eD Owner's Thread - Page 51

Sterryo-

Are you running the W-6's off a receiver and if so how much clean volume can you get out of them? You know anything about the difference in these versus the new bookshelfs @ $1100/pr.? Alex at ED said the new ones will be much more efficient but if the sound quality is similar I would rather spend less and get an amp...

i am powering them off an Onkyo nr1007 receiver thx ultra2 and 135 watts per channel x 9. They can get plenty loud in my 13'x25' ht. not much db leveling between channels using the eD a6's 2-3 db variance only.

one observation though is that one can only imagine how good they would sound being powered by standalone amp with 200+ watts

Sterryo,

Glad to hear you like the W-6's. I still get a smile on my face each time I fire mine up. I have them set up in my "temporary theater" as I finish planning and laying out my dedicated theater in my basement.

I have (7) W-6's and an A5-350 as the foundation of the theater I am building.

I really like them listening to music and one can't really describe the way they look.

i totally agree, been breaking them in all day yesterday and today. being unable to audition them first i was a little apprehensive, man what a pleasant surprise. at their price point they are such a great value, i'm sure a lot of people look at the a6 towers and can't imagine that such a smaller speaker will outperform them. most speakers i've owned in the past were towers and after a while i began subscribing to the bigger is better philosophy. a couple years ago a friend sat me down to listen to his satellite system and it was an eye opener ( his set was several thousand $ though ). when i went from 7.2 to 11.2 last fall, my small theater just became to crowded (5 towers across the front soundstage) so i decided to sell off the towers and go with smaller speakers 5 a6-5t5's across the front and 2 a3 5tc's for height speakers and 2 a3-5tc's for back surrounds, didn't get enough from sale to replace my side bi-poles with eD's $400 bi-poles. system sounded pretty darn good but something was missing especially in regular stereo mode, it just didn't have the impact of the towers so i decided to go with a6 towers to bolster things up a little and was all set to purchase them when i ran across the w6 coupon on the internet so i plugged it in and the w6's dropped to $475. well w6's for less than a6 towers - no brainer . noticed today that the coupon no longer works (DARN)
your theater must sound incredible

bought another new pair to get that center channel speaker .... anyone interested in the other speaker? PM me

Ah sterryo you could have got eD to sell you a single W6. I'm sure you won't have too much trouble selling yours though. Maybe I'll buy it and make a bedroom set......hmmmm

eD wants $400 to split a pair... i asked

got some other eD's over on ebay. check them out

I think they are great, though I may be biased . Here's a thread about them on eD's forum:
Ed forum EL Series Speakers

Here's an avsforum thread about them: eD EL Series Speakers

seriously reconsidering about selling the other w6 and moving the pair to DSX wides and getting the swan d1.1sec as the center..... sure is tempting

Got the replacement grills for my warped tower grills, at last. I think they just had to learn how to make them, although more communication would have been good. They fit perfectly. Me and ED are cool now. (BTW have had no other issues with my ED subs and various speakers in the 8 months or so I've owned them. And I've driven them to their limits many times. Recommended.)

Does anyone know if the W6-6TCs are threaded on the bottom for spikes (yes I know they are monitors and not towers)?

no, only polished surface on bottom and back

I have the A6 towers as well. The Grill stays on fine, its just that it has 6 pin connectors and the middle 2 won't stay in (4 corner pins stay in fine). Its about a 1/4" gap that bows out and when you try to push the grill and pins in they won't stay. I have the grills on all the time I have two pit bulls and they whack the one speaker all the time with their crazy tails and no damage done at all. You can't even notice the bowing unless you are really looking hard from the side with the speaker backlit. Also, the grills on these towers are very well solid, much more solid than the subwoofer grills they hand make in house. (I have the a5-350)

You get what you pay for, and the bowing issue really isn't as huge a deal as some make it out to be. I'm not even going to bother asking ED to fix it since its such a non-deal to me

What would you guys compare the A6 towers to in Sound Quality? Aperion,SVS etc..? I been interested in EMP Tek e55ti towers but am considering the ED A6's.

I'm looking for some nice sounding speakers with nice clear sound for a 2 channel setup. The A6's are very affordable but are the recommended? Also ED does custom built speakers so I was considering maybe seeing if they can build me some custom speakers that have a nicer finish. I wanted to get the AVSer's opinion on the quality of there speaker line though. What do you guys think?

the w6's sound better then the a6's and the e55i's sound better than the e5i's and the e5i's sound better than the w6's. subjective of course however both myself and my teenage daughter came to the same conclusion, so both my old ears and her young ears agreed for once.....

You own the e55ti's?

yes and 2 pairs of w6's

Anybody tried out, heard, or own the new(er?) A6-6T6 Center Channel? I am using an A6-6T6 MTM on it's side (like many others) as my center, but the new dedicated center looks interesting.

Oh wow, I just came across this thread today. I didn't realize there was an eD owners thread in the speaker section. I thought it would be relevant for me to post some of my reviews of the eD speakers. So, here goes the first one!

This Monday (7-26-10), my fiancee and I descended upon eD and took over the demo room for nearly eight full hours. We had come with one mission: to determine once and for all whose towers were the best. The contenders: our current Definitive Technology BP7002's (MSRP: $2398/pr) powered by our Emotiva XPA5 and the Elemental Designs new tower series EL 8.3t (List Price: $2500/pr).

Round one consisted of towers set to small (which is what they would be set back home) with the A7s-650, listening to a full CD or two containing some of our favorite songs, most of which were hand picked to give the EL's a good workout that would let us hear the full gusto they had to offer. We sat in the room, occasionally switching the speaker wires from the DTs to the ELs. The difference was clear, but not clear enough to really decide. We were starving and needed food, so we visited a nice place in Newton called La Cabana. The service was ok, the food was good, and Val's margarita was so good she drank the whole thing.

We returned to eD and resumed our comparison. Five CDs and Blackhawk Down later, we were still unsure what we wanted to do so we did what any smart consumer would do: let the tipsy girl write a pros and cons list.

Pros for the ELs were as follows:
Warmer
more headroom
less strain
handles power better
space free - they could be shoved in a corner and be ok, DT's cannot
hiejhs are bindw (that means highs are kinder)
no external power needed

Cons for the ELs:
didnt seem as accurate - at moderate listening levels
require break in time
seemed thing (supposed to be thin) - could have been source material. The DT's allow for bass adjustment to adjust to users liking.
mid missing - again, possible source material. We did not feel this way on every song

Pros for the DTs:
wall of sound - DT's are known for this due to the bipolar design
bass included
seem more accurate. - only at moderate to low listening levels, to put it simply, the DT's failed at high volumes

Cons for the DTs:
need to be plugged in
piercing highs - felt like someone was inserting a pencil in your ear drum
no headroom - they seemed to hit a wall and had nothing else to give
punchy at times
placement sensitive

I spent a lot of time dwelling on the fact that the DT's seemed to be more accurate. In the end, it wasn't that they were more accurate, it was that they were brighter on the highs and mids. Something that I had become accustomed to since I have owned them for a few years. At moderate to low listening level, I would rate the DT's just a tad higher than the EL's. The built in sub allows a user to adjust the bass output level. However, that is comparing apples to potatoes because the EL's do not have a built in sub.

The ELs came out on top but only marginally. We decided that we would exhaust our final option, ask Matt to come in and listen, since he had least amount of listening time on them (EL's) at that point. Matt brought the pain. Screaming metal tracks with the DefTechs set to large created the most eardrum shredding sound that even MATT couldn't tolerate it any longer. The louder we got with the DT's the more everything became just one loud screeching sound. The clarity was gone, all that remained was just loud sound. We then hooked the ELs up and what came out of them was nothing short of bliss. Warm, rich mids and clear highs played up the screaming guitars but did not explode any heads. The bottom end was smooth and full, with only the xpa5 running it. The louder the EL's get, the better they sound. They LOVED the extra power from the amp. They easily took the same power we were feeding the DT's and then some. No strain, no loss of clarity, just louder and louder. We were all VERY impressed.

Needless to say, we are going to be purchasing these from eD. And yes, guys, Val WILL bring cupcakes next time too.
There are only two things that I require from a home theater system. One is realistic and accurate sound, and the second is affordability and value coupled with amazing customer service. The ELs have all this and more. I can't wait to get my second 650 and shake my house to pieces. I'll leave you now with some pictures we took.

HULK OUT! (For you Alex)

This is a review I did of the EL's over on the eD forum. However, since I found this thread, I think I'm going to be in here quite a bit as I am VERY excited for eD's speakers. This post is only a portion of the review I posted over on eD's forums. The other portion was of the A7-900, but seeing as this is a speaker thread, I chose to cut that part out. If you want to read all of it, here is a link to that thread. http://forum.edesignaudio.com/showth...900-73330.html

I went to the eD meet on Saturday. My main purpose for going was to listen to the EL series stuff and the A7-900. I currently have Definitive Technology BP7002 towers and an A7s-650.

I'll recall my comparison of the towers first. My Def Techs produce more bass, however the bass from the EL towers are a lot smoother. I also prefer the tweeter in the EL towers much more than my Def Techs. I'm currently listening to my Def Techs and the highs are a bit more fatiguing than I would like. My Def Techs are $1199/ea retail and I honestly think the EL towers best them in almost every category. However, the Def Techs being bi-polar, I feel that they would have a better ability to fill a larger room. Without many hours in setup though, the Def Techs lacked the imaging abilities of the EL's. I find my Def Techs to be a bit punchy, this could be because of some of the settings I use, or simply because the Def Techs only use a 5 1/4" driver, although there are four drivers and two tweeters per speaker. One advantage to the Def Techs, would be the built in sub and amp. I found that by running my towers crossed at 80hz I can move the gain on the amps of my towers a little bit more to fit my taste a bit better. Perhaps for someone that likes to tweak a lot running a tower with a built in sub could be a plus. Overall, I think the EL series gets my vote, however, I would like to hear a set that is broken in and in a larger room, and running off a higher power amp like my XPA-5 @ 200w/c all channels driven.

Hey Justin,

Thanks for putting up your review/ comparison up.

Did you happen to see this:

http://blog.edesignaudio.com/?p=1295



A pair of EL8.3t's in a break room. They sure do know how to treat their employees.

Alex,

A little overdue, but here are a couple pics of the speaker stands in my room (please excuse the wires/cables... I need to get around to organizing them a little better)

You guys did a great job on the stands. BTW, the stands in this week's blog look very familiar.


For anyone interested, these stands were built custom to my desire dimensions, with a hollow center column with a close bottom that allows for sand filling. The top plates match the dimensions of my Energy RC-10 speakers, and the base plates are small enough to not stick out (allowing me to pull the speakers/stands further forward), but big enough for stability. These were finished in eD's new satin black, which turned out very nice.

Very happy with these stands...although if I had it to do over, I probably would've gone with adjustable spikes instead of the rubber feet (same as those used on the subs), since it seems the floor under the carpet isn't perfectly flat. Still, sand filled the stands are very stable.

I definitely recommend eD if you're looking to have some custom stands made.

Hi guys I currently have Polk monitor 70 as front and cs2 as center and they sound too bright specially at higher
Volumes. Is it a good idea to change to Ed A towers with 6mtm center!

The stands look great with the Energy speakers on top. Doing some form of an adjustable spike can be done. If you want the thread size, just let us know.


The new A6 speakers are very similar in design to the older A6 products, but built in the USA using a better wood material and substantially more bracing.

So the reviews you see in the thread about the speakers being very detailed but laid back will hold true for the new line as well.

I thought you guys might like to see some production photographs we put in the blog.





These are the A6.t and A6.mtm's that are now being built here in Iowa.

Thanks Alex I just placed the order online

No problem Amit.

If you have any questions, please let us know.

Alex, I did see that. I must admit I was a bit jealous. It would be nice to work for a company that TRULY appreciated their employees.

Sorry I didn't see a reply sooner. Kinda took a break from the forums for a bit. I figured that I would come get this thread going.

I am very excited to be a proud owner of the full EL series speakers, and the A6's (older version). I must admit, these A6 6T6 towers do a very good job. Definitely worth the money. Last night Val and I both agree that the new version of these 6T6's sound better. It's not something that we could really put our finger on, but it was noticeable.

I haven't been able to get the dual 650's out of my head though. I am a bit cautious though after seeing what it was doing in your demo room, my walls are pretty thin and certainly not double braced. If I bought another 650, I would compare it to owning a Porsche but never being able to go faster than 70mph.

I think inside I am jumping in anticipation of seeing some photos of the EL's coming to life. Definitely an exciting time!

So this thread has been dead for a few months...

I'm considering an eD set up and would like to know people's thoughts.

I'm looking at getting the A6.t Towers and the A6.mtm for the Center. What are the feelings of those that have this front 3? My room is roughly 20x25x9 and the $600 for these is pretty much my budget for the front. I'l be using the BIC v1220 and old satellites until I upgrade to the A2 300 and A4.b's.

Thanks for the help.

I have the 6T6 towers and MTM center in my living room. THe 6T6's are the older model of towers. Just different cabinet design. I think they're well worth the money. I've had the living room torn apart and haven't had the speakers set up in there lately, but should have it going again next week.

I also used the 6T6's and MTM in my dedicated room for quite some time. I think they're more than adequate, but you will need a sub to get the lower frequency stuff. Good detail, not fatiguing.....I enjoyed their sound quite a bit.