Revel Owners Thread - Page 87

That
That's what I was thinking too. Going to take some time to break in a little! Does your dealer have any Ultimas too?

I think so.

Anyone interested in trading a never used Stewart Film screen Elecricscreen Electricmask for their Revel speakers? Its 4:3 100”, 92” 16:9, etc. with the masking system. I have a coupe people interested in selling for cash, but I think I can get a more value trading for Revel speakers. I think this screen was probably at least $5,000-$8,000. Screen material is ST130, top masking is 21”.
Thanks!

I got a call from my dealer today too ( that sounds illegal!) He didn't say anything about burning them in but i'm sure he'll be demoing them all week and they will get a little use even though i believe they are an appointment only shop. I mentioned Dynaudio and he said i'd be paying twice as much for a dynaudio that could match this level of reference quality. That's a bold statement but he's a dealer of both. Will be setting up an appointment for saturday more than likely. Unfortunately i've had a change in my finances and won't be able to afford them till income tax. Hopefully he doesn't get an attitude with me about not buying anything from him when i go to demo them because there's another dealer very close to him that already offered me the performa3's at a very cheap cost if i were to buy from him. I don't care about buying internet direct. If someone takes the time to demo what they have for me and help me out with anything then they deserve the sell. I just rambled.

I own a older set of Revel speakers. F30s, C30 and 2 M20s with stands as rears. I am the original owner. Bought these brand new from a dealer. I have been searching to find out what these are worth. Can anyone point me to a site to check value of these The speakers are in pristine condition. Have them in a smoke and pet free home. I may want to sell these and get some other newer speakers. thanks

Go to audiogon and type revel in the search box and you'll find a couple of C30's and a m20 listed. That will give you an idea. I did not see any F30's.

Now that some dealers appear to have the new Performa3 line, does anyone know the height of the C208 with the short feet installed to tilt the speaker up slightly?

Thanks

hello, anyone running ultima gem 2's in a 2-ch system or as L/R in multi-ch? are they difficult to drive? sensitivity appears to be fairly low (86.4). would appreciate any feedback on these.

I have the JBL cousin, PT800 with a 91db. Not hard to drive at all. But even the Gem2 @ 86.4 should not be a problem, as they are only going down to mid-bass. Its the sub frequencies which require large amounts of power.

My dealer here in Columbus just took delivery of the F208 and F206 last week. I heard them basically fresh out of the box hooked up to a Bryston amp (maybe a 4B model?) and the Bryston BDP/BDA combo- very impressive, but again this is all coming from a Concerta line owner Adequate yet very controlled bass, great midrange reproduction of piano notes, and a nice soundstage in both width and depth with excellent resolution. I've owned my Concertas for several years and the friend that was with me is a Performa2 owner, and we both agreed this iteration of the Performa line is a nice upgrade from the previous version while retaining the "house Revel sound" we are both accustomed to.

The speakers were in the walnut finish, and in person they are a more rich dark brown than the photos I see on the Revel website- very high quality. The physical design is different too after being used to the "boxy" appearance of the Performa2/Concertas, the F208s are wider on the face, but taper towards the back. Magnetic grills are different as well.

Which Performa2 is your buddy coming from? There is Performa2 (F32)...and then there is PERFORMA2 (F52). I don't get why Revel didn't go back and make a running change on the tweeter in the F32. If youre buddy is running the F32, these new Performas should be a significant upgrade.

Thanks for posting your review.

Thanks for the review, me being a Concerta owner, I'm very interested in the new line, because it's a possible upgrade path. Did you hear both the 206 and the 208? What were the differences? I'm using a Velodyne DD-15 sub, so if the differences are only in the bass, I would choose the F206.

Oops, my apologies- he is a current owner of the F32 with no plans to upgrade- we just wanted to listen The funny thing is when he purchased his F32's back in 2008 he was wondering if he "should wait" for the Performa3...luckily he decided against it!

Gugu_s- The F206 were in a different room and we did not get a chance to audition them as they were not hooked up at the time. With your Velodyne providing the low bass, I have to think a lot of the difference between the 206 and the 208 would be minimized in your setup.

Another interesting side topic looking at the specs- both the F206 and F208 are listed as 8ohm nominal impedance versus the F32/F52 at 6 ohm nominal. Of course without a detailed impedance graph we can't be sure if impedance dips lower, but it seems like the Performa3s might be more sensitive, maybe easier to drive?
Edited by thrand1 - 1/3/13 at 12:28pm

You misunderstood the specs. If it has a higher nominal impedance it means you need a more beefier amp to drive it. (If the sensitivity stays the same) For instance my Parasound A52 is able to produce 125 W into 8 ohms, 170W into 6 ohms and 225 into 4 ohms. So if i compare the performa 3 to my concerta, the performa is both harder to drive (88 vs. 90.5 sensitivity) and is able to get less Watts from my amp because of being a nominal 8 Ohm Speaker.

In contrast, the old performa F52 was 6 Ohm, but also around 88db, so it is also an easier drivable speaker.

The fact that your friend is an F32 user, is important, because I heard a lot of opinions that the F32 was in fact not much better than an F12 given the older design, tweeter etc.
The most important question is, how does the new Performa stack up to the F52, and Studio2...

Back in early 2009, I really wanted to get Performa2. I was able to listen to the Concerta F12, and the Performa F32 & F52 in the same room. I had a feeling Performa3 was "coming soon" (which in Revel terms means 2-3 years). I wound up not being able to afford the F52 (x 4) & C52 as the recession was hitting big time. I didn't see any point in getting the F32. The F12 sounded better up top and through the mids to me than the F32, though the F32 had more refined and controlled bass. So, I decided to go with the Concerta as a short term solution until such time as the Performa3 was available.

F52 is listed as 87.5dB sensitive, 6.5ohms nominal, F32 86dB and 6.5 ohm
F208 is listed as 88.5dB sensitive, 8 ohms nominal, F206 88dB and 8 ohm

I was trying to compare the Performa2 to the Performa3 in my previous message in terms of sensitivity and need for current from the amp. At 8 ohms nominal, you could potentially hook the Performa3 to an HT receiver if it is not dipping to as low of an impedance/placing as much demand for current on the amp. There don't seem to be many HT receivers that are capable of driving speakers rated 4ohms or below, so the Performa3 might be more accessible than the 2s depending on other factors like the size of the room/your desired peak SPL/etc...I misspoke about "easier to drive," I probably should have said something along the lines of the Performa3 placing less demand on an amp versus the Performa2.

Thank you for your input. Are you using the PT800s on-wall or with stands? How are the imaging/soundstage and dispersion? Cheers.

I've had them setup every way possible, mounted to 15" subs, stands and on-wall.
Like any good speaker, the more space you can give them the better...deeper, wider soundstage. I've only had them wall-mounted for my surounds. With the WG the highs forced into a wide pattern.
With a pair of good subs they play very nice, but that said, a pair of Salon2 are still much better...but big price difference.

That is backwards: a 4Ω speaker will draw more current that an 8Ω speaker. If you connect a 4Ω speaker to an amp that is designed to drive 8Ω speakers then the amp is forced to produce more current than intended...and then you burn up the amp. And if the speakers are only 2Ω then the amp is really in trouble. So a 4Ω requires more power than an 8Ω speaker to gain the same volume.

If one decides to connect more than one speaker to a pair of terminals then thought has to be given to each speaker's impedance and the amp's capabilities as to how you wire them.
Two 8Ω speakers in parallel shows a 4Ω load and two 8Ω speakers in series shows a 16Ω load. With the 4Ω load the amp is being forced to supply more current than if it sees a 16Ω load.

If the sensitivity difference between two speakers is only 2~2.5, there is very little difference in power needed.
But if the difference is say, 84db to 92db then there is a big difference in power needed. So the 84db rated speaker require much more power to gain the same output.

Thanks for the info, but I still dont understand that how does this all come together with the fact that an amp is able to produce two times as much wattage in 4 Ohm than in 8Ohms. And as far as I know, if you are calculating the SPL, wattage and sensitivity is what matters... I'm confused... :S :O

I try not to over complicate it. The bottom line is that 4ohm speakers will try to draw more current from the amp, and therefore people will buy a stout amp that can double its 8 ohm current into 4 ohm loads. If you look at the specs on good solid state amps, you will see that they can usually do that. So, if you go with an amp that does 150 watts/channel into 8 ohms, you will be able to get 300 watts/channel into 4 ohms, and often you will get 400 or 500 watts into 2 ohm loads. It mainly comes into play on dynamic transients.

Well, 1/2 the resistance (4Ω ~ 8Ω) means twice the current flowing into the 4Ω. With SS amps, if the impedance is too low then the amp over heats and more power is used up in the amp than is delivered to the speaker.
A 4Ω load produces twice the current, thus twice the watts as an 8Ω load.
And a speaker that has a low sensitivity requires more volts to produce the same output as a higher rated speaker.

Hold those thoughts. The other posts about 4 ohm speakers drawing twice the current are true only in certain circumstances.

(1) Anps in general can't produce twice as much wattage into 4 ohm loads than 8 ohm loads is because their power supply regulation is not perfect and their internal losses are not zero. Usually the power actually deliverable into a 4 ohm load is about 40-50% greater. There are some high end amps that are rated to deliver twice the power but if you put them on the test bench you find out that the ratings picture was obtained by underrating the amp at 8 ohms.

(2) 4 ohm speakers will draw more power for a given applied voltage. However since more current is drawn, less voltage is required to deliver the same amount of power.

(3) Test bench conditions usually involve steady sine waves composed of a single frequency driving a resistive load whose resistance is low and constant across the audio band. Real world operation usually involves music which is composed of multiple sine waves which add up in such a way that there is less energy for a given peak signal level. Speaker loads vary across the audio band and often have much higher impedance than their rated impedance much of the time. This creates a situation where a power amp dissipates far less heat in actual operation at its maximum output voltage in actual use than it does on the test bench.

If you really want to see an amp heat up, run it on a test bench! In actual use it will run much cooler even though it may heat up some. Most amp overheating in actual use is due to poor ventilation.

http://www.avsforum.com/t/1294455/amplifier-faq

Thank you guys for clearing things up for me, I really appreciate it.

Now I understand, it seems to be true what you said about specifications, my Parasound A52 was benched in a review and it was capable of doing 175W per channel in stereo with 8 Ohms, and 160W all channels driven 8 Ohm , within all the THD, and other specs, although it is only said to be able to produce 125W into 8 Ohms, and 225 into 4 Ohms.
So, as you said, 160 watts + 40% is around 225W.

This means, driving an F52 with 6 Ohm impedance, my amp is capable of doing around 190-200 Watts, all channels driven, and even more in 2 Channel, right!?

Thanks again, today once again I have learnt something.

well guys i was suppose to be on my way now to go audition the performa3's but i had to cancel because my audio buddy could not make it because he got called into work last night. Setting another appointment up for friday.

It's basically Kal Rubinson's fault that I became a Studio2 owner yesterday but no hard feelings.
I haven't had time to remotely optimize the set up or get the proper upstream components even in the stream but dang, these are some really outstanding speakers.
I like detail without an edge and recorded instruments and voices to sound and real these guys do that.
it looks as if the new Performa line borrows heavily from the Ultima2s and that is a very good thing imo.

I previously had Dali Helicon 800s and loved them but the Studios really nail my preference for what I love about music.
I'm looking forward to spending time getting things squared away and delving into what these speakers can offer up.

I'm also looking forward to you guy's impressions on the new Performa line.

^^^^
Congrats on the Studio2s, they are some phenomenal speakers! If I can manage two systems (besides the family room) I would love to get Salon2s for 2 channel since I already know how good the Studio2s are. I know you will enjoy them, so amazing!

Congratulations! You'll love them, I'm sure. When I got my Salon2's, they actually put a stop to all of my upgradeitis with regard to speakers, which was one of their intended purposes. When I think of the money I wasted on lesser speakers in the pursuit of "better", it makes me sad. Well, I've had the Revels for over 2 years and the thought of getting something different is the furthest thing from my mind. Enjoy!

His review of the Studio 1 is what led me to give them a listen. I was hooked and still love their sound.