My Long List of Amplifiers and My Personal Review of Each!
@whitecamaross Yup. Just as I stated. Vivid are like Nautilus but with a lot more bass - too much bass by your account and actually no surprise to me. The Focal Sopra 3 is a step backwards from Wilson Sasha 2...the waterfall plot says it all - unwanted resonances everywhere. Nice even dispersion though. Definitely a great speaker but a step back nevertheless. https://www.stereophile.com/content/focal-sopra-no3-loudspeaker-measurements |
If you want a speaker to fit your room try TAD COMPACT EVOLUTION ONE. http://www.technicalaudiodevices.com/compact-evolution-one Which you can set very close to them. They have 1.3 Beryllium tweeter with composite midrange, all they drivers specifically made to it :) |
What is your room size ? I'm thinking you should apply some room treatment and that will elevate your room musicality. You can contact https://www.acousticfields.com/ , they are the best and there carbon absorption is also the best bass absorber https://www.acousticfields.com/product-category/sound-absorption/acda-series/. |
WC, based on your past reports with larger speakers overwhelming your room, I wish you had chosen the Sopra 2. I suspect the 3 will overwhelm your room as well. I heard the 2 last month against the SF Futuras in a huge 20x25x10 room with both speakers 10+ feet apart. The Sopra 2 were amazing and fun. Much boogie factor. Oh my I loved it. Not at all the refinements or clarity of the SFs but I immensely liked the Sopra 2 . After hearing the 2, a return to the SFs was so mellow. I would love to own both! I don't recall another time where I heard two very different speakers and that I liked both so much. I can imagine the Sopra line to be an awesome fit based on your comments and I suspect it's not so picky about amplifiers like the SFs. But the 3's bass will likely be too much for you after hearing the 2 pump out so much energy in the large room. |
Lots of wishes here... lol. The vivid audios are spectacular. On another league from what I’ve owned. The best bass I’ve had in my room by far. It’s a 68k speaker for a reason. They don’t compress, don’t sound congested, never bright, and the most massive soundstage I’ve heard that unfortunately my room can’t accomodate. They need more space than what I’ve given them. They already present a huge picture but when you use the 900u in mono mode, they open up even more but this actually becomes too huge for my room to accomodate. If I use the gryphon 300, things actually sound better because the soundstage isn’t as huge with it so it fits better in my room. Luxman works beautiful with it but it adds even more size to the soundstage which isn’t needed with this speaker. Yes, the speakers have been sold along with my Wilsons. I need a dedicated room for these beasts and that won’t come for me until next year. I’m sitting too close to the speakers and they need me to go back even more than the 8-9 feet where I sit. Once my room is built hopefully next year, I’ll bring back another vivid audio. It’s something quite special. For now, and in the interim, I’ll be using a focal Sopra 3 once I lock in a deal. |
Maybe there was a problem with the speakers and he is trying to get a return. Maybe he did not received them yet because delivery was delayed or he wasnt home to accept shipment. Maybe he took a little vacation week end for his birthday and his wife said no forum typing please for a couple of days. Maybe something I or someone wrote frustrated him. ( hope not) |
@axeman Love Johnny A. .His tone is fantastic. So smooth and Wonderful sounding. I have the "Get Inside " and the "Sometimes Tuesday Morning "Albums. I have 90% of Bela Fleck albums also . Here is some of Johnny A’s Guitar collection https://www.guitarplayer.com/guitaraficionado/johnny-a-reveals-his-gorgeous-gibsons-and-gretsches Please check out Robben Ford’s "Going Down Slow" with Jimmy Witherspoon Singing. If you are a Guitar Guy, you gotta love that one and probably Robben Ford too ! |
@techno_dude It is too hard to do concentric speakers with multiple drivers as well as individual drivers each perfectly designed for their frequency range - too many compromises. However, a large multi-driver speaker won’t sound integrated from 3 feet away. So large multidriver speakers are limited to farfield listening. Horses for courses.... |
techno_dude - There's usually more than one way to engineer a design, and it's rare when one approach is best in all aspects. Trade-offs are generally involved and in audio it's further complicated since subjective preferences are so significant. So it's not a matter of right or wrong in engineering decisions, but coming up with effective ways to address specific problems. Take turntables for example, there are low mass designs which some companies specialize in while others choose to use high mass. One is not inherently better than the other, but we can all benefit from the many choices in the wide range of products that we have available. |
About the speakers. Kef makes the Uni-Q driver, and a lot of audiophiles swear by that design in the Blade 2. Coherent point source philosophy. On the other side, Vivid makes 4 way speakers like the G2 and they swear by that design. More driver philosophy. Both are opposite designs.... Somebody has got to do something right and the other something wrong...?? They can’t be both right in their approach..... I sometime feel we are being framed by a lot of speaker makers, the thing is it is very difficult to know the ultimate truth behind the curtain... |
You will be shocked by the ZZ Top one , if you have not heard it,You’ll be impressed by the Guitar Tone of Johnny A and the Bass of Hare Krishna ,Quantic ,Thanks Dub, and by the overall excellent sound of Sojourn of Arjuna , Everything must Go. Like i said these are not your usual test tracks, but instead they are interesting and different... to me anyway |
You are right WCSS.... And my bad habit is to start "conducting" when there is a piece that really excites me... And subvocalize the bass line to boot.... All fine when I do it at home, but you can't believe how annoying that was for ppl at RMAF.... I had to learn PDQ to curb my enthusiasms and be still and quiet like a real serious&respectable audiophile *Grins!* G. |
I find old recordings like Saxophone Colossus ( Sony Rollins) Time out ( Brubeck) very useful to evaluate a system. There is a lot of instruments going on those which I can evaluate... drums , cymbals,... And to evaluate the reproduction of voice, I use Anne Bisson Blue Mind. Very well recorded, and known among audiophiles. There is also drums in this, along with some nicely recorded piano. For ambiance mico details and piano, I use Tord Gustavsen. Good double bass to evluate also. African Magic from Abdullah Ibrahim is a HUGE piano live recording with double bass and drum, I urge you guys to get this one eyes closed and thank me later. :) |
Here is some songs that are in my Demo list. They are worth giving a listen. Most are a good test of your speakers abilities . Some are instrumentals, some are vocals and a lot are a good Bass test. They are not the usual suspects Some are obscure and quite different I hope you enjoy Song Title --------------------Album--------------------------Artist Come on Home -----Come on Home -------------Boz Scaggs Sojourn of Arjuna------Greatest Hits of 20th Century--Bela Fleck Morph The Cat-----------Morph The Cat----------Donald Fagen H-Gang--------------------Morph The Cat ----------Donald Fagen Don’t Explain------- Verve Remixed--------Dzihan & Kamien As Big As Your Face--Late For The Future------Galactic Endless Parade------High and Mighty ------------Gov’t Mule Sometime Tuesday Morning--Sometime Tues Morning----Johnny A Depression Blues------ Melvin Taylor & Slack Band-----Melvin Taylor Going Down Slow------The Blues Collection------------Robben Ford Everything Must Go- Everything Must Go-----Steely Dan Thanks Dub-------------Second Hand Smoke-------- Sublime Hare Krishna(King Britt)--Verve remix------Tony Scott Translantic--- (Quantic) Nova Soul 3- various Artists Retreat & View ------ Born to sing no plan B ------------Van Morrison Real Real Gone ---- Philosophers Stone-----------------Van Morrison Flight of the Cosmic Hippo-- Flight of the Cosmic Hippo ---Bela Fleck Asleep In The Desert----Chrome Smoke and BBQ------ZZ Top Sometimes Thing Get..Whatever--Random Album Title---Deadmau5 |
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Hi, dianal krall - peel me a grape Karen Souza - tainted love queen - dsd album with their hits MJ- thriller dsd album Adele sam smith Tom Petty - mqa dire straits lynyrd skynyrd etc I don’t really do any classical or boring music. Part of evaluation needs to be with music that lifts my soul. I can’t do “elevator music” like what they play at shows. My taste varies but above you can see that I try all sorts of stuff. Some music actually was music i never paid attention to before but I ended up liking it due to its spectacular presentation. |
