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View Full Version : Ribbon Tower review with hi-res pictures!



norayr
08-22-2017, 09:58 PM
Hi, I am a new and EXTREMELY happy owner of a pair of ascend ribbon towers. I have been driving around and auditioning several speakers, most notably B&W CM10s, Martin Logans, etc... I first found out about Ascends in 2012, have been reading and researching since then. I quite frankly was expecting something very good, but nothing prepared me for what I heard when I plugged them in. My 10 year old said her ears feel weird, as if they got unclogged.
I am not well equipped to put what I hear in words, but one word jumps out - resolution. I can hear Jane swaying to her own song and her mouth moving millimeters closer to the microphone. The 192kHz FLACs of Norah Jones sound hallucinogenic, when the screen turns off for pure audio, I subconsciously start looking for her, she must be right in front of me, little to the left, how is it I can not see her?
Accuracy and fantastic sound stage are of course the next attributes that one notices. In the ned, I have not heard a better sounding speakers.

I manually equalized using my Yamaha 3010's PEQ, measuring with REW and a umik microphone on a laptop. The original YPAO equalization was too conservative (as measured by REW) and the manual one was much more effective at flattening the curve, but involved.

I also loved the finish, workmanship and the looks of the speakers that I took some high resolution pictures. Please see the link to flickr below.
https://flic.kr/s/aHsm37Cbyz

theophile
08-28-2017, 09:36 AM
Welcome to the AA family. Your one word description of the Towers says it all...Resolution! "Sounds" like you have them dialed in well as they present the depth and breath of the live recording...Enjoy!

Thanks for the beautiful pics...

Ted

davef
08-28-2017, 02:33 PM
Hi, I am a new and EXTREMELY happy owner of a pair of ascend ribbon towers. I have been driving around and auditioning several speakers, most notably B&W CM10s, Martin Logans, etc... I first found out about Ascends in 2012, have been reading and researching since then. I quite frankly was expecting something very good, but nothing prepared me for what I heard when I plugged them in. My 10 year old said her ears feel weird, as if they got unclogged.
I am not well equipped to put what I hear in words, but one word jumps out - resolution. I can hear Jane swaying to her own song and her mouth moving millimeters closer to the microphone. The 192kHz FLACs of Norah Jones sound hallucinogenic, when the screen turns off for pure audio, I subconsciously start looking for her, she must be right in front of me, little to the left, how is it I can not see her?
Accuracy and fantastic sound stage are of course the next attributes that one notices. In the ned, I have not heard a better sounding speakers.

I manually equalized using my Yamaha 3010's PEQ, measuring with REW and a umik microphone on a laptop. The original YPAO equalization was too conservative (as measured by REW) and the manual one was much more effective at flattening the curve, but involved.

I also loved the finish, workmanship and the looks of the speakers that I took some high resolution pictures. Please see the link to flickr below.
https://flic.kr/s/aHsm37Cbyz

Thanks so much Norayr and your pictures are fantastic!!