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Hi'
The above mentioned monitors seem to have everything in a speaker I am looking for.
I have a Audiomat Prelude 30 wpc tube intergrated in a 21 x18 room with vaulted ceilings.
Musical taste are jazz,vocals and acoustic guitar.
As I am unable to audition,any input on either of these fine speakers would be appreciated.Has anyone had the chance to hear both?
The difference in price presents an interesting price value relationship.
Thanks in advance.
Art
Follow Ups:
Keep us updated on what speakers you decide to audition.
These all sound like great products. We should feel very lucky to have such options and affordable ones at that.
I haven't heard the Europa but have no reason to think that it is noy a very good speaker. The Carolina's have brought a level of music to my house that I didn't think possible ... they fit my needs taste and price range. For others I'm sure the Europa's may do the same.I think that we can speculate, pontificate, spew measurements facts and fables online here but we can't do the most important thing which is to listen. It is great to learn about different drivers, crossovers, cabinets, transmission lines, marble reflexes etc...but without sitting down and hearing them I don't think that it means much.
It shows me that these this vs that posts are really doing a disservice, to the point of having one manufacturer say that his topology is superior. I would love to have you hear the drivers in the JTM cabinets show me the zing at 1K..... go ahead and tell me they are inefficient on my little EL84 amp and tell me there not playing loud ! Numbers on paper....come on over and give them a good listen. oh, man here I go... maybe I'm no better. I just think that knocking a key compenent of a fellow manufacturer's speaker that you have never heard is a tad uncouth.
If you want to compare speakers then you have to do it at home or when you can in a shop and then have the abilty to trust you own ears.
Brand loyalty and methodical preferences are remarkable. We see it all the time here whether it be the planar, horn, full-range, monitor, B*se, or numerous other camps. I enjoy it because it shows vitality in the audio industry. Everyone is interested in pushing the envelope. It's really impossible to say that any one product is good for all situations and everybody all of the time. Paper physics aside, not everyone experiences the exact same sensations when sound pressure is transmitted to the brain.I have fed the JTM's 6 watts of SET, 18 watts of PP, and 220 watts of SS which to me proved a flexibility in powering options. I have used various combinations of gold, silver, and copper IC's and speaker wire to find what works best for me. I spent weeks on placement. I never did perceive a "zing" and if paper physics proved it conclusively to me, I will write it off as a small compromise for everything else that this speaker does well. Part of the buying experience is weighing the trade-offs to determine value.
I congratulate both Jordan and Carolina Audio for thinking outside the same old box. I am pleased to have invested in this technology. And I find it hard to believe that Ronnie would not return a call or email even if it was an obvious attempt to unfairly criticize his product or waste his time.
I agree, we are lucky to have a choice in speakers. However, many make the wrong choice. Many are swayed by ads, hype or demo's in hi-fi shops. Listening with your ears is not always the ultimate answer either as many hi-fi shops purposely wire the competition out of phase or adjust the volume so that the competitor plays softer. The human ear will ALWAYS chose the louder speaker as the "best" What you need to do, is to listen to the speaker in YOUR room, on YOUR system. Even then you need to be keenly aware of components that are not up to par. Keep in mind putting a better speaker on a system with a crappy pre-amp will only serve to more clearly reveal that pre-amps faults. And so it goes with the amp, turntable, tone arm, phono cartridge, cd player etc. You won't see that as the case though. After all, you only changed the SPEAKERS. Right? So.......it has to be the new speakers that suck. Maybe........maybe NOT. If building a great audio system were easy, you wouldn't need great salespeople, and great manufacturers, like Roy Johnson at Green Mountain to help guide you thru(and hopefully avoid) costly mistakes.
I avoid criticizing a product that I haven't auditioned myself. Please keep in mind that Carolina Audio (CA) never uses paid advertisements and sells itself only on the word of satisfied customers. His products are not sitting in showrooms across America. He has a generous in-home trial period and no-hassel return policy. Around thirty years of experience building and modifying speakers. Many happy customers who have become personal friends and value his experience and willingness to freely impart this information. Since it is a one-man operation, CA doesn't have to support a sales staff and administrative bureaucracy. This keeps costs down. Quality control issues are avoided in an operation this small. Case in point: the Conus Essence speaker is very similar to the JTM in design yet costs more than double the JTM.Feel free to audition the product and offer any criticism you like. But those of us who own the products and know manufacturer personally are not going to stand down to rediculous personal attacks.
I've sent 3 emails over the past couple of days to the Carolina Audio designer. Not one response.This doesn't bode well, customer-service wise.
I've never had this issue of getting my questions *promptly* answered by Roy Johnson, Reimer or Ed Frias. These guys were Golden with this.
I have a couple and sometimes mix them up !. If Ronnie did contact you but you were checking the wrong account then post that as your error and not go of on Ronnie.
I feel sure that Green Mountain Audio makes a wonderful speaker.
I don't usually do any posting, but to set the record straight I have responded twice requesting his phone number or he could call me at my number. I'm a much better talker than typist. No hard sell just answers to your questions. Feel free to call me at 843-552-3654.
Ronnie Thackeray-Carolina Audio
The phone number for Green Mountain is (719) 636-2500 Roy Johnson is the company's designer. I'm sure he will be of great help to anyone who has an interest in MUSIC or audio. He's a busy man, but has always taken time to talk to me at length about sudio and made recomendations to improve my sound system.
This is a one-man, two handcrafted pairs of speakers per week operation. He keeps email to a minimum but is very generous with his advice and time on the phone.
One more thing about the Green Mountain design. It doesn't care what kind of amp is driving it. Anyone who has ever tried to run Infinity's on Yamaha or Electrostats on almost anything Japanese know what i'm talking about. These things will play and sound GREAT on a rack system. Thats the beauty of the breakthrough crossover design.
I have the Europa's and I have to say they are the most impressive speakers I have heard, bar none. As far as the 1st order x-over is concerned, it makes a tremendous difference. One comparative listen is all it takes. Carolina Audio is a single driver, no x-over system. Basic physics tells us the following:In a single driver, phase shift won't be caused by an electrical crossover- there isn't one!. The signal remains free of crossover parts distortions/haze too.However, any driver has mass, suspension, and damping (by the suspension's resistive losses and the amplifier). Thus it is a "damped harmonic oscillator"- in a Physics 101 book.
A harmonic oscillator has a 1/4 wave's worth of time-delay down at its low-frequecy resonance, compared to the midrange tones. For a sealed woofer with -3dB at 40Hz (close-mic'd measured), that means 1/4 of 1/40th of a second, or 1/160th of a second=6.25 milliseconds. That doesn't sound like much time delay, but it is ~7 feet of distance, at the speed of sound.
Put two microphones on a piano- one for the left hand, one for the right; both equally close to the strings/soundboard. Now, impose 6.25 milliseconds delay between those two mics- that is, between the lowest notes and the mid-scale notes.
Imagine what the piano would sound like if the right hand tones got to the microphone seven feet sooner than the left hand's lowest notes, because that's what's happening as you slide down the scale for ANY loudspeaker- and it's a gradual change in phase, which is why we don't complain too much.
Just some food for thought. Trust your ears guys....not speaker manufacturer's hype. If hype was king, we would all own Bose 901's
Good listening, Dale
and from my experience I can tell you that Carolina Audio is free of "hype." There is a growing number of audiophiles impressed with the new generation of Jordan drivers and Carolina Audio's designs.
Thank you all for your comments and insight.You have given me a lot to think about.
The ultimate proof is in the hearing and match with the room and equipment.
Again,thank you very much.
Regards,
Art
There are speakers that do your taste in music with aplomb.Ellis 1801b:
($1300 Very smooooooth. Go to audiocircle.com or harmonicdiscord.com to learn more)Tyler Taylo Reference:
($1100 Used on Audiogon or thru Tyler website for a little bit more. Company has generous upgrade policy)
http://tyleracoustics.home.mindspring.com/used_equipment.html
Pardon my ignorance, but HOW can the Carolina floorstander hit the highs with as much refinement and smoothness as a top-line tweeter from Morel, SEAS, Scanspeak, Hi-Vi, etc.Please educate me, as I'm unfamilar with Carolina's designs............
The Jordan site indicates:1. Frequency response is stated as 40 - 20,000 Hz in free space;
2. The design is based on the aluminum foil cone flexing so that the inner/center/smaller portion handles the higher frequencies;
3. BTW, Ted has been working on this concept for decades;
4. This is currently the oldest privately owned audio equipment company.
Ronnie at Carolina Audio has worked with transmission lines for decades as well. His 2-way designs utilitize 1st order, externally mounted crossovers. He loves to talk, not e-mail.My old passive 8 inch Fried T-lines overwhelmed every room I tried them in until I set them up in a 20,000 cu. ft. chapel. There, using a 20 wpc NAD receiver, they opened up and sounded glorius. So good in fact that I couldn't bring them back home, so I made a donation to the church.
Rdc: How are your Jordan's breaking in and what are your impressions of them? Do they have "enough" bass? How big a room are they in? If it sounds like I'm looking for you to post a review, you're getting my message, LOL, and thanks.
It's obvious that I love these speakers and benefit from a friendship with Ronnie that allows me to learn so much from a seasoned speaker builder. I also value being part of an extended family of Fried Speaker Products listeners and fans around the country.I haven't released a review of the JTM's because I wanted to live with them for a couple of months and experiment with all of the variables that I have. This includes placement, wire types and compositions, and component changes. I also found the break-in period to be a couple week process. They just keep sounding better with time and use. Basically, everything Ronnie told me these speakers is true, but I am stubborn and must do my own homework.
I will say that the JTM's do produce a satisfying level of bass that would please most listeners in rooms that are not very large. I go back and forth on this issue only because I have a set of Fried Model O\3 subs and am very spoiled when it comes to deep, clean, bass. Running the JTM's off of the Model O\3 subs crossover is the best of both worlds. I think that relieving the Jordan driver of low bass duties enhances its fine mid and treble capabilities. I should really get the JSM sats to sit on my Model O\3's but I can't bear to part with my JTM's. Can you imagine a HT setup with JTM's in the front with JSM's in the center and rear? Or five JSM's with the Jordan 7" subs?
I believe that Carolina Audio's 7" Jordan subs paired with the JSM's would be all of the speaker that I ever wanted and needed for a long time to come. But I also believe that the Model O\3 (and C3\L-C\5) are classics that will hold the test of time. Life keepers.
To make matters even more complicated, in the next couple of weeks I will be receiving the new Fried Studio Valhalla's from Shayne Tenance of the new IMF. Obtaining these speakers has been a dream of mine since I started collecting Frieds some twelve or so years ago. These are not the same Studio's of the 90's, but an improved version. Minus the MARS curcuitry, midrange break-up, and forward brightness. I am also hoping to buy a pair of Carolina Audio's 6XL\2 shortly and place them next to the Studio's for extended listening comparisons on the same equipment in the same settings. Carolina Audio and IMF may be heading in different directions, and rather than choose one over the other, I have chosen both.
Hearing is believing. Check out Jordan's website for specs and graphs on the J92S driver. It does everything but the lowest octaves and is shielded. Carolina Audio's TL design does much to bring out the lower potential of the driver while the driver's engineering excels with the mids and highs. Bypassing the need for a crossover also has its benefits. Pose this question to Ronnie at Carolina Audio. In his designs he has used Hiquphon, Morel, Vifa, and many other driver types. In fact, his 6XL\2, a two way with a Vifa woofer and a Morel tweeter in a flat TL design very similar to the Jordan-based JTM, sounds just like the JTM but with greater bass extension.
and can say that I am very satisfied, and at times amazed, by their performance. I will definitely be a repeat buyer of some of Carolina Audio's other fine products (looking at the 6XL\2). Carolina Audio will let you audition at home for a couple of weeks. I almost got the JSM's to sit on my top of my vintage Fried Model O\3 subs. But I am happy I bought the JTM's for the greater bass extension and flat profile against the wall. Once you gain the space from the thin JTM's it is difficult to look back at the typical rectangular box designs. It's also great not having to buy a set of expensive stands for a pair of monitors and try to figure out what to fill them with. The sleek styling of the JTM's is very classy and modernistic. What impresses me most about the Jordan driver is its ability to produce vocals, strings, and cymbals without the harshness one might suspect from a metallic driver. I think that the JTM's strong suit plays into your musical tastes perfectly.
It is probably hard to find someone who has heard both speakers...I know that Carolina offers a 21day in home trial if green mountian offers something similar than that's the best way to be sure that you end up with the speaker that best suits you.As you know I have the CA JTM's and have never heard anything this good and would have no trouble putting it next to $10 or $20k+... This is something a lot more than just a high value affordable speaker.
Reading the posts below regarding the Europa's and othe speakers there is a lot of talk about 1st order crossover and time aligned/phase correct speakers and I am in total agreement. I think these are essential points in getting great sound. Along with reasonable efficiency these are attributes that I look for in a speaker. The Carolina's with the Jordan drivers give you zero crossover and one driver you can't get more time aligned/phase correct than that.
The obvious question about the CA speaker is one of disbelief... I know this because I had audition them myself to believe what they can do. They are in no way rolled of at the frequency extremes they give you a fantastically coherent sound with all of the assciated imaging and soundstaging.
In your situation with the size of you room the T-line will load withh the larger space much better than the reflex speaker. Hearing the JTM's in a large space really let me hear how with even more room to breath that the extension in the bass is a deeper and the sense of space aournd whatever the bass instrument is is even enhanced further. I find that with small reflex speakers that they sound smaller the bigger the room.
You do not have to give up bass to get a transparent midrange from these because a well designed transmission line (this one is fantastic... The midrange is a transparent on the monitor has on the JTM) will give you the depth without the resonance of a reflex design. Giving you an accurate bass whose depth is not limited to the resonant frequency of the driver and the tuning of the port.
Well I'd have to say that you can't go wrong with the Green Mountains. I own a pair of the earlier Continuum 0.5's (which were replaced with the Europa's in the product lineup) and couldn't be happier with them. I have also listened to the Europa's at the GMA factory and have been itching to get a pair of them myself. Wonderful speakers, and Roy Johnson (owner/engineer of Green Mountain) stands behind his products and will be happy to talk to you about them at great length...Give him a call @ 719.636.2500BTW, I have no affiliation to Green Mountain Audio whatsoever, just one very satisfied customer!
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