@ritter06
I rather imagine you have better eyes that me, if moving your seat back by 17 feet improves the picture on your Sony 19 inch tube!
The $27,900 disappointment? Wilson Audio Watt Puppy 8 issues.
GR Research gave a breakdown of these & I was surprised..
Owner looking to make them sound better.
205 responses Add your response
Since I have experience with Danny's services, I'll add a quick note or two. First he does not decide to just "pick a speaker to tear apart", the speakers he works on are sent in by unhappy clients that respect Danny's work.....just like the owner sending in his 10 year old Wilson speakers. I own (and love) vintage Reference Series Infinity speakers.....I've owned many pairs, and currently own a pair of Infinity RS Kappa 7s. The crossovers are 40 years old, and use "value" parts. I wanted the crossovers updated with new high quality parts, but using the original schematic.....I sent the schematic to GR-Research to see what they could do. Danny's team communicated with me all along the way, looked over the schematic, and made some recommendations per my request. They sent me the parts list (and cost) along with some options for various components depending on cost......and why they might decide on the options. In the end GR-Research built the crossovers mounted on a HDF board, using point to point wiring, that fit well inside the speakers. I've had these speakers since I purchased them new some 35 years ago, and have thousands of hours listening to them......so I know them well of course. The sound from the Kappas has never been this good. Yes the sonic signature is still there, but the detail, clarity, impact, soundstage, and presence has never been like this. Consider me a happy customer |
19" Sony Trinitron: "I don’t know why everyone loves these. " The most watched TV in my home is still the 9" Sony CRT hanging under the cabinets in the kitchen. 30+ years old, and counting. No service required. Ever. Yes, I had to "dumb down" the HD signal to display it. It’s been a trusted friend that’s lasted longer than (almost) anything in my entertainment world (I think the ADS 200Cs in the office might be older?) I recently upgraded one TV to a Sony OLED, so I’m not stuck in the past. But, the little 9" Trinitron just comes on when you hit the power button. |
A flat FR does not by itself define the sound quality of a speaker. Personal experience with multi $K speakers universally reviewed as great sounding with flat FR. They were very accurate but made music sound lifeless. Crossover had almost 2 dozen cheap parts. Rebuilding the crossover with quality parts maintained a flat FR, but brought music alive with clarity, detail, and dynamics. |
mclinnguy That is correct, I did NOT send the speakers in. I emailed the original schematic to them, along with measurements where the finished crossovers could be installed. We agreed on my component choices. GR-Research built the crossover on HDF, and I mounted and wired it to the rest of the speaker. It's not terribly difficult as the Kappa 7s are 3 way speakers. |
Ok I wanted to clarify that before this question: @vthokie83 Everyone is focusing on the frequency response, Danny suggests it should be flat, and many responders suggesting it is not that important, yet in this case it is not measured before or after. Did this conversation come up regarding frequency response, and changing parameters to adjust for different slopes and adjusting the frequency response, assuming GR has past knowledge of these speakers, or were the same values used? |
thecarpathian and mclinnguy thecarpathian - I thought the prices were very fair, $800ish for complete crossovers with air core inductors, high quality resistors, and high end caps (some were Solen I recall), and labor. Sorry I can't find the build sheet off hand to check brands and exact price. mclinnguy - You are correct. I had no interest in modifying with measurements and changing in that way......I'm guessing that would be helpful. I simply wanted the exact same crossover built with high end components. These speakers mean a lot to me as they were my first audiophile speakers, but in today's world are not worth a lot; maybe $1,500 or more with the improvements I've made. I've had the woofer foams replaced, the mids redone, and the emit tweeter tested......and put in some more acoustic material. I guess I could have done it myself. However I wanted to try Danny's services, I thought the price was fair, and I simply did not have time at that point to do it myself. |
@willywonka and others who share his sentiment. I won't go so far as to say I have zero respect for GR Danny, but I don't consider him to be the most honest guy in the room. He does and says things I don't agree with and I left a lengthy comment on one of his threads on YT and told him how and why I thought he was incorrect. He vehemently disagreed with my assessment and as he wouldn't engage in a fair discussion in a public forum with me, he is just another voice in the audioVILE community that I don't consider credible. There are also others that propagate erroneous information that has no backing in science or engineering and their words are clearly spoken to market their product which oftentimes is a solution for a non-existent problem. Its pointless to get into a battle of wits with these people because they won't engage in a fair discussion because they have too much money invested in what they are selling to be unbiased. So, no...GR Danny and others like him just degrade the signal to noise ratio in the audiophile community and I will continue to ignore them and hope they go away eventually. All that said, these hucksters have a right to sell whatever they want to whomever they want, but I'm not buying. Caveat Emptor indeed. |
Why do you feel entitled to further discussion? Fair discussion in a public forum is very passive aggressive and casts doubt as to your true motives. Exactly what is your beef? What is not backed by science or engineering? Sounds like sour grape mud slinging on your part. |
For those who believe GR offers no value with these mods, have you ever compared a modified to stock loudspeaker? I've been modifying my speakers for over twenty years, I've found great improvements can be had with top flight film caps, resistors, inductors, internal wire, binding posts, drivers. Assuming all loudspeakers to be fully optimized in stock form may be wrongheaded.
Back in the day when I was running Merlin VSM-MM I started experimenting with Duelund VSF film caps in BAM and speakers, a great improvement vs the stock Hovlands. I spoke with Bobby (owner/designer) as to improvements I heard, Bobby had not yet heard of these caps and was none too happy to hear of my modifying his babies, yet he seemed interested. Low and behold, a few months later and Bobby's incorporated the Duelunds in the Merlins. |
As a long time builder of high end DIY speakers, using high quality parts, good engineering practices, and hours of listening with a panel of several people to "voice them". I can state pretty confidently, that the modifications and upgrades Danny makes, are all following good engineering practices, with the goal of improving sound quality. Flattening out the very choppy frequency response, compensating for edge diffraction, improving impedance curves, reducing stored energy of the drivers, etc, is NOT a difference of opinion with the original designer on the voicing of the speaker. Bad design (as seen in the original measurements of the Watt/Puppy’s in the vid), is bad design. No good designer would set out to design a speaker with that frequency response as a goal, if they were shooting for accuracy. I am pretty balanced between an objective and subjective listener, when the context is correct for them, but there are certain objectively measurable parameters that almost always lead to an inferior sounding speaker. Just for context, I don’t own any of Danny’s speakers (I have bought his NoRes damping material), but I have heard a pair of his current 2nd top of the line kits, NX-Otica, and for the $3800 price, (and a couple of weekends of labor), the end resulting speaker can easily compete with the sound quality of speakers at 4X the price, without exaggeration. I also helped a friend upgrade a pair of Klipsch speakers with Danny’s upgrade kits, and they succeeded in turning an unlistenable pair of speakers, into a decent budget pair of speakers. |
@hiend2 , You want crazy, like room with the rubber wallpaper crazy, go over to the 'Best audio prank ideas' thread. |
I find it interesting that people love to hatchet others that they don't know on the 'net. @livinon2wheels I've known Danny for many, many years. He and I don't agree on everything and that is OK. He is extremely well respected in the industry, customers and reviewers because his designs bring the goods. Trashing a person and gear that you don't know is the best way to get the rep of being a troll here. His speaker upgrade service is ~ 5% of his business and he does not charge for the design work. He makes his $$$ on parts used to build his design. There are reasons that "The GR Research" rooms at audio shows were consistently judged among the best in SQ at those exhibitions. I was at that RMAF he referenced in his video concerning the Wilson Audio room. The Wilson Alexandria X2 ($158,00.00) driven by VTL Siegfried monoblocks ($65,000.00) were a huge disappointment. Too loud, too harsh in a room with zero treatment. Perhaps you should familiarize yourself with results: https://www.audiocircle.com/index.php?topic=99738.msg1004792#msg1004792
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Send the speakers in? For what possible reason? Nobody listens to them anyway. Wilson is the world's leading high end speaker company. In the final analysis their designs are tuned by critical listeners with extensive live music experience. Dave Wilson in this case. The Watt/Puppy, recently reintroduced, remains the largest selling high end speaker of all time. People don't spend that kind of money on badly designed speakers. |
Tekton speakers are trashed by some here and I guess they would prefer to spend $27,900 on a Wilson that does not measure as well as it should. The bottom line- some fellow goners here like to hear themselves talk when everything they say is utter nonsense. They would have us think THEY are the speaker designers... not the makers of Wilson, Tekton or GR Research. |
It is pretty much anything "manufacturer direct" that seems to get trashed here, a trend i see. It could be the middle men who don't get a piece of the 'manufacturer direct' pie perhaps. Wilson $27900 - minimum Middle man/Dealer's cut, 50% ($13950) = $13950 That's a big chunk of the pie to miss out on.
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Guys like this place actual listening, in a proper musical system, DEAD LAST. It's all about getting their test rig to show a flat FR, plus a BOM with little room for profit. So boring - like most speakers designed this way. We live in a clickbait era, so these videos get him a large audience plus a ready market to buy his stuff. Good for him. |
You might want to be aware of facts before jumping on the keyboard to spread nonsense. Clearly you have no idea what you are talking about. Danny does more critical listening in a proper musical system and proper room than the rest of us individually in our lifetimes. Fixing speakers sent to him is a small part of the overall business. More importantly, he revealed the emperor (mass market speaker brands) has no clothes. |
Wilson speakers utilize some wonderful ideas and the execution is often very good. However, I think a case can be made they dont sound nearly as good as they could. Now that they abandoned that awful tweeter they sound better. The problems with Wilson speakers could be considered bad engineering and design. Once again this thread veers from Wilson to if you are a Danny fan or not. |
The GR dude does come across as kinda dishonest in those videos trashing speakers, honestly. At the same time, it looks like he’s legit, and some of his speakers are well-regarded. So maybe he’s not doing himself any favors with the YouTube shtick. Upgrade kits can’t be such a big part of his business anyway. Which of the following is truer? 1. Negativity is bad for sales 2. Any attentoin is good attention
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EXTRA, EXTRA...READ ALL ABOU IT Jay’s Audio Lab <---> Danny Richie Interview
Wilson VS Magico Speakers, Danner Hammer praises Magico... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VebfP2ivnjM
Alon Magic Wolf appears to be the real winner in all of this.... All the defeated/slayed Wilson refugees are running off to Magico, hereafter. Alon’s partying hard tonight, getting sloshed at the bar, cashing checks at the bank next door........Magico owners....let’s go dancin tonight...party party party party
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Is Danny a hero or a con man? See what you get for stating anything negative about a higher end audio product. And you all wonder why we don't see any negative reviews, best to stay on the safe side and at least give faint praise to everything. But then you say you don't trust all these positive reviews, which is it people! |
@ozzy62 , I disagree. Forming an opinion with measurements is foolish if you have no experience. Danny's has measured thousands of speakers. He knows what measurements translate into good sound. Obviously, his idea of good sound could differ from yours, but my personal experience says his good sound meshes well with mine. It amazes me how people love bad measuring equipment. I have listened to many highly regarded audio components and been left cold. If it measures well, I usually like the sound. Some folks like distortion, and that's OK. This hobby has enough variety to satisfy all. |
Danny has measured and modified many Klipsch Heritage. I have Khorns, agree with the issues he brings up in his Heritage videos. I couldn't have lived with these speakers in stock form, with many diy mods instituted over a number of years I addressed these issues and now have my dream loudspeaker. No doubt I went further than his mods, but his understanding of defects and solutions in regard to these speakers is correct.
No easy thing critiquing audiophile equipment, audiophiles don't like hearing their equipment choices being criticized. |
@toddalin +1 this also applies to people who use measurements to justify their audio experience. |
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Well... unless you are me... the guy who sent Danny the Wilson Audio Duette speakers, which have their own external "Novel" crossover and a direct comparison can be made. You never know... you may see more about that someday. Maybe he should say... "This needs to be better" and that will be code for "This is junk". Here’s the thing... I know that you don’t know what you’re talking about... and I’m chuckling at your words. You KNOW, I know you don’t know.
Does that qualify as snob level gear... but I’m also doing "DIY"? Why? Who’s conning who, exactly? |
@jim2 ++ As previously mentioned I own diy modified Merlin VSM, Danny on right track with these as well.
At present another thread here in regard to people offering 'expert' advice/knowledge of things they have no direct experience with. The 'experts' here are those who've availed themselves of Danny's services, the rest is conjecture or worse.
Seems like audio is a religion for some, criticize some equipment they own or is it believe in and you'll be called a heretic or worse. |
Why is it I poke a little harmless fun at his choice of hairstyles and I’m singled out as the poster boy for nastiness?? I’d write more concerning this travesty but I’m late for my mullet trimming appointment... |
