Speaker Asylum: REVIEW: Avantgarde Trio Speakers by Steve

When I saw Avantgarde speakers for the first time I took them to be an architechtural statement, an interior decorator's delight. And hearing them for the first time at a '96 trade show reinforced that opinion.
But all that changed in '98 at the Franfurt High-End. I visited the show with a friend from the US. "One speaker we really must hear is the Avantgarde" he told me. He'd heard a pair of Duos in the US and was flat bowled over by the sound. Less than excited I checked where their room was and we made our way over.

In a fairly large corner room, Avantgarde had set up a pair of Trios with a Cambridge CD player, Clearaudio TT and cartridge and some German made electronics delivering a hefty 7 watts. Holger Fromme greeted everyone then launched into a half hour of uninteruppted music. Unless you call the applause after a certain Stones number an interuption. These speakers were that good. Absolute magic. We returned twice more for further demo sessions. Being picky, one noticed that the bass had neither the dynamics not the speed of the big horns, but hell, from 100Hz upward this was Formula one. The only problem was, these puppies are big. If you don't have a large lounge or dedicated listening room, which I didn't, don't apply. Its not that they need a lot of space to sound good. They don't. But they dominate their environment and need space around them just to integrate into the room.

During '98 I moved house and finally got the listening room I've always craved. The '99 High End show came around so off we went to Frankfurt with Avantgarde on the must-listen-to list. This time AG had taken a suite and organized 'quiet' listening sessions with their neighbours, so we could again have half an hour of uninterupted music. In the time since the last show, AG had been busy developing a new subwoofer better matched to the speed and dynamics of the horns. Bass now integrated perfectly. From 18Hz to 20,000hz the music was incredibly fast, solid and lifelike. Amazing.
Demonstration appointments were made and 4 weeks later I transported a car load of equipment to AGs studios in Lautertal, Germany.

We hooked up all the electronics to a pair of Duos, switched everything on and left the system playing music overnight. Next morning we sat down for some serious auditioning.

The Duo is a threeway speaker, 18 - 170Hz covered by the active subwoofer, 170 to 2KHz by the midrange horn and 2-20KHz by the high frequency horn. Efficiency is an extremely dynamic 102dB and a nominal 8 Ohm load. Minimum amp requirement is 10 watts and a minimum room size of 200 sq feet is recommended. The horns are described as 'spherical' with a highly shaped polar response which delivers several major advantages.

1. Very high sensitivity makes it possible to reduce the size of the driver, resulting in extremely low mass and correspondingly fast response. These horns are lightening fast.

2. Shaped response. All horns have the same shaped polar response, which results in more direct sound reaching the listening position and fewer reflections to disturb imaging and distort the in-room frequency response. Another result is a very wide sweet spot and low sensitivity to room placement from 170Hz on up (or 100Hz for the Trio)

3. The horn dimensions control the upper and lower frequencies that each horn delivers. The passive crossover can therefore be extremely simple and phase neutral.

4. The horn design avoids folding, which introduces nonlinearities (the corresponding horn 'honk')

All drivers are custom designed and built by AG. Judging by the pictures in their brochure, the magnet assemblies in the horns appear to be larger than the driver membrane diameter, so its no surprise that they can take up to 150 Watts peak signal (200W for the Trio)

So how did it all sound? In a word, sensational. I have never heard sound like this from a domestic hi-fi system. The speakers have the ability to portray the smallest detail, or present orchestral climaxes in an almost overwhelming fashion, while sounding completely at ease and relaxed. No sense of strain whatsoever. In fact, the horns seem to stand there mute while the music plays all around them.

You'd better lock the doors when you listen to this system or like I was, you'll be caught howling along with the music and playing air guitar.

Specifically, the colors of the music are far more intense than I am used to and the 'density' of the music in the room way higher than anything I've previously heard. Singers have a head and a body, while instruments all have a specific character which makes it very easy to hear the difference for example between a viola and a violin.

The system (with a VK-50SE) has enormous presence. I'm used to the VK-5i/Extrema's excellence in this regard, especially with percussion, but this comnbination was streets ahead. Each instrument that entered the mix was percieved like it was in the room.

Interestingly, the system loses no excitement when turned down to fairly low levels. Normally in this situation dynamic shadings and air dissappear and bass takes a walk on the mild side, but not with this system. This is no doubt helped by the BAT electronics

Speed, not just with regard to rhythm and pace but in the systems ability to move from 0 to 100dB. To produce micro, macro and mighto dynamics, to form the whole note, instantly yet in a most relaxed and easy manner.

Dynamics. Unbelievable. When this system gets loud, it does so with tremendous authority, power, control and ease, with no apparent ceiling. There was a difference here between low power SETs and tube electronics with 50 or 60 watts. Low power SETs are undoubtedly beautiful, especially in the midrange, but they get left behind at the frequency extremes. If you want it all from these loudspeakers, don't go with too little power, despite the high efficiency. The BAT VK-60 seems to match the Duo and Trio attributes perfectly.

Soundstage. First indications are that the the speakers are indeed largely insensitive to room placement. With my new Trios, I have been able to remove most of my room treatments without detriment, leaving only some bass traps on the back wall. Its early days yet but this is most encouraging.

Having been roundly blown away by the Duos, we switched everything over to a pair of Trios plus 4 active subs. (107dB, 8 Ohm, 100-20KHz via horns, 18-100Hz via subs). Again we let it warm up for an hour while we had lunch then came back for a listen. First up was Greg Brown's Slant Six Mind. Wierd. The system sounded wierd! Must be the recording. Try something else. Nope, something wrong. Go over the hook-up again.

Turns out that the Trios we were listening to were an older pair with strange binding posts, the kind that when you remove the nuts, you remove their color coding. I'd inadvertently wired up the horns out of phase. Still plenty of bass due to the active subs so the problem wasn't so apparent. Hooked it up properly and tried again with Greg Brown.

Holeee Cow. More than a Duo on steroids, much more. This is another level. All the same attributes, but more. More detail, wider, deeper soundstage, bass with physical impact, players in the room, with all the clues that allow you to completely suspend disbelief. Utterly natural but at the same time your could hear whether artists were breathing through nose or mouth, hear the fingering technique on double bass and guitar, appreciate the fine touch of Rubenstein, the genius of Heifitz. etc. etc. This loudspeaker may change your perception of what a 16/44 CD can do!

And what didn't I hear?. Colouration. Absolutely non that I could detect. Not on voice, strings, piano or anything else we tried. Grain, hardness or harshness ditto . These speakers will probably work well with most competent electronics and do not automatically require a huge investment in ancilliary equipment although they probably need to be matched to the likes of BATs new VK50SE and VK-60 for them to reach the very highest performance levels I heard.

Have fun.

Steve

REVIEW: Avantgarde Trio Speakers Review by Steve at Audio Asylum