If you saw my previous system you already know that I'm the Italian distributor of some brands, so please be aware of this. I'm also a Music lover and a real passionate of audio gears since 1987... when I was fifteen. The new reference system with German Physiks omnidirectional speakers is something that you can easily appreciate if you are used to attend live music events. With the entering of this fabulous speaker the sound can be now compared with real music only. Dynamics, liveliness, timbric accuracy and all of the other words normally used to describe a great system seem now pointless: just put a piano sonata recording, or a live jazz double-bass, sax and drums trio, or even a single female voice... then close your eyes. You'll hear the musicians in your room as never happened before. When you hear what this system is capable of, there is no going back. And you will start rediscovering all your music collection... as happened to me.
The great Reference table made by Franc Kuzma in Slovenia. Known all other the world.
Kuzma Stogi Ref
The perfect match for the Ref TT.
Koetsu Signature Red
Not a bad cartridge... ;-)
German Physiks Loreley
Omnidirectional speaker from German based company. German Physiks is often the first choice of many important musicians all over the world and a statement for the most expert and demanding audiophiles. Not surprisingly, they are not for all pockets.
Hi David, glad to know that the info are useful for you. I have the Loreley MKIII: this model is equipped with 4 DDD per side, so you get 4 times the energy of a "normal" model and 2 times the energy of the PQS402; all that energy is in the 180-24.000 Hz frequency range. There is a huge difference between the PQS402 and the Loreley. Just consider that the Loreley design comes from the top of the line Gaudi, only downsized to be put in a "normal" (although very big) room. The PQS402 doesn't have the full dynamic scale and deep powerful bass that the Loreley possess but still it's much more dynamic than 95% of the remaining speakers of similar size. To give you a couple of examples, a room of - say - 24x36/40 feets is better filled by a PQS402, while a 40x48 feets room is good for a Loreley. The PQS402 is also easier to install and disappear very well with less efforts. Always remember that the more energy the speaker has, the more you have to work to get the best from the speaker. So, if you are looking for an honest advice, get a PQS402 with carbon drivers and enjoy the music as never before... German Physiks are much less power demanding than MBL (efficiency is more than 88dB for the PQS402) but surely need extremely high quality amps in order to get the more natural and truthful sound. Your CAT JL3's are surely enough but you can also feed them with 450 watts of continued power, or 750 peak, if you wish. All the best, luca
Hi David, my pleasure. Well, the first DDD versions (we are talking about the early nineties) were surely more fragile than the present ones. With the last version of the titan DDD you have not to worry about any reliability issues. That being said, you can still destroy a driver if this is your purpose: just heavy clip an amp for a minute or two and you are fine. But even with extremely high levels, assuming that the amp doesn't clip, the DDD has no problem at all. This is the titan version. Since a couple of years you can also get the DDD in the more refined and powerful carbon version. The carbon DDD can play 4 dB louder than the titan and cannot be damaged if you touch the membrane with your fingers. More, the carbon version is even more neutral sounding than the titan and in some way warmer. I personally prefer the carbon DDD for all these reasons. The carbon DDD is almost impossible to damage even if you push it extremely hard. I believe your ears would cry before the driver starts to be really stressed. Talking about timbric and dynamic fidelity, I am sure you will find the German Physiks absolutely unique. Just remember this: you have only one driver covering the 190-24.000 Hz frequency range. Even the monstruos Loreley is a 2 way speaker but with 4 DDD's instead of one per channel. Your beloved 101's has 3 different drivers plus a subwoofer: just compare it with the Carbon of GP and let me know then what's your thought.
Hi David, you are most welcome. What is making German Physiks speakers so special and natural sounding is the DDD, the omnidirectional driver that is really unique and based on the Walsh type driver, but much improved and refined. It is a full range driver so the sound created by all German Physiks is almost seamless. In the Borderland/Carbon the crossover point is between 190 and 200 Hz, in the Loreley around 180 Hz: this means that there is no phase and time anomalies for the 95% of the frequency spectrum. Plus the driver radiates omnidirectionally making sound in the same way most instruments do. The carbon version of the DDD has proven to be extremely reliable even if pushed very hard and cannot be damaged when touched by fingers (while the titan version is obviously more fragile). If voices reproduction is important for you I can say that you'll find the DDD truly amazing and, to my ears, impossible to beat.
Hi Dev, yes I am not writing here since 1 year (curious, today it's exactly 1 year after my last post). I had the bigger German Physiks Loreley here, please see the new picture.
Of course large speakers are not easy to sell and you have to be prepared to lose much money if you buy them new. I see you had the Isis, they should be something really good but you were not completely happy with them. So the obvious questions are: what kind of sound or result are you looking for ? How big is the room where you want to put the speakers ? What are your tastes ?
You can get the German Physiks pricelist contacting Chris at Signals-SuperFi ([email protected]). During the last CES they were using the new Carbon that retails for almost the same price of your 101's. I was there and, despite a terrible sounding room (awful echoes in the mid frequency range because of the wall material and the extremely high ceiling) you felt the big potential of the system IMO. Yes, I listened to the system with the Berning amps briefly but I thought the speakers were too far away from each other and, to be honest, I preferred the sound in the Vitus Audio room at the Venetian (they used another pair of HRS120 with titan DDD).
As you correctly pointed out, there is no perfect speaker and you have to find which one let you enjoy more the music. For me, there is no doubt that it has to be a German Physiks. The only limit I see is the price (especially now with such a bad USD/Euro exchange rate) and the time you have to invest in order to let them deal at best with the room. Just consider that 3/4 of the sound energy is coming from reflections, so the best side wall and back wall distance has to be identified patiently walking around the speakers in your room. But isn't this a part of the game when you chose a top end speaker to live with ?
nice to read you again and glad to know you enjoyed your stay in Genova: the climate there is noticeably warmer than here during fall/winter... if you ever come near to us, please stop by.
About German Physiks: they are not a mass-market or a marketing oriented company, so they don't do any advertisements to get more knowledge of their products. On the other side they take great care of each of their customers, who are often so affectioned to the product that very rarely decide to change with other speaker brands. Why ? I think the best answer is: try and listen for yourself. ;-) There are many well known musicians, orchestra directors, opera and pop singers that use German Physiks speakers as they are the closest to real musical instruments but, easy to imagine, these persons don't like to be named.
During the last 3/4 years the company updated its offer with different new and improved models. I believe they waited until now before to participate at shows for this reason. As you said, they were at CES in the Continuum room and they also displayed the same speakers during the last Tokio Show. In both cases, they got many compliments.
To reply at your question about MBL speakers: no, I didn't compare them side by side. But even if I had this opportunity, I would not display here the results: it would be unfair.
Hi Elberoth2. The Egglestons are among the best dynamic speakers. Savoy's, in particular, are dynamic, extended and coherent and they don't take much space. They are also very transparent and revealing. That being said, you cannot really compare them with the German Physiks: an omnidirectional loudspeaker images in a more natural way, its sound appears more relaxed and involving since it is diffused in the room and not thrown towards you. What you may not expect from them is their huge dynamics and ability to play LOUD: you can actually reach extremely high spl's without strain, compression or any sign of stress from the speakers. The DDD omnidirectional driver is extremely fast, accurate and reliable: before to put the first commercial speaker on the market, the factory pursued R&D for 7 years on the DDD with an engineers and physicists team to reach the desired results. This means a lot for me.
Hello Mark. Actually Holger Mueller of German Physiks was demonstrating his PQS402 in the Continuum room: the sound was excellent, except the bass that was affected by the walls being just a partition of a much larger room. Thanks for your nice comments.
Hello, the Kuzma is a great TT and a very neutral sounding one but I have not compared it with many others to let me give you a response on this point, sorry. I assume that with a 20 watts class A motor it should be one of the very accurate anyway. All the best, luca
thanks for your post and for talking with me at the Milan show. I have not compared the old Performance I or II with the Bravo, but I think that the present line is much better because the parts are intrinsecally better than 20 years ago. More, the circuit was improved according with the 20 years of more experience in audio. Anyway, why not asking Tom Colangelo directly ? The mail of the factory is [email protected]. I am sure he will reply shortly.
Thank you Jack667. After more listenings and breaking in I can only suggest all of you looking for a definitive amp to try to audition the Bravo. I think you would agree with my previous thoughts.
I have reached the first 120 hrs (on 300 suggested) of breaking in on the Viola Bravo. I can say that this amp is as near to a non existing amp as possible and surely the best I ever heard by a huge margin: it is neutral, fast, absolutely no grainy, it delivers enormous quantity of power effortlessly, the sound is fluid like in a small single ended amp. It seems to have absolutely no limits both dinamically and in terms of timbric fidelity. Honestly, I would never have thought that a big solid state amp could be so delicate during the low passages and immediately after explode in a fortissimo without strain. I believe that the Bravo is most likely the best solid state amp ever.
thank you for your nice comments on the new pictures. Talking about the worldcup victory, I just walked a bit in and around the main square of my town... as you can imagine there were many people singing, dancing, making noise and so on. It was just a brief immersion in the madness...
System edited: Just received the bigger brother of the Symphony, the Bravo Reference amplifier: Tom Colangelo engineered it to be the very best solid state amp ever. The power is conservatively rated at 350w/ch on 8 ohms but it's capable of driving even the most difficult speakers thanks to an incredibly oversized supply section (the heart of every amp). The amp consists in two different sections: the power supply and the amp itself, connected with a special 10 wires umbilical cord. I have just started the broken in process but, even straight out of the box, the Bravo reveals its strenghts: huge and effortless dynamic capability, perfect control over the 9 drivers of each Eggleston Savoy, neutrality and resolution even in the most difficult and load music passages. I'll let you know more after the recommended 300 hours of breakin in.
Hi Pat, I have emailed you privately. The Savoys are wonderful and a totally different animal than the Andra II: you should hear them if you can. Regards, luca.
Hi GD, thanks for your thought. I believe that I will participate at the street celebrations instead... but later I'll surely relax with some good music :-)
thanks for your nice comment. The piano is one of my favourite instruments but I don't have the ability to play it unfortunately... so I have to listen to it with my beloved speakers... not so bad actually ;-)
first let me say that I'm the Italian distributor of Viola Labs, so if you are looking for an unbiased opinion from an audiophile please take my advices with a grain of salt. That being said, I chose the brands to distribute with one goal only: exteme quality and fidelity.
There is a distributor in HK and here you can find his address: http://www.violalabs.com/dealers.html
I have not matched the Symphony and Cadenza with Eidolons but I had both the Eidolons and the Radians HC in the past powered with other SS amps, so I can figure out how they could sound with the Viola electronics (knowing the character of the other amps).
The Eidolons, IMO, need an amp with a good grip (read: damping factor) along with a musical character to reach best results. This because the ceramic drivers are very revealing and tend to become dry if powered with the wrong amp. I believe that the match with the Cadenza and Symphony combo should be extremely good, having the amp great control on the bass and a transparent yet musical sound. I cannot comment on the Rowlands though, since I have no direct experience in my own systems.
thank you for your nice comments. If you come here in Italy please give me a call, I would be more than happy to welcome you. The Savoys are truly amazing IMO, you should find a dealer there with a good set-up and go listening. ;-)
The Viola's are some of the very best ss electronics out there IMO. Actually they are the new reference products of Tom Colangelo and Paul Jayson (the ex Cello and MLAS designers). Now Viola is more known in the Far East and in Europe than in the US, mainly because the core business of Cello was in Asia, so the management decided to concentrate in that market first. I believe they are now looking to build up the US dealers network as well.
I would really like to improve further the acoustics of my room, but it is not very easy since the walls, floor and ceiling are made of bricks and concrete... maybe I will cover the main listening area with plywood in the future. I am with you on the "diffusion" concept, btw.
Dear Lobnik, thanks for your nice comments. I saw your system and I have to say that it is wonderful as well. I would be glad to welcome you and, by the way, we are very close since I live in Trieste... Please send me an email so that I can give you my contact numbers.
Thank you Jjhf5678 (what a difficult nick you have).
The Andra II are way less difficult to drive than the original Andra, whereas the Savoys need much more power and current, being only 85 dB efficient and having 9 drivers each. The Viola Symphony is more than capable to power them even at loud levels in my big room, anyway.
Dear GD, what a magnificent words you spent for my room and the new pictures, many thanks !
Actually I am planning to change again some of the pictures with better ones soon.
Anyway I like very much the picture used for the title because that is the kind of light and atmosphere I prefer for evening listenings... just a little spotlight and my imagination to feel the musicians in the room...
thanks for your very nice comments. The room is very large indeed so I can use both large and small speakers with no problem. Even if I am really much satisfied with the present sound, there is always room for improvements, you know... My next step will be probably the treatment of all first reflections and, maybe, some changes on the wall and floor surfaces.
sorry I have not seen your 2nd post until now. Thank you so much for your kind words. Great that you return in Italy soon ! I have a friend near Genova (very close to the town you mentioned) having a wonderful system too... maybe we can arrange a visit for you there. Please keep me updated on your next trip to Italy. By the way, I would really like to visit Canada, it's a fantastic Country for a nature lover (as I am)...
thanks for your compliments. I did change many speakers (and electronics) before to find my cup of tea...
I live in Trieste, about 100 miles east of Venice, in the north east of Italy. If you return in this area, please visit me: I am always glad to meet other passionates.
My room, that is also my show room - as you can imagine by the number of speakers displayed - is very large by an European point of view but not regular. It's about 80 square mts (similar to a 30 x 40 feets room), but its shape is rather unusual, forming approximately an L. Anyway, I'll post a picture from another angle in order to better understand its shape. The room is supplied with 16 Tube Traps, carpets and other stuffs. As a consequence, it has reflection, absorption and diffusion characteristics of average level, similar to most domestic rooms. I think that an acoustically too damped room (like an anechoic one) would deaden the life of sound, thus making void the harmonics and reverberations needed for a correct ambience. So at the end I can use here both small and large speakers satisfactorily.
Viola Audio Labs was founded in 2001 by Tom Colangelo and Paul Jayson, the chief designers who worked at MLAS and Cello when Mark Levinson was the owner. The great qualities of Cello products are now enhanced and prosecuted by Viola. You can read more here: http://www.violalabs.com/designers.html
As far as concerns the differences between the Andra II and Savoys... well, the Andra II is the most known speaker of EW and it is really special: musical, dynamic, smooth and involving yet tranparent and timbrically correct. The Savoys, however, are in a completely different league. When you hear them the first time, they seem not to have a specific sound: as the planars they are uncoloured, fast and extremely correct. BUT they are also extremely dynamic, with no strain or compression even at loud levels (when powered by the right amp). I think they are a true reference and, not surprisingly, they are often used by important mastering studios.
