Folks I know I have sinned
so please forgive me. Here’s the rest of the story.
Well we got to Austin and checked into my friends house, rested a few then went out and checked out the Thiel 1.6 then the Spender S5e as in my previous post. Then we bought some steaks and went back to my buds home to have a little cook up. He was out with his son watching him play baseball.
Later, when they had gotten home and we had all eaten Susan and I were telling them about our travels. His son up and tells us about one of his baseball buds dad that was doing a big remodel on their home, and had a couple of speakers for sale as they were doing an AV in-wall install. I asked if he had a phone# and I called. When we got over there I ended up meeting a true brother in arms. He was in the midst of a very big re-model for sure. He had taken out the fireplace and replaced it with an electric one. Where the chimney had been was now a recess across the wall that he had installed a large DLP and on either side 2x5ft holes cut out that would be receiving his new in wall speakers, along with ceiling holes cut in with boxes to suspend his new surrounds for a 7/1. He also had a custom recess off to the side to take in his equipment, one of which was a pair of Cary 805Cs
and a wireless music on demand (I gotta get one). He had his old speakers, turntable and amp (not the Cary’s) for sale he said, as he would not be needing them any longer.
I have been cautioned and have learned that first impressions are dangerous. It's why speaker retailers are considered a want-a-be or used-to-be car salesman, because they know how to exploit the one-hour demo. It's only later, after you've lived with your purchase, that you find out it's a great source for listener fatigue, and you'd been seduced by its special attributes rather than by accuracy or naturalness or musicality. If anything, I think you would want to err on the side of politeness, in sharp contrast to spitty, edgy, nasty aggression (Gee, who does that remind me of?)(Not me I’m sure).! So we cranked them up with his Cary’s and spent some time shooting pool on a Beautifull Manhattan, Brunswick he had just acquired. He put on some Frank and Dino and Aretha, Peggy, Ray Charles and Ella and the voices were so realistic that Susan and I agreed it felt like you could just reach out and touch them. I also pulled out my reference CD’s that have some particular high freq. cuts that have given many so far a problem (Brian Setzer Live in Japan) I couldn't get them to spit or sizzle, and yet never did I feel that the top end was lacking. Now these speakers have metal tweeters and what veteran metal tweeter haters will find so disconcerting is that we found them smooth, sweet and velvety - almost a complete denial of metal tweeter values. But I suspect that part of the effect was the speaker's room-filling dispersion. With no head-clamped-in-a-vice hot-seat effect, there was a seamless, wall-to-wall sonic stage, with a texture and depth, which can only be described as 'silky smooth', and warm and caressing with no upper-frequency nastiness. Yes a little colored but in a good way that leaves everything clean and accurate. More than once, I heard an instrument play way off axis and the bass while not strong or thumping was, or just, felt “just right”. Susan and I, both of our own separate accord came to the conclusion that these were just right. They did not interpret but were merely a conduit for the music in a most pleasing and realistic way. I had heard that you have to be careful with the front-end equipment with these speakers and that worried me no little bit, as all I have is a Denon 2808, but my new friend said that it should not be a problem and it has proven with proper placement and sub settings he was right.
We came to the point of an offer, and when he spoke first I took it. No Haggle. I was tired
1200.00 inc. a 10ft. pair of Audioquest DBS BI-Wire and a pair of lead shot and sand filled stands from the Mfg.(the speakers were attached with a special adhesive and bolted to these stands and he said he was not taking them off, so they weighed about 100lbs. Each)
Specifications:
Description: 2-way vented-box system
Drive units: 1x 1-inch aluminum dome high-frequency, 1x 6.5-inch woven Kevlar cone bass / midrange
Frequency range: -6dB at 42Hz and 50kHz
Frequency response: 49Hz - 22kHz ±3dB on reference axis
Dispersion: within 2dB of reference response
Horizontal: over 60º arc
Vertical: over 10º arc
Sensitivity: 88dB spl (2.83V, 1m)
Harmonic Distortion: 2nd and 3rd harmonics – 90dB, 1m, <1% 100Hz - 22kHz, <0.5% 150Hz - 20kHz
Nominal Impedance: 8Ω (minimum 3.7Ω)
Crossover frequencies: 4kHz
Recommended Power: 50W - 120W into 8Ω on unclipped program
Max. Recommended Cable Impedance: 0.1Ω
Dimensions: 16.5 H x 9.4 W x 13.8 D (inch)
Weight: 26lb
Now if you haven’t guessed yet—the envelope please?
Please guys don’t hate me, pillage my village and or take my women, the price was just too good to pass up—and did I hear, or listen to better speakers-YES, but not at this PRICE!
B&W 805S
1200.00 with B&W stands (already filled) and Audioquest speaker cable. Now I have an extra 1200.00 for a tube amp.
They are in pristine condition, and the natural grain finish is just beautifull. After some tweaking for placement they are all of the above. I know some have said they found this speaker to be too harsh or bright? I really thought I had screwed the pooch when I first got these home as they sounded just that way setting 9” from the back wall. First I blamed the amp, and then went into depression, denial and pre-separation
. Then I decided to really get into tweaking them out. I moved them out from the wall about 4 ft. where they immediately lost the harshness. Then carefully moved them back till it started again (at 100lbs. each no small task). They ended up at 18 & 3/8 in. from back wall. Then I went into the amp and set them to small and set the sub crossover to 80Hz, along with that I boosted the 4Hz freq to 4.5DB. Then I set the pair of subs to 80HZ and backed off the attack till the transition from speaker to sub was unnoticeable. Susan has cranked them to 120Db (RS meter) and they still are rock solid and except for the VolumeJ no fatigue. This is all for music only, where I used an unused (7/1) amp channel and assigned it this task. I kept my HT (5/1) in tact so I have actually come a full circle, back to where I started looking in the beginning.
I have been listening to them as I wrote this. Thank you all for your help and guidance in my hunt and if I can be of any help to you just let me know please.
Old Texas Dog
