The Devialet thread

[matt49]

I really should try the Vivids myself, once the Dev arrives. As I'll place my speakers close to the backwall (on a cupboard), that would be the V1h or V1w for me.

I used to think these smaller V1s were derived from the V1.5, but it appears to be the other way round. The V1h/w/s were first; with customers asking for a freestanding V1, Vivid developed the V1.5, with its larger enclosure to compensate for the wall reinforcement it lacks... So maybe the V1h/s/w are not that compromised after all (being close to the wall and all). :?

I've also heard these:

Just as good as as the standmounted V1.5s, though I did find you have to fiddle with placement to get the best out of them -- but that's true of most speakers, I guess.

:cheers:

Matt

 

[DocG]

I've also heard these:

Just as good as as the standmounted V1.5s, though I did find you have to fiddle with placement to get the best out of them -- but that's true of most speakers, I guess.

:cheers:

Matt

That's good! Thanks for the feedback, Matt.

I guess I should start looking for a dealer within acceptable distance.

 

[matt49]

Tomorrow afternoon I have a home demo of some SF Cremona Auditor Ms. The dealer's bringing along a Dev 170. (Mine's due to arrive next week.)



Matt

 

[CnoEvil]

Tomorrow afternoon I have a home demo of some SF Cremona Auditor Ms. The dealer's bringing along a Dev 170. (Mine's due to arrive next week.)



Matt

Now you're talking! :rockout: :bounce:

 

[Macspur]

Tomorrow afternoon I have a home demo of some SF Cremona Auditor Ms. The dealer's bringing along a Dev 170. (Mine's due to arrive next week.)



Matt

Exciting times!

 

[Neuphonix]

Tomorrow afternoon I have a home demo of some SF Cremona Auditor Ms. The dealer's bringing along a Dev 170. (Mine's due to arrive next week.)



Matt

Not that I am suggesting that you'll be enerting into this home demo with your mind already made up but....

Do you think that there's a good chance the dealer will be leaving your house without this particular pair of SF?

Is he bringing the stands as well?

 

[James7]

Tomorrow afternoon I have a home demo of some SF Cremona Auditor Ms. The dealer's bringing along a Dev 170. (Mine's due to arrive next week.)



Matt

Good man ... Best of luck

 

[matt49]

Not that I am suggesting that you'll be enerting into this home demo with your mind already made up but....

Do you think that there's a good chance the dealer will be leaving your house without this particular pair of SF?

Is he bringing the stands as well?

Neuphonix, you're not wrong. :shifty:

If the Cremonas sound decent, they're staying. I've heard the combo three times already: it's a winner.

The purpose of the home demo is to reassure myself that the speakers offer the right kind of scale in the room. If they sound thin or boomy, there's a problem.

On the other hand, if there's a problem with sibilance (been there, got the t-shirt), some room treatment will be needed. We'll see.

:cheers:

Matt

 

[matt49]

Now you're talking! :rockout: :bounce:

Exciting times!

Good man ... Best of luck

Thanks, chaps, you'll be hearing from me (or, if it goes wrong, from my lawyers).



Matt

 

[Neuphonix]

[/quote]

Thanks, chaps, you'll be hearing from me (or, if it goes wrong, from my lawyers).



Matt

[/quote]

Tell your lawyers to contact your guru, not us!!

We're all in the same boat as you :help:

 

[matt49]

So, I'm now the proud owner of a pair of ex-dem SF Cremona Auditor Ms, and very lovely they are too. I'd like to say that I'm listening to music through them at the moment, but until my Dev arrives next week (apparently the units have now shipped from France), I'm a bit stuck.

The dealer came over this afternoon with the Cremonas and his Dev 170. Plugged in one of my modded Sonos boxes, and away we went.

Not without problems, however. I wasn't really worried about the combo itself, having heard it three times before: it's just so right. The thing I was most concerned about was that there'd be some nasty sibilance, such as I experienced with the MF AMS35i and Harbeth SHL5s. If the sibilance had reared its ugly head again, I don't know what I'd have done. Given the nature of the room (the speakers fire down the room towards some recessed and shuttered windows), the problem would have been hard to mend. Curtains aren't an option.

Thank goodness there was no sibilance at all. But there was clumpy and boomy bass. We played around with positioning, and it became clear that the problem was the right-hand speaker, whose rear port was firing towards a little "hole" in the corner of the room. (I may get around to posting a photo tomorrow.) By moving the speaker out into the room, we could eliminate some (but not all) of the boom. By the end of the session we'd got the sound about three-quarters of the way to perfect.

I'm pretty sure a tubular bass trap in the corner will fix things. There are other things I can try. The speakers really need to sit on granite slabs. And the room is also as bit on the live side. Currently I have a cowskin on the floor, which needs to be replaced with a thick rug plus underlay. That should crack it.

This may all be academic anyway. After the demo I had to whizz off to view a house. Mrs49 and the girls are very keen on it. The potential listening room is quite large and would allow me to stand the speakers well away from rear and side walls.

All will be good.

:cheers:

Matt

 

[Macspur]

Quite a day then Matt!

I would have been surprised if it had gone without a hitch, these things rarely do, but like you say

it may well be academic anyway.

All good stuff!

Mac

 

[DocG]

Thank goodness there was no sibilance at all. But there was clumpy and boomy bass. We played around with positioning, and it became clear that the problem was the right-hand speaker, whose rear port was firing towards a little "hole" in the corner of the room. (I may get around to posting a photo tomorrow.) By moving the speaker out into the room, we could eliminate some (but not all) of the boom. By the end of the session we'd got the sound about three-quarters of the way to perfect.

I'm pretty sure a tubular bass trap in the corner will fix things. There are other things I can try. The speakers really need to sit on granite slabs. And the room is also as bit on the live side. Currently I have a cowskin on the floor, which needs to be replaced with a thick rug plus underlay. That should crack it.

Thanks for the useful feedback again, Matt!

Forewarned is forearmed. In my case, the speakers will end up on a cupboard against the wall, so I'll keep your findings firmly in mind when demoing the Dev with Cremonas myself. (Note to self: don't buy without home demo... once the house is finished :doh

 

[James7]

Good to hear. Foam bungs in the ports might help. This will reduce bass extension, but placing nearer the wall will boost it again. It will certainly tighten things up.

 

[matt49]

I would have been surprised if it had gone without a hitch, these things rarely do, but like you say

it may well be academic anyway.

Mac

Cheers, Mac. All looking good; more on this below.

Forewarned is forearmed. In my case, the speakers will end up on a cupboard against the wall, so I'll keep your findings firmly in mind when demoing the Dev with Cremonas myself. (Note to self: don't buy without home demo... once the house is finished :doh

Doc, I fear that will be a bad place for Cremonas, with their rear port. I'd also worry about bass boom though the cupboard. Maybe a nice thick granite slab to sit the speaker on? One advantage (for you) of the Vivids is that their reflex port fires forwards.

Good to hear. Foam bungs in the ports might help. This will reduce bass extension, but placing nearer the wall will boost it again. It will certainly tighten things up.

Thanks, James, that's on my list of things to experiment with. However, I'd rather go the bass trap route: better to cure the room than mess with the speakers' output, I think. Also, sitting the Cremonas close to a wall does affect their imaging (as I should think it does with most speakers).

Now obviously you can't leave a new pair of speakers unused, so this morning I took some kit out of my study and set up a temporary system downstairs, with a (modded) Sonos going into a (heavily modded) MDAC into a Cyrus X Power. The difference from the Dev is pretty obvious. This system has a rather thrashy top end, a bit of grain in the upper middle, and quite a bit less grunt down below. One advantage is this lack of beass heft, which means the boom is mitigated slightly.

But oh do these speakers sound fine! The three qualities I'd pick out are their speed, their coherence, and their very sweet tone (despite the hint of graininess). They manage to be hugely tuneful and analytical at the same time, and the one isn't bought at the cost of the other. I love the way they see right into the structure of the music and still let you experience it as music.

So I have a couple of days of listening to this temporary system (which ain't bad at all) before the shiny beast arrives next week.



Matt

 

[Macspur]

Bungs can be a solution in some cases, but personally, I wouldn't want to compromise beauties like the Cremonas.

I tried them myself when I was having boomy base issues and didn't like the results, but thankfull the E350 cured the problem.

Mac

 

[James7]

I am not sure bungs necessarily mean compromise. That's why quite a few speakers come with bungs, as a way of tuning bass. In fact, I think you could argue that using ports to try to boost bass output is itself a compromise. But bungs aren't going to work in every system. And certainly the bass trap is a good plan. Worth trying though, if the bass trap is not totally effective. Either way it sounds like it should be correctable without too much trouble. The more you describe the sound of the SFs Matt the more convinced I am it will take a pretty large new listening room to persuade you to switch to something else.

 

[DocG]

Forewarned is forearmed. In my case, the speakers will end up on a cupboard against the wall, so I'll keep your findings firmly in mind when demoing the Dev with Cremonas myself. (Note to self: don't buy without home demo... once the house is finished :doh

Doc, I fear that will be a bad place for Cremonas, with their rear port. I'd also worry about bass boom though the cupboard. Maybe a nice thick granite slab to sit the speaker on? One advantage (for you) of the Vivids is that their reflex port fires forwards.

Maybe the will-be Devialet room correction could help. But I think I should stick with speakers designed for the purpose, speakers that work with the boundaries. That's where the Vivid V1w comes in, or the Guru (not your guru, just the speaker ) or Audio Note. Maybe Gallo's Stradas could work too, but those most likely will need the help of a sub... Looking at it, my shortlist is still pretty short atm...

 

[James7]

[/quote]

Maybe the will-be Devialet room correction could help. But I think I should stick with speakers designed for the purpose, speakers that work with the boundaries. That's where the Vivid V1w comes in

[/quote]

i was looking in to the V1s and 1w after you mentioned them, having never come across them before. It seems that they are designed, as you say, to work near the boundaries of rooms. Given Matt's experience with the Dev they'd be my first port of call i think. They are even quite sensitive, especially given their relatively compact size, so shouldn't be adversely affected by being driven by a 110 rather than 170. And having pondered this for a day or two, i've decided I even quite like the looks! Though whether a public forum is the right place to come out on this I am not sure

 

[DocG]

Maybe the will-be Devialet room correction could help. But I think I should stick with speakers designed for the purpose, speakers that work with the boundaries. That's where the Vivid V1w comes in

i was looking in to the V1s and 1w after you mentioned them, having never come across them before. It seems that they are designed, as you say, to work near the boundaries of rooms. Given Matt's experience with the Dev they'd be my first port of call i think. They are even quite sensitive, especially given their relatively compact size, so shouldn't be adversely affected by being driven by a 110 rather than 170. And having pondered this for a day or two, i've decided I even quite like the looks! Though whether a public forum is the right place to come out on this I am not sure

Hence no avatar! I get it!

Well yes, I already spotted a Vivid dealer. He only has the V1.5 in demo, but if I get serious, he can get the other models in for a demo in the shop and at home. But I'll wait for the Dev to arrive first (no news from that dealer so far). As Matt has to wait for about two months already, I should have known the dealer's "one to two weeks" forecast was somewhat optimistic. :shifty:

 

[matt49]

Sorted!

No, the Devialet hasn't arrived yet, but I have sorted out the problem with the bass, or at least I've found a configuration that means I don't hear it.

I tried out marble slabs under the speaker stands, in case there was some nasty interaction between the speakers, their pedestals and the wood floor. If it made any difference, it was negligible.

What cracked it was that I simply moved my chair back by two feet. That's it. Actually I experimented with a few positions, moving the chair back and forth along the line perpendicular to the point halfway between the speakers. It turns out there are some nasty bass hotspots along this line, and I'd been sitting right in the middle of one of them. Much happier now.

Of course the underlying issue is still there: there are some nasty clumps of flabby bass energy in the room, and I think overall bass performance could be improved significantly with some acoustic treatment. But at least I can now listen to bass-heavy music without feeling like the San Andreas fault has just opened in the middle of my living room.

And this week is definitely Devialet week.

:cheers:

Matt

 

[DocG]

What cracked it was that I simply moved my chair back by two feet. That's it. Actually I experimented with a few positions, moving the chair back and forth along the line perpendicular to the point halfway between the speakers. It turns out there are some nasty bass hotspots along this line, and I'd been sitting right in the middle of one of them. Much happier now.

That must be the hifi upgrade with the highest VFM imaginable! :cheers:

 

[Macspur]

Hi Matt,

Just wondering if the Devialet has arrived yet?

Mac

 

[WishTree]

That's where the Vivid V1w comes in, or the Guru (not your guru, just the speaker ) or Audio Note. Maybe Gallo's Stradas could work too, but those most likely will need the help of a sub... Looking at it, my shortlist is still pretty short atm...

Gallos will work for sure but as you mentioned, Subwoofer (a good one) is a must! I would assume with Vivid V1w/s, one can live with out the sub (but IMO, a sub is still needed if one desires to have the lowest frequency response)

My Target system would be Devialet with Vivid!

 

[matt49]

Hi Matt,

Just wondering if the Devialet has arrived yet?

Mac

Hi Mac,

I'm told it'll be tomorrow.

:cheers:

Matt