Joseph Audio RM33si & others in the $8,000 range

Agree with Jtinn about Joseph campaigning for votes at shows. I visited their room at the last 2 STereophile shows in NYC. After the demo was over, they handed out voting cards and pencils and asked people to vote for them. I dont see anything inherently wrong with lobbying for votes, but since they were the only room I was in that did this, I think that gives them at an unfair advantage............

As far as their speakers, they are good but I find them a little on the dry side. Also, the 33's bass was a little disjointed from the rest of the spectrum, but I understand an upgrade hase come out to alleviate this.

If you are looking for speakers in the 8k range, do yourself a favor and listen to the Alon Lotus Elite Signatures. They are one of my favorites at ANY price.

Bigkidz, you want detail? Check Red Rose Classic.

Hi!

We are very proud of our achievements at the HE shows, having made the "Best Sound At Show" list at every show where votes were tallied, and having captured #1 Best Sound At Show for the last two years. The RM33si won this award even though we were in a small room, with only 9 seats. The line to hear them stretched down the 10th floor hallway. Never before has a $7499/ pair speaker won this award, beating out speakers as much as $120,000 per pair! The fact that we beat out the mega-systems displayed in rooms that could seat up to 50 people at a time is pretty amazing. We did spring for a larger room at HE2002, and
hoped that the lines would be shorter, but once word got out about the Pearls, people were once again waiting in line to give them a listen, and ultimately voted the Pearls as "Best Sound At Show".

As for Dolpin's claim of "handing out voting cards and pencils" at the HE shows - here's what actually happened. Around 6pm Saturday at HE2001, I discovered that a number of people in our room did not have ballots, so I sent one of our people down to the lobby to get some in case some people still needed one. I did ask if people had ballots on Sunday, but we did not even think to ask until Saturday night, when the show was well past its attendance peak.

I notified the HE show management about this, and they made sure at HE2002 that everyone had ballots, so there was no further problem.

As for "Heavy Campaigning" - we don't do it, simply because heavy campaigning for votes at a Hifi show is not likely to be effective. There would probably be a backlash of people who would be bothered by such tactics that would result in the loss of some votes. We do urge everyone who visits our room to vote, and remind them of the importance of their opinions at this show. We emphatically do NOT tell people WHO to vote for. If they wanted to vote for us, well, who are we to disagree?

Strangely enough, I've seen advertisments claiming to have "Best Sound at CES Show" and "Best Speaker at CES" without attribution. It would appear that other mfg's have seen our ads, and decided that they could make similar claims as if they were honored with some sort of voting award at the CES show. There is NO such voting at CES. Those in the know will see through those claims. We take our claims seriously, and have no need to exaggerate the honors bestowed upon our speakers. (Including "Joint Speaker Of the Year 2002" for the RM7si signature Mk2's)

When you go to listen, try to audition the Pearls and the
new RM33si Limited Edition...you might just find out why we've won so many awards.

Jeff Joseph

Mr. Joseph-I will speak for myself here. I can't remember when or if a manufacturer has ever entered into the lion's den here on AudioGon....but I find it refreshing and I would like to say thank you for doing so. Your explaination to the events discussed above are appreciated. To me, it shows your proactive response to certain situations whether it be making sure people have ballots and pencils or designing great sounding speakers. I can only speculate that the Audiophile community has been hit with so much BS from manufacturers and dealers that we are somewhat hard to convince. I have heard your speakers at two shows and I was impressed. You have my vote.

Joseph Audio speakers have consistently impressed me. I think their steep-slope crossover is a very elegant approach, and they are very nicely voiced. And as we have seen here (and numerous times over at the Asylum), Jeff Joseph himself is quite a gentleman.

After auditioning his speakers at CES for the first time a couple of years ago, I spoke with Jeff about the possibility of becoming a dealer. Jeff explained to me that he requires a retail storefront, and of course I respect that decision. But if I had a storefront, Joseph Audio would easily be among the front-runners in a more or less conventional-looking speaker.