I heared a few in the last 15 years, and it does sound terrible in my (subjective) review, even old Bose speakers sound a lot better. I replaced a pair of Alexandria's for a set of JBL M2 for someone (who hired me to review his setups), and all who heared both in that space know that the M2 is leagues ahaed of the Wilson, for a fraction of the price. The owner could not be happier.
For me they are a prime example of overpriced shiny junk that is sold to rich "audiophiles" that don't know....
For me they are a prime example of overpriced shiny junk that is sold to rich "audiophiles" that don't know....
WOW >
There are some very passionate opinions out there / I haven't heard the pleasure or pain of Willson's > I just know they are GROSLY overpriced.
There are some very passionate opinions out there / I haven't heard the pleasure or pain of Willson's > I just know they are GROSLY overpriced.
Wilson are poor quality loudspeakers. The "quality" of a loudspeaker in doing it's task of reproducing recorded sound is measurable. All anechoic measurements I've seen of Wilson speakers are poor to mediocre. Just look at them over at Soundstage network. B&W are even worse. They're targeted with a lot of fluffy nonsense talk and hype at audiofools. And they're ugly. 💩
From Troels site: "My most successful design, the Delta 30 was, for more than 7 yrs, the 2nd best selling speaker in Europe and once, one of the 3 best small speakers in the world. It looks and is a cheap speaker. I ALWAYS score it higher in blind tests when I don't know I'm listening to it."
The extremely high price of products like Wilson speakers is an essential part of their appeal as ultra-fi/veblen goods for people that want ultra-fi/veblen goods. If the price was dropped significantly sales would almost certainly go down not up. Being among the most expensive is telling potential customers (who are not going to be technically/engineering literate) and their peers that these are top quality speakers.
Another important mechanism for raising perceived performance is confirmation from others that Wilson speakers are top quality which is what the owners in this thread are looking for from the DIYers here. Their response when technical facts don't support this is also interesting and tells us their high valuation of the product is essentially a social one and not a technical one. Contradictory technical facts are of little to no relevance. Confirmational facts (or more usually associations with positive things given building up technical arguments based on technical facts is better avoided given where this form of reasoning would inevitably lead) are important and often learnt by rote.
On the other hand the people here slagging off Wilson speakers for being poor studio monitors have lost the plot. Wilson speakers are ultra-fi and if judged as ultra-fi they are good speakers with the facts on their side. Facts such as sales, passionate support by many customers,... Good luck to them.
Thanks to the font size and boldness this was a hard to miss, passionate statement 🙂
During my many years of diying i've never attempted to build speakers, not counting a pair of electrostats 40 years ago. All my speakers since have been factory made and indeed, there is a pair of Wilsons, that have kept me company for over 20 years.
Why the reluctance? Only cause i have heard dozens (hundreds?) of diy speakers and haven't much liked most of them. This includes the commercial products of advanced diyers, using top quality drivers, crossover components and measurement setups. The sound was sometimes spectacular but only on a narrow range of music.
Can they compare favourably all round to the better examples of Sonus Fabers, JBLs, Magicos, ATCs or indeed Wilsons? Not to my ears. There was always something not quite right, not entirely balanced. Interestingly, the premium parts open baffles scored much better than any other of the diy samples.
The process, the learning and the satisfaction are all great, but the end result is at best unknown.
I think I may have AI analyze the myriad threads re: objective / subjective enjoyment of the hobby along with the variants on the theme of 'why people pay for certain things'. Then, we could request that the mods auto-generate a new random theme-based thread roughly once a month with various predicted responses assigned to each user. It could 'save' 100s if not 1000s of man-hours of typing.
AI isn't just coming for the jobs, it's coming for the hobbies too! MWAH HA HA!
AI isn't just coming for the jobs, it's coming for the hobbies too! MWAH HA HA!
Thanks for this Cowan. But the stands need to be a lot higher. Treble unit about ear height is about right. Stand height has much more, impact on sound quality than LC-OFC wiring & other Golden Pinnae juju 😊
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If you had to pin down what made that speaker stand out, in a good way, in a DBLT, what do you think it was? Did everything work together just right, or was it cabinet damping or crossover refinement or something else, that made this one a bit special?
Well it certainly wasn't cabinet damping or the crossover which were about as cheap as it gets. I pontificate a little from https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/wharfedale-glendale-xp2-recapping.421689/post-7882615 onwards.
The bass of Delta 30 is one of its strengths but a slightly bigger box would fit it's TS params better. Putting it in a bigger nicer plywood box would improve it. This, and swapping the capacitor on the treble would be what I would try if I still had a pair.
If you twisted my arm, I would say it was the bass unit but we had that in other boxes but not with the same performance.
Great speakers are always more than the sum of their parts and I think Delta 30 illustrates this perfectly. 😊
Not wishing to offend but it seems to me that there are a flood of off topic posts on this thread now, (to a level where it seems to have been hijacked,). it is after all "what do you really think of Wilson Audio?"
I would have thought most more suited to a general "what's good/bad with professionally made loudspeakers" or some such thing.
I'd ask a simple question (I think) associated with the original aim.
What objectively good Wilson Audio speakers are there? (The "objectively" part is in my view very important).
I would have thought most more suited to a general "what's good/bad with professionally made loudspeakers" or some such thing.
I'd ask a simple question (I think) associated with the original aim.
What objectively good Wilson Audio speakers are there? (The "objectively" part is in my view very important).
The biggest problem with WIlson audio is that the speakers are not good engineered, even if they cost a fortune. The main reason is the crossover I think, and lin lesser degree (depending on the speaker model) the cabinet. But they sound ragged and not neutral at all. It's not a smooth but not flat house curve like the Harbeth speakers have, it's a ragged response with heavy peaks and dips. Some were measured, and even the very biasd (pro) stereophile measurements of different speakers show what i mean.
And yes i did listen to it, i heared Wilson Watt/Puppies of different generations, Alexandria's and Alexia's. And all have the same kind of problems. The 1st gen puppies were actually the best of the bunch af far as i can compare them (not hearing them on the same sessions)
And yes i did listen to it, i heared Wilson Watt/Puppies of different generations, Alexandria's and Alexia's. And all have the same kind of problems. The 1st gen puppies were actually the best of the bunch af far as i can compare them (not hearing them on the same sessions)
I believe DIYers may be rather too subjective and too angry with companies overcharging for their luxury products because
they know perfectly well what you can expect from a certain driver brand and what it costs to achieve a decent performance.
Plus you can't manufacture such a product without heavily exaggerating about how well engineered it was. This goes against
the truth, but can not be helped when you are in high end sales business. The will to achieve higher profits is a top priority
with these companies.
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Just skimmed the thread. As expected, most think Wilson make terrible speakers and it's all just a con. Maybe aye, maybe no.
I've only heard Wilson speakers once, at a show 30 years ago: Watt Puppys, version 5 or 6, in a very big room. Listened for 5 mins to a Bjork track, something electronic, don't know what. Volume was much higher than I normally listen to. Sounded stunning - clean and dynamic. It was a 'wow' moment for me, hearing speakers do something that 'ordinary' speakers don't do.
But I did form the impression that they may not have sounded so great at lower levels, and with something like small-scale baroque music. That's speculation on my part, though.
I did hear some megabucks Magicos a year ago, for what it's worth, playing a track I know well (Tord Gustavsen 'At Home') It sounded OK, nothing special. My guess is that they'd have been spectacular with Bjork electronica, though.
So, I suspect that it all depends what you like to listen to, and how loud.
I freely admit to a degree of prejudice against companies like Wilson because of their prices, but that's not a comment on how their products sound.
I've only heard Wilson speakers once, at a show 30 years ago: Watt Puppys, version 5 or 6, in a very big room. Listened for 5 mins to a Bjork track, something electronic, don't know what. Volume was much higher than I normally listen to. Sounded stunning - clean and dynamic. It was a 'wow' moment for me, hearing speakers do something that 'ordinary' speakers don't do.
But I did form the impression that they may not have sounded so great at lower levels, and with something like small-scale baroque music. That's speculation on my part, though.
I did hear some megabucks Magicos a year ago, for what it's worth, playing a track I know well (Tord Gustavsen 'At Home') It sounded OK, nothing special. My guess is that they'd have been spectacular with Bjork electronica, though.
So, I suspect that it all depends what you like to listen to, and how loud.
I freely admit to a degree of prejudice against companies like Wilson because of their prices, but that's not a comment on how their products sound.
Brands like Wilson and Magico make very overpriced systems, you can't deny that. The big difference is that Magico speakers are actually well engineered while Wilsons are not. I have far less problems with Magico (only on style and price) than with Wilson. It's still overpriced, but it's not crap at all like Wilson because the engineering is there. Idem with the very expensive Focal speakers, they are at least quiet good engineered. Wilson's not.
I have listened to a pair of Witts, many years ago, but i listened to them in a shop, positioned roughly.
I don't remember well, but i think they were the first series.
I remember well the amplifier: Krell KSA250.
Big and powerful female voice is what i remember best, but too much time has passed to give my assessment here now.
And it would be unreliable anyway due to the conditions of the room.
I remember that when the seller told me the price i was amazed.
The seller perhaps told me about an exceptional construction.
Too many years have passed..
I don't remember well, but i think they were the first series.
I remember well the amplifier: Krell KSA250.
Big and powerful female voice is what i remember best, but too much time has passed to give my assessment here now.
And it would be unreliable anyway due to the conditions of the room.
I remember that when the seller told me the price i was amazed.
The seller perhaps told me about an exceptional construction.
Too many years have passed..