Thiel Owners

Roll Tide!

@tomthiel I’m a little late, but welcome and thanks for your valuable and insightful comments.

I like Thiel's augment mode where the crossover to the woofer is first order and only the subwoofer is higher order. … I use a stereo pair of Thiel SmartSubs and place them at the proper ear distance for best integration and use the room-boundary controls to adjust for early wall reflections.

My first sub was a single Thiel SW1 and PXO5 in augment mode. True enough, it integrated seamlessly right off the bat. As I gradually added acoustic treatments to improve my room, I generated numerous bass response plots that clearly showed the SmartSub's ability to eliminate front and side-wall cancellation. Very neat! There's no other product I know of that can do that.

I bought my SW1, serial no. -4, from Dave C., a Shaolin martial arts master who used to do graphic arts work for Thiel. Did you knew him? According to Dave, my sub is a pre-release SW1 that Jim used to demo the first-generation SmartSubs at audio events. He'd give it a tune-up before every show ... can't say if that improves the sound today.

Keep in mind that when conventional subwoofer integration is employed, the frequency response at the listener position is optimized at the expense of all other positions in the room. Therefore the average power response in the room is wrong and the resultant sound is artificial.

Bottom line: I think that bass-generation position is very important and I position my subwoofers where they are distance-correct and let any room problems be addressed via Thiel's sophisticated distance controls or room treatment. 

Based on these comments, I tried killing the room EQ on my current subs, and I think you’re onto something. Cutting out the EQ seemed, at times, to remove something not quite right in the bass. Anyway, I'll keep this 'back to analogue' option on the front burner as I continue to tweak.

PS: The Classé DR amps in your system; very cool! I’ve been driving my Thiels with Classé amps since the mid 90s, but I jumped in too late to sample any Dave Reich designs. After being shut down by B&W, Classé was recently acquired by Sound United. It’s another conglomerate, but I think it's a good sign that Dave Nauber is reassembling his design team in Montreal. They had just announced a new generation of amps when B&W cut them off, so they should have a running start getting back on their feet. Together with the good news about Rob Gillum’s new business — Yea! — there’s hope for continued enjoyment from both brands.

Jonandfamily.....go Vols!

Could not have done any better than Jeremy Pruitt to pull us out of a decade of quicksand.  SEC!

ish_mail,

Makes me wonder if I'll get along with  just my CR-1 analog crossover to dial in the subwoofers, and not use the DSP units I bought for the subs (I have both the Dspeaker Anti-Node and the older Velodyne sms-1, which I bought second hand "just in case" I need them).

Here's a thought from the archives about "bright Thiels". RonKent's observation re same system, different speakers . . . Within very close limits, the models represent nearly identical frequency response performance. But Ron's experience of increasing "smoothness" is correct. All sorts of hash accumulates in the high frequencies and coherent speakers permit the ear-brain to perceive that hash considerably more audibly than other speakers. I perviously alluded to this phenomenon . . . it is a deep and interesting arena where future psychoacoustic research will validate Thiel's approach (IMHO). Anyhow, the original CS2 is the last model that used fundamentally off-the-shelf drivers which we tweeked in-house to suit our purposes. That Audax soft-dome tweeter was highly regarded, but had far less sophistication and produced more "sonic edge" than than any future Thiel-designed driver. Similarly, many audiophiles removed the CS2 grille (just because.) That grille frame contained the anti-diffraction machining and the fabric tamed the resonant peak of the dome. Furthermore I might venture a guess that Ron may have upgraded cables and/or other equipment as he upgraded his series 2 speakers.

From the beginning Thiel chose to produce the most authentic reproducer of the signal supplied to the inputs. Most companies pull some punches to make the listening experience more palatable. I find it instructive that in all the years of exhibiting around the world with all manner of associated equipment, I never experienced these artifacts of "brightness, hardness", etc. We and our various associates vetted ancillary equipment against both technical and listening tests.