Aragon Soundstage vs. Stage One

G

Guest

Guest
<font color='#000000'>I was wondering what the original date was for the Aragon Soundstage review in the Hardware review section?

Will you do a comparison review of the Soundstage with the Stage One?

Has product quality changed since Aragon was bought by Klipsh? &nbsp;RE: Stage One vs. Soundstage and old vs. new Aragon amps.</font>
 
G

Guest

Guest
<font color='#000000'>I also have an interest in this topic.</font>
 
gene

gene

Audioholics Master Chief
Administrator
<font color='#000000'>All;

I have prepared a detailed response to these questions which I will be featuring as a new FAQ. &nbsp;I am awaiting Aragons feedback before posting. &nbsp;It should be up by tomorrow in our FAQ and daily doses section. &nbsp;Please stay tuned....</font>
 
gene

gene

Audioholics Master Chief
Administrator
<font color='#000000'>Here is the article I promised regarding the impact of the Klipsch takeover of Aragon we feel has happened based on our personal experiences and limited knowledge of their new products based on their own documentation.  Please feel free to comment.

Post Klipsch Aragon Transcendence Towards Mediocrity?</font>
 
T

tburg

Audiophyte
<font color='#0000FF'>I was a die hard believer in Sony products based on their reliability, it just took me needing service from them once to sour that belief. I am upgrading to the Aragon Stage One. I hope I am not jumping from the the fire into the frying pan. &nbsp;
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G

Guest

Guest
<font color='#000000'>Prior to making this leap, have you considered the following Processors:

1) &nbsp;Integra Research RDC-7 Processor
http://www.integraresearch.com/product.cfm?id=1

2) &nbsp;Integra DTC-9.4 Processor
http://www.integrahometheater.com/model.c....ate&p=i

3) &nbsp;Anthem AVM-20
http://www.anthemav.com/NewSitev2.0/AnthemProduct/AVM20/AVM20.html

4) &nbsp;Parasound Halo
http://www.parasound.com/halonew/

There are certainly alternatives to the Stage One. &nbsp;I'd be willing to bet these units will out perform the Stage One, but who's to say. &nbsp;Just thought I'd throw them out and see if anyone has reviewed these units yet.

Sanford</font>
 
K

Klipsch Employee

Audiophyte
<font color='#000000'>Greetings!

For those of you looking for an online review of the Aragon Stage One, you might be interested in Kris Deering's review at Home Theater and High Fidelity:

Aragon Stage One Review

You can currently find pull quotes from previous reviews at the Stage One product page on aragonelectronics.com, or you can contact me directly and I will be happy to direct you to the specific issues of magazines featuring a review of the Stage One.

--Joshua Ryan Hall
Public Relations Manager
Klipsch Audio Technologies

E-mail Joshua: hallj@klipsch.com</font>
 
B

Bprest0n

Enthusiast
<font color='#000000'>First I would just like to say, what a sad state of affairs for Aragon now that Klipsch has taken them over.  I feel they made a grave mistake buring a website like Audioholics.com who used to praise them and recommend their hardware for people looking for quality separates.  In my opinion, their 2007 amp is a joke.  It has a smaller power supply than most flagship receivers.  I had a friend who used to rep Aragon and told me when he looked under the hood of their new amps, he couldn’t tell the difference between them and the old Acurus.  Normally that would be ok, but Klipsch is asking significantly more for these amps then when they sold as Acurus.

The review at Hometheaterhifi.com seems more like marketing literature than a review to me.  Lots of fluff, no details.  Note also that that website promotes exotic cables.

I had the opportunity to demo a fully set up Aragon Stage One and Anthem AVM-20 and felt the AVM-20 was a far better processor and better value.  Note this processor went up against the Aragon in Sound &amp; Vision (S&amp;V) magazine and the Anthem won product of the year.  Also note that the Stage One according to S&amp;V was only capable of delivering 2Vrms to the sub out.  My Yamaha receiver delivers 2x that and it’s a receiver!  I hear good things about the Sunfire processor and the Parasound Halo.  IMO, if I were going separates, I would prefer a processor and amp with balanced connections.  The Stage One does not have this capability.  The Stage One also cannot up convert its video inputs, doesn't have DTS 96/24, and uses crystal dacs found in $1500 processors.  Nothing state of the art here IMO.

I also find it even more dumbfounding that Klipsch had the nerve to burn AH and then come on their forums promoting their products.  What a shame. &nbsp;
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<font color='#008080'>We don't really censor here. Posting a link to another review after purposefully stiffing AH on ours is kind of tacky, though.

That's pretty much all I have to say. Other than that, the gear is what the gear is. People make decisions with their money based on equipment quality, performance and company customer service. So as always, we'll let the people decide for themselves where they want to spend their hard-earned dollars.

I for one, simply do not understand the customer disservice mentality behind what happened in this case.</font>
 
G

Guest

Guest
<font color='#000000'>You call that a review? &nbsp;Please, there is no detail about the unit at all other then what you find in a typical advertisement.

Sad, really sad. &nbsp;

At first, I thought Klipsch had somewhat of a good argument about Audioholic's generalizing things, but with this response, I'm in stiches. &nbsp;Who are they trying to fool? &nbsp;My personal opinion is to stop referring to them as Aragon and only refer to them as Klipsch. &nbsp;Aragon died!

As for the Klipsch staff who posted this cheesy review, if you want to read a real review, check out what these guys wrote about the Yamaha RX-Z1.

http://www.audioholics.com/product....p1.html

What's most interesting about this article is it doesn't just sing praises like that pile of crap about the Stage One. &nbsp;In fact, it actually criticizes the unit and they even make suggestions on how the reciever can be improved. &nbsp;Yamaha must not have minded as they went ahead and published it on their site, which is where I actually found the article to begin with.

Man, it seems Klipsch made a mistake by not having Audioholics review the Stage One. &nbsp;I think these guys are one of the the few places who review equipment fairly without all the techno-babble from marketing geeks.

I'm moving on to check out the Processors mentioned above by Sanford. &nbsp;Later for the Klipsch. &nbsp;Think about it, Klipsch makes some of the worst speakers on the market, now they will follow suite with the Stage One and scaled down amplifiers they're promoting.

Charlie B</font>
 
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Guest : <font color='#000000'>Think about it, Klipsch makes some of the worst speakers on the market, now they will follow suite with the Stage One and scaled down amplifiers they're promoting.</font>
<font color='#008080'>Well, we don't know this for sure, but if a company shies away from valid criticism then it doesn't bode well for the manufacturer OR the consumers.

All we know right now is that there isn't a critical review of the product out there and therefore either:

a) the product is perfect and has almost NO cons (except for the mentioned lack of OSD)

b) Klipsch may have opted to only submit product for review with people willing to promote it without serious critique.

For their sake I hope it's a) - but we just don't know - and that's what really bothers us. We don't know because they went back on their offer of allowing us to purchase a product for review. If this was a brief encounter or exchange we wouldn't really be a big deal - but to go so far as to charge our credit card for the unit, tell us it had shipped, and then decide not to do the deal, speaks volumes for the company.

Read their response in the article above - they give no apologies or explanation for their actions. None.

Joshua, when you get a serious critical review of the unit (note I do not mean critical to mean negative only critical as in careful, exact evaluation), please feel free to repost the location here.</font>
 
G

Guest

Guest
<font color='#000000'>I think what is important to remember here is that lack of courtesy speak for itself. &nbsp;Manufacturers should want to get their products known by as many reviewers as possible. &nbsp;Whether the reviews are positive or negative is somewhat irrelevant as it shows the manufacturers willingness to stand behind their products by getting them reviewed by a wide assortment of publications. &nbsp;The internet is the future for home theater IMO. &nbsp;More and more people are going online as opposed to buying magazine subscriptions for their information. &nbsp;

Look at Axiom Audio for example. &nbsp;They built an entire loudspeaker business driven by the internet. &nbsp;They do not advertise in magazines as far as I am aware.

Too bad, I was really looking forward to the Audioholics Stage One review &nbsp;
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Khellandros66

Khellandros66

Banned
<font color='#000000'>I have never heard either of these pre-amps, however I have heard a McIntosh and a Lexicon MC-12 (I know each is a a lot more price wise) but I was thinking that if the new Aragon pre-amp isn't as good as the old one why not spend your money on the new Lexicon MC-8, four 32bit Floating Point SHARC Hammerheads, plus 10 192kHz/24bit DACs vs then new Aragon which only uses two Motorola 24bit Floating Point DSPs.

Just a thought thats all.

:)~

Bob</font>
 
G

Guest

Guest
<font color='#000000'>Either the acquiring company looses sight of the virtues of the acquired company, OR, the acquiring company is shrewd and replaces the high-quality innards with cheap internals, yet keeping the high-end name tag and high-end price (with extra high profit margins). Thus, the buying public gets cheated until the scam is exposed -- now much easier and faster with the internet and websites such as Audioholics!

Not sure if you guys realize but I heard Paul Rosenburg has recently stepped down from Aragon. &nbsp;IMO him and Federici gone speaks volumes about the direction the company is now heading. &nbsp;The days or no nonse audio products built by Aragon may have now come to demise. &nbsp;
</font>
 
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Schurkey

Schurkey

Audioholic Intern
<font color='#000000'>Here is the article I promised regarding the impact of the Klipsch takeover of Aragon we feel has happened based on our personal experiences and limited knowledge of their new products based on their own documentation. Please feel free to comment.

Post Klipsch Aragon Transcendence Towards Mediocrity?</font>
Why does this link open a web page with an entirely different title...a review of the Soundstage (and 8008x5)?

Why is the page in that review titled "Aragon Soundstage Build Quality" replaced with content about the Aragon 8008x5 amplifier?

Seems like the Aragon/Klipsch/Audioholics story has been "edited".

Why did I have to break the link in the quoted post? It's YOUR link, obviously not "spam".
 

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