Completely different speakers with different drivers and a built in amp. Apples to oranges.
KeithR's "Dream Speaker" Search
- Thread starter KeithR
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Completely different speakers with different drivers and a built in amp. Apples to oranges.
No they're not - same speakers modded - with a supertweeter added. Amp is a sub amp.
You're crazy. And wrong. Look again.
If these speakers are not a value, you must think Wilson's are a real rip off.
Hey Rob, I’m afraid you are incorrect. go look at how the drivers are made as well as Johns own post on his website. it’s not remotely the same and Seas had never done this before.
Fine with me Jeffery if you are convinced on which you state then you are missing nix and the Speakers are worth the $80K + asking price.
I'll still go with my gut
--entirely, I will admit based on the 4/5 listening sessions I'd had with Devore products over the last 5/6 years.So until I possibly hear those mentioned maybe THEN I will be in a position to make a confirmed opinion one way or the other.
I'll rest in the interim from further partaking
BruceD
Well they went to the trouble of using brass...for all metal parts it seems. Not sure what if any sonic benefit it brings but it will definitely add to the cost...just how much is again debatable.
The defense must have missed the new AlNiCo 10" driver and additional super tweeter,. The defense also seemed to miss the additional cabinet with two woofers and an amplifier. I might have an asshole, but I also have a pair of eyes.
http://devorefidelity.com/oref/
On the spectrum of loudspeakers, appalling to convincing, Devore places closer to convincing than appalling by a good margin. But they aren't musically convincing to me, the main problem being the glaring disparity between the attributes of Devore's various bass implementations and the midrange + treble characteristics of each speaker. That incoherence alone is too distracting of fidelity for me to consider owning them. There are further integration problems wrt how the midrange and tweeter drivers' dissimilarities intrude, but these are much lesser offenses.
But that's me. The company has its adherents and happy owners. So since a point of contention has emerged about value as applied to Devore materially, I have to come to the company's defense. The fit and finish, quality of assembly and overall complete execution of the product is among the best in the loudspeaker industry. All of Devore's loudspeakers are built to a cosmetic excellence and build precision beyond reproach, and they do it without dipping and smothering everything in obscuring black gloss paint. Is the 4-box system worth $85,000? Only the buyer can answer that. But independent of what one thinks of their sound, compared to what else this industry seeks $85,000 for in the first fifth of the 21st century, the 4-boxer looks solid in pixels and on paper.
By conventional channel distribution economics, if the store price is $85,000, there should be about $17,000 of factory cost in that item. Looking at how they executed and reading about the design and execution of the speaker, is that possible? Maybe. It shouldn't be. But the production volume will be very low; these speakers will be labor-intensive to produce. The custom brass components will cost all out of proportion to anything that will seem reasonable to the layperson. Plus the development cost should be built into the unit costs up to a certain level of production (that an $85,000 speaker may never ship enough volume to drop that cost component).
Now on the other hand, high end hifi has ceased to be priced on a channel economic model. Many small and single-entrepreneur companies design high end products for perceived value to a market of the "1%" so the price can be set very high and production volume can be kept low. The idea is to do the least work (produce lowest volume) for an unscalable company to generate the entrepreneur's needed lifestyle income. This is how we get $150,000 items that should cost $35,000 or less. $40,000 items that should cost $12,000. Or something really worthwhile like a Zu Dominance authentically-priced deep in 5 figures, but Sean could only build two pair a year.
Magico speakers have a magnificent internal structure and associated components. But none of them are worth five cents to me, though to some people they are seen as underpriced. Same with the whole abominable Wilson line. Rational pricing has been abandoned by the majority of high end speaker makers, with turntable makers and DAC producers all too happy to assume the same guilt. In that context, the relative fairness with which Devore's main line is priced suggests that the 4-boxer is not just a calculated high-end ripoff, but has some logic underpinning the $85,000 outcome.
Phil
But that's me. The company has its adherents and happy owners. So since a point of contention has emerged about value as applied to Devore materially, I have to come to the company's defense. The fit and finish, quality of assembly and overall complete execution of the product is among the best in the loudspeaker industry. All of Devore's loudspeakers are built to a cosmetic excellence and build precision beyond reproach, and they do it without dipping and smothering everything in obscuring black gloss paint. Is the 4-box system worth $85,000? Only the buyer can answer that. But independent of what one thinks of their sound, compared to what else this industry seeks $85,000 for in the first fifth of the 21st century, the 4-boxer looks solid in pixels and on paper.
By conventional channel distribution economics, if the store price is $85,000, there should be about $17,000 of factory cost in that item. Looking at how they executed and reading about the design and execution of the speaker, is that possible? Maybe. It shouldn't be. But the production volume will be very low; these speakers will be labor-intensive to produce. The custom brass components will cost all out of proportion to anything that will seem reasonable to the layperson. Plus the development cost should be built into the unit costs up to a certain level of production (that an $85,000 speaker may never ship enough volume to drop that cost component).
Now on the other hand, high end hifi has ceased to be priced on a channel economic model. Many small and single-entrepreneur companies design high end products for perceived value to a market of the "1%" so the price can be set very high and production volume can be kept low. The idea is to do the least work (produce lowest volume) for an unscalable company to generate the entrepreneur's needed lifestyle income. This is how we get $150,000 items that should cost $35,000 or less. $40,000 items that should cost $12,000. Or something really worthwhile like a Zu Dominance authentically-priced deep in 5 figures, but Sean could only build two pair a year.
Magico speakers have a magnificent internal structure and associated components. But none of them are worth five cents to me, though to some people they are seen as underpriced. Same with the whole abominable Wilson line. Rational pricing has been abandoned by the majority of high end speaker makers, with turntable makers and DAC producers all too happy to assume the same guilt. In that context, the relative fairness with which Devore's main line is priced suggests that the 4-boxer is not just a calculated high-end ripoff, but has some logic underpinning the $85,000 outcome.
Phil
Stenheim Alumine Five:
I heard this speaker not on the typical CH Precision electronics, but Doshi tubes. Doshi uses KT-150 tubes in its amplifiers so I felt it was going to be reasonable proxy to my ARC. The speakers themselves are gorgeous in person - the finish is more matte and i think looks awesome. The red slits are replaceable via magnet for any color that you or a spouse chooses.
First I'd like to say that there is a tonality about this speaker that is beguiling - it was a very different sound than I was anticipating. The midrange is rich, vivid, and open. On a few vocals that the dealer started on, I could see the appeal of this speaker very much. It was also a more upfront sound than normal dynamic driver speakers. Tone was excellent - and as I burned through my playlist I kept coming back to how horns and strings sounded. I did notice that Johnny Cash didn't sound quite like a baritone, so some embellishment may have occurred but it was very seductive.
The tweeter was almost a tad shelved down for me, without air of some others - to be fair, this could have been the amps and I wondered if a DartZeel would be the prefect Swiss partner as Dart is known for its extremely natural and extended treble. There was positively no sibilance. Dynamics unsurprisingly were excellent - 94dbs is a notch up from my Devores on that scale. I actually went back to some tracks after a two hour session to confirm this. Also on the plus side there was good flow and *excellent* clarity. My Devores aren't this transparent at home.
However, after the first half hour I started to notice some negatives - first was that soundstage wasn't as good as some others (Rockport and YG in particular). I felt everything was quite low - and confirmed when I got back to my Devores that this was the case. On electronica this was more notable - didn't get that huge fabric in front of me where beats are outlined and envelopment effects. Depth was also fairly shallow - this could have been more room related, not sure although the speakers were a good 4' from the curtained wall behind it. But gosh, that string tone!
On the bass, just feel Stenheim may tune their bass for smaller living environments through the front port. I find it overdamped and that the Rockport is more natural in this regard and still retains the bass title. There just wasn't as much weight in the low registers. It seemed like the port was cutting off the bass notes early if that makes sense.
All in all, this was a strange audition - the speaker hit on two of my three criteria, but I'm not sure the sound stage was effective enough for my tastes. While leaving, I kept thinking "Harbeth in an aluminum box with dynamics." I also notice that JV notes the image height and "bottom up sound" in his Axpona notes - precisely was what I heard yesterday.
I heard this speaker not on the typical CH Precision electronics, but Doshi tubes. Doshi uses KT-150 tubes in its amplifiers so I felt it was going to be reasonable proxy to my ARC. The speakers themselves are gorgeous in person - the finish is more matte and i think looks awesome. The red slits are replaceable via magnet for any color that you or a spouse chooses.
First I'd like to say that there is a tonality about this speaker that is beguiling - it was a very different sound than I was anticipating. The midrange is rich, vivid, and open. On a few vocals that the dealer started on, I could see the appeal of this speaker very much. It was also a more upfront sound than normal dynamic driver speakers. Tone was excellent - and as I burned through my playlist I kept coming back to how horns and strings sounded. I did notice that Johnny Cash didn't sound quite like a baritone, so some embellishment may have occurred but it was very seductive.
The tweeter was almost a tad shelved down for me, without air of some others - to be fair, this could have been the amps and I wondered if a DartZeel would be the prefect Swiss partner as Dart is known for its extremely natural and extended treble. There was positively no sibilance. Dynamics unsurprisingly were excellent - 94dbs is a notch up from my Devores on that scale. I actually went back to some tracks after a two hour session to confirm this. Also on the plus side there was good flow and *excellent* clarity. My Devores aren't this transparent at home.
However, after the first half hour I started to notice some negatives - first was that soundstage wasn't as good as some others (Rockport and YG in particular). I felt everything was quite low - and confirmed when I got back to my Devores that this was the case. On electronica this was more notable - didn't get that huge fabric in front of me where beats are outlined and envelopment effects. Depth was also fairly shallow - this could have been more room related, not sure although the speakers were a good 4' from the curtained wall behind it. But gosh, that string tone!
On the bass, just feel Stenheim may tune their bass for smaller living environments through the front port. I find it overdamped and that the Rockport is more natural in this regard and still retains the bass title. There just wasn't as much weight in the low registers. It seemed like the port was cutting off the bass notes early if that makes sense.
All in all, this was a strange audition - the speaker hit on two of my three criteria, but I'm not sure the sound stage was effective enough for my tastes. While leaving, I kept thinking "Harbeth in an aluminum box with dynamics." I also notice that JV notes the image height and "bottom up sound" in his Axpona notes - precisely was what I heard yesterday.
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Keith, I really think the AG Duos Mezzos are gonna be the spkrs that convince you. Just ensure the amps are best suited to them.
When I heard with FM electronics and with audio consulting, the stand out attributes were bass, soundstage, and speed
Ked, this just shows how hard it is to pin down spkrs attributes in a single demo, no matter how well set up the demo is. What opportunities are there, and how motivated is Keith, to seek out second, more favourable demos of these spkrs, and even the Animas?
definitely agree on the speed front. as I mentioned, the speaker might be more ideally suited for no global feedback SS and improve the bass.
i have a friend with the Fives on the east coast using Constellation, but just bought a Jadis amp. I'm curious what he prefers. he also mentioned that the east coast dealer puts the Fives on platforms - i think i know why.
The width of the boxes around the midrange and the squareness will detract from the big 3D soundstage you're seeking. They look neat but those super square edges are not a good thing, and the wider a speaker is the less 3D depth you get, as the effect is largely generated from late reflections. Some manufactures like VSA even put tweeters on the back to enhance it.
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