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Stereophile review of the new Wilson Watt/Puppy

I received my copy of the latest Stereophile yesterday and was curious to see what Martin Collums had to say about them, even though I would take it with a grain of salt, knowing that he had owned them in the past. He's still one of the reviewers that I consider to be most technically informed and balanced in his reviews.

I'm starting this thread because I want to know if others found his conclusions as confusing as I did. He says that the speakers have deep powerful bass, great detail, wonderful dynamic range, and are able to play very loud without breakup. 

However, after all of that, he concludes that they are better for jazz and orchestral and perhaps a bit reticent for pop and rock. This made no sense to me, especially for a $40.000 speaker. I am curious about the opinions of anyone else who has read the review. 

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daveyf's avatar
daveyf
2,888 posts
 

I don’t have a problem with reviewers who gush platitudes, but I do question how discriminating they are when a new product arrives in short order, one that replaces the old model, and they then magically hear the improvements of the new model. What occurs now that made them unable to hear the failings of the previous iterations at the time of their prior review?

cundare2
280 posts
 

@rbstehno : When I get my Stereophile issue in the mail, I look at the conclusion of each piece reviewed and 99.999% of the time the piece they are reviewing is the best they have ever heard. Sometimes, in parts of the review they will have a few negatives but in the end, it’s worth every single $ that it cost and is highly recommended. Surprise, the reviewer claims it’s a major contender. For what, not sure, speaker of the year, best speaker for the money, your guess is as good as mine

Well, that may not be all as sinister as it sounds. What I’ve been told is that the glossies select products after private demos, in-person show evaluations, etc. Editorial chooses products that then seem to have potential to be outstanding offerings of interest to the largest # of readers. So there’s a pre-filtering process going on. TAS & Stereophile can review only a tiny # of products that are released every month, so I understand why they would not want to waste space (or months of review time!) on components that are likely to be crappy. One might argue that it would do a service to readers to "warn" them away from crummy stuff, but it’s not hard to argue instead that the way these pubs select products is just as valid.

This is an explanation, not an endorsement. But I think you’ll appreciate what these pubs do if you approach them from this perspective.

 

doyle3433's avatar
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doyle3433
323 posts
 

Listened extensively to a pair of Sabrina's with an Aurender A20 at the 2024 Fla. Expo. I really enjoyed how natural and easy this simple set up sounded. The rep there played many requests, classical, Jazz and Rock. I felt that the Sabrina's didn't miss a beat with any genre. Dynamic and alive. 

I too read the article. Really didn't spark any interest in me. If a speaker doesn't excite me from the get go, (like my Volti's do every time), I'm not interested. 

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