Revel Owners Thread - Page 89

That makes sense based on what you have. My deftechs are old but still very good for movies.

The Ultima Studios are definitely slightly superior to the F208s but they cost $11,000 more. If you want to really love the F208, dont listen to the Ultima. Going back down you notice the difference and its pretty clear its been engineered that way (Obviously). Make no mistake, the law of diminishing returns hit very very hard, but its still noticeable. Also, it's personal preference but I prefer not using a sub for music unless its a sealed sub that's very musical.

I have an SVS sb13-plus that's pretty musical and tight but these are no JLs. Sure compared to my BP-10s they are very tight but whether they will be serviceable w the F208 is another story.

Also, I want the performa3 for music too.

I have a Velodyne HGS-18, pretty old sealed sub, but works great especially with XT room correction. If I end up going Ultimas, I'll have to go used or dealer demo's if I can find one. I'm willing to give up some performance with the Performa3's. I rather have a speaker with good synergy over being too revealing.

The sub should help with the lower end and take some stress of the amp, just have to hear the mids and highs.

So would you be more interested in the F206 vs F208?

Yes, the number that the Revel dealers and sales rep are throwing out there is that the new Performa3 is 90% of the Ultima2. It's tough to quantify sound quality but the fact that they are close says a lot about the Performa3. I thought the Performa3s were good enough to buy and this is a gross understatement.

I don't want to sound like a broken record but this does not discount the Ultima2. So all you Studio and Salon owners rest assured, your speakers still rule the roost.

truwarrior22...if you are in IL and you decide to go with new Revels...let me know. Got a great local dealer I'm working with, it would be worth your while.

duh i knew about the bass management lol. I read the performa3 owners manuals

I don't think the boundary or Hi-frequency compensation alone is worth getting the 208 vs the 206. I have it on my Performa S30, i've never touched it. I don't think it is a good idea to have a crossover, which can make adjustments in the analog domain, it needs adding extra components, which will not help the sound. Specially is this true with todays digital Room Correction technologies, which are far more precise, far more complicated, and yield better results.

Bi-amp capability would have been a nice feature for the F206 too, I think they left it out to give some specs advantage for the 208 to justify it's higher price tag, because otherwise it seems funny that my Concerta F12 has it, and the 206 doesn't...

Although, with proper amplification (above 150 Watts from seperate amps into 8 Ohm per channel and above ) and cuting down the low freuqencies (with a proper sub) which consumes most of the power usually I don't think there is any advantage of Bi-Amping.

I had my F12's biamped with my old Arcam AVR (which is a really nice AVR), and getting it bi-amped improved it, but after I got my Parasound A52, they are just bi-wired and of course the sound is miles better, than with the Bi-Amped Arcam. Of course it could be, that Bi-Amping with a Parasound Amp would make it a bit better, but I don't want to spend this much for maybe nothing.

Of course if I had a Salon2, or Studio2 which both are really Power hungry, I would definitely do it. :P

Will do Esox50..I hope this is an open invite. Thanks for offering to help. Too many people boast about their savings in the forums and then clam up when asked about it.
Edited by lsdec - 1/10/13 at 9:45am

You are only gaining if you do active bi-amp. The fact that the A52 provides better sound says it all. I would not even bother to bi-wire the A52, serves no purpose.

As far as making adjustments either with-in the XO or with room correction, I prefer my music w/o any room correction.
Then again my mains have biased XOs which greatly improves overall sound and most certainly HF output.

Yep, of course lsdec. I bet I can get you a better deal than through any of the other dealers you would deal with in IL. You seem like you're waffling on 206 vs 208. But just get the F208 and then let me know and i'll let my guy know you're coming.

Seems like no dealers in California have the Revel Performa3's on display for auditioning purposes. One of them told me today that they were told by Revel that the CES show delayed shippment. Oddly enough, we were in agreement that no one in the shipping department attends the CES show, so the show has no bearing in delaying the shippment. Now how some dealers have them in stock, while others do not, beats me. It appears like they are available for sale, but dealers have not received them for displaying and auditioning purposes. How does Revel expect to sell these, if no one can audition them? Kind of like buying a car, but not being able to test drive it.

Found more images of the Performa3 line at their new domain:

http://www.revelaudio.com/
Edited by laulau - 1/10/13 at 11:05pm

I was looking at the specs of the 206, 208. I don't see how their low end extension can be identical. Dual 6.5" should not be as good as dual 8".

I got may F208's from a Dealer in Manhattan. He did not have them in stock but Revel did and he had them dropped shipped to me with 3 da

You're right. I'm pretty sure they accidentally put the 208 specs in for the 206.

Per the revelspeakers.com specs, the 208 does dig deeper than the 206:

F206
Floorstanding Speakers
(Print this page)
SPECIFICATIONS
Description 3-Way Floorstanding Tower Loudspeaker
Low Frequency Extension -10dB@30Hz -6dB@36Hz -3dB@42Hz
Recommended Amplifier Power 50-200
Sensitivity (2.83V @ 1m) 88dB
Nominal Impedance 8 Ohms
Crossover Frequencies (Hz) 275 Hz, 2150 Hz
High-frequency Drive Components 1” (2.5 cm) Aluminum Tweeter with Acoustic Lens Waveguide
Mid-frequency Drive Components 5.25” (13.3 cm) Aluminum Cone, Cast-frame Midrange
Low-frequency Drive Components Dual 6.5” (16.5 cm) Aluminum Cone, Cast-frame Woofers
Enclosure Type Bass-reflex via Front-firing Port
Input Connections Binding Posts
Height 41.4" (105.1 cm)
Width 9.8" (24.9 cm)
Depth 13.7" (34.7 cm)
Weight Net Weight: 58 lb (26 kg)
Finishes Piano Black, Piano White, or High Gloss Walnut

F208
Floorstanding Speakers
(Print this page)
SPECIFICATIONS
Description 3-Way Floorstanding Tower Loudspeaker
Low Frequency Extension -10dB@23Hz -6dB@27 Hz -3dB@34Hz
Recommended Amplifier Power 50-350
Sensitivity (2.83V @ 1m) 88.5dB
Nominal Impedance 8 ohms
Crossover Frequencies (Hz) 270 Hz, 2200 Hz
High-frequency Drive Components 1” (2.5 cm) Aluminum Tweeter with Acoustic Lens Waveguide
Mid-frequency Drive Components 5.25” (13.3 cm) Aluminum Cone, Cast-frame Midrange
Low-frequency Drive Components Dual 8” (20 cm) Aluminum Cone, Cast-frame Woofers
Enclosure Type Bass-reflex via Front-firing Port
Input Connections Dual Sets of Binding Posts
Height 46.5" (118.2 cm)
Width 11.8" (30 cm)
Depth 14.8" (37.5 cm)
Weight Net Weight: 80 lb (36 kg)
Finishes Piano Black or High Gloss Walnut

What I do not see within the specifications for the Performa3's is the frequency responses like they have listered for other series. All that is listed in lower frequency extensions.

^^^^ But those are not the numbers they had on their new site, that was linked to in the first post on this page.
So I have to assume the new page is wrong.

This Performa3 line has me intriqued. Might try them out as a comparison to my Focal Electra 1007BE. Comments on that?

Has anyone heard the M105s? Notice any significant differences between M106 if crossed at 80hz?

Yes, I also noticed this when I was reading the brochure for the Performa3 line. Which begs the questions, are they not flat from the -3db LF Extension number to at least 20KHz? Why is a standard frequency response specification not listed?

Hope they're not starting to engage in DefTech and Golden Ear type of obfuscation.

oops on the first two and the last few pictures.

had a big auditioning day today. had a demo of the performa3's just the m105's. was very impressed with my peachtree audio dac*it compared to a $7000 cd player. The owner was too.
The performa3's that i listened to were nice but not my cup of tea. They were ran by a luxman stereo integrated.
Let me start off with the imaging. They do not throw the sound forward at all. They disperse the sound of axis and blend the soundstage right in the middle for the presentation. I am not a fan of this. I like the sound to fill the room. The music seemed more like it was a little wall RIGHT in front of the speaker. A simple moving your head six inches in one way and you would simply not hear one of the speakers. Very natural and smooth midrange with no added weight. Bookshelves impress me with their ability to sound full range from top to bottom although the bass is present, it can not fill the room like a full range speaker. Was not impressed with the highs. They were soft and because the sound doesn't have any depth and is kept far away from you i felt they lacked in detail. What i can say about the highs is that they won't reproduce a nice twangy guitar when needed. I felt that was a big no no for me. All around the frequencies complimented each other though. Nice speaker just not my cup of tea.
Also the store owners wife was there was complaining to him that some of the music i was listening to was disgusting and unbearable. I did not hear this but my audio buddies where not in the listening seat and told me about it and how he had to keep going back to her to apologize. In my defense i brought a demo cd i made that consists of all different genres that i listen to. I had some norah jones in high quality, a dubstep song to listen to low frequencies, an oldie rock song and a newer harder rock song, a few jazz and some stevie nicks lol.
The finishes were top notch as you can see and the f208 was very large and intimidating.
Afterwards i went to a much larger speaker shop and auditioned a larger number of speakers. I was a little disappointed in the raved about psb imagine. The symphony one tower was a neat presentation and was a little warm but i felt like for the money the presentation was not big enough and seemed a little congested. While the highs were good they were not as clean as the kef r series. The mids on the symphony one were as good as the performa3's but filled the room much more with a much larger sweet spot and depth. They may have been a little underpowered but still reached out quite well
KEF is my new most favorite brand and their reference line was the first time i had audio bliss and only one speaker was going for a reason they could not figure out. I will post what i think about the kef's in a different thread i make or go to the kef owners forum.
I also got to listen to a $100,000 home theater room and myself and my two buddies were in awe. Triad speakers, nad components and JL fathom woofers with a ridiculously big projector screen. The picture doesn't do it justice. This was a very very very large store and there were people from across the store coming over to see why the WHOLE store was shaking lol.
I also got to listen to some grado headphones while i was there and was a little unimpressed even with the $1000 GS1000.

you can click on the images to enlarge them

i am very content on a certain speaker that no other speaker in the price range could compare to but i would still like to audition paradigm and dynaudio as i've auditioned b&w, martin logan both motion series and stats, definitive technologies energy and monitor audio.

That's weird since the KEF R series are the other speakers I have on my short list. A little disappointed that you didn't enjoy the Revels more, but looking forward to reading your impressions of the KEFs. Thanks again.

Nice pics.
The mahogany monitors look really nice as do the F208s.
I guess it's all a matter of perspective but in reality that screen is not that large.
I'm guessing it's about 96" diagonal.

Asa far as the woman complaining about your music?
Ridiculous.
It's a business and hopefully a business has customers and customers have different taste in music.
Maybe you should've asked the owner to break out the Mantovani.

So what speakers are you very content on?
This isn't a mystery forum afterall.

Personally, I haven't heard a truly forward speaker in a long time.
The weakness with forward speakers generally is that they lack depth.
I'm sure there are exceptions but I'm speaking from personal experience.

I have heard the energy speakers and felt they were very in your face speakers. I settled on the Kef R series and found no fault with them. They are leagues above the performa and the only speaker in my price range that i felt justify using a tube amp. They are the real deal in my book. They have a lot of depth and not forward in your face.
I have a full write up here
http://www.avsforum.com/t/1451331/how-my-audition-today-went-with-revel-performa3-line-psb-kef-and-a-dedicated-home-theater-room-with-triad-and-jl-audio#post_22818098
It looks like the same thing i wrote here but i added quite a bit through out the whole write up

Just wanted to say also that the closest thing to the R300 was the $5000 PSB synchrony one. They only thing they beat the the little R300 at was bass output but that's because they are a full range speaker. The R300 had plenty and did not lack at loud levels. The quality of the bass on the kef was better. The Kef did everything the psb tried to do right and then opened up pandora's box

Well, bthrb4u, the key is you found the speakers you like.
You obviously did your due diligence.
Congratulations and happy listening!

bthrb4u, thanks for the report. So you are saying if you shifted your head 6 inches one of the M105s would attenuate? Like there was something blocking the sound at certain angles?

How close to the speakers were you? Did you audition any other speakers in the same room?