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Model: | Trio |
Category: | Speakers |
Suggested Retail Price: | $$$$ |
Description: | 3 way spherical horn with active subwoofer |
Manufacturer URL: | Avantgarde |
Model Picture: | View |
Review by Aurelien_from_France on March 30, 2014 at 00:09:45 IP Address: 82.67.63.238 | Add Your Review for the Trio |
I make the review brief as English is not my mother language.
I have had quite a lot of high-end speakers. I enjoyed most of them. But, here, the situation is drastically different. It is not really a speaker : from the viewpoint of sound, it is just like the real event, from the viewpoint of design, it is more a work of art !
Everything is just perfect. It just sounds like live music.
You can drive them to incredibly loud levels with a 10 WpC amplifier (the efficiency is close to 110 dB !!) and enjoy a so delicate sound a low levels …
I cannot find any drawback. I cannot find anything they don’t to just right. Either classical or rock, everything sounds just real.
Of course, it is expensive. Obviously. But there is a kind of trend that speakers contenders to be « best of the World » have to reach incredible prices. Maybe 200 000 $, or 300 000 $ or event 500 000 $ ! This one is expensive but not crazily expensive. And to my ears they are indeed the best. I like the sound as an audiophile but I also appreciate the design and engineering as an astrophysicist.
People at Avantgarde are extremely nice. This is a small, "human" company. They make superb speakers. I plan to keep this one a lifetime. It just fulfills all my hopes, and beyond.
Product Weakness: | Will make you find all other speaker a bit ... ridiculous :-) |
Product Strengths: | Perfect sound. Huge sensitivity. Magnificent design. |
Amplifier: | Audio Analog |
Preamplifier (or None if Integrated): | MBL |
Sources (CDP/Turntable): | MNBL |
Speakers: | Trios |
Cables/Interconnects: | Adioquest |
Music Used (Genre/Selections): | all |
Type of Audition/Review: | Product Owner |
I've heard the Avantgardes. While rather musical, I thought they rang like crazy. For that kind of money the manufacturer surely could've built a thicker or otherwise reinforced horns.
My Duo Omegas are made from the same materials, and they do not "ring" in any way.
"Your liver suffers dearly now for youthful magic moments...so rock on completely with some brand new components"
big j.
"... only a very few individuals understand as yet that personal salvation is a contradiction in terms."
Watch out! the efficiency police are out!
Curious, what do you use as a source? You say 'MNBL' but I'm not sure what this is.
Cheers.
Yeah right. At $62,000 a set for a base price, maybe one person in five thousand reading this site could even think about getting a pair of those. That sounds like insanely expensive to me.
nt
CLick the picture below to see my system
enjoy the music!
I am very happy for you that you love your new loudspeakers. You are however misleading people unintentionally I expect when you claim these loudspeakers are 110 db efficient. The loudspeaker system efficiency will always be set by the lowest efficiency speaker in the system and in your case that will be the woofers. There is no possible way that your woofers are even achieving anywhere near 100 db much less 110 db across their band. Below 100 Hz a reasonable efficiency guess would be perhaps a true 95 - 96db for those boxes. While your horn with their compression drivers may well be capable of 110 db levels the actual system efficiency is not even close to those figures. People will get the wrong impression when such exaggerated figures are given as fact. Best regards Moray James.
moray james
I think it would be fair to point out that Aurelian is misleading no one...he's just passing along the sensitivity specs as per the manufacturer's published data. And I do believe that sensitivity should be the operative word here...not efficiency.
Moray James wrote: "The loudspeaker system efficiency will always be set by the lowest efficiency speaker in the system and in your case that will be the woofers. There is no possible way that your woofers are even achieving anywhere near 100 db much less 110 db across their band. Below 100 Hz a reasonable efficiency guess would be perhaps a true 95 - 96db for those boxes."
This rule is, of course, true, except for when it is not true.
If you biamplify, triamplify, etc., with a line level crossover then the situation becomes more complex as well as more versatile and interesting.
you can biamp all you like but you cannot ever hope to come remotely close to the efficiency stated (110 db)you won't have the available power and you wont have the power handling even if you did have the power at hand. You just can't pull an elephant out of a shoe box. That said I am sure these are fine sounding loudspeakers. Best regards
moray james
I agree their numbers are an exaggeration, but isn't the point for most of the aficionados here to use flea or other low watt amps, in which case the bandwidth over which this system (> 100hz) provides a fairly high sensitivity.
I don't know anyone in a small home room that really needs 105+db/w sensitivity for the first two octaves. I would think a stout SS amp with typical highish gain for the low section mated with a aforementioned small watt amp with lower gain would work well in a domestic environment. Would it not?
I guess, what I am saying, is that while 110db is obviously a marketing creative license, for practical purposes it is conveys the appropriate practical usage.
----------------
"When Khruschev said "we will bury you" I don't think he meant with surplus parts." zacster
Right and wrong at the same time.All the Avantgarde models come with amplifier for the woofers, so their efficiency (or lack thereof) is moot.
The Community M200 used in the midrange of the Trio is about 108.5dB/W on a horn with a Di=7. The horn they are on looks like a tractrix, and could very well have a Di=10, and thus it would be 111.5dB. It very well may be that high as they have a special voice-coil made for their M200 so as to not have to use a resistive pad in the network.
Same comments apply to the Beyma CP380M they use for the tweeter.
The link is a similar HF driver from Faital Pro on a tractrix horn, it looks like you could claim it to be 110dB (which they do).
http://www.communitypro.com/files/literature/spec%20sheets/M200A_SPEC.pdf?phpMyAdmin=c9cc5b3953d87385dc22218d669e7aab
http://www.usspeaker.com/beyma%20CP380M-1.htm
Note, the Beyma is on a CD horn, so it would have more HF on the type of horn in the Trio.
Edits: 04/01/14
The Avantgarde mid driver does not look like the Community M200s I have here.
There is a cover on the back, and the voice-coil top-chamber is a bit different.
The M200A is no longer available (as I think that was what Avantgarde uses)
The M200 requires a low-pass filter to remove the peak that the M200A top-chamber removed.
I have a photo montage from a magazine review on my hard-drive at home that shows the three drivers from the Trio, it's easy to see the M200A details.
The woofers are active, so their efficiency is irrelevant. The entire system as it sits is above 110dB with the active subs/woofers.
Steve
Remember, it's all about the music.
A system is only as sensitive as the least sensitive section, regardless whether that section is self powered. In effect, if the system is flat, the more sensitive parts of the system are padded down to the least sensitive part. It doesn't matter how this level matching is done, by active crossover, L-pads or whatever; the effect is the same.
Lookie here, I used to run Altec A5s, of about 105db sensitivity, with JBL Pro subs of about 100db sensitivity. An active crossover was used at 100hz. Now I ran the JBLs wide open but had to turn the Altecs down to match them. The result was a SYSTEM sensitivity of about 100db.
Now I could've run the A5s wide open and had 105db sensitivity above 100hz but that would've sounded like Hell, right?
If the speaker is passive, then yes, Moray is right. You would have to pad the horns down to match the output of the woofers. However, in this case the woofer is active and has increased gain to match the horns. Therefor you get the same dBs per watt from the woofers as the horns. Thus, equal sensitivity.
Remember, it's all about the music.
He is right, not only that but even just the hf section is limited to the sensitivity a the lowest point (assuming you wish flat response).
For a compression driver, that means that the 15K to 20K area is the limiting thing AND if one has a CD horn (those are not) the maximum sensitivity up high is only 100-105dB.
How have you been, are you missing the iron from the old days?
A few images @ homes :
Beautiful speakers Aurelien, congratulations on a fine purchase! I love great horn speakers. Question- are those rectangular speaker boxes in the corners additional bass speakers? I have not seen those before in the Avantgarde product line.
Seems pretty common, actually...........
Hey Todd, long time no see. Long time no see for the living room owner as well... please say hello for me. That was a fun road trip / listening weekend, so long ago.
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