Vandersteen Quatro / Model 5 Set Up

Guys, the Vandersteen dealers with Quatros and 5As know how to set them up. The SPL Meter and Stereophile test disc work fine for most rooms. However, that said, there are defintely some "artists" out there who do a significantly better job due to experience. It's worth your time to buy from a dealer like that if you can. As for paying someone to come out and tune your speakers...it's cheap! Even if they charge you a standard rate of ~$100/hour you'll pay less than 10% of the cost of the speaker new. The worst tuning session I know of took 4 hours. This was by one of the "artists" who is a perfectionist as well. Those 4 hours made a big difference.

In the end, what you consider to be annoying I feel is totally justified. When you want the best, be willing to go out and get it. Also, sometimes the best is not necessarily the easiest.

YMMV

This is very pertinent, as I have recently been evaluating the Quatros and I would like to learn how to set them up (you correctly state that the manual does not go into sufficient detail). I have also gotten the impression that many dealers aren't versed in correct setup. So can you tell us all which Stereophile disc & what type of SPL meter the "guy" used to set up your Quatros?

The presence of the pdf files on the Vandy site is new. Of course the manual calls for the Vandersteen CD and an SPL meter. The CD is unobtainable to non-dealers (even some dealers don't have them) and most users don't know how to use an SPL meter. The more I think about the requirement that a dealer must be paid to come out and set these up, the more I dislike the premise, altogether. I know that the dealer is supposed to do this gratis the first time around when you buy them NEW, this does not apply of you move, move them to another room, or buy them used. Add to that the fact the many dealers (at least from my experience and what I’ve heard from others) are rather incompetent at doing the set up, this is a very annoying aspect of the higher-end Vandys.

It DOES make a big difference, too, so the "just leave the 11 pots in the "straight up position, just doesn't wash. I had a guy guide me through the set up with a Stereophile disc and my SPL meter and it was like a different set of speakers. Too bad that sound is not more easily accessible.

And,

The exact same procedure is recommended for setting up the 5A's as well, per RV.

Vandersteen has a pdf of the quatro manual listed on their website.

Yes, please, I'd like to see that, too!