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Hales Design Group speakers....how good were they?

I started a threat awhile ago http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?hbest&1125332737&read&3&4&
basically asking people to outline the best home system they've ever heard. A relative (into audio) was most impressed by a friend that once owned Hales Design Group speakers. The setup was unique, with the room being one of the best natural setups he'd heard. This person was from Calgary and used an Ayre K1-X pre with a NAD amp and CAL audio CDP. Needless to say its unusual. But he swears it was best and weirdest setup he'd ever heard. Who spends $8k on a pre and $1k on the amp and source...it drove the owner of a local highend dealer bananas because he himself couldn't build a room that sounded as good, and had no system that could touch it. He had quite the arsenal of speakers at his disposal as well, including Reference 3A, Oskar, Dali, Meadowlark. At any rate I was wondering why I hadn't heard of these speakers before? I realize the company has gone belly up, and they are dated. How would they hold up to current offerings by Reference 3a, Von Schweikert, Gallo Nucleus, Totem etc...
lush
mdhoover
695 posts
 
It's really a drag that such a great company went under. What the heck happened?
leslipton94d1
1 posts
 
I didn’t know Paul Hales personally but I’ve been told by a number of people who did that he was quite the asshole. I like his products though and owned the Rev 3 for a short time myself. The problem with the speaker is that the drivers integrated very poorly. Maybe he never studied crossover design in school. It was very easy to hear each of the drivers and the materials they were made from. The midrange driver in particular was incredibly slow sounding. That woofer though was amazing. Bass power, depth and slam were incredible.

An Avalon Eidolon is a lot faster through the midrange but its bass is a joke compared to the Hales Rev 3. The Eidolon isn’t very good at higher spls either. It gets shouty. As for VS speakers, I don’t care for their sound personally. None of them. Ever hear a VR9? If you like your hifi to sound like hifi, the VR9 is for you. The Rev 3 in several ways outperforms the Avalon and the VS and if I had to choose one without consideration for price it’s the one I’d pick. All you have to do is listen without prejudice for price and you will feel the same way.
ionman
8 posts
 
Leslipton,

Thanks for your comments. That is very interesting that the Avalon Eidolon's bass doesn't stack up versus even against the Hales Rev. 3s. If that is the case then what do you actually get for spending $20K? Are they even worth the price tag then? Same with the VS's. What do you mean by 'hifi' sound, btw.

As far as the tweeter is concerned on the Hales, with respect to being able to tell what it is made of, I think that this may do a great deal with speaker placement in the room. Not properly positioned, the tweeter can stand out and it does sound like a metal dome (I think someone on audiogon pointed this out as well).

I know what you are talking about with the midrange being a little slow. I think this may have something to do with the fact that Paul Hales used a 4th order Linkwitz-Riley crossover network for the Hales speakers. Since he was so keen on reproducing a flat frequency response across the audible spectrum, I think the "slowness" in the midrange was the compromise. I can't say that I really notice it anymore and that it wasn't a quality of the speaker that really bothered me that much. The flat frequency response of my Hales Rev. 3's allows me to listen to music at high volumes for hours without listener fatigue. Along with the excellent bass response, that is another quality of the Hales that intrigued me.
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