>> is the Zu Dominance more immune to room issues? Do you think it will fix things when replacing the IVs...<<
I heard Zu Dominance (the only pair in existence) in the home of a very generous, friendly and questing Zu customer, with also a discerning collection of music. We had corresponded periodically over the past year when he approached me for advice on recommendation from Zu. The system built around Dominance speakers is in a Rives-treated room, and it is a dedicated listening space, and a very comfortable one.
One of the owner's first comments when we entered his room was to explain what Rives had done and then to say "I think they went too far and I'm still thinking about what to do next...." With that we turned on his system
No speaker is immune to room issues, but some are less affected than others. When Sean Casey first told me a few years ago what he was thinking about for his super speaker, I was wary. Three FRDs, two supertweeters, a big built-in sub. It had the potential to be an overbearing speaker in most domestic settings. As executed, it isn't at all. Dominance has more acoustic power and scale available to the room than the smaller Definition, but it is as fleet, precise, delicate and agile as any small monitor. It is both large and beautifully focused. That focus and immediacy mitigates, but does not obviate the room.
I am unlikely to ever buy a pair of Zu Dominance. It is the best speaker I know of commercially available at any price, and is easily the best speaker I've ever heard, on balance, in over 40 years of being active in high-end audio. But it is a more visually and physically imposing speaker than I am likely to want in any domestic setting I'm likely to live in. Perhaps I'll get closer to Dominance by buying Experience sometime. But would Dominance "fix" my room if I bought them? Sorry. The room would still retain it's basic acoustic flaws.
Some perspective is in order for this discussion.
I've never said that I don't understand nor that I don't believe room correction is influential. I understand it perfectly, and there are both physical and DSP remedies. All of them are imperfect, too. My low priority assigned to professional room correction is a choice of principle and aesthetics. In any residence of mine, there will never be a dedicated listening room, no matter how much available space there is. Music via hifi is part of the social experience of being in my domicle, and that's not going to change. So the systems are in the living areas and if there is a choice forced between a 1st reflection panel and a Nieto painting, the 1st reflection panel loses that contest, no matter how much good it would do sonically. There's only so much wall space.
I've never heard a system for which the attributes of the gear couldn't be heard through the room, so whether a room is treated or not, the signature of the assembled hifi prevails. A related point is that the many people who came to hear music in my home who then left asking how to get "that sound" were not deterred or distracted in any way by the fact that they were listening in a room only marginally corrected by furnishings of the room. I have, by the way, heard the room empty, and it is radically improved by the way it is furnished. Improved enough, and it has no runaway tendencies.
So, while I have found most treated rooms quite unnatrual in significant ways, for anyone who wants to put room treatment as a first priority, it's an act of free will so have at it. But if people *ask* me whether I advise them to start there, my answer is no, for reasons already stated. I also, as you've seen from repostings of some other opinions I've written, don't want to participate in any trend that reinforces the notion that hifi for music is a geeky, solitary pursuit more regarded as pathology than enlightenment. But that's me. I'm an evangelist for the interest, and I'm actually more interested in bringing more people in from outside our community, than in influencing people already in it.
One more thing: I've known a lot of audiophiles with treated rooms over the decades I've been involved with this interest. One observation that comes to mind is that I expected a preference for room treatments to also result in more system components stability or longevity. But that's not what I've witnessed. Audiophiles with treated rooms have in my experience tended to be more restless about their gear than people who don't prioritize acoustic optimization. Is that coincidence or correlation? I don't know. But I haven't seen room treatment lead to greater apparent satisfaction nor more settled owners in the hifi realm.
And, Glory, my private email traffic from people asking my help has gone up due to this latest run of this thread, even today since Keith's criticism of my room and priorities. So, you know....I'm demand driven. I don't mind people asking for help, and I don't mind people ignoring me either.
Phil
