Thiel Owners

Snbeall - the upgrade project is making progress every day, but the reports are lean due to legal / ownership uncertainties, which I never expected to take this long to work out. All products can be improved with better passive components, but the newer the products, the less bang for buck. Stay tuned. Use the PPs as-is.

The PP1.2 was my first approach to modern Thiels, after using my 2.2s for decades as mix-master evaluation tools. The PP1.2 blows me away, just as they are, and even more so with component upgrades. I haven't yet tried my emerging "Laminar Launch" technology on it, but its already-small and round form factor may be the best of the Thiel batch in its stock form. Stay tuned.

Regarding subwoofer - the PP benefits the most of all, since its bass was never intended as a stand-alone, and its roll out is critically damped 2nd order and optimized for subwoofer mating. My best results are by hanging the PPs on the ceiling (as recommended in the User Guide), and placing a subwoofer against the front wall, below each PP. The room-tuning sets on Thiel SmartSubs provide compensation for the wall or corner reinforcement.

A big deal is that the PP makes no floor or ceiling bounce as there always is with floor-standers. The ear-brain compensates wonderfully for those bounce interferences, but when they are absent, the sound becomes more natural. As you see, I'm a fan.

Tom - indeed Ed and his brother Bill were our source for the model 01 tweeter. They knew their stuff. We had hoped to work with Ed Long, and with Eminence as we developed our own drivers. But Ed wanted full design control (including XOs, etc.) which was a non-starter for us, and Eminence ran out of their depth early-on. At the time they could not source cast baskets, and were not interested in Jim's custom pole geometries and close tolerances and QC specs. Their attitude was that if it's good enough for Peavey, it should be good enough for you. Peavey was their principal customer and pretty demanding for the times, but home playback was a different league that they couldn't relate to. We found Vifa at their beginning and developed a long-term, mutually beneficial relationship with them, until they ran out of depth and we took matters in-house in the mid 1990s. 

For something different -- i waited until after the SB to post :) -- based on a comment i read from Paul McGowan, i purchased Billie Eilish's new CD "when we all fall asleep, where do we go?" I listened to it earlier today and Wow! While not exactly the type of music i generally listen to, it's really well recorded (reportedly on a cheap system in her bedroom) and really shows how good our Thiels are--bass, imaging,depth, resolution--are all there! Highly Recommended.