Revel Speakers

As far as the ultima line is concerned, I am around, on a constant basis, speakers that cost far more than the Salon 2s, that are not even close to the Salon 2 in performance. The irony is that for many in this hobby, they listen with their wallets and not with their ears, so the Revels are to cheap to be taken seriously.

Chrissain, I surmise that a significant reason for the excellent performance of the Salons and Studios is because of the beryllium tweeter. It's an expensive component and hard to manufacaturer. But ... it's performance attributes are stellar. There's not many companies that manufacture beryllium tweets. Other than Revel, there's Magico, Focal, Usher and Paradigm.

I happend to own the Paradigm Signature 8s (v3). Another performer on steroids that is reasonably priced.

I've read the bench test specs on many other high-priced so-called darling speakers. Frankly ... I've been underwhelmed. I appreciate that there's no substituting for a live audition, but as many have lamented, not many B&M stores around any more. So we're left to trial and error.

Anyway, the Revel Studio 2 is on my short list to try (??) and listen to one day. In the meantime, I suggest that folks with good front ends and source input materials give a serious listen to the Paradigm S8s (v3).

A word of warning. I agree with the comment above -- this type of speaker is not forgiving of bad source material and they should be driven by a very high quality, high current, high power output SS amp. I kinda lucked out with my ARC tube Ref 150. But that's a story for a diffferent day. If interested, check my posts. It ultimately came down to power, low output voltage, and a very robust power supply.

Paradigm and Revel share many of the same design goals, and both hit outside their price range.

Based on e mail correspondence I had in the last year with a reviewer who is very familiar with both lines, I understand that both Revel and Paradigm share many design attributes, particularly as regards the beryllium tweeters. The reviewer also mentioned that both companies base their designs on Canada's NRC research data.

But I repeat what I said above, at least as regards the Signature 8s. Crappy music will sound crappy. GI/GO. The S8s are "current" hungry and require lot of watts from a great amp to sound their best. I've read similar comments about the Revels.

Prior to the F52s I had Wilson Sashas. I thought I wanted to get away from music and sold my entire system. After a couple of months I missed it and decided to purchase modest gear that included the Revel F52s. To my surprise my current system has been the most enjoyable to date. Now I'm looking for something that is neutral, but a little less colored than the F52s and I don't want to spend 20K. I love the fact that I can listen to the F52s all day without fatigue.