Hey people's,
Had a bit of time to waste today before car ticket ran out, so did the suitable thing by popping into my local hifi shop (I don't think I've been in there since I bought my dm2/7 speakers and rega brio r). I was curious to see what active speakers they had, and if they had the Yamaha s2100. They unfortunately didn't have the yammie but they did have the dynaudio xeo range. So to make some sort of comparison to my dm2/7 I asked if I could hear the xeo 4s. The salesman got busy setting them up as I browsed the shops various offerings. Watching a very lifelike film about African lions,on a substantially expensive TV,whilst sonos blared out ACDC (the kind of music I now assume must go through any hunting lions head to get them in the mood), I suddenly heard the opening notes from Nils lofgren's Keith don't go. Even from the other room I felt a nervous shudder go through me and something like "cripes,that sounds insanely good" was the voice in my head. So I went next door and sat down, and soaked up the sounds.
First off the Nils lofgren track sounded incredible. The clarity on the string plucking and crystal twangyness was levels above what I was used to with the dms. However,volume had to be at about 75% for sound to fill this largish room. (8m X 6m). Soundstage wasn't as jaw dropping as the speed and clarity. Onto the next track I wanted to hear the bass so asked for some bassy music as I had a memory blank to a superb bass track I heard the other day, ah well. So we put on some of mogwai's rave tapes, where I found the bass to be somewhat lacking. The boxes themselves are smaller than the dms and maybe the drivers are smaller too, so I could see why the bass would be perhaps not as present. It didn't go as deep,and again the soundstage was less and separation of instruments seemed less then the dms. This made the xeos sound a bit more strained and the noise sounded constricted and boxed in.
Next I asked to listen to telegraph road by dire straights,not a track I'm over familier with but I remember it having multiple instruments and is a well regarded recording. This sounded surprisingly underwhelming in that again, it sounded strained and it did not have the presence,depth of sound and scale that the dms with the Roksan k3 has.
So, I was surprised in the end. At the start of the demo I was actually surprised how good they sounded,clearly superior in clarity from my set up, but as the demo went on, the limitations became apparent and they did not reach the levels needed to make them clear winners over my current set up. Maybe in a smaller room they would sound much better (bit I do still feel that bass was far less reaching).
Anyhoo, there you go...
Had a bit of time to waste today before car ticket ran out, so did the suitable thing by popping into my local hifi shop (I don't think I've been in there since I bought my dm2/7 speakers and rega brio r). I was curious to see what active speakers they had, and if they had the Yamaha s2100. They unfortunately didn't have the yammie but they did have the dynaudio xeo range. So to make some sort of comparison to my dm2/7 I asked if I could hear the xeo 4s. The salesman got busy setting them up as I browsed the shops various offerings. Watching a very lifelike film about African lions,on a substantially expensive TV,whilst sonos blared out ACDC (the kind of music I now assume must go through any hunting lions head to get them in the mood), I suddenly heard the opening notes from Nils lofgren's Keith don't go. Even from the other room I felt a nervous shudder go through me and something like "cripes,that sounds insanely good" was the voice in my head. So I went next door and sat down, and soaked up the sounds.
First off the Nils lofgren track sounded incredible. The clarity on the string plucking and crystal twangyness was levels above what I was used to with the dms. However,volume had to be at about 75% for sound to fill this largish room. (8m X 6m). Soundstage wasn't as jaw dropping as the speed and clarity. Onto the next track I wanted to hear the bass so asked for some bassy music as I had a memory blank to a superb bass track I heard the other day, ah well. So we put on some of mogwai's rave tapes, where I found the bass to be somewhat lacking. The boxes themselves are smaller than the dms and maybe the drivers are smaller too, so I could see why the bass would be perhaps not as present. It didn't go as deep,and again the soundstage was less and separation of instruments seemed less then the dms. This made the xeos sound a bit more strained and the noise sounded constricted and boxed in.
Next I asked to listen to telegraph road by dire straights,not a track I'm over familier with but I remember it having multiple instruments and is a well regarded recording. This sounded surprisingly underwhelming in that again, it sounded strained and it did not have the presence,depth of sound and scale that the dms with the Roksan k3 has.
So, I was surprised in the end. At the start of the demo I was actually surprised how good they sounded,clearly superior in clarity from my set up, but as the demo went on, the limitations became apparent and they did not reach the levels needed to make them clear winners over my current set up. Maybe in a smaller room they would sound much better (bit I do still feel that bass was far less reaching).
Anyhoo, there you go...
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