Naim and Elac Adante, Wow

Mmeysarosh, you raised some good points, however you missed one key point, which is the Adante is a $2,500.00 set of speakers and the Kef Ref 1 which are $8,000.00 the Sopra 1 which are $9,000.00 or the B&W 805D which are $5,000.00 a pair.

Mr. Jones did not design the Adantes to be a flagship, like the Unifi series before them, the Adantes were designed to offer much of what an uber speaker system delivers for less money so compromises had to be made.

As we mentioned before the Adantes sound like a Wilson Watt Puppy 5-7 series in terms of soundstage, bass punch, and clarity.

With the Adante being built to be a $2,500.00 set of speakers they are going to have some dynamic limitations.

The Kef Ref 1 are better speakers and they should be at that kind of price difference so are the Sopras.

The point about system matching is starting to sink in you must have the right partnering gear with them which requires a bit of care and an investment in something that will match the speakers sonic flavor.

The Naim Atom works so well because the Naim sonic palate is warm midrange and good bass control and excellent punch. the top end is very smooth and even though it is 40 watts we got good volume long before the amp is running out of steam.

It is going to be interesting to see how this thread develops as more people try the Adantes with a whole bunch of different gear.

Last thought about matching, we just put out today a Quad VA amp 15 watts tube with a pair of Quad S2 loudpeakers a compact bookshelf with a ribbon, combo which was designed and voiced together sounded amazing, then played the Kef LS 50 on the same electronics and not good in comparison.

So either two things are happening either the Quad speakers are better than the LS 50 or the amp isn’t partnering well.

See goes back to that damn audiophile thing of matching speakers to amps. sources to electronics, cabling with everthing and then room tuning, positioning and tweeking.

Last point, we would take in your words a less balanced speaker system that offers so many wonderful attributes but you have to be prepared to work with vs a more balanced design that does a lot of things well but excells at few of them.

The Adantes are not perfect but if you value what they do, soundstaging, bass punch and definition, alot of clarity you will be seduced by them, they have a very life like visceral quality, if your tastes goes for  warmer midrange, less treble detail and bite, and are not into super tight bass, and want a less thrilling more romantic sound these speakers will not be for you.

Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ

Again you raise some valid points, have to diagree with a few of them.

We never thought the Unifi's the Debuts or the Pioneer spekers were neutral. 

A different perspective could be our assertion that the Adante line will be followed by a TAD like product with even better drivers, and other nicer things. The next realease will be the Argo line which is similar to Adante but with different drivers and powered. So we are estimating 2020. 

It is clear that Elac is using Mr. Jones to upgrade the public face of Elac. 

We were Elac dealers years before the Adantes and the Jet tweeter was excellent, their speakers were very refinded but they where not exciting designs. 

The other reason for changing the system could be due to parts costs which may have made the  prototypes too expensive for the price they were trying to hit when the final product would reach the shelves and if the Adante drivers were approaching TAD level for $2,500 and $5,000 speakers how could they then develop a higher end line?

Never cared for the Sim gear always sounded thin to us like the Ayre gear, so have to disagree. Haven't heard the lastest D ice modules either.

Classe has always had a darker tonal balance so yes that one coud be good.

And yes we do agree that this speaker does need careful matching but when you do you can get some very good results, as we reported the monitors remind us of the WP 7 not exactly the same but to emulate a $17k plus pair of speakers in any way is kind of an accomplishment.

To understand what Mr. Jones was thinking you should listen to his interviews. 

Nice talking with you lovely to have a civil discourse like the forums were designed to do.

Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ

Audiogod66, really!  We call em like we here em. The Adantes are a good line of speakers for the money, are they better than anything else for the price that depends on the listener and their  tastes.

We have done demos of the Elac AS 61 a $2,500.00 monitor vs both the Harbeth Compact 7 a $4k monitor and the ATC SCM 19MK II also a $4k monitor. Harbeths are intrinsically colored you can not have a box which resonates and tell me that a lively cabinet is not going to impart some desgree of coloration to the sound. 

We never stated that the Adantes have a flaw in the treble because they are bringing out a more expensive line, the Adantes are built to a price point that fact that they actually aquint themselves very well vs some of the most highgly respected monitors the Harbeth and the ATC for example talks volumes about how good they are for the price. 

We would never expect a $2,500.00 set of monitors to be pefect and are willing to overlook their flaws vs what they do well for the price. 

Also we never said anywhere that the original WP were accurate they were not, they were however one of the best selling expensive pairs of loudspeakers that ever hit the market because they were exciting and dynamic sounding loudspeakers. 

As per the original German Elacs we owned them and they were very nice speakers, they were however, not a particular good value for the money and were generally eclipsed by the Dali loudspeakers we were selling at the time. 

Most of the top loudspeaker manufacturers makes pistonic drivers, do you honestly think B&W or KEF who are giant companies with huge resources can't make a cone which is pistonic?

As per Duntech sold em in the past, they weren't that good, as per Vivid excellent speakers, we prefered the new Paradigm Personas and the Kef Reference but the Vivid's were excellent. 

Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ

Adn we have the 282/dr 300/NDX 2 running so it would be an easy demo for us to do.

As we started this post the two product line gel like magic, the Adantes love a warmer puncher amp and the Naim stuff fits it like a glove. 

Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ