Living@Rethm Club

Kushanava

Active Member
Joined
Sep 5, 2012
Messages
264
Points
43
Location
kolkata
The number of Rethm owners have grown significantly over the years.
Though we have references to several rethm threads , but most of them are on the older version of the speakers.This thread intends to show a clear path to grow one's audio system around the rethm
speakers.Calling all owners of reth audio to showcase their systems and sharing their experiences on
1.Room
2.amplifier
3.cables
4.positioning
5.power conditioning
6.others..
 
My Current Setup:
1.Rethm Saadhana Speakers (V3 upgraded). Colour Black & Silver
Probably , i am the first person in the forum to have received the latest version of the Saadhana's with the Bass module amplifier changed to Class D.

2. Amplifier - Sugden A 21 se

3.Marantz Cd 48 . Just purchased the ifi DSD micro Dac.

4.Power Supply - Eltek 1KVA online UPS

5. Cables - Murthy's Speaker cables and IFI stock Interconnect.

6. Room size :13.8*28 sq-ft . Speakers are placed along side the shorter wall.
Speakers are placed 7 ft from the front wall , 1.5 ft from side walls.The listening position is around 10 ft from the speakers.

7.Crossover : 12 o'clock , Bass level :10 or 11 o'clock depending on the song.

Will be posting the pics soon.

Now, firstly this has been a blind buy and my mind was set on a "Hifi" perfect sound.The Saadhanas shocked me by the its realism and naturalism. I was still trying to search for the Hifi Edge and it was not there.It was all calm and composed and well balanced as if someone has used the right spices and in perfect proportions.
The speakers have been with me for a month now, and I have been playing around with the positions and have settled to the above settings for now. The speakers are still breaking in and playing beautifully.The biggest satisfaction with the speakers is its ability to response to changes to each component in the system.I am still holding on my praises till i give my system enough support for these speakers.And this actually provokes you to search for improvements.What I have realized is I need improvements immediately on the cables and on the Noise Floor.
Jacob has recommended Auditorim or Audience cables. I would like to know if anyone else have any other suggestions as I am not finding pre-owned Auditorium 23 .
Also please suggest how to improve the noise floor as the speakers seems to be very sensitive to that.Initially I had an issue with the "Hum" in the bass modules , but that got resolved after adding the Online UPS. But still I see some improvement areas in Bass by reducing the noise floor.
 
Congratulations Khushanava!

I know of four other FMs owning Rethm products.
Myself, prem, hydra and AVM.
Hope they and any others will chip in with their set-ups and impressions so we can have a consolidated Rethm thread.

Jacob George, owner of Rethm, posted this sometime back (post 63).

This is my set-up.

Speakers: Rethm Saadhana V2 (these are the previous model)
Amplifier: Rethm Gaanam (this is the previous model)
Turntable: Scheu Cello with Classic MkII 10" tonearm and MC S cartridge
Phono pre: Trigon Advance
Music PC: Fanless Antec ISK110 cabinet, Asus J1800I-C board, HDPlex linear PSU
DAC: Yet to be finalized. An existing Musical Fidelity M1CLiC being used at present
CD player: Existing Arcam CD73.
Rack: Soundfoundations (FM magma)
Power: Distribution box from Soundfoundations. 2 kVA stabilizer from Vertex, Chennai
Spkr cables: ASI Liveline

The speakers and amp are both previous models and bought used from fellow FMs.
The turntable and phono pre bought from The Listening Room, Bangalore. Both demo pieces.
Cables also bought used.
I seem to be one hell of an advocate of buying used. I would definitely suggest it.

Lovely sound despite the compromises in room size and furniture placement. Better than what I had expected given these issues. No ear fatigue even in long listening sessions. A dream come true setup.

2a5naqt.jpg

34ou0lh.jpg

6ehzq1.jpg

10y3y9x.jpg

xvpfl.jpg

52h0n5.jpg
 
Last edited:
Lovely , clean setup:clapping:. Wire-management is something very important and often is ignored. Lets share some wire-management Ideas tools and techniques.This is a big challenge for me as the speakers are 7 ft in front of the front wall.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Hi Kushnava

The Auditorium 23 speaker cables are very very nice. Supremely musical and organic. You cannot go wrong with it.

Rethm speaker cables too are a great match with the Saadhanas.

You can also look at Nanotec, Anticables, Livelines, Ocellia, depending on your budget.

Also you do not need to increase or decrease bass volume. Its a one time exercise. It is not a function of which song you play. You need to change the bass volume level when you change the amplifier or the cables or do room treatment to adjust for the same.

You could try pulling out the speakers by another 4 to 6 inches from the side wall.
 
Last edited:
congratulations !

there are very nice speakers and they will need to be matched well to extract all the juice possible.

Positioning will be a key aspect - more so with these beauties..

They are capable of conveying the music in a magical manner.

High performance cars demand high performance components, sources and accessories and dancing partners. Nothing wrong with that.

do put up some pictures of your setup as well.

njoi the music !

A few questions :-

a. is your room your personal music space ?
b. The dimensions you mention tells me that the speakers are well into the room. Is the wall behind your listening position bare ?

regards
 
Last edited by a moderator:
@Prem - Thanks for your suggestion.
Yes . I thought I would go for the Rethm Cables first , but Jacob told that they are not focused on cables at this time and recommended the Audiotorium Cables. Do you have information on a reliable website to buy cables from ?

Bass levels are currently set at 11 , but for low quality materials there is a boom . So I usually change them to 10'oclock

The Positioning is still under consideration. Are you recommending the movement from the sidewalls to tame the Bass boom?I have a question here . The more I widen the speakers the midrange seems to be a little more transparent.I started with 2 ft and then changed it to 1.5.Now once the speakers burn in , probably it will be a good idea to go back to 2 ft position.

@MPW
Yes I see there is a huge room for improvement for these speakers.
So i am aiming to spend money on things that would make majority of the improvements first and then would focus on fine tuning the system.

a. is your room your personal music space ? --- Yes.
b. The dimensions you mention tells me that the speakers are well into the room. Is the wall behind your listening position bare ?
-- There is a small Deity room (enclosed by wooden partition) behind my listening area. So I had to leave some space for that.
 
Last edited:
Hi Kushnava

I do not know who deals in Auditorium cables but you can write to Auditorium 23 and check with them. They also have matching interconnects. Moving from the sidewall should give you better mids with also better integration between mids and bass. First get the placement right. Then set up the crossover and vol.
 
Last edited:
First off, hearty congratulations on a fine pair of speakers.

Just a thought about your placement - if I understand correctly, the speakers are firing along the 13.8 feet dimension. If so, 7 feet is bang halfway into the room, and not ideal as I believe that's where you'll have a room mode. Probably the reason why you're having some trouble with bass. Why don't you experiment with placing them one-third into the room? I think it will sound better. And if you have the freedom, fire them along the longer wall. You will gain tremendously in terms of image depth.
 
First off, hearty congratulations on a fine pair of speakers.

Just a thought about your placement - if I understand correctly, the speakers are firing along the 13.8 feet dimension. If so, 7 feet is bang halfway into the room, and not ideal as I believe that's where you'll have a room mode. Probably the reason why you're having some trouble with bass. Why don't you experiment with placing them one-third into the room? I think it will sound better. And if you have the freedom, fire them along the longer wall. You will gain tremendously in terms of image depth.

Actually the speakers are placed with their back on the 13.8 ft wall.
 
Congratulations, Kushanava! I had listened to the upgraded bass modules of the V3 Saadhanas sometime back and there was indeed a subtle improvement over the earlier V3 units.

I'd visited the Rethm Studio a couple of weeks back also, and Jacob George had repositioned the Saadhanas by pulling them further into the room. The improvement (I was quite surprised that the old position could actually be improved on) was remarkable, with a far sharper imaging, wider stage (obviously) and with the bass more towards the feel-it-but-not-hear-it character.

Photo of the Saadhanas at the Rethm Studio, taken from the listening seat (please forgive the mobile phone snap, shot in interior lighting):
znu0jp.jpg


The Saadhanas seem to LOVE more space behind them. I'm sure there is a point in all rooms where the space behind the speaker becomes counterproductive, but I urge you to find that position in your room, because these speakers sound markedly better with just the right amount of space behind them.

The space to the side of the speakers (between the speakers and the wall), as Prem said, makes a fairly marked change in the character of the sound. I found this aspect of the placement the most difficult to get right in my room, because I found that the sound (and the sharpness of the imaging) changed even with very small changes in position (probably because the room is quite narrow, and probably because I'm a bit of a worrywart). You should experiment with this aspect of placement.

I have my Rethm Trishnas set up in a smallish dedicated room. The room is trapezoidal in shape, with the front wall (wall behind the Trishnas) shorter than the rear wall, and with the side walls slightly slanted. The front wall is about 10ft wide, and the rear wall is nearly 12ft wide. The room is about 18ft long.

The Trishnas are placed 5 ft from the wall behind them (distance between baffle and wall), and 1 ft ,10 inches from the walls to their sides (distance between centre of driver and wall). The speakers are placed with 5 ft and 8 inches between the centres of the each driver. My seat is 8 ft from the mid point of the two speakers. The bass modules are set at 12 o'clock at this placement.

This is how the placement of the Trishnas looks like at my place, from the seat (the camera was placed on the back of the chair):
2por0hi.jpg


I have fairly stable power at home, so I have nothing set up in the power conditioning dept. (The stabilizer you see in the pic is the aircon's)

I keep meaning to get some "v" cut wood blocks to raise the speaker cables, but I've not yet got around to doing that.

I use Nanotech MS #207 interconnects and Rethm Speaker cables. I can't recommend both enough. Both made substantial improvements in the system when they were introduced into it.

I'm quite content and very happy with the overall setup now, so I don't experiment any more with placement or other equipment. (No, I'm not getting lazy, heh heh).
 
Last edited:
No other contributors?

@prem, @AVM please do write about your experiences with some pics.
Prem, you have written much about your journey with Rethm but not since long. Your new pair must have settled in beautifully by now. Let us in on it.
AVM, you have not written about your experience at all. It would be very nice if you would.

Wonder if there are any others. There must be.
 
@Hydra: Sorry for being late to respond .Have been busy with work this week.
Your setup is looking awesome.

I have got the same colour of the Saadhanas that are in the studios. Do you have an Idea on the room size, treatment and the position measurements in the studio. I have started playing more with the positioning now. Will update based on the changes.
 
That's lovely setup there Hydra.
Sure Naturelover. They are a fabulous pair of speakers. My setup is not complete yet but what I can share is they have spoilt me.

Prem was over a few weeks back and helped me with the placement. He has an amazing art of setting these up.
Thanks Prem.

Once setup and the ASI livelines in, they simply fill the room.
A lot of work in terms of cabling is still pending. I shall chip in post that.
These surely demand a lot of attention and patience (which I don't have) but the rewards are huge.
Happy listening.
 
Last edited:
I have had short bursts of excitement with the Rethms (not that they are moody:p) and today was one of those days.
I had been wanting to hear the Saadhnas with a different amp and what luck, I ended borrowing a very high quality 70 watts tube power amp with an attenuation control.
Loads of power for high sensitive speakers and I started of nervously since there wasn't an accompanying pre amp.
I was amazed at the presentation, soundstage with depth as if there is an endless tunnel. There are shortcomings but the glimpse of what quality power can bring out if Rethms was the highlight.
I have this on loan for a week. Lets see how it goes.
 
Last edited:
This is exciting! What amp is that?
Waiting for more.

....I ended borrowing a very high quality 70 watts tube power amp with an attenuation control.
Loads of power for high sensitive speakers and I started of nervously since there wasn't an accompanying pre amp.
I was amazed at the presentation, soundstage with depth as if there is an endless tunnel. There are shortcomings but the glimpse of what quality power can bring out if Rethms was the highlight.
I have this on loan for a week. Lets see how it goes.
 
Guys,
Can you help me understand how to eliminate the small hissing noise floor when I start my amp.The sound is lower when CD player is connected through the coaxial as compared when using the USB through the ifi dac.Can this be an Interconnect/ speaker cable issue ?
Is it common for all rethm speakers because of the higher sensitivity?
 
Try noticing if it occurs when the computer or laptop that is switched on and off.
 
Get the Wharfedale EVO 4.2 3-Way Standmount Speakers at a Special Offer Price.
Back
Top