Polk SDA 2Bs verses Vandersteen CEs ???

geppy1

Has anyone ever owned and compared Polk SDA 2Bs to Vandersteen CEs ??? What did you think?? thanks

On3s&Z3r0s

I did own both for a while, and between stock 2Bs and the CEs I'd definitely give it to the Vandersteens. I thought they had better balance from high to low, perfect mid-bass for my taste, and the low bass was much better controlled. I listen to a lot of acoustic jazz and female vocals were good (I personally think its easier for most speakers to get those right), but good male vocals were astounding. I have some HD disks of Muddy Waters and Johnny Hartman that blew my doors off. When the Vandy's are properly set up the stereo imaging is every bit as good to my ears as the 2Bs, and the sense of space and separation between different instruments always surprised me since I assumed the SDA's would out-compete them in that area, but I think the time-aligned drivers and just the quality of the drivers really shows in their accuracy. The also are pretty stellar when it comes to loud rock too as I have a crystal clear memory of putting in The Who Live at Leeds and feeling like I could have been in front of the stage. They were great to listen to with just about any decent equipment and were never fatiguing.

But, after I sunk a fair bit into the 2Bs to TL them (bringing the total cost over what I spent on the CEs, which I also got used), I decided to keep the 2Bs for my 2-channel rig. The TL treatment brought them very, very close to the quality of the Vandys. The biggest difference was still the bass, but by upgrading amps I got that pretty close to what I was getting out of the CEs. (I've heard the bass on the 3A's and that is really outstanding.)

The real deciding factor though was maintainability and convenience. The CEs sounded great when they were properly toed in and a couple feet off the wall, but they lost some of their magic when pushed closer to the wall or when not in the sweet spot. My wife didn't like having speakers "in the middle of the living room," so that was a big part of it. Plus, the CEs are generally starting to show their age and eventually need their drivers re-coned which pretty much requires them to be shipped to Vandersteen from what I was able to ascertain. So, I sold them while I could still recover my investment easily. But, if I had a dedicated room for audio, and if they weren't too expensive I'd definitely grab a pair.

tophatjohnny

On3s&Z3r0s wrote: »

I did I have a crystal clear memory of putting in The Who Live at Leeds and feeling like I could have been in front of the stage. They were great to listen to with just about any decent equipment and were never fatiguing.

No stage (especially front of) that The Who played, either with Moon or Jones on the drums sound anything close to 2B's even when you inject steroids into the SDA's! Nice enthusiastic take though. I'm still stuck in love with the SDA effect, but will never compare it to concert level. That is achieved by going to the show. On the other hand, maybe you were slipped some mushrooms or something??:biggrin:

erniejade

I had the 2cd sig. at the same time as sda 2.3 when setup properly the soundstage on the vandies was as good as the sda's but, a tad on the mellow side. What is your room like? high ceilings wood floors highly reflective? or thick carpet /padding dead room?

In the den or basement, the vandies sounded great but, once I put them in the living room where my acoustics are dead, the sda sounded better. In a more live sounding room the vandies sounded better. The vandies to my ears were a bit more mellow sounding, but, you are not missing detail at all. Easy to live with also.

Another question would be how loud do you listen to your music? I lit up the vandies protection many many times. Its funny, all of a sudden your speakers start lighting up!

I agree about the 3A mentioned here. Not only was the bass a bit tighter but the mids were cleaner. I regret selling them!

The 2ce you can get for 400-500$. Great speaker for the price but, again, it depends on the room, and how loud you listen to them. Remember they are bi wire / bi amp only aslo and do not have binding posts. Depending on what year, they will either have screw terminals ( hopefully ) or bananna?s. If they are bananas and you are not set up for bi wire, you need to run 2 sets of wires from your amp since you cannot jump them.


So in short, 1, how loud do you listen to your music? 2, what kind of room and how is the room acoustically, 3, do you prefer a more fwd sound or a bit more mellow sound?

On3s&Z3r0s

LOL... fair enough, maybe that was a bad example especially given the fact that I've never seen The Who live. I just meant that disc sounded super realistic to me (kick drums not withstanding) on the CEs, and they outdid the SDA 2Bs on that one. I don't doubt that bigger SDAs could have buried the CEs for the arena rock sound, but since Geppy was asking about the 2Bs if figured it was a worthwhile direct comparison.

And I think it's probably a great point that room acoustics would make a big difference. My 2-channel room is pretty bouncy... hardwood and a couple big windows, so that definitely could have accounted for why the CEs seemed less fatiguing sometimes.

tophatjohnny wrote: »

No stage (especially front of) that The Who played, either with Moon or Jones on the drums sound anything close to 2B's even when you inject steroids into the SDA's! Nice enthusiastic take though. I'm still stuck in love with the SDA effect, but will never compare it to concert level. That is achieved by going to the show. On the other hand, maybe you were slipped some mushrooms or something??:biggrin:

geppy1

Good point as we are talking about 2Bs and not really big SDAs.