Schroder sq and the new talea

Granted that it was impossible to distinguish the effect of the tonearms in this comparison. But one thing was clear to me - the Talea setup outperformed the Schroder setup by a significant margin. Joel Durand played a piece by Ravel that floored me. He played it at concert volumes, which is to say, much less loud than what you normally hear out of a stereo reproduction. This is a huge challenge to stereo playback because we often compensate for lost detail by raising the volume.

The Ravel piece had three crescendos of very short duration. The rest of the piece ranged from rather quiet to extreme pianissimo. In this range I have never heard such dynamic nuance and tonal color coming from a stereo system. I have only heard that in a concert hall. Without these nuances the music is generic and dull. My perception was that the listeners in the room fidgeted quite a bit when the piece was played on the Schroder system - and for good reason. It could not deliver that level of detail. So the musical interest was lost.

Fascinating to hear the Talea setup in absolute terms, not just in comparison to the Schroder setup.

Lewm: You stated: "For what it's worth, from where I stood in the back of the room, I slightly preferred the Schroeder/Sussuro/Artemis to the Talea/DynavectorDV1S/Atma-sphere, because the former sounded a bit more lush and dynamic (to me, from where I stood)."

I was sitting dead center second row and I had an SPL meter. Every time the Schroeder was played, it was played at 5-8db louder which could explain what you heard. I would say where I was, the Talea setup had greater body, texture, inner detail and naturalness. It just sounded more lifelike.

I actually complained a number of times that the volume wasn't matched between the two setups and I was ignored. I finally walked out after about 4 tracks being played on both arms.

I have no financial interest in either arm. I have heard the Talea more than a few times before and have compared it with several top arms and it is absolutely outstanding. I have also listened to the top of the line Schroeder in my system as well as many others and while quite good, I do not have a sense that it is in the same league as the Talea.

Listening at RMAF did not change my view at all.

Jtinn, from what I have heard so far about this much talked about (before and afterwards ) "shoot-out" it displayed indeed once again that real-world fair comparison with only one variable parameter ( ... which should not be the volume...) is hardly of interest to any manufacturer.
An old and well-known scenario displayed its charm once again - the old "dominant male" (deer) was defending his territory against the new-coming young rival.

Dertonarm: Well said. There were so many people interested in this and it was a complete farce. A person with good intentions would not have manupulated people this way.

When only the best will do

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