Why do I never see Avalon speakers in discussion?

Bobvin

Bobvin

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Having returned to the high-end (about 7 years ago) after a long 20+ year hiatus, I had a pair of Avalon Ascendants as my first set of floor standers after a brief affair with a pair of Usher "Tiny Dancers" stand-mounts. I probably never had those Avalons setup to their ultimate potential, but the closest was probably the setup done by the dealer's guy who used the Sumiko protocol.

I wonder hows those Avalons might have sounded if setup with the Wilson protocol? They were far into the room vs where my Sasha's sat, and when I first got Sasha's out of the crate I tried them near where the Avalons were. The Avalons had a tremendously deep soundstage, and I thought they were very musical. In fact, I was afraid the Sashas would not be able to produce such depth.

When Gary from Definitive in Bellevue came to WASP my Sashas, he noted the soundstage perhaps wasn't super deep, just that it started a couple feet behind the Avalons. With the Sashas properly setup, the soundstage just happened to start more in plane with the speakers, which were now back closer to the front wall.

The Sashas are superior to the Ascendants, but there are some other very nice speakers in the Avalon lineup. But I never hear anyone in the Shark tank talking Avalon. Are they simply out-of-favor, given the Raidho's, the Wilson's, and others? I heard Indras with a 300B amp (don't remember the brand) and I thought they were a great pairing.

So what's the overall take on Avalons?
 
Funny you mention that. There was a discussion about Avalon speakers on another forum this morning and in particular, the Tesseract. Someone mentioned they looked like a KKK person in their robes and the next thing you know, people got offended and all of the comments about what the Tesseract speakers look like were removed to keep the offended from being further offended.

With regards to Avalon speakers and their deep soundstage, I think it's done by crossover jigger pookey. All Avalon speakers seem to have an unnaturally deep soundstage.
 
I think some of their sound stage depth is attributable to their faceted faces. B&W Nautilus and other speakers with almost no front baffle around the mid-range and tweeters seem to share the feature of extra-deep sound stage. I haven't heard those crazy tear-drop speakers from Vivid, but I will bet they throw a deep sound stage too.

I don't see this model Tesseract in the Avalon lineup. Did you mean the forum name was Tesseract?
 
Excuse me, I meant Sentinel. Or maybe not...

 
Or this:
Avalon_copy.jpg

I haven't known any Avalon speakers to not have beautiful wood skins.

I think it would be a stretch to equate these with a hooded member of the KKK, but some people are easily offended these days—false outrage has grown to a deafening level. I've always felt there are things in life worthy of my anger and rage, but it is reserved for pretty major issues. I learned early, as I'm sure most sharks did "sticks & stones..."

To me, the new Wilson Sasha2 resembles a hooded monk, which is a little better than the garbage receptacle look of version 1 (which I owned). These just look like a tall hooded monk (or an alien.)
 
They aren't getting much press these days, Dr. West's Sound Lab stats suffer similar fate.
 
Bobvin said:
Or this:
Avalon_copy.jpg



. . . I think it would be a stretch to equate these with a hooded member of the KKK, but some people are easily offended these days—false outrage has grown to a deafening level. . . . These just look like a tall hooded monk (or an alien.)
Click to expand...


I wonder how the offended people would have done on a Rorschach test.


THESE look like an alien:

The Alien black.jpg
 
Bobvin said:
B&W Nautilus and other speakers with almost no front baffle around the mid-range and tweeters seem to share the feature of extra-deep sound stage. I haven't heard those crazy tear-drop speakers from Vivid, but I will bet they throw a deep sound stage too.
Click to expand...
I bet you are right! They have the same developer: Laurence Dickie.
laurence-dickie.jpg
 
I assume you meant to say RMAF 2013 since RMAF 2014 is still 6 months away. If you are talking about Phillip's room at RMAF 2013, I completely disagree with you. His room sounded better at RMAF 2012. He had the speakers situated across the left corner of the front wall instead of using the front wall to fire out into the room like he did in 2012. I did not like Phillip's room at RMAF 2013.
 
mep, Yes I did mean 2013 RMAF, and I did mean Phillip's room with Luxman gear. I listened to cuts from 6 different records and the speaker's positions were not discernable, huge soundstage. The big Utopias with Solution next door floored me with power, impact, deep bass, spl, and image focus.
 
KLH-Did you hear Phillip's room at RMAF in 2012?
 
No, I didn't attend RMAF in 2012. Regardless of other parameters of the system, the stage and the ability of the Vivids to completely dissappear was among the very best rooms at 2013.
 
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