Reference 3A upgrades!
Posting this as both a thank you to Mr. Tash and as information for anyone who’s contemplating upgrading their Reference 3A’s. I just received back my Royal Virtuoso monitors with every viable upgrade option and what I have here before me is a VAST improvement over the original. I’m running them 24/7 to break in, the beryllium tweeter is pretty badass, superb definition with apparently zero fatigue. Communication was good and turnaround time was about 2 weeks after all the options were decided. Bonus points to Tash for tolerating my relentless questions. Exemplary customer service from Divergent Technologies, I couldn’t be more satisfied.
Here’s the work order:
This replaces existing old paper in oil capacitors (also excellent but a little too slow for the new beryllium dome tweeters).
@theedge I’ve been throughly enjoying the Royals. I currently have a Rel S510 with them and it’s a fantastic pairing. The imaging and soundstage is amazing and the beryllium tweeter is completely non-fatiguing. Thankfully I’ve not had any issues with mine. In regards to the wiring, I was looking at the work order and it states: Internal Wiring- High Purity 6N OCC copper with Teflon Dielectric, continuous cast single crystal cryo treated. Appropriate thickness of wires used for each driver. |
@testpilot Before obtaining the RV I had looked for a set of the 40th, not an easy find. Understandably so. |
@theedge Wow! Didn’t know about the La Suprema II, are they RV’s on top of a Bass module? |
Thanks for your thoughts. The RV full Corian cabinets are incredibly inert, the only issue is maintenance. While polishing the speakers one day I noticed that the l left speaker had a verrry fine hairline crack running right along side the top edge of the cabinet. I had a couple of Corian fabricators take a look them. They told me that repairing a structural crack requires routing out a channel and re-filling it with a composite ($$$). Thankfully the hairline is only cosmetic and could be sealed with a Corian epoxy (a rather expensive and difficult to find epoxy) to prevent it from spreading. When the speakers went to Divergent for upgrade, I had Tash inspect the cabinets and he verified that they were fine. Btw, Divergent does not stock replacement Corian cabinets so ownership runs the risk of a costly repair if ever needed. Anyway, I’m still fascinated by the RV’s luxurious sound and their ability to completely vanish from the room regardless of the recording…magnificent. |
