Thiel Owners

@tomthiel, at the risk of beating a dead horse, please note in order to have a consistent, generally available reference that I used the Audiogon Blue Book for pricing. I also used end of cycle pricing for the CS 3.5's combination, and beginning of cycle pricing for the CS 3.7's combination. The original pricing for the CS 3.5's was about $2550 and the original pricing for the Threshold S500 was about $2900. Of course that doesn't take inflation into consideration. The end of cycle Threshold S550e was priced over twice that cost, which included a nice upgrade of dual trannies and true balanced inputs, that couldn't be used with the 3.5's eq. On the other hand the $11,000 pricing quote of the 3.7's seems quite low, as the Stereophile link suggests $12,900. IMO, the CS 3.5's were and are one of the all time audio bargains. Kudos to you and the rest of the Thiel team!

@jon_5912
I don't know that the CJ is rolling off the treble.  At least, it doesn't sound like it - it doesn't sound darker, in fact a bit more lower treble illumination.   In comparison the Bryston actually sounds a bit darker.
And of course the differences I'm describing fits in to the "picky little audiophile differences" category.   But as we all know, those little differences we seize on to can have big subjective effects in how we enjoy our systems.    I swear, sometimes I feel like I might not even be in this hobby if it weren't for tube amps :-)

tomthiel

Thank You for the Adcom and continuing Thiel Audio history lessons.
I hope that you are well and enjoying this holiday season.

Happy Listening!

Thielrules

I did not use REW-  and did not know about it until your mention. Room EQ Wizard?  I’ll download and check it out.

I simply used Logic’s EQ plugin and snapped a few pics while pink noise was playing. I didn’t go too crazy with it.  I also recorded musical passages to compare by ear.  
Email is noams@comcast.net if you’d
like to see what I got - imperfect as my methods where.  

Unsound - good horses keep living and living. Your judicious explication reminds me of a general theme which our Goners might enjoy. Thiel presented a peculiar problem for many retailers, including Innovative Audio. Retailers make packages. Those packages follow guidelines or rules. In the day it went something like one third budget for source, a third for amplification and a third for speakers. Give or take a lot. Thiel comes along and the formula crumbles because Thiel rarely sounds very good with an equally priced amp, and someone with twice the amp budget is inclined to believe that a speaker at twice the price of Thiel is better for him/her. (Most often him - often her perspective permitted the Thiel, damn the formula.)

Jim had no patience for what he considered such illogical behavior. His formula was that lower prices make easier sales. He also fought to lower prices, especially at product introduction, with unrealistic and ill-founded ideas of how costs would fall as production rose. In fact the opposite was true, but that’s a different story. But the fallout was that just as the retailers settled into their Thiel pricing / presentation strategy, the prices would rise significantly to the consternation of many dealers. The joys of sales rival those of manufacturing. LOL.

Audio Consultants in Chicago broke the mold splendidly. They set up Thiels in multiple rooms spread over multiple stores so that customers could hear $2500 speakers driven by $10,000 amps and understand that the whole budget was well spent. AC was our top dealer year after year.