Music Direct.
My new B Stock speakers
I finally got off the fence and a pair of B Stock Revel M126Be speakers arrived Friday, and there was no electrical activity in the atmosphere for the first half of the day, so I put 4.5 hours on them today (Sunday).
I want them to replace a pair of nearly 30 year old B&W 805 Matrixes. I say nearly 30 years old because I only remember that I bought them some time after ’94 and sometime prior to ’98.
Walnut cabinets and their appearance and finish is truly gorgeous, but that was not a priority, and the listing at MD did not do appearance justice. I listen in the dark with my eyes closed, and my listening room is closed off (I have three sometimes rambunctious dogs) whether I am in the room or not in the room. Appearance meant/means nothing to me. Just like my vehicles.
The serial numbers are not anywhere close to each other. I assume this is why they are B Stock? Not matched? The MD sales rep on the phone just gave me some generic possibilities why they could be B Stock.
This next is on me. Whenever I see speakers at MD that interest me (and the Revels did quite some time ago) I usually send MD a question asking where they are made. It is not due to xenophobia, but I would prefer to buy a speaker manufactured in America. I am not crazy about the idea of a company outsourcing for cheaper labor. But I am not trying to start a discussion on that. For the Revels, for some reason I did not send MD a message asking them where they were made, I did a google instead, and I got the impression that they were manufactured in Ct. And, without me asking, the sales rep from MD volunteered (when he was comparing Revel sound to B&W sound) that I would be impressed by the difference between British speaker sound versus American speaker sound. But the placard on the back says they were "made in Indonesia." Okay, enough on that . . . but I was looking for an excuse to send them back within 60 days.
They are rated at a sensitivity of 86 (the reviews say "easy to drive") and nominal impedance of 8 ohms. My Cary V12 did not sound (to me) strained using 50wpc triode vs 100 wpc ultralinear. These are in a small room at nearfield..
Out of the box:
I guess I had been in denial and my old B&Ws are actually worn out &/or obsolete.
Here is something that is NOT subjective that I do not understand, and perhaps someone who is knowledgeable can explain it to me. I have several test CDs. An older one has an in phase/out of phase that is a series of three test tones and the middle tone is supposed to be quieter as it is out of phase. With my B&Ws all three tones sound the same, BUT, on Rodger and Doug’s CD, where Rodger says says verbally "in phase, sound should be centered between your two speakers/out of phase, the sound should be all over the place. . ." (that was a paraphrase) the B&Ws did exactly that. So in the 4.5 hours I put on them today (before dark clouds appeared on the horizon) , I had both of those CDs out. On the first one that all three tones sounded the same with the B&Ws, with the Revels, the out of phase tone is CLEARLY quieter! What gives? I asked either here or on AA years ago why I was hearing no difference with the B&Ws, and the consensus was don’t worry about it as long as you hear what you are supposed to on Rodger & Doug’s CD.
Okay, I am going to wrap this up because I don’t have the ear that most of you guys have (no sarcasm intended) or the vocabulary. So I don’t always know what it is that I am hearing that makes me like and dislike or thevocabulary to describe. I do know that the test tone (in pase/out of phase) is tangible. I did unhook my sub (hmmm, is it possible that this affected my test tone experiment? I just now thought of that) because I wanted to hear them standing a lone. They could definitely benefit from more bass, and I do plan on listening with the sub, but to my ears they were not absolutely pathetic. They could just use more. They are rear ported versus front ported like the B&Ws are.
What I heard, and with my ears (abused by 28 years of jet engines and shooting rivets and other loud noises) anyone would be entitled to say "confirmation bias," but:
I did say I was looking for an excuse to send them back. However, I also said that relatively shortly after feeding them musical signals, I QUICKLY came to the conclusion that they sounded better than the B&Ws.
So at the risk of using subjective cliches, the clarity (especially on percussion and the high keys of a piano) was much sharper and defined. Voices immediately sounded as if they had more "texture" (if that’s the right cliche) and inflections were more noticeable. I put on the DCC red book L. Ronstadt’s Greatest Hits Volume 2 (because the same tracks sound better than on the MFSL red book Simple Dreams, I like the DCC sound better) and I wanted to hear the opening bass track on Poor Poor Pitiful Me (I definitely like the sub turned UP for that better than no sub), but despite that, her voice is a lot more "interesting" with the Revels than with the old B&Ws. By "interesting", I mean real.
I’ll leave it at that because I am no reviewer. I don’t even pretend to be. If anyone has borne with me this long, however, I am interested in why the in phase/out of phase test tone works with the Revels but not with the B&Ws.
Oh, and associated equipment was a Maranzt SA10 (but I did not use any SACDs for those 4.5 hours) a Cary SLP05, a Cary V12 in 50 wpc triode, I cannot biwire these Revels so I only used one half of my shotgun biwire set up which was the thicker of the two Kimber blue speaker wires, but I don’t remember the numbers, and Kimber balanced (XLR vs RCA is what I mean to say) Silver Streak interconnects. On an edit I will add that the power cord for the SACDp is a newly purchased from Amazon $50 Preffair (if I spelled that correctly) and the amp and preamp still have stock cords, but Amazon tells me that two more Preffair cords will arrive on Tuesday.
I’ll now apologize for any and all typos that I don’t get edited out . . . I was a bad typist when I had two functional eyes, and now I am a REALLY BAD typist. Plus, since it was too early for me to be drinking alcohol when I was listening, I went with coffee, and that also has an effect on my typing.
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@grislybutter , what I seem to pay attention to most is the vocal work. There were inflections in Linda Ronstadt's voice that were brought out more than what I had noticed with the B&Ws. Also, before I settled down in my chair in my room, I put on a couple of jazz CDs (The Rippingtons and The Blazing Red Heads) just to get the system warmed up. I was in and out of the room and doing a few other things while that was going on (and this is standard for me, I usually put one of those CDs in while I am preparing my dinner, and then after I eat and clean up the system is warmed up) and what I noticed from outside the room was a cxlarity (sharpness?) I hadn't heard before when I was outside the room. Particularly with those shaker things that I guess are part of the percussion. And the thing is, I really wasn't listening for it when I was outside the room, because I was not expecting that. I honestly was expecting to be disappointed, and beyond that, I've read enough here to know that speakers need break in, so I was truly not expecting much. With all that typed, I am a moody person, and when I have things on my mind I don't listen, so although day two was supposed to be yesterday, and I did have the amp and preamp turned on and idling good and hot, I did not even put one CD in. Today is a new day though. @curiousjim , I will do my best. But I do not have the ear for this, nor do I have the vocabulary. So it will be, at best, a beginners review. |
@grislybutter , sorry, I didn’t read that carefully before I replied. The type of music? Too early to say, I guess, I listened to an old test CD that had music tracks that were mostly instrumental jazz and one had a lot of percussion, and to start with I had two hours of instrumental jazz that I referenced last post, and I did enjoy that, and as I typed, I was impressed by the clarity and how lively it sounded (particularly some of the percussion) , but with that typed, I did like it through my B&Ws. also. Female vocals are probably my favorite, and I have listened to Linda Ronstadt an awfully lot, and as I typed before, I really liked the nuances I heard on her voice on several songs from Greatest Hits Vol. 2 through the Revels.. . . . but it’s way too early for me to answer that question. I suspect, if I stick to my MO, I will be listening to a lot of female vocalists, but to begin with, I had intended to listen all over the map, and I do own a wide variety. I’d be listening right now, but the skies are dark and ominous, and a few threads of late have got me running on the paranoid side. @gareneau , if you didn’t catch Soix’s replay, because I miss replies sometimes when they do not have an @ in front of them, MD is Music Direct. They are easy to deal with and they frequently have specials on factory refurb/open box/and B stock.
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@immatthewj my go-to is female vocalists too. I can't listen to Linda Ronstadt, it evokes memories from my past - painful times when her music was my comfort but I do love her voice. I also can't get enough of Joanie Sommers, Sonnie and Cher, Frazey Ford, and 60s, 70s soul and R&B, Gladys Knight, Ronettes, and alike. The other types of music I would test is "complex" - classical pieces or difficult arrangements, but I will never have speakers that will play those music and details at a high level. So I am happily stuck with "simple" vocals. I hope those Revels will grow on you!
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The weather couldn’t make up its mind tonight--dark and nasty to almost clear to dark and nasty--but no electrical activity. So I finally said screw it & got back there & put 3.5 plus on ’em. I did what I told myself I wasn’t going to do (for a while) which is to say after I warmed the system up with one of my two "warm up" jazz CDs while I was cooking/eating/cleaning up I then started picking out CDs with one or two or three songs I really really really like a lot and playing those one or two or three songs. I(I had intended to stick to test CDs and the reference music that is included on them, until I got some more hours on them. Anyway, here is what was surprising: as much as I was surprised on Sunday by how much better they sounded than my old B&Ws, tonight I was a bit surprised by how I wasn’t blown away again. In other words, I was expecting more than I got tonight. Which is not to say that they didn’t sound good, because they did. The way my mind & ears work together is funny. But yes, I do know that I am still shy of ten hours on these and they do have a ways to go before they hit their theoretical stride. I was just surprised the way they DIDN’T strike me tonight. But I am seriously not taking anything away from that. And another PART of that could have been some of the source material quality. A few things I did notice: with the lights off & my eyes closed I was always impressed with the way the B&W’s sound stage could extend beyond the walls, and not only do the room boundaries disappear, so do the B&Ws. The Revels also manage to do that. (This is contingent upon good digital source material, usually MOST noticeable with SACDs. I still haven’t played anything but red book with the Revels). Something else (again contingent upon the source, and USUALLY with SACDs) that I liked that the B&Ws did was provided a lot of "height" to the sound. Early on tonight, I noted that was lacking to an extent with the Revels. As the evening wore on (I have cut way way back and tonight, including with dinner and while listening, I only had 2 and a half glasses of wine) I began to notice the "height" increasing. Again, this could have been due to the quality of the red books I was selecting. I am sure I am not telling anyone anything they do not know, but they are not all created equal. One thing I think that I definitely did pick up on tonight, was at the later stages of my session I felt that I was starting to hear more of the ’front to back’ in the soundstage. This has never been a particularly strong point for my B&Ws and I attributed it to the room. With the B&Ws there is a front to back balloon, but it lacks detail that define those dimensions, and tonight, near the end, I started to pick up on a bit more front to back detail. So I could chalk that up to a) the wine (but it really wasn’t that much) b) I WANT to hear improvement so I am whether it is there or not or c) the Revels, even at this early stage, are just better than the B&Ws and they are making more, in certain aspects,.with decent source material. Although I am not rolling on the floor in orgasmic aural ecstasy, I am not unhappy with the way it went tonight. @grislybutter , I did a google on your Celestions, but what I got was mainly gguitar speakers. Which did you get? As a a new owner of new speakers, I am happy and excited for you. I find it too bad you can not bring yourself to listen to Ms. Ronstadt anymore. She has such a beautiful and expressive voice. Sometimes I hear her and I think of that expression, "She has pipes." I didn’t listen to her tonight, but I have some CDs earmarked. I know what you mean by music bringing back sad memories. In (I think it was) ’74 when I was in HS, my oldest sister (like 6 years older than me) got in a bad car wreck in a town far away and came away with a severe traumatic brain injury that left her nonfunctional until she died in a nursing home about 4 years later. Weeks to months after the accident happened I still believed we were The Waltions and nothing that bad would happen to our unit and I still believed in miracles for The Waltons and I still believed she would get better, and every morning when I was getting dressed and ready to go to school I would listen to my Elton John Don’t Shoot Me [. . .] cassette and when Daniel came on I would insert my sister’s name for Daniel’s. I can listen to that today, but Daniel always makes me think of her and those days and it makes me sad. Tonight i listened to a track off of Loyd Cole CD (LOve Story) and the track is one that blows me away, Like Lovers Do . . . the lyrics paint such vivid wistful pictures for me . . . and to top it off, it reminds me of when I bought that CD . . . it was in the ’90s and I had a great job and life was worry free and I listened to a public radio station at work and they played a lot of stuff none of the mainline stations played and that’s how I picked CDs I would buy and that’s how I discovered Lloyd Cole Love Story . . . and that wistful song always reminds me of those great carefree fat & happy days when I was about 30 years younger and I still felt physically great and maybe mentally better too . . . and for those reasons, plus the wistful nature of that song . . . it makes me sad when I listen to it. But I do anyway, despite the sadness, I love the imagery it evokes for me. So TMI and long story to say I understand about your relationship with Ms. Ronstadt . . . and I find it sad that you can no longer bring yourself to experience her wonderful beautiful voice. @ghdprentice , I reread your reply. I am taking your advice regarding giving myself plenty of time before I get into the placement link @james633 sent me and experimenting, but I am going to break them in the "old fashioned"(?) way, because with all the unsettled weather we have been having around here lately, I have been afraid to have stuff even plugged in a lot of the time. Not to mention how paranoid all those unattended tubes make me on a good day. As I get older I get more and more neurotic and as far as "good days" . . . they are further in between. Alright . . . Ramble On . . . I am hoping for an electrical free atmosphere tomorrow, and Ill get some more hours in. I am excited about it.
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