Help for a beginner

http://www.audioreview.com/


go to reviews etc

 

Amazing. That is really helpful.

Those Quads sound perfect, if slightly impractical. I don't think I'd find space for them or else I'd be tempted to hire a car and go and get them!

The price on the Tannoys is skyrocketing a little but I will keep an eye out for another pair.

I had actually spotted the Rogers myself.

The Snells are the ones I can find the least about. They have a nice look to them and the price is a little high for something I know nothing about. Do you think they look like the right sort of thing or should I hold out for Rogers or Tannoys?

I think I have a cousin who fixes up old Tannoy speakers so maybe he can assist.

I have a question about Rogers. There is a ton of info on the LS3/5a but not so much on other series such as LS2, Exports, etc. I'm sure the LS3/5a is the most famous for a reason but are the others in the same sort of league or should I stick to the LS3/5a model?

 

Do you think they look like the right sort of thing or should I hold out for Rogers or Tannoys?


I think you should grab them both....drop what you not so keen on back on e bay.

It'll give you as long as you want to evaluate both.





Kidding, only half though.

 

Totally agree with the other comments regarding listening to speakers in a dealer room being a waste of time. If you listen to different speakers in different dealers' rooms then I would go so far to say that it is counterproductive and confusing. Also totally agree that in your situation, second hand is the way to go - view it as an extended home demo.

You say you have a cousin who refurbs Tannoys - if it were me, that would be my starting point for sure.

 

I've owned a pair of LS3/5s's and a pair of Studio 1's, and although I owned them maybe 4 years apart, I think if I had to choose between the two I'd go for the Studio 1's. This is mainly due to the lack of bass on the LS3/5a's, and the plentiful bass on the Studio 1's! They both sound great tho'. The Export is very similar to the Studio 1, although a chap I chatted to who owned both reckoned that the Studio 1 just shaded it.

I was chasing a pair of LS5/8's or LS5/9's for a while, but never got hold of any. They're supposed to be very good also.

Should also mention that I sold my Studio 1's as eventually I decided I preferred my Tannoys, but to be fair it took me about 3 months of regular swapping around to make that decision.

 

I disagree vehemently about dealers. Good dealers, anyway. Speakers sound different from room to room, but the differences between speakers are consistent. If you have a speaker with a rolled off bass and a zingy metal-dome tweeter treble and compare it with a speaker with a bass boom and a slugged soft-dome tweeter top-end, you will hear the difference between those two speakers wherever you listen to them. It's called listening 'through' the room and it happens in seconds.

Although the speaker-room interaction is vital, it does not alter the fundamental voicing of the speaker. Some over-stress the room effects, as if the room has an overarching impact on the sound. If you hear a voice you recognise, you will not suddenly fail to recognise that voice because they moved into another room. The same thing happens with loudspeakers.

A good dealer acts as a filter. You might have a shortlist of 10 products that have received good reviews, you end up only being able to hear three or four at a dealers and you find one to your liking and one also ran. Those you take home for the weekend. The chances of that person coming back with both speakers and asking for more are extremely limited. And usually those who do fall into the 'lost cause' category and take a year to choose the product they are least happy with and end up starting the process off again a few months later.

If you go to multiple dealers, make sure there's some kind of benchmark at each one so that you can cross-check. I agree that if you test five speakers at one place and four completely different speakers at another, you'll get nowhere. Personally, I think the selecting the dealer process is pre-listening anyway. If you go to demonstrations in more than three dealers, you'll just end up going round and round in circles.

 

Wow, am suprised to hear that opinion from a hifi magazine editor.

I think it's asking ''far too much'' of the hifi buying public to be able to work out the major room modes of a demo room, the shape of it, and how it will affect the signal and then...

''listen through''

...this information... presumably then ''filtering in'' the room effects of their own listening room.


Room effects may not affect the fundamental voicing of the speaker, but it does effect how we hear the speaker, and that in essence is hi-fi.

 

For once .....yes.

I would listen to what BN is saying.

What Alan is suggesting is, in my view , too complex and making far too much work of something that should be fun.

Of course if you are confident of what Alan is saying that's different but my guess is you are not.(I wouldn't be)

Take a punt on a pair of secondhand speakers and live with them for a bit.

Let us know how you get on.

 

This is getting off topic, but...

I've yet to encounter someone who couldn't automatically acclimatise to a room in less time than it takes to read this sentence. Or even this one. Determining fine subtleties in a system might take a little longer (perhaps as long as two tracks well known to the listener).

Think about the logistics of running group listening tests, for example. A group of people assemble in a room that they may have been to before, but even the most regular listener does not have day-to-day access to that room. For most of them, it is not 'their' room. In fact, usually the person most used to that room is the one doing the equipment changes, so the one person who's least involved in the listening part of the test. And yet, these listeners usually turn in remarkably consistent results, even under blind conditions. These listening sessions dictate how your products sound before they leave the factory, how they sound in the reviewer's system, how they sound in a dealers and how they sound at home.

Its how, if someone ends up with a pair of KEF Uni-Qs for example, I can confidently say you shouldn't toe them in. I know this because I have never encountered a location that the speakers benefitted from toe-in. Variations in room acoustics should mean that under some settings these speakers would benefit from toe-in, but to date no such placement has produced better results than non-toed-in settings.

Some aspects of the speaker-room interaction are key. Try putting a pair of full-range speakers in a room the size of a bedside table, or fire a pair of near-field monitors across a barn and you will quickly hear the extremes. Which is why a good dealer would discuss the nature of the room before picking out components (interestingly, it took six posts for someone to ask questions about room size, and people had already dashed off speaker suggestions, based on what exactly?)

I also don't see how getting someone else to do the chopping and changing of equipment for you becomes too much work. From experience, fatigue sets not long after you disassemble the third set of packaging in a single day.

Also, if you are buying a turntable from a dealer, they'll check and install the cartridge for you and show you how to transport the thing and set it up at home. Depending on the deck, that alone saves a lot of frustration for someone unused to setting up turntables.

My point is that a review should be a part of the selection process, a dealer should be a part of the discrimination process and the end part of the process should be done at home. That's not to sell people 'up' - it's to prevent making mistakes over and over again. I've seen that happen too often.

 

"I also don't see how getting someone else to do the chopping and changing of equipment for you becomes too much work.


You're missing my point.

Its not the physical engle oi wsrfering to but the selection process.

I'm just saying I think you are making it too complcated. (especially as the gent is non-car owner)


From experience, fatigue sets not long after you disassemble the third set of packaging in a single day."


I've always enjoyed it actually.

Quite excitng in its own way.

Horses for courses though, as always.



Also, if you are buying a turntable from a dealer, they'll check and install the cartridge for you and show you how to transport the thing and set it up at home. Depending on the deck, that alone saves a lot of frustration for someone unused to setting up turntables.


This may just be a point.

 

Hi Alan,

Do I win a prize? I don't disagree with a lot of what you have said. Some good info. But there is a mistrust of dealers and bits of the hifi industry. Also you can get some bargains 2nd hand and have fun trying the options. This is not for everyone.

Customers will be asking who are these good dealers and do they stock everything I could be interested in? Finding a dealer that suits you could be hit and miss. It would be nice to go into a dealer and have all your options there.

SCIDB

 

Yep, I agree with all you say. Being in London does give the person the opportunity to hear more than most, but that does mean a lot of traveling.

And yes, there is a lot of distrust and mistrust toward dealers, and not without reason in many cases, too. But there are also good ones.

And you win a fabulous prize* for being the one that asked the question.

* fabulous prize offer subject to non-availability

 

Hi Alan,

Didn't you start in Hifi working for a hifi dealer? Was it K J Leisuresound?

SCIDB

 

Originally Posted by Alan Sircom
(interestingly, it took six posts for someone to ask questions about room size, and people had already dashed off speaker suggestions, based on what exactly?).


No, I've just looked back and I think thats an unfair comment.

BN asked in post 6 as you say, before that were only general comments about Sam's own suggestions.

So, I don't beleive your criticism is watertight.

 

Yes I did, but it was Grahams, not KJ. That's immaterial though. I don't agree with the whole dealer process, but it can be useful.

I just find the broad-spectrum hostility toward dealers misplaced. They have their uses, even today.

 

The OP suggested interest in a pair of loudspeakers and mentioned budget. He also mentioned some broad parameters about the rooms, but nothing to do with size.

General comments were raised, but take the first three comments in particular.

Here's broad suggestions about room.

Try a Rega RS1 speaker

Later comments described room size and location and an RS1 would be likely a good product for that listener, but not necessarily ideal for the amplifier he uses. If the later comments described the room as 40' long by 24', with a high vaulted ceiling and an open plan kitchen in an ell to the side, those speakers would struggle to sound good, especially on the end of an A400.

These are the sort of questions those who are trained learn to ask because they shape the sort of components to select.

So, no... I don't think my comments were unfair at all.

 

"Here's broad suggestions about room."

https://www.audio-forums.com/as-rediect/showthread.php?t=22593

(Didn't take long did it?)

You're a magazine editor someone said?








Anyway, Alan, frankly I don't really care.

Over to Sam.

Hope all this is helping!

 

Hi Alan,

The comment about where you worked was just my curiosity. I did remember reading it somewhere and thought it was either Grahams or KJ. I think Roy Gregory worked for KJ at some stage.

I do think that dealer hostility needs to be addressed. There are some dealer horror stories out there and things the hifi industry is poor at.

SCIDB

 

I have met two or three really good dealers in my life. But I have stopped visiting dealers long ago. Must admit - I once had some really unpleasant experience with KJ. I tried numerous times to arrange a home auditions with some dealers, or just a shop audition, and if it is anything outside a dull boring mainstream stuff they either do not allow it to take home or do not even stock it, even if they advertise it. I do not know why, maybe I am just unlucky or look suspicious, or is it because "me is foreighner", as you already figured out? It is almost impossible to a/b items you want, because whatever you ask for a dealer does not stock both. (I for one believe that comparing audio side by side is mostly waste of time anyway, but it is another topic). One "analogue" guy - most of you must know his name, gave me a long lesson about the bad economics of stocking a gear which is not in high demand. But my last straw was one respectable hi-fi shop where I took my amplifier to audition some speakers. To start with, the dealer connected the amp to a pair of Wilson Benesсh Curves "to establish a benchmark", as he said. I dared to suggest that a single ended tube amp (yes it was a SET!) would be … eeer…struggling a bit with Wilsons. The guy kindly explained to me that a low powered amp will drive any speakers, only not as loud as more powerful ones... With this newly obtained indispensable knowledge I left the building and promised to forget about dealers once and for all.
But seriously speaking, once you have figured out the used market why on earth would you buy a new gear, unless money is not an object? I used to have some amazing used stuff in recent years, which I enjoyed immensely and which I would never ever afford otherwise. How many of us can buy a new ASR Emitter, or large Zingalis, or Reimyo, or top Lavardin or Shahinians to mention just a few? Audition them at a dealer? Give me a break.
And guess what - I have not lost a penny on the above stuff. (Apart from IT and Reimyo, which I still use. I will let you know guys if I decide to shift it. I will not charge above what I paid. .).

Sorry for the rant, it is completely off topic, and maybe irrelevant for a person who is not an audio junkie like me, but just wants to listen to the music on a good system. But even then, if you do not mind a cynical advice - by all means audition it at a dealer, but do not forget to try something which looks like way out of your price range, and if you like it, think twice.;-)

 

Indeed, though even at their rudest hifi dealers could never quite match staff of certain indie record shops for sneering condescension and up-themselvesness. They're only shop assistants when all's said and done.