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Paradigm Persona B Loudspeakers Professional Review

I met Jerry Seigel at the RMAF this past October and had a quite lengthy discussion with him on audio reviewing in general. He was very nice in person and not what I expected. I never mentioned this to him, but I always felt he liked everything he auditioned.

Not so for the Paradigm Persona B loudspeakers. I won’t bore you with the specifics of the review as you can read it online, but he summed it up as he couldn’t wait for the audition to be over. The words bright and brittle kept being mentioned in the review and he gave it 2 LP’s out of 10. I have never heard these particular speakers, but I have always felt that Beryllium speakers were too bright for my taste and that is what he seems to say in the review. I am looking forward to what The Audio Doctor has to say about this as he always seems to be pushing their top of the line Persona speakers in these pages.

Has anyone heard the Persona B speakers and what do you think about them? I was actually thinking of a 3rd system in the spare bedroom with some kind of stand mounted speakers. I believe these speakers will be off my review list.
128x128stereo5
contuzzi
413 posts
 
Why do you care if you think beryllium tweeters are automatically bad?

The Persona B are incredible.  Anyone who has heard them properly set up (and no they don’t need warm amplification) would agree.  

This reviewer obviously has an agenda, or he got a defective pair.  Maybe he is just running on a lean mixture.
prof
3,450 posts
 
Among a big list of speakers I've auditioned in the last couple years,  I auditioned the Personas.  I found them very clear, but I did find myself fatiguing from the sound after a while.  That's one of the main things that gave me pause about them, and almost none of the other speakers I auditioned left me feeling the same. 

That's not to say they are somehow "objectively fatiguing speakers."  Just one more person's report of his experience.
rlb61
742 posts
 
Experience has taught me that relying on reviews solely is a sucker’s game. The only way to know for certain whether the speakers are good for you is to audition them yourself. Everyone hears differently, including reviewers. Remember, one person’s awesome Be tweeter is another person’s piece of garbage. Just sayin’.
ricred1
1,988 posts
 
rlb61,
I couldn’t agree more, " Everyone hears differently, including reviewers. Remember, one person’s awesome Be tweeter is another person’s piece of garbage. Just sayin’." I always say, no absolutes only preferences! Unfortunately, some on Audiogon seem to think their preference equates to an absolute!
tutetibiimperes
202 posts
 
@stereo5 

It’s funny you mention ‘icepicks in the ears’ because the first few speakers I heard that used AMTs that was my reaction to them.  Then I heard the Triton References, Spatial X2, Legacy Aeris and Valor, the Emotiva Airmotivs, and the Gayle Sanders Eikon and my opinion on them changed completely - something was just off about my first demos, whether it be Room acoustics, positioning, settings on the electronics, source material, or something else.  

There were a lot of Beryllium tweeter speakers at Axpona and most sounded lovely.  The new Satori Beryllium tweeter in particular is making its way into a lot of designs.  

Between the new Revels with the Beryllium tweeters, the Salk Song3A with the RAAL ribbon, the Mangers with their unique bendy-wave driver, the Martin Logan electrostats, and the Legacys with the big AMTs there were excellent examples of treble reproduction using a variety of high frequency drivers that all sounded great.  
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