Please elaborate on your experience, what you heard, how you found them and so on, it will help others looking for information.
Speaker Auditioning Experiences - Kolkata
- Thread starter haisaikat
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Please elaborate on your experience, what you heard, how you found them and so on, it will help others looking for information.
koushik
Well-Known Member
Hi Quixand,
I am not aware of Watteffects and Sollfege. Where are these showrooms in Kolkata? What are the main brands available over here? Good to know more hi-fi stores are opening in Kolkata.
I visited Sollfege 8 months ago ..
They stock B&W , Wharfs , Sonodyne , Golden Ear for stereo.
Amplifiers were Denon and Rotel .I am not sure if they have upgraded the stock now.I was interested to hear the Golden Ear Triton 2 , but they were out of stock.The new Golder ear Triton 1 is getting rave reviews ...It may be a good speaker to audition.
They stock B&W , Wharfs , Sonodyne , Golden Ear for stereo.
Amplifiers were Denon and Rotel .I am not sure if they have upgraded the stock now.I was interested to hear the Golden Ear Triton 2 , but they were out of stock.The new Golder ear Triton 1 is getting rave reviews ...It may be a good speaker to audition.
you can look at their facebook page for details...
https://www.facebook.com/sollfegeIndia/info
https://www.facebook.com/sollfegeIndia/info
Watteffects is located near Southern Avenue, Rabindro Sarobar lake.
https://www.facebook.com/WattEffects
I have not been there yet.
I'm penning this down as an absolute beginner. There may be naming mistakes and address mistakes, model mistakes. I will edit this as soon as I can find my list of Contacts and research that I'd done at that time.
I gave serious thought to putting a Home Theater together 5 months back which led me to this forum. I had no idea that Kolkata actually had auditioning rooms till then. This forum gave a great starting point.
The initial plan was to start off with a pair of Bookshelf speakers and expand gradually to 5.1. My usage is 50% Music & 50% Movies/Television.
After a bit of due diligence went to ProFx to get a first hand experience.
Had short listed Polk, Tannoy, Wharfedale by this time and had called them to set some time aside.
PROFX:
Wanted to demo the Denon x500, x1000 AVR and just see what I was getting into. I took some concert CDs recorded in 5.1 with me. After a bit of walking about found ProFX room. Denon AVRs were not available at PROFX at that time. Instead sat back and auditioned Polk 220B and Pioneer VSX522 or 523 I do not remember the exact details. I found this combination a little too shrill for my taste. I think I must have spent 45 minutes to an hour there.
No Denon receivers was a bit of let down.
Digital Acoustics:
IIRC this place is near Maddox Square. Audition room built in a house. Wasn't expecting that.
Here I got a chance to listen to the Tannoy Mercury V1 and Denon X500 or X1000. I was carrying some music on my iPhone converted from FLAC.
I was carrying The Roots, Some EDM numbers, Some Electronica, Some Metal and some Karsh Kale.
Tannoys sounded good to me, way better than what I had experience at ProFx. Maybe it was the chunkiness in sound that was missing.
The Quote on the Denon x500 + Tannoys were a bit high I felt. It wasn't an unfruitful experience though. I decided to take a look at Yamaha AVRs the next day.
SKS:
Next day I wanted to keep things fresh and went down to Lake Market where SKS Traders are. They stock Yamaha AVRs and speakers along with some other brands.
Listened to some music, demo CDs from a VX 375 or 377 with 5.1 speakers Yamaha (NS40 IIRC).
Honestly by this time I was confused. Pioneer POLK seemed too treble forward, and now Denon Tannoy was sounding a little bit too chunky.
For some years I have been using IEMs and I've always gravitated towards my RE0s + FiioE6 over Nuforce, TF10s. Must have spent 45 minutes atleast watching various clips from a demo CD.
WattEffects
After work I went to Watteffect Listening room after getting dealer numbers from Justdial.
The audition room is on the bigger side compared to the rest.
Wharfedale 121s were setup and yep that was it. I spent an hour there playing the same playlist I had been carrying. The Snare, Cymbals sounded perfect to me. Crisp, Not too sibilant. This was the closest I had been on stage for quite some (I've played a few gigs in College - Drums).
The low end on theses speakers were good.
There's a Track "Simon V - Inner Surface (featuring Jojo Mayer)" one of my favourite drummers. It's an upbeat drums N Bass track with some ethereal Female vocals on it. There's a small section where the bass decays slowly and throughout the song the Bass line follows the Kick Drums very closely. I enjoyed it a lot.
Played some Roots - One of my favourite Hip Hop who actually play instruments. They are on Jimmy Fallon's Show nowadays doing "impromptu jams".
Carried the albums "Undun" & "How I got Over" with me. Sounded terrific I was air drumming (in my mind). The Vocals sound great I somehow always follow vocal cues. The Kicks sound very natural. There are section with Piano, Flute? etc. Overall sounded very good to me.
One thing worth mentioning is that my friend accompanying me thought 121s sounded subdued to him.
Not for me I put in the advance.
Utsav there was extremely patient and helpful dealing with a noob. Later he helped me get a used Diamond 9 CS and Diamond 10 DFS rear speakers to complete 5.1 setup.
Sollfege
Went back to South Kolkata (I'm in the North) to Sollfege to demo some Subwoofers. This was a very impulsive decision. Played a lot of the same Music, Movies on that. There room seems to be well equipped.
Went and demoed the Paradigm PDR80 paired up with Wharfedale 122s.
The guys there too are very helpful and patient. But I wanted to give a listen to more Subwoofers.
Harmonie Audio
Went to Tollygunge to Harmonie Audio. By this time I had gone over budget and just got the Wharfedale SW150 Subwoofer. Auditioned Wharfedale 100HCP too. This was a demo piece.
I thought it sounded decent after around 45 minutes to 1 hour of listening to the same playlist and realized that the Paradigm just needed to "Cool it" in some sections and was actually overbearing. I don't have the biggest room and felt the Sub did a good enough job.
Mr Vasu was very helpful and patient and let me open (what looked like) a brand new box of Grado SR60s or 80s dont exactly remember.
==+==
There were some very interesting options along the way Velodyne, SVS etc but I just did not have the budget for it.
Final Setup -
Wharfedale 121 Bookshelf
Wharfedale Diamond 9 CS Center (Used)
Wharfedale Diamond 10 DFS Rear (Used)
Wharfedale SW150 Subwoofer
Hooked up everything to Yamaha RXV375.
Source - PC, PS3, XBOX 360, Tata SKY HD+
Pretty satisfied with the setup (4 Months old). Please do keep note that I had no experience of doing anything related to Home Theater before this and I'm sure I've made a lot of amateurish blunders
I went by gut feel, what sounded good to me, Magazines and pocket.
I sourced my speakers from different vendors and only time will tell which did well. The best experience was definitely at Watt Effects followed closely by Harmonie.
Last edited:
SKS Traders is located at Lansdown/ Motor Vehicles just opposite to Poddo pukur. If you have come to Lake market, then you must have visited the AQ Square, exclusive showroom for Yamaha. I bought my AVR from there too.
aludum
New Member
==+==
There were some very interesting options along the way Velodyne, SVS etc but I just did not have the budget for it.
Final Setup -
Wharfedale 121 Bookshelf
Wharfedale Diamond 9 CS Center (Used)
Wharfedale Diamond 10 DFS Rear (Used)
Wharfedale SW150 Subwoofer
Hooked up everything to Yamaha RXV375.
Source - PC, PS3, XBOX 360, Tata SKY HD+
Pretty satisfied with the setup (4 Months old). Please do keep note that I had no experience of doing anything related to Home Theater before this and I'm sure I've made a lot of amateurish blunders
I went by gut feel, what sounded good to me, Magazines and pocket.
I sourced my speakers from different vendors and only time will tell which did well. The best experience was definitely at Watt Effects followed closely by Harmonie.
I want to build my first home theater and I have no knowledge about hi-fi. my room size is 12*12 in which there is a bed 6*7 and the rest of area is for ht. i can't visit the store since i can't walk well after surgery. i can only audition them on the day when i'll be purchasing them.
I live in kolkata and the budget is 2 lakh including receiver and sub. Speakers need to be front ported since they have to be placed closed to wall. Also I have to buy bookshelves because of space. According to room space, I should buy satellites buy I want to hear decent quality sound. Also, I want to buy HSU or SVS sub as I heard they make great subs.
These following speakers have good reviews in whathifi, cnet etc. . I have no personal experience. I know their prices are different but I want to buy the best sounding one. Guide me.
1. B&W 685 S2 - 65,000
2. Wharfedale Diamond 220
3. Polk Rti A1
4. Polk Tsx 220b
5. Kef Q300
Attachments
I don't think I'm qualified for 2L budget I'll leave it the pros, But I do remember Utsav from Watteffects mentioning Emotiva around that range (maybe a tad bit higher).
You can probably reach out to him (contact details listed on Justdial).
Auditioning is a must otherwise you may get stuck with something that won't suit your taste.
I'm not sure if dealers will be willing to send demo pieces to your place for audition, too far fetched maybe.
You can probably reach out to him (contact details listed on Justdial).
Auditioning is a must otherwise you may get stuck with something that won't suit your taste.
I'm not sure if dealers will be willing to send demo pieces to your place for audition, too far fetched maybe.
Polk RTi A1 and B&W 685 S2 does not even belong in the same bracket, the difference is night and day between the two.
2 Lakh is a considerable budget and one can build a really great HT with it, read old and new threads and you will get some idea about what experienced forum members advise and why. It is important to not be swayed by very many opinions, look out for experienced member advises.
Kolkata has decent options now with some new dealers coming in the fray. In your list Wharfedale is acceptable to most, Kef Q300 are very decent speakers, I head them with Pioneer AVR at ProFX and they sounded quite nice. Although the Q300s are praised very highly for their stereo duty, them being nice speakers will do well in HT setup as well.
Throw in the mix Q Acoustics, Dali and Monitor Audio. Audition these and I can not overemphasize the need for auditioning all the available options. Auditions only will tell you what is right for you, time consuming affair for sure but a true eye-opener and rewarding experience.
Visit SKS Traders opposite Paddmapukur for Dali, and Harmony Audio in New Alipore for Q Acoustics and Monitor Audio.
2 Lakh is a considerable budget and one can build a really great HT with it, read old and new threads and you will get some idea about what experienced forum members advise and why. It is important to not be swayed by very many opinions, look out for experienced member advises.
Kolkata has decent options now with some new dealers coming in the fray. In your list Wharfedale is acceptable to most, Kef Q300 are very decent speakers, I head them with Pioneer AVR at ProFX and they sounded quite nice. Although the Q300s are praised very highly for their stereo duty, them being nice speakers will do well in HT setup as well.
Throw in the mix Q Acoustics, Dali and Monitor Audio. Audition these and I can not overemphasize the need for auditioning all the available options. Auditions only will tell you what is right for you, time consuming affair for sure but a true eye-opener and rewarding experience.
Visit SKS Traders opposite Paddmapukur for Dali, and Harmony Audio in New Alipore for Q Acoustics and Monitor Audio.
Speakers don't need to be front ported to be wall mounted. Do look at Dali Zensor 1 and PSB Image. I am using Zensor 1 wall mounted.
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