A 30 yo design that looks like a $600 DIY speaker with limited resale value: it takes a lot of confidence to write that check!
*Now reading other posts in this thread, I see I am piling on. Still, you believe in your ears to go this route against the formidable and more mainstream offerings.
While Smile, Jerome, and good ol' Schmitt certainly contributed color to this post, the comments were pretty antagonistic about these speakers. I certainly didn't want to leave Schmitt the last word...
My 604's arrived a few weeks ago. The first thing that struck me was that they were flat gorgeous. Everyone that has seen them loved the woodwork and finish. They've assumed a warm and commanding presence in the room. DIY? Not by a darned sight.
I burned them in for some 150 hours before hopping back on this thread, mainly using an old NAD amp and my DirectStream DAC. They initially sounded like crap. Flat. Just flat. Good lower frequencies, but oh-my-god flat.
Over time, they opened up and sound something like a good speaker, but only for a few hours before returning to crap. Yes, it made me a bit nervous.
The week my speakers arrived, my dealer had visited to help me set up the system and he left a Masseto to demo. It was a nice step up from the Aurieges. This week I took delivery of a near perfect used Vosne Romanee purchased from a fantastic guy on Audiogon. The VR was a another pretty dramatic improvement, just as the speakers finally began to open up. The NAD went in the storage room and the VR and Haut Brion have been playmates ever since.
I'll leave it at this for now. I have no regrets about getting the speakers. It's nirvana so, suck on that! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I'M OUT OF HERE - SO LONG BITCHES!
Just kidding! (please don't ban me, Mike and Joe)
I really do love this system. I want to thank Brian and Bill for steering me (with confidence) in the right direction. I'll probably do a review once the speakers settle in a bit more. For now, the imaging, soundstage, sub woofer like bass, the tone, and holistic sound coming from these speakers is amazing. I'm very happy with them, even though they aren't fully burned in. For me, worth the cost.
