Thiel Owners

ronkent:  I have owned my 2.2's (#991+#992) from 1992 to the present, and I haven't been seriously looking to replace them. I have had an interest in the 2.4, 2.7, and especially the 3.7, but the investment needed to make the change hasn't made sense to me given how much I like my 2.2's. Also, the 2.2's are not so big that they dominate my living room, and the natural cherry of the speakers is a perfect match for the wall of built-in cherry cabinets in the room. 

My home theater in a different room includes five Powerpoint 1.2's and a SS1 sub in a 5.1 configuration, so I have a very positive appreciation for the excellence of Thiel's coaxial tweeter/mid designs. I can see how having a combined tweeter/mid in a floor-stander like the 3.7 would eliminate some of the issues that can arise in the 2.2 if the vertical listening position isn't just right. 

@tomthiel loved the story about Nelson Pass. I googled it and came up with this post from the master himself on another board. I’ll highlight a snippet from his post here: "It was the perfect high end audio product: Exotic, inefficient, expensive, unavailable, and toxic."

Here’s the full post from Nelson:

The "ion cloud loudspeaker" used photocopy
machine ionizing nichrome wire strung in a flat
array a bit like a window screen, but with more
space between the wires, and charged to a variable
DC potential of about 10 KV.

This screen developed a layer of ionized air, and was
enclosed between two stators, much like an electrostatic
speaker, except that instead of a charged plastic diaphragm,
you had a charged semi-flat layer of gas, and you could
push-pull it with high AC voltages on the stators.

It worked fairly well, and gave new meaning to the word
"transparency".

It also had several flaws, one of which did result in a
trip to the local emergency room with breathing problems
similar to those sometimes experienced by arc welders and
caused by extended exposure to ozone.

The Wall Street Journal printed my comment:

"It was the perfect high end audio product: Exotic, inefficient,
expensive, unavailable, and toxic."

jafant:

Thanks for the warm welcome! Just last month, I became the happy owner of the PS Audio M700 amps and Gain Cell DAC/Preamp, and the Stellar gear have definitely opened up the sound of my system. They have also forced me to wade into the messy (and expensive) world of cable choices, and I'll be posting my thoughts on that issue on the PSA forum very soon. In cables, as well as in other audio components, I tend to look for gear that sounds the "best for the money" rather than the "best that unlimited money can buy."

At this point, I rarely use my turntable and focus instead on CD's and streaming digital audio via Sonos (using the DAC in my Stellar preamp). I haven't explored higher resolution formats much at all.

My musical tastes were shaped by the blues-rock (eg, Cream, Led Zep, Hendrix, Rolling Stones, etc.) and folk-rock and singer-songwriters of the 1960's and 1970's, including Joni Mitchell, James Taylor, Neil Young, Jackson Browne, Shawn Colvin, and others. I also listen to some classic blues and Motown.   

pwhinson:

What a perfect quote from Nelson Pass to characterize the essence of high-end audio!