Ascend 340SE (and a little bit of Sonos)
While I was in Long Beach for the AVS Forums EH Expo after-party, Curtis was kind enough to give me a listen to his Ascend setup at his home - 3x 340SE + 4x 170SE + HSU VTF-3. Thanks Curtis, I enjoyed it immensely.
My thoughts...
We listened to some Dave Matthews, Norah Jones, and I was introduced to KD Lang. I really enjoyed the smooth female vocals. These speakers really sounded beautiful in the midrange and I absolutely loved the reproduction. They definitely gave me that 'you are there' feeling in 2-channel, with a bit of a forward representation. Excellent vocals performance, very clean and natural with not even a hint of a boxy sound. I would love to compare the 340SEs to Magnepans, in this regard. Much better than the Monitor Audio RS6s, that I listened to a little while ago, as well as the a few pairs of Totems, that I felt were too colored for my taste.
I also found out I had pretty good extended hearing, at least up to 17khz (generated by a test tone), which probably explains my sensitivity to harsh/bright highs. If I really listen, I am able to hear annoying high frequency hums from TVs and other electrical devices. That said, bothersome highs on the 340SEs didn't appear at all during 2-channel listening, but when we really cranked it up on movies like the Matrix and Saving Private Ryan, my ears did feel a tad bit of punishment. This was most likely due to the volume being a bit higher than I normally listen at. The listening distance will be much farther in my environment, so I wanted to get a good feel of how the performed when really cranked up (excellent control). While I don't think the highs overpowered the rest of the range (neutral), I did experience some fatigue at higher SPLs. Curtis, what does -11 db on your receiver measure at? -15 db on his receiver wasn't a problem.
The one weakness of this speaker was, as one would guess, the bass response. I don't think I can recall the bass performance well enough to comment, but I will say that it wasn't as deep (or, possibly, as strong) as I'd want for 2-channel - though still enjoyable. I wish I had thought to turn off the subwoofer during the Blue Man Group DVD-Audio disc. If I had, I would have been in a better position to say something more about the bass performance. Curtis echoed my sentiments, adding that he looks forward to the day that Ascend builds a tower speaker. The good news is, the 340SEs have more than enough to blend well with a subwoofer.
The soundstage was good considering Curtis' small room. While it fell pretty short of what I'd like, it was certainly due to the room. The opening on the right side of his room provided a noticeable expansion, compared to the left side, where reflections definitely played a role. The left side of the room had plastic blinds, which produced accentuated highs and a slight pull to the left. The good news was that I could tell there was definitely room to grow. I'm excited to hear the differences in a larger, well-treated room.
During the battles in the Matrix and Saving Private Ryan, the dynamics were excellent. The sniper shots during the quieter passages during the tank scene in Saving Private Ryan were very tight, well controlled and made a powerful impact. The microdynamics were just as good, and I could easily pick out the subtle clinking of shell casings that hit the floor in some of the extremely loud and busy scenes. The clinking was tight and controlled and didn't blend into the explosions, gunshots and other busy noise.
Unfortunately, I'm not in a position to buy right now, but these speakers will definately be ordered for an in-home trial after I add room treatments to my dedicated theater (planned). I only wish they looked beautiful enough for survive the WAF for consideration for the 2-channel living room system. Though, with a dedicated room planned, I can't complain too much.
I had been eyeballing a Sonos system for a while now. I was surprised and excited at the same time when I saw Curtis had a ZP80 and Sonos controller. The controller was a lot bigger than I had imagined and had excellent build quality. It was a very solid and durable device. The ZP80 was smaller than I had imagined. The user interface was smooth, I enjoyed browsing his music collection, adding songs to the queue as I went. I know I would listen to music much more often with one of these. Listening through a computer is tedious and I hate loading CDs. I even hate loading DVDs, so much so that my wife's getting me Sony's 400 DVD player for Christmas.
EDIT: Forgot to add that these speakers are pretty revealing. I could instantly tell which CDs had more compression than others. I could easily tell which recordings had more noise floor, even between tracks on the same CD, as well as being able to tell when the artists stood a bit too close to the microphones.
