Worst speakers at Stereophile show


Here's what I thought were the worst sounding speakers at the Stereophile show. The Eggleston speakers that list for 100,000 dollars. I heard them in the Nagra room, with the Nagra 845 tube Amps, Nagra Preamp and Nagra digital reel to reel player. The cabinet on the Egglestons looked gorgeous. But let me tell you, these speakers were horrible. I was shocked how bad they sounded. They were so bright sounding. Eggleston has got to change midrange drivers. Those Morel midbases just sound to bright. Egglestons should use the Dynaudio 3 inch dome mids. Krell came out with a new mini monitor. It cost like 6000 dollars. These Krell Speakers sounded so edgy and the sound could get out of control. I didn't like them. Silverline had the Silverline Sonata speakers there. These speakers had to have the worst crossover. I played a track with a nice beat to it. It sounded horrible on these speakers. Then I put my ear to the speakers and I couldn't believe it, 80 percent of the midrange and bass was coming out of the tweeter. Silverline has got to change the crossover. How could you have the midbase coming out of the tweeter. That's why the bass sounded so edgy. A tweeter cant handle bass. Now another speaker I heard, that I didn't like. I heard the Merlin VSM se speakers. Merlin had 2 rooms with the VSM se speakers. One room had the Joule Electra Tube amps and Preamp. The other room that had the Merlins VSM se was the Sim Audio room. The Merlins in the Joule Electra room sounded not bad. It had nice detail. The same Merlins VSM se in the Sim Audio room sounded so average. The Joule Electra Tube Amps, sounded so much better on the Merlin speakers, then the Sim Room, which was using Sim W5 Amp, Sim P 5 preamp and Sim CD Player on the Merlin VSM se. The Merlins in the Joule Electra Room sounded very detailed, but didn't have that bass impact and large sound that I like. Then I heard the Verity Parsifal speakers on these Tenor OTL Tube Amps and the Audio Aero Capitole 24 bit CD Player. The Veritys didn't sound good. Someone said it perfectly to me, the Verity's dont have a full body sound. I then heard the Meadowlark speakers. I think they were the Herons. The bass did not sound good. It sounded way out of control and to boomy. I was also dissapointed with the Totem designer. Vince is a nice guy. But he kept playing these Totem tower speakers. They used a 5 inch midbase and the tweeter. They didn't sound to good. Then there was these nice looking Totem speakers in the room. They were called the Totem Wind. There's a pic of them on Totemes website. www.totemacoustic.com They used a 8 inch woofer and 2 dynaudio 3 inch dome midbases and a tweeter at the top. Vince played these speakers for like 40 seconds and they sounded really good. The bass and the midrange sounded nice. I wanted to hear more of them. Then Vince stopped playing them and went back to the Totem speakers, with the 5 inch midbase and the Tweeter. Everyone in the Room wanted to hear the other Totem speakers. But he wouldn't play them. He said he would play them later. Every time I went in the Totem room, he was playing the speaker with the 5 inch midbase and the tweeter. The 3rd time I was in the Totem room, another guy wanted to hear the Totem Wind speakers, but Vince said the same thing, he'll play them later.
doug99
Hi all. All this time since the show, I thought it was just me. This was the first show I was ever able to attend. I was really looking forward to see and hear all the products I could only read about. I heard some great music but the biggest thing I came away with was that I was just not that impressed with some of the highest end systems. That's not to say that any sounded bad, only that maybe I expected more. I have Vienna Acoustics Beethovens and I kept thinking to myself that the differences in sound I heard from the megabuck speakers, while all positive, I really couldn't justify pricewise. Some speakers cost 10 times the price of the mine but I wasn't hearing 10 times the difference in sound. That said, I did think that some speakers while low on the price scale, really showed great value. I thought the Thiel 1.6's sounded great for the price, among others.
That was hilarious Doug99...!

I have no worst of show... But we had a 9-way tie for best. Just another way to look at the difficulties each system had doing the making-music thang. Had me wishing that there was a system (picking and choosing from equipment that I do not own and am not a dealer for) comprised of say Lamm ML2s driving Pipedreams driven by a Gamut CD-1 into a Hovland HP100... No wait, make that the $60K Burmester CD/Transport pair that HP raves about instead of the GamuT 1. Oh! How about the Kharma exquisites instead of the pipedreams? And driven by the big Halcros. Yeah, that's it. That'll be my Best of (no)Show.

Oh, and Thiel 1.6 are an *excellent* speaker for the price (better than the rest of the Thiel line, IMHO). Moving up a notch the Merlins are *great* as well (they sounded better at CES 2002 than at HE2002, IMHO).
The Verity Persifal sounded bad?

Sorry, there was something dead wrong with the system (compatibility with the Tenor amps, maybe - I've never heard them).

I heard the Persifals with several font-ends and most of the time the result was anything but bad. Weird.
I'm currious to know which room your guy's are refering to that you heard the "Verity Audio Parsifal" speakers in? I seem to rember them being in at least a couple of diffferent rooms last Jan. I'm not a big Verity fan per se, but did think they sounded EXCELLENT overall in the Elgar room!
They were being used in whatever room the mondo expensive Elgar 24/196 gear was set up in. I was in there when Julien Hirsch was in the room auditioning the digital stuff, and I was impressed by the what I heard.
Anyway, I was just currious if there was another room being refered to here.
Doug99

I once heard eggleston products which is the Andra
with the levinsons also,using meridian 508 cd player
the sounds is very transparent but not musical and
uninvolving,my friend brought the speaker in my house
with my plinius sa 100,adcom gfa750,cec cdplayer,and
master gen tara lab. the andra sounded speaker of the
year.I guess the gear they used did not match,or maybe
it is not your preference,some its all about preference
also.or I suspect the room is not acoustically prep. i do
agree with you the driver can sound too bright in the
less padded room or small room,or even paired with tubes.