The best speaker you ever heard?

Hi all,

Just one person's experience, i finally traded up my SF Strads for a pair of Wilson X1 Grand Slamms. Stunning beyond all belief. Musical and organic (and this coming from someone who's favorite components include my Zanden DAC and, up until last nite, my SF Stradivaris.)

The set up is soooo incredibly important. 8 hours but after Pedro from Absolute Sounds changed the tweeter resistors and worked with Arif from KJ West One...smokes!...this is the best sound i have had the pleasure to really listen to. i am fortunate thanks to KJ West One to have found a pair in mint condition.

i would not tell anyone else it's the best, or anything silly like that. what i will say is that relative to the SF Strads:

1. effortless, effortless, effortless. one rarely understands this until you "see it" in action.
2. effortless [helps] translate into musicality because the speaker can get out of the way without strain and deliver whatever signal you feed it.
3. once properly dialed in...so critical on a Wilson!...the music flows thru the speakers like they are not there (at least way more than the Strads). Whatever size, volume, soundstage, quartet, a cappella, choral, deep house, rap...small, big, intimate, cavernous.
4. The Strads excel on mellifluous sound...natural and organic. soulful as michael fremer once said. in my system, the Slamms matched and exceeded the Strads even on this. that, i was truly not expecting.

just one man's set of ears. Enjoy everyone!

I am curious what you are running them on. I was impressed with the Wilson as far as build quality and choice of drivers. I heard them on a couple different sources and it sounded like the sound was stuck inside the cabinet. Not putting your choice down. Im wondering what kind of source I need to hear these on? Thx.

Hi Paimei,

i am never fussed by other opinions. i keep my own counsel. ;) regarding Wilson, i just posted a review with my full system on it. i would say that source is less important than Speaker set up. and i am not talking about "art is science" positioning/placement. The main man of the national distributor came with the GM of the Dealer and they spent 8 hours. They resoldered new resistors into the tweeter (twice) to adjust for the treble dispersion in my room. The speaker is literally that adjustable, and it comes with the installation of the speakers.

Good became impressive became wow...became Smokes!!!!!!!!!!!! over the course of 8 hours. And they actually said there is a touch more tweaking they are happy to come back and do after the New Year's.

My source: Oppo 83 Transport to Zanden DAC Signature, through CJ ACT 2 pre and Gryphon Antileon. IC/SC is Transparent REference, and the PCs are all PAD Dominus B or Anniversary Contego.

Again, the sources are all good to my ear, but the set up was waaaaaay more important.

For example, the first soldered resistor was better than the original...but it still felt like middle C in the piano was being damped...kinda like the "trapped" you mentioned...like being in a sound proofed practice room when i used to practice the piano in music school. once they changed resitors again...it all opened up completely.

hope that helps...

Lloydelle,

I do agree with your assesment. I have heard the Grands sound very good myself and setup is always the key with big full bandwidth speakers. Most who have never tried to set one up will never understand the task involved and it's worst with big panel speakers...

Congrats .....

Hi Weseixas,

Thanks. And yes, panels are tough to set up...but can be incredible. I still remember listening to the Apogee Stages with Mark Levinson electronics around 15 years ago. They were already kinda old by then...but it was remarkable how "lifelike" they sounded.

Do u use panels?