heinlein2302
New Member
Also iaudio, I notice you have Acoustic Portrait speakers. Has that company shut down? I have been trying for several days but I can't get past 70% on their flash entry page.
Cadence vs Lyrita vs Rethm
- Thread starter heinlein2302
- Start date
Oh, sorry.
You mentioned only the Arita so I thought you didn't want the hybrids and didn't audition them.
So, you didn't like the Amayas either? Same reasons? Do share your thoughts on Amaya vs Harmony please.
I have been reading many other posts by you and Venkatcr (including that wonderful review of Audire) and I find that my tastes and listening style is similar to yours (though narrower perhaps), so inputs from both of you would be very valuable to me.
Hi Heinlein,
When I started off I thought Cadence was a fantastic company, then as I listened more, I got a tad disillusioned with the sound.
In general, here's why you might like a single driver SET amp combo.
1. Read up on the theory of the first watt. A lot of musical goodness is encoded in this first watt and with a single driver it gets reproduced as music because:
a) It does not get lost in the crossover of a conventional speaker
b) The single driver responds faster to signals and more of the signal is reproduced as music
Hence you hear a lot of the goodness that's coming from the amp which does not use feedback or split up the signal like a push pull amp. In a push pull tube amp you'll have two tubes per channel amplifying half and half of the signal whereas in a SET amp you have one tube per channel. I speak generally here, to give you pointers to research further.
2. You don't have any crossover so music is not split up. This splitting up causes an unnatural sound that single driver lovers find hard to come to terms with in conventional speakers. Single drivers have a purer sound while conventional speakers have a somewhat artificial 'hifi-ish' sound.
3. It's a point source so everything is coming from one point and there's a wonderful cohesiveness to the sound.
4. Single drivers sound good even at low volumes you don't need to blast to hear music being reproduced well.
Why you might not like a single driver SET amp combo
1. You miss the sheer volume
2. If you play at higher volumes you might feel the need for more power to handle more dynamic passages
3. You miss the bass and treble extension of conventional speakers
In general and this is my sole opinion, people who tend to like single drivers and SET amps are more focused on the musical side of the music. People who like conventional speakers, you'll find them describing speakers in terms of superb treble extension, superb midrange tight bass etc. examples of which you'll find on this very thread. Parts of the music versus the whole package without breaking things down. And this is where the crunch lies - if you figure out what kind of a listener you are, you're more likely to find a system that will satisfy you for a longer time.
regards
GeorgeO
Well-Known Member
The one time I heard the Cadence hybrids, with their EL 34 based amp I was very impressed. Electrostatics do sound a bit different. I have listened to Lyritaand also have a single driver system using the Fosetx 167E that is used in some of the Lyrita speakers.
Bottom line? I can only second Venkat's recommendation-you owe yourself an audition before splurging!
Bottom line? I can only second Venkat's recommendation-you owe yourself an audition before splurging!
heinlein2302
New Member
Thanks again, gentlemen.
@Stevieboy: I really do like the idea of a speaker that sounds good at low volume, as I usually listen at low to moderate volume. I find with my current speakers that I can't hear a lot of softer/subtle sounds at lower volumes, and then the music is not as satisfying somehow. This is further exacerbated when there is the slightest white noise e.g. a ceiling fan running even at low speed.
I did read up the first watt article on Lyrita's website. In fact, I have been reading up a lot of this technical stuff. I would have been an audiophile already if only I had the ears to match my reading habits.
@Georgeo: I listened to the Quad ESLs once and really loved the sound. That is why Cadence was on my radar. But now I think about it, I am no longer sure if it was because of the ESL panel or the tube amp. I guess I shall find out soon.
Needless to say, all your advice is well taken and I plan to go and listen for myself.
@Stevieboy: I really do like the idea of a speaker that sounds good at low volume, as I usually listen at low to moderate volume. I find with my current speakers that I can't hear a lot of softer/subtle sounds at lower volumes, and then the music is not as satisfying somehow. This is further exacerbated when there is the slightest white noise e.g. a ceiling fan running even at low speed.
I did read up the first watt article on Lyrita's website. In fact, I have been reading up a lot of this technical stuff. I would have been an audiophile already if only I had the ears to match my reading habits.
@Georgeo: I listened to the Quad ESLs once and really loved the sound. That is why Cadence was on my radar. But now I think about it, I am no longer sure if it was because of the ESL panel or the tube amp. I guess I shall find out soon.
Needless to say, all your advice is well taken and I plan to go and listen for myself.
Forgot to add, you should find the comparison between the Amity and Harmony One's telling cos they'll point the way to which way your tastes lie...
Enjoy the auditions! There are forum members in Delhi who have Cadence too, don't know if they have a showroom there...
Will await your impressions now.
Enjoy the auditions! There are forum members in Delhi who have Cadence too, don't know if they have a showroom there...
Will await your impressions now.
my advice..please dont worry about single driver/SET/multi drive/crossover etc when you are auditioning. these are listener created "groups" which dont really matter
keep an open mind and go with what you like and what fits into your budget.
BTW Everyone listens to music only to enjoy music so that does not make people listening to SS etc as Non musical people:sad: it is just that all of us are "conditioned" to respond to music with certain traits in presentation which are unique to that person, so you just need to find your niche
keep an open mind and go with what you like and what fits into your budget.
BTW Everyone listens to music only to enjoy music so that does not make people listening to SS etc as Non musical people:sad: it is just that all of us are "conditioned" to respond to music with certain traits in presentation which are unique to that person, so you just need to find your niche
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Absolute Phase
Active Member
Same case here to Prem, have been through so many speakers but finally settled on the Rethm Saadhanas and they in a different world. Nothing like a single horn. Period.IMHO.
+1 to arj & bingo prem u hit the nail no the head. However wishful our thinking may be, single drivers cannot produce full sound spectrum. At best they are wide spectrum. SETs may come closest to straight wire amplification but they have issues in controlling the speaker cone due to low damping factor. I've personally experienced the excessive boom produced by single driver-SET combo. The owner of that combo now uses a sound processor to change the situation.
subhobh
Active Member
Even I am also planning to go for Lyrita system with Harmony one single driver speakers. I loved the small details produced by the amplifier on low volume, and also the dynamics and perfect soundstage. My primary listening is Vocals, Instrumentals, Easy listening, Blues, Pop and Classical.. Not a rock fan though.
Didnt get a chance to audition Cadence stuff.
iaudio
Well-Known Member
Heinlein, I use an Acoustic Portrait and I am one happy customer. They have not shut down operations, afaik. Try to get a listen and if you like it, talk to Siva of Acoustic Portrait and he can work out something for you.
Gvenu of our forum has an AP system in your region.
Hi Arj,
I did not mean to suggest people who listen to SS are non musical
What I meant was there are two kinds of people, those who analyse individual parts of the music and describe a system in that manner eg soundstage, treble, midrange and those who listen as a whole. Two prime examples of these two diverse listening/description styles are Dr Bass's description of the Cadence electrostats and my description of the Blue Oyster Cult song 'Don't Fear The Reaper'. I was suggesting to Heinlein to first figure out which camp he falls into and then use that as a guiding light to find the kind of system he would be able to settle down with.regards
Acoustic Portrait as a brand and/or Corrson as a company is still there. AFAIK, they are coming out with whole new line up of equipments. They are also building a new website which will have all the details of this line up.
Hi Captrajesh,
Isn't loose bass cause by low damping different from excessive boom caused by too much bass? I think a lot of times the room has a far greater role to play in the bass getting too much in a room and boom then happening. Which is why in many people and reviewers suggest that in typical listening rooms, less bass eg bookshelf versus more uncontrollable bass from floorstander is a much better proposition. Cos then you'd have to spend far more time to place the speakers better and treat the room for bass response. And the room of the person in question was quite untreated from the picture that I remember if that person is from Chennai too and I'm guessing right who you mean.
I'd definitely agree that my system has looser bass than a conventional two/three way speaker driven by a SS amp which has tighter bass, but excessive boom as a given in a SET-single driver system...
regards
Hi Arj,
I did not mean to suggest people who listen to SS are non musical
regards
Steve, I do not know how you concluded about my listening habits. I also do not know how you concluded that people who listen to single driver listen to music as whole and vice versa
. It is funny, really! To me at this point you are analysing a lot.I really do not have to get into describing how I listen to music because I do not have to justify why I use the gears I do
. However to complete this post and to give a general pointer, my entire CD collection (about 500 CDs) has less than 1% audiophile recordings (Shefield Labs, Telarc, Stockfisch, Reference Recordings, ECM etc), rather it is full of Indian CDs (bollywood, Ghazals, Devotional music, fusion, hindustani, pop, old classics) and a collection of popular western artists like Knofler, Floyd, Fleetwood Mac, Cat Stevens, Tracy Chapman, Jennifer Warnes, Chris Rea, R.E.M, Lynyrd Skynrd, Tab Benoit, Beethoven, Janis Ian, Norah Jones and the likes. None of these have ever been represented by an audiophile recording label. Many a times I have been accused by fellow audiophile friends of not doing justice to my equipments.
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Steve, I do not know how you concluded about my listening habits. I also do not know how you concluded that people who listen to single driver listen to music as whole and vice versa
Hi Dr Bass,
Well it wasn't too hard. I merely noted what you wrote in your post immediately after mine where I wrote about BOC. Which was something about superb treble and fantastic midrange in describing the Amayas I think. Whereas I was describing how the song was conveyed to me. That's two different describing styles, that's all. You're entirely free to listen any which way you choose to I was merely penning an observation I made from your words. You chose to describe parts of music I chose to describe how it made me feel.
Which is why you like what you like and I like what I like, why you've made the system choices you've made and I've made the system choices I've made. In fact, over the weekend I met someone for whom treble is an important factor and that's why he loves his electrostatics. Yes I do find in my reading of reviews and comments made on forums that people who like multi-driver speakers tend to describe sound more in terms of its individual components whereas people who are SET owners and single driver owners tend to describe more how the music connects to them.
You're entirely free to ignore this finding cos anyway it's a personal one.
I'm getting the feeling that you're getting the feeling that I feel that one way is better, do forget it cos it's futile in this hobby to try to establish absolutes when there are so many subjective opinions and ears involved
It was/is merely an observation to help heinlein. I chose your post as an example cos it was handy in this thread for heinlein to find, it being his own thread This difference in views is also evident in manufacturers. Viren being someone who strives to make his products sound 'musical' above all else and others striving to deliver better, smooth treble, tighter bass than the previous speaker etc. Two different camps.
regards
Hi Dr Bass,
Well it wasn't too hard. I merely noted what you wrote in your post immediately after mine where I wrote about BOC. Which was something about superb treble and fantastic midrange in describing the Amayas I think. Whereas I was describing how the song was conveyed to me. That's two different describing styles, that's all. You're entirely free to listen any which way you choose to I was merely penning an observation I made from your words. You chose to describe parts of music I chose to describe how it made me feel.
Which is why you like what you like and I like what I like, why you've made the system choices you've made and I've made the system choices I've made. In fact, over the weekend I met someone for whom treble is an important factor and that's why he loves his electrostatics. Yes I do find in my reading of reviews and comments made on forums that people who like multi-driver speakers tend to describe sound more in terms of its individual components whereas people who are SET owners and single driver owners tend to describe more how the music connects to them.
You're entirely free to ignore this finding cos anyway it's a personal one.
I'm getting the feeling that you're getting the feeling that I feel that one way is better, do forget it cos it's futile in this hobby to try to establish absolutes when there are so many subjective opinions and ears involved
This difference in views is also evident in manufacturers. Viren being someone who strives to make his products sound 'musical' above all else and others striving to deliver better, smooth treble, tighter bass than the previous speaker etc. Two different camps.
regards
This is the reason I said you are analysing a lot. And while analyzing you are also assuming a lot.
How I describe the sound of a system totally depends on the situation, purpose and also the person I am talking to. When I know the audiophile personally and we understand a piece of music commonly, my expression would be different. When I have to write on a forum like this where I do not know most of the people but have to express something lacking or something exciting about the system, I would try to use technical terms which we all understand on a common plane. It is my way of communicating. I have always been explicit with my comments. Some people call it bold. But to me I am trying to be as direct as possible so that there is very little left to guess.
If I say, the opening of Beethoven 5th Symphony by Carlos Kleiber, the array of violins sounded like it should, magnificiently large, somewhat scary and very dynamic on the Amaya. What does it really convey ? Does it say anything about the tones of the speaker ? Does it say anything about the fact that the bass actually has a timing mismatch with electrostatic panel ? Or does it convey anything about the way an Amaya sounds different from a Dynaudio per se ?
There was an interesting conversation I had with an audiophile who owns a Harbeth. When I asked him how does an Harbeth sounds like, he used such wordings like "Mahler sounds like it should, big and dynamic, Diana Krall sounds like she should velvety and airy, Floyd's guitar sounds like it should electronic and lively". In the end, my take away was almost nil, because there are many speakers which do what this audiophile is describing, how is the Harbeth different ? I could only conclude that without an audition I have no idea what a Harbeth sounds like. I finally did audition the Harbeths at Spore and you can ask me how it sounds. It is not as difficult to describe its signature sound.
Well, this is just to suggest that you may be inferring a lot by just reading the writing patterns.
Tell me something, all this SET, SS, Multidriver, single-driver has come into our lives only few years back. Prior to that most of us did not know what it is and listened to music on basic systems. How come both camps enjoyed music on them then ? Are you saying that even those little 2 in 1s also allowed one to dissect music ? As per your conclusion the multidriver camp would have never enjoyed music in the past (since the systems did not allow them to dissect) ? Funny isnt it !!!
Almost every audiophile would like to connect to music, why is there such a huge disparity in the number of single driver speakers sold compared to conventional speakers ?
Also most of the world's best musicians and music directors use multi driver speakers to listen to their works !! I hope at least they know what they are doing.
I'm getting the feeling that you're getting the feeling that I feel that one way is better, do forget it cos it's futile in this hobby to try to establish absolutes when there are so many subjective opinions and ears involved
Well, all I can say that, at least on this forum, I have read way too many posts where single driver speakers are pitched against multidriver speakers in a bid to establish some kind of supremacy. A typical illustration is as below:
If Viren can actually improve treble and bass in one of his existing speakers, will he not do it ? I am sure you would applaud him for an effort like that ? What made you think that Viren's efforts are in the 'musical' direction while someone else's efforts are not ?
Steve, I have never evaluated why some people like horns while some like single drivers and some others conventional multidrivers. I know music is something which directly touches your senses. What happens to it after that nobody has ever been able to find out. Now, at the most you know how it feels to you when you listen to music in your system, how it is communicated, what gives you that joy and satisfaction in this whole process. Trying to evaluate what is happening within another human being during the music listening process is just way too complicated not within your reach to accomplish a task like that. No amount of arguments in favor of single drivers can actually justify that you are hearing anything more musical than a multi driver speaker listener and vice versa. Compared to the algorithm that runs in our brain, these arguments are extremely trivial.
That is the reason none of these arguments actually help an audiophile choose a camp. The day he hears one he will automatically know where he belongs.
I have only one explanation to all this. Every individual likes a certain unique presentation of music which connects him best to the music. This presentation is a combination of many things, tangible and intangible, viz frequency range, tones, dynamics, PRAT, staging, fluidity, warmth, air, openness, slam, body etc. A certain ratio of all of them together form a musical picture which appeals to an individual. How it is achieved is something that does not really matter !! How many driver it takes or how many watts it takes, who is really counting that ? All that matters is, this unique presentation is the closest to reality for one individual and for him this is MAGIC !!
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bhagwan
Well-Known Member
:clapping:
Dr. Bass I must say you have put it well.....
The Cadence design is 'dated' The Amaya has been around for 15 ++ years & sound has moved....
I do like Cadence sound - I use their amps myself - but their VA-1 is - for lack of a better word - under powered & lacks the 'drive' !!
I like Jacob's speakers a lot. Their new powered Lowther based speaker is a great product, I would suggest an audition....
Mr. Bakshi's products I have not heard for a while... I am keen to listen to his 845 - some day.
I currently have a 300B amp @ home & am really enjoying it... The 845's are not in use - static display - temporary..
:sad:
nice thread going on... 2 cents from a newb.
Most of the multi way speakers have poor crossovers. Not only many manufacturer's use abysmally cheap quality components in crossovers, many of the crossovers are also very poorly designed (ofcourse not with super expensive equipment). In some of the diy designs, the crossover costs as much or more than the drivers! The choice of crossover point is also in dispute. A lot of FR users claim that putting a crossover point bang in the mid range is the root cause of all problems.
I also read that FRs dont do good with large orchestral pieces, rock music, techno music etc. What is the reason for this. Is it a lack of bass, that can be fixed with a sub. How does a FR system with a sub perform for these genres. I dont think a lack of high end will be an issue for most of the people as most of them cant hear beyond a certain range, but even this also can be fixed by using a FR with a tweeter, crossed over beyond midrange. Anyone using a FR with a tweet?
Most of the multi way speakers have poor crossovers. Not only many manufacturer's use abysmally cheap quality components in crossovers, many of the crossovers are also very poorly designed (ofcourse not with super expensive equipment). In some of the diy designs, the crossover costs as much or more than the drivers! The choice of crossover point is also in dispute. A lot of FR users claim that putting a crossover point bang in the mid range is the root cause of all problems.
I also read that FRs dont do good with large orchestral pieces, rock music, techno music etc. What is the reason for this. Is it a lack of bass, that can be fixed with a sub. How does a FR system with a sub perform for these genres. I dont think a lack of high end will be an issue for most of the people as most of them cant hear beyond a certain range, but even this also can be fixed by using a FR with a tweeter, crossed over beyond midrange. Anyone using a FR with a tweet?
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