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In Reply to: Re: 10 Best Speakers-What do you think posted by Bold Eagle on January 12, 2002 at 18:27:46:
Hi Brian A, I was the first to post a review of the Dunlavy Millennium on audioreview.com. Initially I thought the Millennium lacked deep bass; after I read your review, I re-positioned the speaker, install spikes and changed some cables then I got a truly full range speaker. I have the Millennium for almost 3 years now and still very happy with it, it is best speaker I've ever heard.Bold Eagle, the Dunlavy Millennium is a commercial model, it is not a popular model. If you only consider popular model, you may include the SC-VI, it was the Stereophile Loudspeaker of the Year. The speakers I've heard include Wilson Watt/Puppy, X-1, MAXX, ProAc 4, Sonus Faber Amati, Eggleston Andra, Thiel CS5, CS6, CS7...etc.. None can beat the Dunlavy Millennium.
Follow Ups:
Wow, I am glad I was able to inspire you to get the best out of your Millenniums. It is amazing how their bass is so clean you at first think it is lacking, for you are so used to bass bloat and booming. Tell me, what did your wife think of them. My wife about flipped but now she likes them. How did you go about getting them? What made you purchase them? Do you know of anyone else that owns a pair?
The fact that the bass is clean is the reason that one think it is lacking. Poor setup is the real reason that the bass is really lacking, just like what I did. When you have the big Dunlavy 'floating' on thick carpet, you will not hear any bass at all. Setup affects midrange and treble too, when you sit too close to the speakers you will hear excessive treble just like JA did with the SC-IV/A follow up review (I have the TACT RCS 2.0 measurement to support this).My decision to purchase Dunlavy was mainly base on magazine review, especially the reviews of the SC-V and SC-VI. I didn't get a chance to audition the SC-V and SC-VI as no local dealer had them on display. The only model I ever auditioned before my purchase was the SC-IV, it was very impressive. My initial target was the SC-V or SC-VI, the SC-V was better on price performance. With the introduction of the SC-IV/A I was hoping Dunlavy would release a SC-V/A so I waited for the 1999 CES to see if Dunlavy would release anything new; soon after the CES Dunlavy's website had a new model called Millennium priced between the SC-V and SC-VI; after checking the specification I was very disappointed as it didn't seem to be a replacement for the SC-V. I wanted to fly to the Dunlavy factory and compare the models side by side but I was too busy at work and finally picked the Millennium for its better overall measured performance just like you did; I'm glad you proved my decision was a correct one.
My girl friend said the Millenniums are awesome, I almost flipped when I first saw them; hated their look (as your wife did); too bad DAL didn't offer Kevazinga at that time, mine is rosewood finished. I believe Kevazinga would make them look much better.
I don't know anyone else who owns a pair. One of my friend was very excited when he first saw my Millenniums, he had a speaker in his dream which happen to be of the same shape as the Millenniums. He was completely blown away by the Millenniums, if he got the bucks he would probably buy a pair.
Interesting story. I was quite leary of their looks at first. I only had the picture on the Dunlavy website to look at. My speakers look a bit different than the picture. They have a smaller waist which makes them more graceful looking. As soon as I saw them in person I immediately liked their looks.Perhaps you would like to hear more on how the SC-V sounds compared to the Millennium. Actually I was disappointed in the SC-V. The female voice seems just slightly weak. My audiophile friend says it is those 3 inch upper mids struggling to produce the lowest octive of the female voice. Perhaps some important tone is right in the middle of a crossover.
But the bass of the SC-V was quite good. My friend nailed it when he called it effortless. Those two 12 inch woofers can really move the air. However the Millennium goes deeper and is yet tighter. The non parallel internal walls of the Millennium contribute to this. They give the speaks an incredible cleanness of sound that is hard to describe. It is bourn out in the waterfall plot, the Mill is cleaner than any other Dunlavy, or any other speaker I know of for that matter.
I would really like to read a review on this speaker. However it is deep in a nitch. Quite expensive to produce with that odd shape. The factory didn't seem too anxious to build up a set for me. They kept pushing the SC-VI. Factories are not the ideal place to produce single units. However John Dunlavy himself measured and tweeked my speakers himself.
I have two dreams. One is the NASDAQ hits 5000 again ;) the other is Dunlavy will produce a super Millennium with the one inch dome, two 6.5 inch mids and two 12 inch woofers. It would weigh 400 lbs and be 7 feet tall. Flat to 15Hz +/-0.5dB. Anyway, they are working on a digital speaker that will be pretty much perfect. You feed it with a digital data stream and it has internal digital amps with some digital corrections to eliminate all frequency, phase, and timing errors.
I understand that the Millennium is costly to build, no wonder they are not too anxious to build one for you; so we are very lucky indeed. Soon after your review appeared on AA, DAL increased the price by USD1,000; now they removed the price from the website. Did you ask DAL to send you the measurements of your speakers? I got the measurements for my speakers and the one they posted on the website is a little bit better than mine (just a little bit). The dimension of my speaker is slightly different from their website too, it is 23.5"(W) x 20.75"(D) x 73"(H) without the base and the width of the waist is 10". What's the dimension of yours?
Mine is about the same size. Oddly some of the dimensions are about .5 inch different. I never did get the written results of my speakers frequency response. I'll have to do that.
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