I have been living with a pair since around 2006. This is an old review and there were various running changes to the model, a sort of major change (the Omega upgrade) to the drivers and perhaps crossover and the newer models are set up differently. I haven’t heard the latest models.
The speaker can sound terrible if not set up correctly and is ruthlessly revealing of any upstream shortcomings including line noise, weird inter-component grounding anomalies and noisy components. It requires proper placement in the room and relative to the listener position; and in my experience has almost instantly revealed differences in amps, preamps, cartridges and various tweaks, including footers, tube rolling, etc.
My current set up is better than my original one and takes advantage of a fairly large room. The biggest shortcoming in my estimation was always the difficulty of tuning the speaker so that the bass did not sound discontinuous. Get the bass to kick and it sounded like a different system than the horns; get it to blend smoothly with the horn and it was too reticent in my estimation. Jim Smith will probably tell you that the shortcoming is the set up not the speaker but it’s not an unusual complaint of those who own the speaker.
I finally found the mountain top by several changes when I moved households and set up the system in this larger room, which is probably a better room, acoustically. I don’t use a lot of treatment, mainly bass traps in the corners, I don’t worry too much about first reflection points given the way the horns disperse, but I have them farther into the room and there is also more space behind me. (Although sitting against the back wall sounds great if there is a guest sitting in the captain’s chair). The other augmentations- multiple woofers, including a pair of 15 inch Rythmiks to which I added a DSP controller that does not process the signal going into the main speakers. And changing cartridges made a difference- I had an Airtight Supreme that was long on miles and while having it retipped, I replaced it with a series of Koetsu stone bodies, which have far more gravitas in the bass. There are variations among these Koetsus that are hard to explain but one thing was consistent- they not only had that famed midrange, with none of the overly romantic midrange colorations for which the original Rosewood was known, but have the ability to deliver real bass with more authority, air and a 3d quality that is usually just associated with midrange attributes. My tonearm is a linear tracker, so this cartridge change may simply be compensation for that- the linear arms are not necessarily prodigious bass producers.
The quality of the amps and upstream components makes a huge difference. I had good tube amps running them when I first got them-- but switched to the Lamm ML2. It was a dramatic qualitative difference in the ease and flow of the music-- the Lamms are known for this, but the combination with the AV Duo is known to be synergistic.
These are now getting to be old speakers-- and new ones are expensive. I’ve solved most of the gremlins and think, short of having Jim come live with me for a few days, am getting a lot out of them. But they are not, like any good component, plug and play, and will demand some attention to good clean power given the sensitivity of the speaker.
As to the measurements on impulse response, I don’t really have anything to contribute. There has been stuff written about phase relationships among the horns and woofer, positioning the tweeter for time alignment, but I’m not sure that addresses either the measurements or your question.
Bill Hart
The speaker can sound terrible if not set up correctly and is ruthlessly revealing of any upstream shortcomings including line noise, weird inter-component grounding anomalies and noisy components. It requires proper placement in the room and relative to the listener position; and in my experience has almost instantly revealed differences in amps, preamps, cartridges and various tweaks, including footers, tube rolling, etc.
My current set up is better than my original one and takes advantage of a fairly large room. The biggest shortcoming in my estimation was always the difficulty of tuning the speaker so that the bass did not sound discontinuous. Get the bass to kick and it sounded like a different system than the horns; get it to blend smoothly with the horn and it was too reticent in my estimation. Jim Smith will probably tell you that the shortcoming is the set up not the speaker but it’s not an unusual complaint of those who own the speaker.
I finally found the mountain top by several changes when I moved households and set up the system in this larger room, which is probably a better room, acoustically. I don’t use a lot of treatment, mainly bass traps in the corners, I don’t worry too much about first reflection points given the way the horns disperse, but I have them farther into the room and there is also more space behind me. (Although sitting against the back wall sounds great if there is a guest sitting in the captain’s chair). The other augmentations- multiple woofers, including a pair of 15 inch Rythmiks to which I added a DSP controller that does not process the signal going into the main speakers. And changing cartridges made a difference- I had an Airtight Supreme that was long on miles and while having it retipped, I replaced it with a series of Koetsu stone bodies, which have far more gravitas in the bass. There are variations among these Koetsus that are hard to explain but one thing was consistent- they not only had that famed midrange, with none of the overly romantic midrange colorations for which the original Rosewood was known, but have the ability to deliver real bass with more authority, air and a 3d quality that is usually just associated with midrange attributes. My tonearm is a linear tracker, so this cartridge change may simply be compensation for that- the linear arms are not necessarily prodigious bass producers.
The quality of the amps and upstream components makes a huge difference. I had good tube amps running them when I first got them-- but switched to the Lamm ML2. It was a dramatic qualitative difference in the ease and flow of the music-- the Lamms are known for this, but the combination with the AV Duo is known to be synergistic.
These are now getting to be old speakers-- and new ones are expensive. I’ve solved most of the gremlins and think, short of having Jim come live with me for a few days, am getting a lot out of them. But they are not, like any good component, plug and play, and will demand some attention to good clean power given the sensitivity of the speaker.
As to the measurements on impulse response, I don’t really have anything to contribute. There has been stuff written about phase relationships among the horns and woofer, positioning the tweeter for time alignment, but I’m not sure that addresses either the measurements or your question.
Bill Hart