden
    The Ino Audios in a very clever damped and diffused studio room around 15 years ago. Top speakers with 4 x 9 inch woofers for each channel for midrange, and 4 x 15 inch subs. Sealed room. The measured in-room response with wall support is around 138 dB at 20 Hz. Earth shattering and clean, yes.

    [​IMG]
     
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  21. Daily Nightly

    Daily Nightly Well-Known Member

    Location:
    New Jersey, USA
    When I got a pair of A.R. 3a's and a Dynaco Stereo 400 at a flea market in 1999...made even the Dokorder 7100 reel to reel I was using (at the time) sound better than its league.
     
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  22. tman53

    tman53 Vinyl is an Addiction

    Location:
    FLA
    The Dahlquist DQ10's were the first mind blowing speaker for me. I heard them for the first time in the mid 70's and quickly realized that I was not playing on the same field with my bookshelf speakers. I remember hearing them at an audio shop owned by a doctor outside of Philly that I cannot recall the name of. Of course they were way out of my price range but I did wind up purchasing a set of RTR floor standers ( can't recall the model) that matched up very well with my Dynaco gear at the time.
     
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  23. Strat-Mangler

    Strat-Mangler Personal Survival Daily Record-Breaker

    Location:
    Toronto
    Wilson Acoustics Grand Slam at 100K/pair back then.

    Worked for an audio store but that room was off-limits except to a few employees. The guy in charge of that section allowed me in to sample Kind of Blue being played through top-of-the-line equipment for that store. MIT cabling of about 25K in value, etc.

    The sound was ridiculously organic, as if I was in a smoky jazz club. I've never forgotten the experience. I'll never be able to afford this kind of gear but it's crazy to think of what's possible when the right gear is used to reproduce sound.
     
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  24. William Bryant

    William Bryant Forum Resident

    Location:
    Nampa, Idaho
    Do you mean Wilson Audio?
     
  25. Strat-Mangler

    Strat-Mangler Personal Survival Daily Record-Breaker

    Location:
    Toronto
    Yes, sorry. The room also had Watt Puppies at 50K/pair back then.
     
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