**Official Ascend Acoustics Tower Thread** - Page 17

Can someone what the difference between the tweeter on the CMT-340 to the Sierra 1's would be? If you don't need the bass of the sierra 1...is it better to go with the CMT-340? Or do the Sierra-1 tweeters sound smoother too?

Can you get the Sierra 1 with the ribbon tweeter or is that only available in the floor standing model? I'm sure this has been asked before...so thanks for being patient.

I haven't seen Tower center with the Raal tweeter, can someone post a picture.

thanks

Djoel

Sierra Tower Center photos

To see these photos you will have to create an account and log into the forum.

http://forum.ascendacoustics.com/att...0&d=1320200075

http://forum.ascendacoustics.com/att...1&d=1320200075

http://forum.ascendacoustics.com/att...2&d=1320200075

http://forum.ascendacoustics.com/att...3&d=1320200075

http://forum.ascendacoustics.com/att...4&d=1320200075

Those photos are with the NrT but it shouldn't look any different with the Raal outside the front baffle cutout. I think the price with Raal is around $1350

While the 340 is very fine in its own right, the Sierra is a more refined speaker overall. The difference is not just in the bass. More transparent and open.


http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showp...&postcount=458

Not sure there has been one yet, but I am sure there will be soon since they are starting to be delivered next week.


The baffle cutout is essentially the same. This lowers the cost a bit since there is no need for two different cabinets. To do this, RAAL customized the tweeter's faceplate for Ascend.

How much does the Tower Center with the Nrt tweeter cost?

I believe it is right about $1K.

Have one thanks


Thanks on the price, I've seen the pics several times.





Thanks, will be looking out for those.

Djoel

Hello,

I just wanted to chime in and say I took delivery of my black matte towers yesterday. Hopefully it will be followed here in the next few days by the STC. I'm rounding out my speakers with the 170 SE's as surrounds and a Rythmik sub.

First blush is that I'm very impressed and pleased with the speakers. I do not have a lot of experience with "critical listening". My other "system" is a Klipsch Quintet with the 10" matching sub. Obviously there is no comparison between the two as they are worlds apart (and rightfully so) but that is what my experience is with so take the following with a little grain of salt. This listening was don in my theater that is 13.5 x 20 x 7.5 and has no acoustical treatments at all.

I have only had about four or five hours with the towers ATM. A mixture of iPod, Pandora, CD's, and a couple of movie samples is where my initial impressions are coming from. One of the things that struck me was how "honest or true" these speakers appear to be. With these speakers source material is very important that was evident very quickly. If you have a crappy, compressed, or otherwise compromised source, these speakers will definitely let you know. They don't hide, or cover up anything and when fed quality material they will have you grinning from ear to ear with what you hear. I tried to listen at all different volume levels just to see what type of range they had and I can tell you that they can go loud, but that is not necessarily impressive into itself a lot of speakers can play loud. Oh, and I'm not so interested just in how loud they go, I'm much too old now to be purely impressed just by that, but how they sound at all volume levels. My little Klipschs would get harsh when driven loud and it would be obvious after listening at higher volumes that you had done so. The towers do so with out harshness, actually it kind of sneaks up on you and then all of sudden you realize wow this is pretty loud. Sound weird I know, but I don't know how else to explain it.

For my music listening they go down deep enough to capture the bass drum thumps and some of the other "popular" music my teens listen to. I did not feel like there was anything I was missing and the clarity of the music was also very prevalent. Not once have they sounded muddled, muddy, or harsh.

During the movie watching I watched a couple of movies that I am very familiar with. I put on the the 170 SE as a temp center to try to get an idea of what I was in for. The towers don't do the heavy hitting that a sub would for the LFE type material, but I would not expect them to and that is not what they are tasked for doing. They do seem to effortlessly handle HT and I can't wait to put the STC in the mix. The dialog and other surround duties were effortless.

I am still in the "Honeymoon Phase" and I obviously will be doing a lot more listening and tweaking with setup, position, and room treatments. I also wanted to say what a pleasure it was working with Dave and Dina at Ascend and that they truly know what customer service really is.

I'm hoping as these speakers ship and make it to their new homes others will chime in with their impressions.

Regards,

RTROSE

Awesome, thanks RTROSE. Sounds like you got a great impression from these speakers. Hope to one day get these myself. Looking forward to your thoughts on the center speaker. Post some pics too!

Congrats, RTROSE!

Which tweeter did you get?

So is there supposed to be a Sierrra center to go along with the Sierra Towers? The only thing I see on the website is Sierra-1 center which I supposed is best linked with Sierra-1 towers.

Yes, not on the website yet, but mentioned in this thread and on the Ascend forum (pictures too). First batch being delivered in these next couple of weeks (as mentioned in the threads), and is called the Sierra Tower Center (STC).

Thanks! Ask and you shall receive.

Grill on.......





Grill off........



Black matte finish. Looks good and has a slight texture to it as well. Perfect for HT very little reflection off the speakers.


The standard NRT tweeter. It does not disappoint, I can't imagine the speaker sounding better that it already does, so that ribbon must be really something.

Regards,

RTROSE

Just beautiful. Quick question. My space on the left side of my HT glass shelves is very limited. Could you give me the exact dimensions/footprint of the base of the towers? The width is especially important. thanks.

13.5"L X 10"W is the base dimensions. The speakers are only about 7.5" wide without the base.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

RTROSE

The dust cap looks different from the Sierra 1 in your photo RTROSE. I thought it used the same midwoofer? Perhaps just light?

Here is a gallery of photos

http://www.ascendacoustics.com/pages...RT/srtgal.html

I'm curious Dave what you figure is a good xover point and slope for the tower with Brian's subs.

The dust cap, to me, looks the same as the Sierra-1. Probably lighting conditions are highlighting the center. I do believe Dave mentioned in a post somewhere on the Ascend forum that the woofers are a slightly modified version of the Sierra-1 woofer, which makes sense as these are no longer required to cover the midrange in the towers.

I can take a better photo later if you wish but my Sierra's look just like the ones in the photo, dust cap and all.

I too think you are seen some lighting issues. Was hard to see the viewfinder with such a big smile on my face!

Regards,

RTROSE

I'm not Dave, but using my Sierra-1 experience, the bass quality of the speaker is a great match with the Rythmiks, that the xover point is pretty flexible for me. I would expect the same for the Tower.

This wasn't the case with my older subwoofer where I had the speakers handle more of the bass duty.

So are you supposed to screw the speaker cabinet to the bottom plate?

Do you have to use those spiky things as well?

I've used Dave and Brian's gear with installs I've done. I love both of their products and engineering skills. Both their products and even themselves are very special in this shady business. The nicest bookshelf I've ever seen and heard "for the money" is that Sierra-1. I remember opening the box and seeing white gloves for handling them, a AP report signed off by Dave PERSONALLY... I was impressed from the get-go!

I then inspected the finish on the gloss cherry cab and was really blown away... I then asked the customer if I could hold onto them for a couple days longer to show my friends. I got the OK so I took them to an audio shop and had the boys give them the run over. I didn't share who made them nor the pricing. Dave doesn't place nameplate on the speakers but includes it and you can attach it to the cab if you like so I gave it to them with no identification.

Well... they came back to me VERY VERY IMPRESSED! One said it's one of the nicest sounding speakers he's heard in YEARS. I then asked what do you guys figure it's worth? I had pricing ideas ranging from $2k to 4k.

When I told them a cool grand they almost fell over!

LOL

PS I'm talking about an NrT Sierra-1 in Glossy Cherry.

I did something similar with the "classic" CMT-340 6 or 7 years ago. All the employees in the shop ended up in the room to listen to this black box. The shop owner came out of his office and said "this sounds really good!" Then they asked how much it was...and when I said "about $600/pr (I think it is $500 at the time)"..they were in shock. One of the sales reps didn't want me to bring stuff in to compare any more, but the owner said to come back any time.

Yes...the plate screws into the bottom of the speaker cabinet.

No...you do not have to use the spikes.

For that matter there is no reason in particular requiring use of the base plate. For those extremely space constrained, stick some rubber pads to the bottom, and put them in place!

That said, the base looks really nice, and does provide a means to help stabilize them. I didn't use the spike/metal disk arrangement, just the rubber pads to the bottom of the base on my wood floors.

Jay

For my speaker stands, I actually use furniture sliders on the bottom of the bass against my wood/bamboo floors.

Last night I played an SACD recommended in the hi-rez section that I just got, Junior Wells "Come On In This House", it might be the best music title I've ever heard in terms of sound quality. Content was off the hook also.

http://www.amazon.com/Come-This-Hous...8745337&sr=1-2

If you have multi channel SACD capability, and want some demo material for your new Towers that make your buds go "HO LEE KAY WRAP!!!!" this one will do that (IMHO, as always).

Edit: If you were to get this SACD, make sure the sub is on for playback, it has some wicked low bass in there.

Jay

Hello,
I am curious if anybody here traded in original sierras for the towers. I could not find much info about the trade in option except that it's supposed to be available.
Thank you

Best to just call them and ask. You will never find a friendlier, more customer service oriented company.

I bought used Sierras for side surrounds, and they integrate very nicely with my new Towers, where my old speakers did not.

Jay