swamyg1 said:
Yeah but that 570 is MUCH higher end (and more expensive) than the CC-170... I know the 170 is their bottom of the line, but how does it compare to the highly regarded BIC DV-62CLRS? I would love to hear some opinions...
Well, I'll give you an opinion or several, but understand that I've never heard the 170 either so I can't offer you thoughts on the comparison. I've briefly heard other (better) Paradigm centers and I thought they were fine, but I was really just casually checking out the whole system and wasn't really paying any attention to the center specifically.
However, I own a pair of the BIC DV62CLR-S, and one of them is actually for sale (more on that in a moment). I'll tell you honestly what I think of this speaker, but you should keep in mind that as a professional sound engineer I have no time or patience for anything I consider crappy speakers. That doesn't mean I'm a snob who will only listen to $25,000 speakers... Far from it. Because I don't have a big budget though, I'm always on the lookout for very reasonably priced speakers that sound amazing for their price.
I mention this because I don't want to offend anyone who loves the stock DV62CLR-S when I say that out of the box, I found them to be unlistenable. I purchased a brand new pair on ebay at the beginning of September, and hooked them up as a stereo pair (a popular thing to do with these), hoping to be happily surprised based on all the positive reviews. I actually wanted to use them as nearfield studio monitors (with a little sub), but they sounded like cheap speakers (i.e., they sounded like they looked) and I was not impressed. They had a decent amount of bottom, but it was boomy and had that typical cheap speaker hump in the upper bass/lower mids to make up for the lack of real extended bass. The mids overall were messy and unnatural, and the highs were sibilant and harsh, way too bright for me without any real detail. They weren't the worst speakers I've ever heard, but I didn't think they deserved any of the kudos people seem to heap on them.
As I said, many people seem to love this speaker in its stock form in spite of my feelings on it, so there ya go.
Now I always read that the DVs are too bright out of the box and require serious break-in, like 60 hours or more before they start really sounding good, so I gave them the benefit of the doubt. I put on some challenging music with both heavy, pounding bass and lots of upper mid and high content at a pretty good volume and let them run for several days in a row while I was out at work. I put close to 100 hours on them just to be sure they were broken in... But didn't feel it made nearly enough difference to really even talk about it. I still couldn't listen to them.
So I contacted Ed Frias of EFE Technology and sent him my crossovers for modification. If you're seriously researching the DV series, you should know all about Ed by now. If not, search the forum for him or read the DV62 reviews on Audioreview.com and you'll see a TON of reviews of his modded DVs. I had very little hope that he could do anything to make them GREAT... Better maybe, but not great. But hey it was $20 a speaker plus shipping so why not try it (I hated them the way they were, nothing to lose).
Well, in about a week I got them back, installed them, hooked them up... and WOW. That man knows what the hell he's doing!!! I'll be honest, I didn't think it was a miracle or anything, I mean they didn't sound like my B&Ws or even close, but they were PLEASANT now, very listenable. Vocals were very natural with little or no noticeable sibilance. Bottom was more accurate and less boomy, definitely acceptable especially if you're using a sub with them. Where before the mids sounded messy and harsh but undetailed, they were MUCH cleaner now with adequate detail. They almost sounded slightly distorted before, but with Ed's mods they didn't. I found myself listening to all kinds of music on them for a few hours in a row with no fatigue and really enjoyed it. In fact I did begin using them as studio monitors (with a Cadence X-Sub which has since given way to a Hsu VTF-2 Mk 2) and found them easier to mix on than almost anything else I'd used in the past. (If you're curious to hear mixes done with them, click the link to my web site in my sig and then click the live digital recording link. All the samples on that page were mixed using the BICs with the Cadence X-Sub.)
Since that time I've purchased a pair of Ascend CBM-170SEs and I'm now using them as studio monitors. They are obviously superior to the BICs in every possible way, but that really shouldn't be a surprise. I now use one of the DV62CLR-S as a center channel in my little home theater, and I'm thrilled with it there. In fact I like it so much, I actually have no plans to upgrade to anything else until I have a house and the budget to get whatever I want. I just like it that much. I'm currently using B&W DM602 S2s as mains with SVS SBS-01s as surrounds and an SVS PB10-ISD sub, so it's in the company of some really excellent lower- to mid-priced speakers (the B&Ws retail for about $600/pair). I'm ordering a pair of the new Swans 5.2s this week and putting the B&Ws on ebay, but I'm hanging onto that BIC center. Dialog in movies is CLEAR and natural. It doesn't stand out as sounding different from the rest of my system, and I never find myself noticing it and wishing for more, as I did with my little $100 Boston Acoustic center I was using previously.
If you're considering the BIC I should tell you my first impressions when I took them out of the box. The first thought I had was wow, these look like I paid... exactly what I paid for them. They're plain black vinyl wrapped and while they don't look bad, they do not look like expensive speakers either. (It's pretty obvious that it's not real wood.) When I took them apart to remove the crossovers to send to Ed, peeking inside the cabinets I thought honestly, they looked like a cub scout troop's speaker building project. They're put together solidly enough but you won't see any of the nice internal bracing or detail that you'll see in a better speaker. Just some plain MDF with a strip or two of fill thrown in.
The drivers looked decent enough, which (Ed told me) is why he mods their crossovers, because they actually put pretty good drivers in those cheap boxes. The crossovers on the other hand looked like something a kid threw together from Rat Shack parts for about a buck fitty. I know nothing about crossover design but these looked CHEAP. I've seen pictures of the crossovers from both the SBS-01s and the Ascends, and there's a WORLD of difference there. When I got the modded ones back from Ed, they looked completely different. He obviously puts some much better quality components on there.
So as a budget center channel I'm not going to tell you they're "better than anything at 3x the price" or anything like that. What I do think is they're a very solid, usable budget center channel speaker WITH Ed Frias' crossover mods, and I think they're a great value. I've even listened to multichannel music on my system and got up to walk in front of the speakers to compare what was coming out of the B&Ws vs. the BIC, and was pleasantly surprised to find that it was adequately timbre-matched with them. Sure it didn't have the refinement that the B&Ws have but it was close enough for me til I can get a fully matched system.
I'm quite sure the Paradigm features a much higher build quality and probably looks quite a bit better than the BIC. Whatever you may think of the Paradigm sound, you can't argue that their stuff is well-made and looks great. I would suggest you go listen to the 170 and see how you feel about it. If it rocks your world, go for it.
If you think you might be interested in taking the second Frias-modded DV62CLR-S off my hands (since I only need the one now), PM me and we'll talk about it. I'd like to see it get a good home. If no one buys it this week I'm putting it on eBay next week.
By the way, according to SVSound.com, SVS is releasing their SCS-01 Center Channel speaker as a stand-alone product for $185 so you might want to consider that. No idea when it'll be available for purchase but I'm sure it's a great center based on what the SBS-01s sound like.
You might also look for a used Ascend CMT-340 center. It should blow away the Paradigm and would definitely kill either the modded BIC or the SVS, and with the SE models out now you might get a deal on a used one.
Damn that was a lotta typing. I'm so tired after my gig I didn't even realize how much I'd written.
