Aerial Acoustics Owners Thread - Page 10

Originally Posted by Jrunr

What Kind of amplification are you using with your D2V and Aerials?

Originally Posted by Mudslide

Perchance....has anyone upgraded out of a pair of 5B's and wants to sell? I haven't seen any on A-gon in a year.

Originally Posted by coolrda

Stereo Design in San Diego has a list of used equipment on their webpage. I believe they have the model 5 bookshelf speakers if that's what your interested in.

Originally Posted by Mudslide

Ah, my town of birth.

Thanks much. I'll see if I can reach them, tomorrow.

EDIT: I found them...wrong color (I need black or cherry), not the 5B (different drivers), and darned high priced for 10 year old speakers. But I'll contact them just in case they want to dicker. Thanks again for the lead.

Originally Posted by carlm9

Mudslide,
It doesn't look like they even sold. As a previous Owner of a Rosewood pair of 5B's I can tell you at $1000 they would be worth it but any much hight than that would not be worth it. I love Aerials but the 7B's are a much better deal and sound a hell of alot better, much wider soundstage and deeper base. It also has the same footprint as the 5B's with stands. Good luck

Originally Posted by Mudslide

Thanks, Carl. I just found the closed sale ad. Are they back up or just pulled because of an accepted offer or seller change of mind? I agree with you...a grand is about the right price...maybe even less depending on condition. I do prefer the cherry as that's the color of my 7B's. But another pair might be WAF and room overkill as surrounds in a surround HT. But again, you're right about value/cost/sound.

And Carter, thanks for trying!

Originally Posted by carlm9

Mudslide,
Don't think it is overkill. I had 9's upfront, CC5 center, 7B's for surrounds and (2) SW12's. One of the best systems I have ever owned. I also had the SR3's at the same time and if I can offer any advice, if you have the room, go full range for your surrounds. The 7B's walked all over the SR3's. It did spoil me though because I can never go back to just wall mounted surrounds again. Good luck in your search.

Originally Posted by Carter

Speaking of amps. I have been thinking about upgrading. It appears that many of you suggest 200 watts into 8 ohms and more for the 7b's. I currently have a Chiro C 300 amp running the 7'bs and ccb3. What are your suggestions for amps? I have been happy with the Chiro at 140 watts a channel but it sounds like I could get more out of the 7b's. Anybody heard Wyred 4 sound with the Aerials? Also been thinking of Cary 7.250 and Bryston 6B. Of course the draw back to the Bryston and Cary is Cost.... Was really trying to get 7 ch for 3k or less. Used is fine.

Originally Posted by coolrda

I originally was going with Parasound A21's, but, instead opted for used Parasound 1500A which I picked up for 400+ a piece. I have three bridged to the fronts. While running the amps in stereo sounded very good, bridged they are fantastic. There's a effortless dynamic grace to the sound with 600+ watts. The slam in my small room nullifys the sub with music. Maybe it's from monoblocking the fronts but the full power of the performance is to scale. Though I plan to someday replace my amps with a step I'm in no hurry.

Originally Posted by Roger Dressler

I suspect that one reason you may be hearing an improvement using one amp per speaker rather than one amp driving a stereo pair, is simply that the amp box is working less hard--less current being pulled from the power supply. Not to mention the monoblock aspect for unquestioned isolation across channels.

But let me also offer an additional perspective wrt bridging vs higher power. Many times we use a modest power amp, then switch over to its otherwise identical bigger brother with, say, double the output capability, and feel that there's a benefit in "authority" and "ease" due to the extra current output capability--even when playing at the same loudness as before. Having more output devices stacked in parallel allows not only this increased power, but a lower output impedance, hence higher damping factor. The bigger amp is working less hard than the smaller one.

So what do we have when we bridge two amp channels? Higher voltage swing, so more power capability on tap. What about output impedance and damping factor? Impedance is doubled, and that means damping factor is cut in half. Not a desirable thing.

How about each amp's effort? Well, the Aerial 7B impedance is rated at 6 ohm nominal, 4 ohm minimum. That means your bridged amp is seeing 3 ohms with dips to 2 ohms. Those amps are all working much harder than before, not less.

What does Parasound say about bridging the 1500A?

>>Q. Will these amps handle a four ohm speaker while the two channels are bridged to MONO?

A. No. Remember amps bridged to mono will "see" half the impedance the speaker is actually presenting. Sustained 2 Ohm loads are not advisable with any Parasound amplifier.<<

Unless there is insufficient voltage swing in the single amp stage (which seems unlikely with >200w available), you'd probably be better off running just one of the channels in each of those three 1500A amps, and letting the other sit idle.

Just food for thought.

Originally Posted by Mudslide

Ah, my town of birth.

Thanks much. I'll see if I can reach them, tomorrow.

EDIT: I found them...wrong color (I need black or cherry), not the 5B (different drivers), and darned high priced for 10 year old speakers. But I'll contact them just in case they want to dicker. Thanks again for the lead.

Originally Posted by Carter

Hey Mudslide...........just letting you know newly posted black 5b's on A-gon.

Originally Posted by Mudslide

Great! Many thanks, Carter. I emailed the seller. We'll see.........

Originally Posted by Mudslide

Well...the seller has no f/b and there has been no reply to my email. We tried, Carter.

Originally Posted by pjg66

Hello everyone,
This thread seems a bit quiet at the moment. Maybe a new post (my first) will help.

My current main rig includes 10T's plus CC3, driven by 3 Bryston 7BST monoblocks (for me, Aerial + Bryston = Magic!). The 10T's were acquired 13 years ago after extensive audition, and I've never looked back. I remain very satisfied with these older Aerial models, and assuming the speakers remain in good working order, there are no plans to replace them.

I've tried to stay abreast of what's going on with Aerial, since it is one of my favorite high-end companies (the others being Bryston and Meridian). But there are some things to be curious about. Maybe those of you in the know can help enlighten.

Whatever happened to Novalith, the synthetic concrete developed by Aerial for the mid/tweeter unit of the 10T? In the Jan/Feb 1996 issue of Fi and the April 1996 issue of Stereophile, Michael Kelly talks very positively about this material and its damping properties. He says that to cast a bass cabinet for a speaker at the 10T's price would be prohibitively expensive. But he also says, "In a couple of years or so, we'll come out with a level reference speaker - the 20T. That'll be fully cast."

Aerial appears to have abandoned Novalith altogether. No big deal - just wondering why.

Another thing - one of my silly fetishes is to keep track of the lists of brands carried by the high-end dealers that advertise in magazines like Stereophile. In the last couple of years, several have dropped Aerial (or Aerial has dropped them). I know nothing about the economics/politics of high-end merchandising, but is there any significance to this?

Finally, the 20T that eventually came out appears to be an awesome speaker. Stereophile has given it due recognition, but some of the threads (on various sites) that deal with uberspeakers seem to ignore it. Models from Magico, Wilson, mbl, YGAcoustics, Tidal (and some others) pop up all over the place. But not the 20T. Am I looking in the wrong places?

For those of you who have bought the 20T, did you listen to other megabuck speakers? Why did you choose the 20T? Though I will never play in that sandbox, it's fun to hear what convinced someone to plunk down $32K for a speaker.

Thanks for reading through this. Any responses are welcome.

Happy listening!

Originally Posted by pjg66

Hello everyone,
This thread seems a bit quiet at the moment. Maybe a new post (my first) will help.

My current main rig includes 10T's plus CC3, driven by 3 Bryston 7BST monoblocks (for me, Aerial + Bryston = Magic!). The 10T's were acquired 13 years ago after extensive audition, and I've never looked back. I remain very satisfied with these older Aerial models, and assuming the speakers remain in good working order, there are no plans to replace them.

I've tried to stay abreast of what's going on with Aerial, since it is one of my favorite high-end companies (the others being Bryston and Meridian). But there are some things to be curious about. Maybe those of you in the know can help enlighten.

Whatever happened to Novalith, the synthetic concrete developed by Aerial for the mid/tweeter unit of the 10T? In the Jan/Feb 1996 issue of Fi and the April 1996 issue of Stereophile, Michael Kelly talks very positively about this material and its damping properties. He says that to cast a bass cabinet for a speaker at the 10T's price would be prohibitively expensive. But he also says, "In a couple of years or so, we'll come out with a level reference speaker - the 20T. That'll be fully cast."

Aerial appears to have abandoned Novalith altogether. No big deal - just wondering why.

Another thing - one of my silly fetishes is to keep track of the lists of brands carried by the high-end dealers that advertise in magazines like Stereophile. In the last couple of years, several have dropped Aerial (or Aerial has dropped them). I know nothing about the economics/politics of high-end merchandising, but is there any significance to this?

Finally, the 20T that eventually came out appears to be an awesome speaker. Stereophile has given it due recognition, but some of the threads (on various sites) that deal with uberspeakers seem to ignore it. Models from Magico, Wilson, mbl, YGAcoustics, Tidal (and some others) pop up all over the place. But not the 20T. Am I looking in the wrong places?

For those of you who have bought the 20T, did you listen to other megabuck speakers? Why did you choose the 20T? Though I will never play in that sandbox, it's fun to hear what convinced someone to plunk down $32K for a speaker.

Thanks for reading through this. Any responses are welcome.

Happy listening!

Originally Posted by Andrew Clark

Hi everyone,

I was planning on waiting until I could provide final details on the Model 7C before I posted again, however some recent speculation and assumptions posted here have made it necessary for me to respond sooner. So in no particular order

Contrary to one point, Aerial has been active in print and online media recently. Our Models; 20T version 2, 9 and 5B have been reviewed by Stereophile and HomeTheaterReview.com. All of those reviews can be accessed from our website:

http://www.aerialacoustics.com/reviews/index.aspx

As far as the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest is concernedwe simply felt that it was best for us to follow the lead of a many of our customers and business partners that were telling us that they were not planning on attending. We enjoy exhibiting at trade shows and meeting with our customers, but if we don't believe our investment in terms of time, effort and money are going to provide a positive return, we are better off dedicating those resources to other priorities that we believe will.

Which brings me to the last topic; the Model 7C. We are making steady progress and the product has NOT been delayed due to the economy. In fact, if I could wave a magic wand and have them in the warehouse now, I would NOT hesitate to do so. The reality is that the delay is due to a decision we made to design two completely new drivers for the system. This basically sidetracked the project as the cabinet and crossovers had to wait for new drivers to be completed. We are pretty much at that point now and are back on track but there are still lots of work to be completed and production lead times in front of us.

I am pleased to report that I have had the pleasure to listen to the new Model 7C prototypes extensively and I am extremely pleased with the results. I believe that everyone else who hears the Model 7C will be too. We understand that this delay is frustrating but we ask that you please be patient with us while we continue to march towards production. Rest assured that the wait will be worth it.

Thank You,

Andrew Clark
Aerial Acoustics