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In Reply to: RE: " It's not that the $1200 speaker is better " posted by beppe61 on February 26, 2014 at 07:20:26
The Audio Note AX-Two (small ones - excuse my knee). I bought them the same day. It was designed by Andy Whittle of Rogers/Celestion - so while it has an AN logo on the front it's well more of a Celestion sound IMO.
The thing to note though is my comment would also apply to my newest loudspeakers - the KEF LS-50.
Everything starts at the source. No matter how great a loudspeaker is it can not fix or put back errors or omissions from the source and amp. Linn harped on this for years and so did UHF magazine.
It's also why I didn't mention the name of the speakers because it isn't that the AX Two is necessarily better than plenty of other speakers. The KEF LS-50 is just as good if not better (in some ways and not in others).
The reason the dealer sells out of them so bloody fast is that he is connecting them up to wonderful sounding gear. Joe Smirtz walks in and hears a $1200 loudspeakers and is blown away by the emotional involvement that he hears. That emotion starts from the Source and the amplifiers/cables and the speaker passes it on. Every other place selling every other $1200 loudspeaker has them connected to $1k SS Rotel or $500 MP3 converters and there is not emotion or subtlety (worse it's on a wall-o-speakers and a switch box).
So you walk out thinking "Holy crap these are the best $1200 speakers I've ever heard."
I despised the KEF LS-50 every time I heard them because of what they were connected to and the lousy rooms they were in. Put on a terrific front end and all of a sudden they go from coal to diamonds.
I now also own the KEF LS-50 as a result.
Follow Ups:
I guess my only problem with this approach is that at some point, as you suggest, it can be misleading if the dealer is not upfront about what's going on.
Yes, some speakers are better than we generally hear them to be, but to get them to sound that 20% or so better, we have to connect them to gear that will entirely screw with the budgets of most customers. Audio Note front ends can be hugely expensive such that no one interested in AX2's is ever going to hear them sound that good at home and it's deceptive to demo them that way. A truly state of the art makeover artist can make a plain woman (or man for that matter) into a million dollar beauty by bringing out some of their hidden aesthetic qualities, for a million dollars.
What I think is more interesting is figuring out how much you NEED to spend to get AX2's to sound extremely good w/o creating a weirdly out of balance system. You may also find that these speakers have limitations that a hugely ambitious, highly resolving chain of electronics will expose. Audio Note kisses everything it touches (until you get into its stratospheric gear), so it's not always the best example of what I'm talking about. Even the fairly highly resolving Quest Silver Signatures ($20K) are fairly forgiving.
Your general point is a good one, as Sir Ivor taught us. But at the extreme, it can become a silly one, yes?
I agree - One will be seriously dissapointed in the AX Two when you connect it up to rubbish. That was pointed out somewhat in the PF review.
So there are two ways to audition stuff - one is to hook it up to excellent gear as my dealer here noted "let's hear what the speakers can "really do" which is valuable I think so you know the limits of the loudspeaker.
But also your point is well taken - people buying $1200 speakers are not likely going to spend $300,000 or whatever on front end equipment. Chances are they're going to buy the I-Zero amplifier and zero source (fortunately, I auditioned the combination as well). It's hard to go wrong doing this based on what I heard in my home with the combination. For the money - it will be difficult to beat.
It's actually a KEF LS-50 problem as well. The speaker is quite difficult to drive properly and few people are going to buy big expensive SET amplifiers. With the typical electronics on them - I am not sure I would want the KEF. On the other hand it's not really the speaker's problem if the gear is rubbish - don't shoot the messenger.
And it's tough for speaker only makers because they can't hope to account for all the various gear that MIGHT be connected to it. Audio Note wants you to connect Audio Note so it's tailored somewhat together. EL84 and 300B for AN K and AN J - 211 and parallel versions of the amps for AN E is sort of what I get from the line. HE versions to allow for the EL84 and 300B and 2A3.
A $300K front end is not just excellent gear, it's absurdly excellent gear. Excellent gear ahead of AX2's, likely getting from them ALL that they have, would include a CDT 3, a Dac 2.1 Signature, and an OTO Signature. That's $23K, still nutz for AX2's but it does provide a perspective. I expect Mr. Sound Hound could have made his point with it. Anyway, we've bored the non-AN crowd enough for one thread.
To answer a question you posed a week or so ago, Tocaro does not yet have a dealer in Hong Kong.
Hi Bob -The AN dealer is Elephant Holdings in Hong Kong. I don't think the Western dealers outside of Audio Federation have enough money to be bringing in the big rig gear to be putting on AX Twos - LOL.
And I think to put all the above in perspective - if a person has $23k to spend on front end gear - while the AX Two is a terrific and IMO "criminally underrated" speaker consumers are going to put at least an AN K on them. Love the K with the foam surround here.
PS Last time I was at Elephant Holdings they were looking to bring in speaker line - maybe TOcaro could give then a call (granted I am selfish cause I want to hear the two directly against eachother in the same room).
They just dropped Wilson Benesch which probably struggled to sell against Audio Note in spite of the sexy looks and even bigger price tags. So now both their listening rooms are AN K and AN E. Interestingly they don;t have the AN J but two of the guys own them. In Hong Kong with the apartments I should think the AN K and J would be better suited. But I think it is the rich Chinese guys who come in and their apartments and homes in China are massive.
The Tocarro interest me - How close to the back wall can the 42D go.
I'm holding off on the big speaker purchase for awhile. I want it to be an "easy purchase" not a nerve-racking one. Smallish HK apartments, tube friendly, and it's understandable the E/SPX HE (Alnico) are in the top spot. I go on about them so much for the last 10 years maybe I should actually spring for a pair! There is an aspect of getting used to a certain presentation - like having a favorite old pair of shoes. They're comfortable. I brought the KEF in to shake up my comfort zone.
My goal is to have to have 4-6 reference loudspeakers for review purposes. I want to have a panel, a horn, single driver, etc.
On the amp front I have high damping factor class A/B SS, 8 watt SEP in the OTO, an 845SET, EL34 PP tube.
As a dealer you can have different presentations that question the other presentations
Edits: 02/28/14 02/28/14
Notes:
AN-K/SPes with the new foam surrounds are much better speakers than the earlier ones with rubber surrounds, I agree.
Tocaro 42's don't worry about rear walls. I'd say a couple of feet would be okay.
The speaker I wish YOU'D try out would be the K/SPx. I've always thought that a slightly better K/SPe could be dy-no-mite. But they cost too much to be commercially viable.
AN-J's always struck me as the in-between AN speakers with no particular identity. Then I heard a pair in a 12' x 14' room and changed my mind.
Yes, as a dealer, I have to have different presentations, but it can be unsettling. In my case it's like having a blue eyed beauty, a brown eyed sexy French peasant, and...well, I'm still too close to the Tocaros to put a metaphor on them yet. At the moment, they strike me as the wife rather than the babe, the one you stop seeing as an aesthetic/sexy object. I sometimes wish the three presentations would cancel each other out but they don't.
Thank you very much indeed for the kind and valuable reply.
I agree completely with the paramount importance of a good source.
But i was saying that if you take a great sounding chain the single elements constituting it must be also great.
If the chain is strong also every single link must be strong.
Thanks a lot again.
Kind regards,
bg
Many speakers are not nearly as bad as you think...especially less expensive ones. The reason many sound bad is they are demoed with cheap electronics, which are often far worse in sound quality compared to good electronics than the gap in speakers.
Hi and this is good.
I am really thinking to switch to valve one day.
I read a lot of people doing this to get more "music" from their set-ups.
But it is a mid term project ... i am on the move now.
But i feel i will end with a tube integrated.
And good to know that affordable and great sounding speakers are available.
I think this Audio Note have been designed with tube amps in mind.
So they should be also easy to drive.
Thanks a lot again.
Kind regards,
bg
Here is my current duo
Really nice indeed ! Congratulations.
Sometimes i wonder if i should switch to tubes ... maybe with more efficient speakers ...
Thanks again.
Kind regards,
bg
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