$40.000 speaker advise. Check out my list


Hello all,

I'm currently owning a system which consists of Mark Levinson 33H amps, Mark Levinson Nr 32 Pre-amp, a Wadia 860x Cd player and a pair Revel Ultima Studio speakers. Cables are Nordost Valhalla/Valkyrja.

I believe my speakers are the weakest link in my system and am considering upgrading. I listen to all sorts of music, from jazz, classic to pop/dance.

I have a few speakers on my wish list but they are not easy to find to listen to them so I want ask you opinion first before I start searching for a dealer the have one or more of these brands.

Could you please go through the list and rank them from 1 to 6, best to "worse" speaker and explain why you think the list should be in that order.

The speakers I am thinking about are (in random order):

1. Sonus Faber Stradivari
2. Verity Sarastro
3. Lumen White white light
4. Rockport Antares
5. Revel Ultima Salon
6. Avalon Eidolon Diamond

Thanks a lot for your help.

Regards,

Max
maxx1973
IMO the MAXX ll not only should be on your list but tops the list in that price .
Max,
I would go for evolution acoustics MM3 (that I ordered), Magico Mini or Kharma, at least if you like very transparent sound (but not sure they will match well with ML gear). I listened to a lot of speakers over the last 6 months in Hong Kong / Taipei(the one you listed + JM Lab Utopia, Maxx2, VS VR5, VR7, VR11, FM acoustics, Ascendo M and a lot of others I forgot...) to my taste the Magico Mini and MM3 were superior to the rest of the pack. MBL101E were also special.

Otherwise 6-4-1 are all quite nice, didn't like 3 and 5. Never listened to 2
Dali Megaline, I thought were at the top of the Dynamic drive speaker Nose bleed heap ? I would definitely put them at the top of the list if I was in the 40 k territory for sure. I know this guy is a pretty respected audio guy here, check out his system in link below, but maybe they need tubes, I would think the ML gear would be pretty awesome with them too. Of course they are huge line arrays probably about double the size of most the speakers mentioned here, but if you got the space and money anyway so what!

http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?vaslt&1022712214&read&keyw&zzalbert=porter
I am jealous that you have the opportunity to upgrade to any of these speakers! I have heard several of these, (albeit most at CES or Dealers rooms), so I will give you my impressions.

1. Sonus Faber Stradivari

Heard these both at the dealers, as well as at CES, (with my friend, whose system I will discuss later).
My friend and I were very impressed with these speakers at CES. They sounded great. They filled a very large room, and were a fantastic speaker at soundstaging and imaging. They did not seem to have that really warm sound that most SF speakers have.
Highly recommended (2nd best sound, easily beating out the third place Avalon Diamonds, IMHO, as they have better bass response.) And gorgeous too boot!

2. Verity Sarastro

Sorry, never heard them.

3. Lumen White white light

We heard these at CES as well.
They sounded very good, but not as good as most of the other speakers on your list. I was more impressed than my friend with these speakers. He did not seem to like them much at all. Aesthetically, these are not my favorites either.
(Fourth best sound, barely beating out the Salon.)

4. Rockport Antares

My friend recently upgraded to these speakers. These are by far the best speaker I have ever heard. They do every thing my friend's previous speakers did (i.e. the Avalon Eidolons), but better. They image and soundstage incredibly, and the frequency response is definitely full range. I think the best thing about these speakers is that the bass is only there when you need it. The bass never sounded boomy at all, which is amazing considering what the bass can sound like when playing a bass heavy piece. (We played a Taiko drum piece and our jaws just dropped.) These are relatively efficient speakers, but you'll need every bit of the power you already have, and you might even need a bit more. My friend uses the hybrid Lamm M2.2 (220 wpc) monoblocks with these and they sound great. The DarTzeel stereo amp (100 wpc) sounded great with them too, however, it could not generate the bass response like the Lamms could.
Definitely the best (First Place!), and not by a small margin. (I like there looks too, but I like modern looking speakers.)

5. Revel Ultima Salon

I have heard these at shows and at dealers, so I know the sound of these, and I too own the Revel Studios. The Salons are obviously bigger, beefer Studios, as you are obviously aware. They have great bass response, compared to the Studios very good bass response. (However, they can sound boomy in a small room, but that should not be a concern to you.)
These speakers also need TONS of power to get the most out of them. Your Levinson 33Hs are probably not enough, even though they work fine with the Studios. (I use Lamm M2.1 (200 wpc) monoblocks with my Studios, and I have spoken with several Salon owners (that upgraded from the Studio to the Salon) and they like to use double that to get the Salons to come to life.
Obviously, I like these speakers, but you've listed some really good speakers, so they come in fifth, slightly behind the Lumen White Light.

6. Avalon Eidolon Diamond

I have heard both the regular Eidolon (my friend used these for years) as well as the Eidolon Diamonds (my favorite dealer uses these both in his home as well as at his store, and I have heard them there quite a bit).
The Diamonds are a great speaker, no question about that. I think like the Stradivari slightly better than these, but it is a very close call.
The one thing that these can't do is get the absolute bottom end bass notes. (This is the reason my friend upgraded from the Eidolons to the Antares). Otherwise, these are incredible speakers that do everything very well. One point though, these, like the Salon, need lots of power in order to really get the best sound out of them (especially to get that last bit of bass response they are capable of).
Third best speaker, (due to the slight lack of bass response.) Again, gorgeous speaker, especially with some of the fancy wood finishes!

My recommendation is to get the Rockport Antares. I think these easily beat out all the other speakers on your list.

Good Luck with your search!

PS Other speakers you might want to check out would be the Avalon Isis (this adds that last bit of bass response the Diamonds lack) and the Dali Megaline speakers, (although a warning that these require bi-amping). Although neither will (IMHO) beat the Antares, as it lacks nothing. But in case you want a different look, these speakers will do the same job, based on my research, but not on my listening knowledge, unfortunately.