Aerial Acoustics 6T Speaker

Teajay, I just auditioned the 7T last week, but my local dealer does not have the 6T. Have you heard both?

I reviewed about a year and a half ago the 7T. Gave it a big thumbs up, you could go to hometheaterreview.com and look up the review in the archives for the details. The 6T is for smaller or normal sized acoustic spaces then the 7T which performed wonderfully well in my very big listening space.

The 6T images like a reference level two-way, the speaker completely disappears, yet its overall dynamic range and low end extension is amazing considering its relatively small footprint.

Teajay-

I have heard both models and did not like the sound? Maybe the 10T/20T are better. I simply could not get into this speaker. Same can be stated for the Vandersteen Treo & Quattro. Per haps it is the crossover or something...

I much prefer, and make them my reference loudspeaker, THIEL CS 3.7 or CS 2.7 , depending on room size- the speakers require big rooms to really open up and sing. Happy Listening!

Hi Jafant,

This just proves that personal taste and system synergy always is in effect and everybody should use their own ears. I wonder when you heard the 7T's and 6T's what was the upstream gear?

Both Thiel speakers I have spent time in front of and neither are my cup of sonic tea. Great detail and transparency, however I found them to be all leading edge and somewhat lean sounding even with tube gear. It's one of the speakers that sound like a good speaker to me, but not like real music.

Right On! Teajay-

I wanted to like/love the Aerial speakers- it just did not happen. The associated gear was from Classe' Ayre and Mark Levinson- no slouches there. Cables/cords were from Transparent Reference XL or OPUS systems- no slouches either.

Perhaps the Aerial 10/20T models are better?

@teajay How do the Aerial 6T and 7T hold up nowadays against some of the more recent designs you've heard? I haven't heard the 7T, but absolutely loved the 6T that I demoed, against speakers from Paradigm, KEF, Klipsch, and Focal.

I just bought a pair of 6T’s yesterday. My wife and I demoed a lot of speakers and nothing came close to the Aerials 

It’s very interesting that the Thiel speakers are characterized as "lean" by teajay. I thought they are very natural and full-body sound. I can understand they could sound a bit "cool" if driven by a front end system that is a bit bright.

I was wondering if the 6T drivers are still sourced from SBAcoustic? If so then the drivers may be a bottle neck in term of performance, but given its modest price, they still would provide outstanding value.  In term of driver technology and quality, I would put the Thiel driver a step above those from SBAcoustic.
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6T drivers are shown in more detail here: https://www.remusic.it/EN/Aerial-Acoustics-6T-loudspeakers-81b35000. It appears that the woofers and midrange are SB Acoustics given the papyrus blend. The tweeter is the Scanspeak Discovery tweeter (not the Revelator as incorrectly stated at the above link). All are customized to some extent for Aerial by the respective manufacturers, but agreed that they are pretty cheap drivers considering the retail price of the speaker. The stock version of the tweeter is available from Madisound for $54 (non-volume pricing of course).

The 6T was in the top 5 or so speakers I’ve heard, though I preferred the 7T to it. Recently, I heard a pair of 6T driven by a Naim integrated amp at a friend’s house and they sounded horrible. Narrow staging, rolled off treble, and weak bass. Very much outclassed by a pair of KEF floorstanders in that room and on that same amp. At the dealer’s, my impressions were basically swapped between Aerial and a different KEF floorstander. Would not recommend buying unless you can try in your own room on your own electronics, especially given the comparatively poor (and continuing to decline) resale value of Aerials due to a particularly vocal disgruntled former dealer.