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In Reply to: Am I a Spendor guy??? posted by hesson11 on February 6, 2006 at 20:30:52:
After to listening to about 75 different speakers it came down to Spendor SP 100s or Harbeth Monitor 40s for me. I had high hopes for Reynaud, but found them not to my liking at all. This was about four years ago, and I understand he has re-designed some of his line. I thought the 40s had a glorious midrange, but were a bit bright and analytical for me. I only heard them once, and the electronics were suspects. The Spendors absolutely needed the right amp to tame the lower midrange-upper bass, but with that I found them great and bought them. I use a Plinius 8200, now discontinued.My standard in all of this has been the great concert hall, with warm, rich, inviting sound. After I purchased the Spendors, I chanced on the Vandersteen 3A Signatures. If I had it to do it all over again, I would have bought them. I think they are a much better buy and very close to what you want. If you add two Vandersteen 2Wq subwoofers at some point, you will have a wonderfull system for the whole range of classical music, but you don't need the subs to really enjoy music. They add quite a bit to organ music.
But, you must listen for yourself. Everybody's opinion is nothing more than a guide to what to listen to. To thine own ears be true!
Follow Ups:
" I thought the [Harbeth Monitor] 40s had a glorious midrange, but were a bit bright and analytical for me."They are not a bright, analytical speaker, so as you suggest, the electronics may have been at fault. They are absolutely neutral through the entire midrange, honest to a fault, thanks to their very highly resolving midrange driver; and they have a gorgeous high end, thanks to one of the best tweeters in the world. They ARE monitors. They do tell us what's in the recording. But they haven't the cold, stern quality associated with truly analytical speakers. We may be arguing here over what "analytical" means in audio, but I think it is generally considered a pejorative term, referring to a recognizable coolness. Harbeths do tend to sound objective compared to Spendors and Harbeths, but at the risk of quibbling, I hate to see the word "analytical" applied to them.
Bob:I have never heard on any other speaker Ella Fitzgerald's voice sound so wonderful as it did on the Monitor 40s. It was absolutely entrancing. Simularly, on other music I thought the midrange certainly was a contender for the best I ever heard, But as I said, the highs seemed exaggerated. For example, I played one CD (he had an excellent CD player) derived from an analog tape that I had heard many times on many speakers. The tape hiss was always there, but with the 40s it was very prominent, obvious. But this could have been the electronics. In any event, I tend to associate exaggerated highs with what is often called an analytical sound. My attempt at a second hearing of the 40s to be arranged in London by the designer got frustrated by a schedule mixup, so I never had another chance to hear them. Mr. Shaw himself, in a note to me, stated that the 40s had almost an electrostatic quality. You can make of that what you will.
I did not mention that the 40's shared one fault with the Spendor SP100s: they do have a tendency to boom. This is something that can be mitigated/eliminated in the Spendors with careful placement and the right SS amp. I suspect the same must be true of the 40's, but I didn't have the opportunity to try. I am not a big fan of ported speakers, though both the SP 100s and the 40s have done a pretty good job with the ports. Ports are still to some extent a fake, and it is in the area of the port response that I could hear one of the biggest differences between the SP 100s and the Vandersteens.
Joe
Yes, but there are electrostatics and electostatics. One guy who heard the M40's in my house said they sounded like full range Quads. I took that as a compliment. They didn't sound that way to me, but maybe that's my aging ears.I never found Compact 7's tizzy but I did find them a little boxy sounding in a large (5,000 cubic feet) room. Actually, I believe they have a slight dip built into their upper midrange to compensate for a boost in that area produced by close room boundaries in the smaller rooms they're intended for. The M30's had none of that...they share the same tweeter with the M40's.
I have only heard the Harbeth Monitor 40s that one time with the suspect electronics, and the C7s once in London, when the srew-up happend. Shaw said I should never have listened to those, as, based on our correspondence, they weren't for me. He was right. The only way I was able to hear the 40s was through an appeal to the Harbeth discussion group, and an owner who lived about 40 miles away invited me to his home. I could hardly get into the electronics issue with him.Joe
Big big boxes, sort of resembling a wardrobe? RE Greene has published FR curves of his, and they always slope down, even before eq, and I've always heard they had a naturally decaying high end. Bob had a pair, though I doubt he measured them. I've never heard them, myself. The smaller Compact 7s, which I do have, have a little too much tweeter, and can be troublsome in a room with a low ceiling.
________
"Occasionally we list eccentrically, all sense of balance gone."
Gosh, I would never accuse the C7es2 of having too much tweeter....in fact they have a considerably softer balance than my previous Proac R2's. I suspect many listeners may find them too polite in the treble until their ears adjust to the smooth balance. Maybe in comparison to Spendor they are 'hotter' but they sound very natural to me.
Compared to the R2's the C7's are utterly unfatiguing, far less coloured, brilliant on vocals and have remarkable imaging for what is a fairly large conventional looking box.
System Details
Absolutely, 100% sure they were the 40s. I was getting near buying them, as I was down to two choices. As I said, the electronics were a bit suspect, though they were very high end. The room was heavily carpeted and draped, so it wasn't the room. As I said above, I could hear tape hiss very prominently on a recording where it was quite low on the vast majority of other speakers I had heard. However, I never make any major decisions based on one listening in one place. I would have not crossed them off my list based on this one hearing. I was also bothered by the bass boom in the 40s, reported by other respected listeners, and finally, all things considered, I felt the price was a bit steep. Still, I did go to some considerable effort to hear them one more time on a trip to London, but signals got crossed, and it didn't happen. Two days ago I moved on from my Spendor SP 100s to Vandersteen 5s, and I am happy to be done with ported speakers.
The 40's were not designed to be used in typical homes. I think the bass can't be managed without an equalizer.
________
"Occasionally we list eccentrically, all sense of balance gone."
When I said the 40s had a tendency to boom, it was no more than I had heard in the SP 100s in other set-ups, probably less. In my home, which has a large living room, I have completely eliminated the bass boom from my Spendors, and I believe I could do the same for the 40s. I recently met an owner of a high-end store who owns 40s. He said he has no problem at all with the bass using the right amplification and room placement, and he doesn't use an EQ. I have an EQ that is usually out of the circuit. I use it only to correct poorly balanced recordings, where it can do wonders.Joe
In my 5,000 cubic foot room, there was no boom, but the ceiling was 11 feet away, which no doubt helped.
Pablo, you have stated in several recent posts that the C7s have "too much tweeter." Have you seen any measurements supporting this? I sold my pair of C7s 3 years ago (now own Harbeth HL5s) abut did not hear too much tweeter. BTW, agree totally with you on the match between Quad 909/99 and Harbeth.
the way they measure in my room, and the way they were measured by someone else who has more sophisticated equipment and the way they sound to him too. Martin Colloms also mentioned some tizz from the tweeter. It was never noticeable in my family room, because there's no dropped ceiling and I sit far away. Now, it is possible that our first generation C7's are different from the later ES IIs, but Alastair, from whom I bought mine and who sold a lot of them around the world, told me that there were no changes to the crossover and no real diff in sound. I'd buy a new pair if I thought there was a difference. Robert says I should get an equalizer. I am also one of a handful of people (maybe fewer) who prefer the defunct K6, which sounds and measures a little warmer and smoother.How do the 5's compare?
I think I said too much about the Quads, but there is a sort of synergy with the C7.
________
"Occasionally we list eccentrically, all sense of balance gone."
> > How do the 5's compare?Its hard to compare because the room changed - I went from a Manhattan loft to a much smaller room with a fireplace in a CA ranch house, and from tube amplifiction to transistor. My hunch is The HL5s go lower in bass and somehow, are easier on the ears with poor recordings than the C7s.
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