L800 L+R

xsmi

True. But I’m also moving a chair around to see if I can find one. No go.

msg

Sound stage should be near immediate. Looks like you've got about 6ft between inner faces and what, 8" off the back wall?

Facing perfectly forward?

How far away is your listening position?

Width will clean up bass, while distance to rear wall will control bass presence. In increases, out decreases.

You have them correctly positioned, L-L and R-R, and the SDA cable installed yes?

The sound stage will sound noticeably diffuse at first if you've been running conventional speakers in the interim after moving out your vintage SDAs. I didn't like them at first because of this. Required some retraining and time to get used to, and I was missing my previous bookshelf/subs combo, which had a really tight soundstage.

Depending on the material, you should be getting a wide, diffuse sound stage, with some of the audio outside the speakers seemingly on an arc. I've noticed it about 3-4ft out and in front of the speakers at times.

Everything will collapse if you have anything inside and close to the speakers, but your placement looks like a good start.

VR3

No soundstage??? something is definitely amiss

xsmi

The instruments are there, just, between the speakers. But like MSG said, the stage is diffuse. The SRS, have soundstage for days with instruments placed well in that well defined space. Not so much with these, yet. They feel quite collapsed and ill defined.

xsmi

I feel confident when the ruler comes out and another 40 or 50 hrs , they’ll open up.

Emlyn

Those mushy rubber footers they include are not good for sound quality and the spikes that aren't spikey not much better. The 40 or 50 hours active use rule of thumb is good with these.

nooshinjohn

Soundstage was a mess when I first started out and it only got worse until around 50 hours. I moved them around a bit, and found that even an inch could make a difference. Center images settled down first nearing 75 hours, followed by the rest filling in as time goes on. The magic began around 100 hours.

It took nearly 200 hours on mine for them to settle down. I have had them playing since the end of November and feel they still have a bit of break-in left.

Mine are set 7 feet apart, and 4 feet from the side walls, 10 inches off the back wall.

msg

xsmi wrote: »

The instruments are there, just, between the speakers. But like MSG said, the stage is diffuse. The SRS, have soundstage for days with instruments placed well in that well defined space. Not so much with these, yet. They feel quite collapsed and ill defined.

I had a very similar experience that had me in various stages of indecision on whether to keep them initially. That indecision actually got worse as the speakers got better, because I still wasn't completely sure I was experiencing them properly, nor was I certain that I even liked SDA, and there was still some stuff that sucked. One day I'd love them, the next day I'd be sure they were going back. I was really settled with my previous setup with conventional bookshelf speakers and sub(s), and initially, I missed that configuration.

I talked a lot to Emlyn, F1, VR3 and others during that break-in/eval time. Em is the one who brought the diffusion to my attention - that was his term, and it perfectly described what I was experiencing. It did make sense that this would be an audio characteristic with these speakers with what the SDA technology does in expanding the stage. That helped confirm things were working and I moved forward with that understanding - this system would present much differently. I was just really used to tight, crowded soundstage, not the "wall of sound" as others have described it. It's still weird to me sometimes.

I have some 2.3TLs that I never really got set up working properly. Completely stock except for the tweeters. I didn't have any real SDA experience to speak of, so things were completely foreign with the L800s.

John has shared a lot of perspective comparing his experience between the vintage and current SDA line, though, and I've been following that thread as well.

One thing I noticed with the L800s that I didn't like was that if I'm sitting way off axis, say lounging at the far end of the couch, reading, sitting nearly in front of one of the speakers, the SDA makes the opposite speaker seem near completely non-present. It's very weird and very much not enjoyable; sucks for background listening. I do this regularly, and am not always seriously listening, so I felt like I was constrained to the middle listening position, like an audio prisoner, however good things sounded there.

I conveyed this to another member a few weeks ago, who asked whether it was possible to listen without the SDA cable in place. Just within the past couple of weeks, I removed the SDA cable to see what it would be like. They still sound surprisingly good without SDA, and they work close enough to conventional speakers for off axis casual listening. Both speakers sound present, at least, though it's not ideal for critical listening, but that's not the intent/use with that configuration. Because we don't toe SDA speakers, it turns out that the angled baffles work like toeing the speakers, though they don't cross at the ideal angle, but it was surprisingly good. This reminded me I still need to play with spreading the speakers a bit further anyway. It took me three major moves to get the L800s to where I like them, and I've had them there since. They could use a little more attention, though.

Not being able to directly compare, I think I'm picking up from others that this iteration of SDA technology presents a bit differently than the vintage SDA do.

I will also say that I was very much back and forth during the first 200 hours, but that's become a general rule for me to stick it out during that time, with the speakers running near 24/7 from point of unboxing. I go through that every single time, though, with every set of new speakers. In my experience, every speaker has been all over the place, and unpleasant to some degree. I almost every case, however, they've settled down with time, and I wind up liking the speaker. Except for those damn RTi10s, my first speaker. Those things sucked and almost ruined music for me. Great for HT though.

One of my test tracks is Cowboy Junkies' Misguided Angel from the Trinity Revisited album. If you want to test for imaging and player placement, that's a great track for it. Listen to the track, and then watch the video on YouTube or something, and you'll see how that session was set up. It's pretty neat, and the SDA works well with it.

nooshinjohn

msg wrote: »

One of my test tracks is Cowboy Junkies' Misguided Angel from the Trinity Revisited album. If you want to test for imaging and player placement, that's a great track for it.

The imaging on this track is simply amazing! Thanks for turning me on to it...


Patricia Barber's "Too Rich for my Blood" from the "Cafe Blue" album is another great recording to give a spin...

WLDock

msg wrote: »

Em is the one who brought the diffusion to my attention - that was his term, and it perfectly described what I was experiencing. It did make sense that this would be an audio characteristic with these speakers with what the SDA technology does in expanding the stage. That helped confirm things were working and I moved forward with that understanding - this system would present much differently. I was just really used to tight, crowded soundstage, not the "wall of sound" as others have described it. It's still weird to me sometimes.

One thing I noticed with the L800s that I didn't like was that if I'm sitting way off axis, say lounging at the far end of the couch, reading, sitting nearly in front of one of the speakers, the SDA makes the opposite speaker seem near completely non-present. It's very weird and very much not enjoyable; sucks for background listening. I do this regularly, and am not always seriously listening, so I felt like I was constrained to the middle listening position, like an audio prisoner, however good things sounded there.

Nice Info there Scott, thanks for sharing that. I really wish I can get the chance to listen to the L800 again under better circumstances. I really don't remember the original SDA as it was years ago at an audio store when I briefly listened to them, the Bose 901, etc.

Your comments makes me think of a recent speaker comparison I participated in at the home of an acquaintance on another audio forum. We compared my Boston Acoustics VS 260, VR965 against his Boston Acoustics VR3 and Revel 228Be. His own VR3 vs. 228Be comparison beforehand is what prompted the whole thing. Many of my conclusions turned out to be the same as what he had already experienced. The presentation and soundstage was shockingly different between the two speakers.

The VR3 were almost like a tightly focus studio monitor vs. 228Be which made the stage MUCH larger and wider. It was a crazy experience that really makes me want to listen to the new and old SDA for fun!

In the end, it all comes down to preference.

We both did some writeups on the last two pages of this thread: https://www.avsforum.com/threads/revel-performa-228be-vs-boston-acoustics-vr3.3193379/page-13


Pictures, or it didn't happen!... Here are some. No we didn't listen to them like this, We only listened to two sets at a time. We gather all for a photo op.