Your speaker tastes are similar to mine. I loved my Thiel CS 3.5s for years….they are now in my AV system with an old Velodyne sub. My main system now has Dunlavy Audio Labs SC-IV-As. John Dunlavy was an trained electrical antenna engineer….who then designed speakers. Thiel and Dunlavy had much the same conclusions about what they liked in sound. Minimum/no phase distortion. Maximum coherency at the listening position. So his design conclusions included first order crossovers, sealed (big) boxes, WMTMW vertical arrays with the beamy tweeters at ear level. He put a lot of effort in his crossovers. Each is tuned to the particular aspects of each driver. He matched each matched pair of drivers with a custom honed crossover. Speaker pairs were matched aurally in his anechoic chamber. Even each unique tweeter resonate point was damped in his custom crossover. Yes they are designs from the late ‘90s…but, for me, in my system, they provide me with what I want and enjoy. More than a few mastering engineers use them.
In no way am I unsupportive of the great designs that Chris has done for PSA. Just saying that I’m delighted with how my Dunlavys fit with my current PSA stack. And, you may find used Dunlavys at a price that is in your price range.
Actually Chris has been to sessions at my house (and to Darren’s when he had Dunlavys)… and may have comment.
Good listening!
I really appreciate your thoughtful response to my questions about options to replace my 32-year-old Thiel speakers. You are probably right that I would be more likely to find a true upgrade if I looked at speakers that are a notch up in size/performance. I’m constrained, however, by the increased cost of higher performance speakers as well as the wish to maintain the overall look and feel of the dual-purpose living room in which I listen to 2-channel audio. (I also have a 5.1 home theater set-up in my basement, which is designed to use five ceiling-mounted Thiel PowerPoints and no floor-standing speakers.) If size and cost were not major issues, I would probably be looking at speakers costing twice as much, in the $20-25K range.
My upgrade goal is to have speakers that sound as “real” as possible, while never sounding harsh or overly bright. I like the clarity, speed, and impact of planar drivers, but I prefer them to have enough warmth that they are never too “in your face” or fatiguing. I love hearing the richness and fullness of wooden instruments and voice, and I don’t like speakers that combine high levels of detail with an overall sound that leans toward cold or thin or analytical.
I still love my Thiels, and their sound continues to improve in response to every tweak and equipment upgrade I’ve made over the past few years. They image beautifully, as a good time/phase coherent speaker should. Midrange is clear and full enough to sound expressive and natural. Bass is solid and enjoyable, though it could be a bit tighter. At the same time, I’ve had to be very careful not to make system changes that seek out greater detail by giving up tonal richness. I generally measure the success of equipment changes by assessing how much time I spend listening to music after I’ve made a change. So I know I’ve made a bad change if I’m listening less and a good change if I’m listening more without fatigue.
Again, thanks for your helpful comments and questions!
Ah… That’s exactly where Maggies excel. With the right amplification, you get exactly that!
Sounds like the Acoustic Zen Crescendo mk2’s would fill your wish list with aplomb. Used pricing is a over the top bargain too…
Chops, thanks for the info on Magnapans. I actually did consider them many years ago when I bought my Thiel 2.2 speakers. I liked the overall sound, except for the limited bass, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to mess with subwoofers and I didn’t know if I would like the way they imaged in my living room. Also, the larger models seemed quite large and likely to overwhelm the room visually. I had just too many questions to dive in at the time, and I guess some of the same questions remain for me – at least in my mind and for my room.
I’m glad the 1.7i’s are working out so well for you!
The Dunlavy speakers sound very cool – very big, but very cool. The overall size is probably too large for my space and the “aesthetics committee” but you’ve prompted me to consider the possibility of staying in the Thiel family and looking for a used 2.7 or 3.7.
Thanks for the great Dunlavy info!
I don’t know much about Acoustic Zen, but I looked at their website. It looks like they don’t change models very often, but I did see a 2024 price list for new speakers.
Excellent advice!
For about $10k, you can check out the Legacy Signature SE. My brother had the Thiel CS6 and replaced them with the Legacy Signature SE. Although the Legacy’s has two 10" woofers, it really looks more compact in real life. The ribbon air motion tweeters and super tweeters give the sound a lot of air and extention. The double bass drivers give them a nice bass impact and power. Not to mention the midrange that makes his Thiel’s sounds a bit lean and unnatural.
Here’s more information on the Legacy.
https://legacyaudio.com/products/view/signature-se#specifications-reviews
No need to I guess! Why fix something that ain’t broke…Google the Crescendos…lots of great reviews online.
There’s a set of aspen FR20 used on US Audio mart for about $10K that would put you up in that next performance echelon (if you can manage the size) and are still considering PS Audio speakers. They are somewhat larger than your Thiel’s but would be a much bigger upgrade than a lot of things mentioned in the thread.
I really like the Thiel designs (especially something like the 3.7). However, I don’t know if you can still get them repaired if you damage a tweeter etc. I know one of the guys from Thiel was repairing something under the name coherent sound or something.
One goofy thing that Jim Thiel did was that he used a pen plotter measurement system (talk about old school) that he made himself, even though he was playing around with a ListenInc soundcheck system. He measured the cable inductance of the long run of speaker cables from his office back to the test setup in the back warehouse and compensated the high frequency of the measurements for this. I think that he messed this up though, as all theil speakers have a somewhat rising response in the top end (that wasn’t shown in the measurements that he took). I find them to be a little overly bright/airy at times and, paired with the Bryston electronics that they favored, I found them to be a little ruthless with certain recordings. Overall, I think the guy was a genus though.
That particular mid-tweeter was made for them by a company in china called FST speakers. I actually contacted them many years ago when Thiel went out of business to see if they wanted to still sell the unit and they responded with a resounding “no”. I think that it was problematic to make becuase of the extremely soft suspension and aligmnent issues.
Thank you, Chris. Your posts continue to be interesting and enlightening.
Well, I interviewed with Thiel back in 2008 or so and spent a few days at their facility in Lexington. They graciously showed me all their operations and I was very impressed at a number of things.
It’s a shame that the new owners didn’t really understand what they bought.
Unless you have spent some time listening to all of the speakers mentioned
in this thread you are really just stating your opinion like everyone else…
I have spent time listening to Craig’s (and Darren’s) Dunlavy’s. I worked at a dealer in seattle that was a magnepan dealer (Defintiive Audio), I have heard to the Thiel CS3.7 multiple times (including at the theil factory). I heard the Boressen speakers at Axpona. I have heard the vandersteen’s at multiple shows (and one of their dealers in San Jose).
I haven’t heard the acoustic zen stuff but I did meet the owner. He was very friendly because his factory/offices are in the Rancho Bernardo/San Diego area (right by the sony offices that I used to go to when I worked there).
Still, this is all just my opinion and everyone is looking for something different. For instance, the magnepans do a certain magic trick (due to their dipole panel system) that is very holographic with certain acoustic recordings but I hear a lot of their limitations when I listen to them (bass, dynamic compression). Then again, some people may not be as sensitive to their stuff because it’s pretty program dependent (and I would want something that can play everything).
Thanks Chris…It really does come down to ones own likes and dislikes in this hobby!
Those were fun to watch, how the paper roll would wind forward and backward to draw horizontal lines (paper was rotated 90 degrees). It was all fun until the machine started to change pens. Those pens notoriously would not start writing after sitting there in the plotter unused while another pen was drawing. Then it was a rush to “pause” the plotter so the pens could be taken out of the pen holder and we would manually get the ink flowing on all the remaining pens, before “un-pausing” the plotter and letting it continue. There were many times where I had to manually draw a few lines that would be missing on the drawing. So much for technology, LOL.
The stand mount Boressen speakers at axpona were ridiculously good. To say I was impressed would be an understatement.
Chris, I agree that an FR20 would be a more significant upgrade than the other options I’ve been considering, but I had hoped to find something smaller and more streamlined as an option. That’s why I’ve been more interested in the FR10 than the FR20. If I had a designated listening room of decent size, I’d be looking at larger (and more expensive) speakers. Fortunately, I’m in no rush to replace my Thiels. I’ll keep looking at and listening to upgrade options until I fall in love with one of them. Given my recent experience with auditioning speakers, I’m convinced that I will need to have an extended listening session before I go ahead with any purchases.
With regard to Thiel repairs, Rob Gillum runs Coherent Source Service. Rob worked for Thiel for over 30 years, and he knows what parts are available and which ones can be re-built if replacements aren’t available.
I hadn’t heard the story about Jim Thiel and the pen plotter measurements. Very interesting! Over on the A-gon forum, there is a really long thread for Thiel Owners. Tom Thiel (Jim’s brother and a co-founder of the original Thiel Audio) posts fairly often over there and is a good source for tidbits about Thiel history.
Thanks again for all your insights and great advice!!!
They spent about 85% of my 30 minutes in there chatting about their power product and how “the internet has a floating ground” and I just wanted to hear the speakers more.
In the past, Raidho hasn’t pushed for a very flat response (having more of a proac-link BBC dip and slightly elevated bass and treble) and I was trying to get a sense of if that is what they are doing with these. I also wanted to see how directional that rather wide tweeter is (which will beam above 7-8Hz horizontally I’m guessing). What I did hear sounded great and I can see why they are getting good press.