Thiel Owners

Hi tomthiel,
You had mentioned that Jim used flat Goertz speaker cables for the 3.7 development.  If I'm not mistaken, in one of the PCS speaker reviews, he had the reviewer use their AG3 Divinity cables which changed the reviewer's perception of the sound.  These appear to be their top of the line--did Jim use these in particular for developing the 3.7s?  While I don't spend a lot on my speaker cables, I do understand that there is a material difference between silver, which is what the AG3s are made of, and copper.  Do you have any insight into why Jim chose silver?  I imagine he must have used copper and decided to go with silver due to some sort of shortcoming with that material, but that's complete conjecture on my part.

There were a few posts regarding positioning, so I will post my experience.  I started with the Thiel speaker manual and positioned my 2.7s in the beginning about 8 feet apart, 2.5 feet away from the wall, and I sat about 9 feet away.  I noticed that the soundstage opened up a bit more when I moved them a little further apart to about 8.5' (perhaps because I was sitting 9' away) and toe'd them in slightly.  Unfortunately, there are a lot of reflective materials in my living room that I cannot remove, and I can clearly hear the impact it has on the sound (slightly stronger sound emanating from the left side due to reflections).  Sometimes I just like to walk around when I listen to music, imagining the sound stage in the front.  And as others have mentioned, the height at which the ears are make a difference to the sound.  Still, the Thiels do a great job of keeping it centered and broad even if there are subtle difference as I walk around, sitting down or standing up.  By the way, I noticed that the difference between my system and other, cheaper mainstream systems is when I turn up the volume and walk into an adjacent room, the sound is still crystal clear, as if the singer was performing there.  The quality of sound from lesser systems are more muffled and don't project as well.  Just an interesting observation.

I should think the speaker set up track on XLO Test CD and similar is independent of speaker brand or type. That’s the beauty of it. Hunting for the perfect speaker locations for using trial and error or even using a diagram is practically guaranteed to obtain local maximums only. Usually, all things being equal, speakers should be placed closer together than one might predict a “sensible” distance. The more diffuse the sound using the out of phase track the larger and more correct the soundstage will be when the system is in phase. There is no guesswork with the speaker set up track. Trying to find the locations by ear is like trying to solve x simultaneous equations in x + N unknowns. 😩

Thielrules, the drivers were damaged, so yes.

I’ve had someone more professional than I come in with a test CD and measuring devices to calibrate my system and adjust settings along with the speaker placement but there are some CDs that just don’t sound as good to me where the speakers are. It may very well be a bias with what I prefer to hear, or a flaw in the testing conditions whereby the test CD doesn’t accurately reflect the distribution of frequencies and audio wavelengths found in the difference CDs I listen to. In other words, I’m sure the placement and settings are ideal to listen to the test CD!
In the end, what matters to me is how I prefer to hear the sounds from each CD from wherever I am sitting or standing at that moment, however inaccurate they may be! That certainly is hypocritical I admit because after all, I love the Thiels for their accurate representation of the material. Could be that I’m ignorant, lazy or just simply human! I am not perfect, despite what I tell my kids.