I just heard the Wilson Alexandria XLF's Wednesday


My local high end audio shop hosted its annual "Music Matters" open house where reps from their prime product lines demonstrate their latest wares. In the past I've been introduced to many products that were either just reaching the market or still in prototype stage (e.g., the Magnepan Mini's).

In one room we had Peter McGrath of Wilson, Dan D'Agostino with his new $50K/pair monoblock amps, a Meridian rep with a Sooloos front end, and John Atkinson of Stereophile, who had some great 24/96 music files he'd recorded himself.

Two demos were of music Atkinson had recorded with minimal miking--a small orchestra and pianist playing Rhapsody in Blue and a 9-person vocal group with organ accompaniment.

This setup produced the most realistic reproduction of music I've personally heard. I am a subscriber to the Seattle Symphony and attend live concerts there monthly. It's obvious to me that these live performances have--in addition to the music--a sense of room energy that's consistently lacking in audio reproduction. NOT THIS TIME! The Meridian/D'Agostino/Transparent (Opus)/Wilson signal chain produced a completely fleshed-out, live-feeling presentation. A sonic hologram if you will. The presentation was transparent and resonance-free, linear, extended, but most of all, live-sounding.

In fact, the very next demo I went to was of Audio Research pushing the new Wisdom Audio $95K flagship panels+sub system, and it sounded artificial by comparison. On its own I'm sure the Wisdom is an excellent speaker, but following the twice-as-expensive Alexandria XLF it was a complete letdown.

Anyone who has an opportunity to hear the Alexandria XLFs should give them a listen just to see what can be done. For me it completely re-defined what can be done with musical reproduction and makes me regret not setting out to become a millionaire when I was young so I could afford a pair (plus the D'Agostino amps) today.

BTW, in all previous Wilson demo's I've heard (Sophia 2 & 3, Maxx 2 & 3, Alexandria X-2, Watt/Puppy 7, Sasha W/P 8), they always sounded decidedly better--more musical, liquid, resolving, real-sounding--with tube electronics. Not so this time. The D'Agostinos are so neutral and so good at driving the speakers that all you think about is the music and the holographic presentation.
johnnyb53
Perhaps the issue of making a 3 or 4 piece reference system to separate the extreme-low frequencies into another enclosure and just doing "mid-bass" on-up with the main system will almost HAVE TO BE the only practical solution to this problem (i.e. completely effortless Bass). In the WAMM system each frequency band was addressed with
a very specialized speaker- including even an electrostatic driver. each driver could be adjusted in all directions. the configuration i saw had mono block amps
for the front towers and a stereo amp bridged to mono for the two subwoofer cabinets in the rear. even this set-up was revised several times before
Wilson stopped making it, and only a rare few know what exactly those refinements were. but if the company was at least willing to include a wire harness and a crossover control box it might be at the very least a useful experimental model to explore not only "the best we know how to make" but literally "closest to what i heard in the concert hall".
coming back down to Planet Earth for a moment, something is bothering me about Wilson's insistence that if you use MDF and compromise in various areas that don't have a direct effect on the sound, that it would undermine their philosophy (even though it would be MUCH less expensive).
i personally don't care how long the drill bits last making a cabinet- can
you dampen vibrations using a combination of materials that don't cost a fortune to obtain and don't cost as much to assemble? that's just as worthy an approach as any other and $200 grand does not automatically buy you the best SOUNDING loudspeaker. $200 GRAND... to listen to pre-recorded music.
philosophically speaking, i would feel even better "spending the difference" directly supporting musicians that can make great music.
i remember seeing Art Blakey (ATJM) a few months before he died. towards the end of their set, Art asked the audience that if they enjoyed the concert to PLEASE go out and buy some Jazz records, because the sales of straight-ahead recordings were so minuscule and players were struggling to feed their families. imagine an icon of jazz history shamelessly pleading to an audience for financial support.
Hey, i am sorry, but when i get wound up, i can't stop for a while... I love great sounding systems, but i need to look hard at the numbers too.
I have started to see these 4-tower guys come to the fore again:
- EA MM7
- Gryphon Pendragon
- Genesis 1.2/Dragon
- Tidal Sunray/Dual Tower Sub

I wonder if XLF/Dual Thor should be considered a 4-speaker set in the same way? I suspect so given that they have a dedicated Wilson Crossover presumably designed with this exact configuration in mind.

I think Jacob Heilbrunn owns it...have emailed him. Anyone have thoughts on this?
Johnnyb -

Thanks! for sharing. While I have not heard the newest Wilson XLF loudspeakers, I have auditioned Wilson Sasha & Sophia loudspeakers.

Associated gear during my demo time was ARC CD5 cd player, ARC Ref5 pre-amp and Bryston 3B ST power amp. Cables/cords were Transparent OPUS line and a Transparent powerline conditioner.
The room was very heavily damped plus Bass Traps in all 4 corners. The room was perfectly square as well.