Daniele Cohen from Alsyvox visits Rhapsody.Audio

[Taiko Audio]

Hi LL21,

I do get that, I’ve owned subs since I was 12 years old, but I can virtually guarantee you will not give them another thought with these ribbons. You will really need to hear (and feel) these to believe

 

[LL21]

Thank you. You're expertise is so well regarded, I have to admit I am extremely open minded. As someone who uses the Kaleidescape to watch action flicks, and who is currently listening to deep house...i am skeptical. Even with the mighty Rockport Arrakis, I would still use a sub...which Arnie has done with 2 REL Sub towers of 3 stacked subs for each tower...all of them rolling off between 23 and 28hz apparently. And I just asked Duke Lejeune about 3 stacked subs with dual 18" each...2000 square inches of sub cone power. ... but i guess that's what the 2nd Carvaggio panel is for!

 

[Taiko Audio]

That is an interesting looking product, I can’t check the media section, it returns “The Kaleidescape Store is unavailable in your territory.” Are those just 4K movies or do they provide something extra? It reads like they do. I’m a big movie fan, hence my interest. I used to be one of those guys spending days on calibrating those old Barco CRT beamers. For ground shaking bass and impact my favorites scenes are War of the worlds, the lightning strikes and the initial machine surfacing. U-571 as a golden oldie of course, Star Trek the beginning initial scene perhaps, that digs so low it triggers the DC input protection of my Heisenberg monoblocks.
6*18” woofers each side(?) would indeed get you close to the Carvaggio full woofer sfa!

 

[LL21]

That is an interesting looking product, I can’t check the media section, it returns “The Kaleidescape Store is unavailable in your territory.” Are those just 4K movies or do they provide something extra? It reads like they do. I’m a big movie fan, hence my interest. I used to be one of those guys spending days on calibrating those old Barco CRT beamers. For ground shaking bass and impact my favorites scenes are War of the worlds, the lightning strikes and the initial machine surfacing. U-571 as a golden oldie of course, Star Trek the beginning initial scene perhaps, that digs so low it triggers the DC input protection of my Heisenberg monoblocks.
6*18” woofers each side(?) would indeed get you close to the Carvaggio full woofer sfa!

Interesting story...i had been piling up DVDs and Blu-Rays until i realized a server made a lot more sense. I am not a videophile so a simple server seemed like a good solution. Eventually, i went by my local audio dealer, and he recommended either something super-simple...or the Kaleidescape. I decided to try it...and what i found was that it is not about the storage or quality...both of which seem excellent to me. Its the interface...the entire screen is a random selection of your entire movie collection by cover...you move over to one movie, and it automatically shifts all of the other movies around it to show similar movies based on your criteria...star, genre, etc.

Although we have a few hundred movies only, we have already rediscovered our film collection in a whole new way. it automatically goes straight to the film, cuts out all the ads, etc...they have really polished the presentation and interface. And despite the fact that i did not think it would be 'worth it'...we kept it and shockingly have watched more movies in the last 3 months than in the last 6 years combined just because we flick to our fav films of old, watch our favorite scenes...and watch another one. I really enjoy it.

As for B-A-S-S...do you genuinely think/know that the REL 6-stack and the Caravaggio woofer panel have comparable skills? i have to say...THAT is interesting, particularly given how one can set them up diagonally to be more efficient...i had always understood that punch your chest deep bass that rattles your pant legs was the domain of cones. And while I am reallly not a rattle-your-pant-leg-go-til-you-go-deaf-bass guy (at all)...i DO appreciate how a system that CAN do that sounds when played at normal volumes...effortless, spacious.

Look forward to learning more until we can actually hear one...

 

[moby2004]

That is an interesting looking product, I can’t check the media section, it returns “The Kaleidescape Store is unavailable in your territory.” Are those just 4K movies or do they provide something extra? It reads like they do. I’m a big movie fan, hence my interest. I used to be one of those guys spending days on calibrating those old Barco CRT beamers. For ground shaking bass and impact my favorites scenes are War of the worlds, the lightning strikes and the initial machine surfacing. U-571 as a golden oldie of course, Star Trek the beginning initial scene perhaps, that digs so low it triggers the DC input protection of my Heisenberg monoblocks.
6*18” woofers each side(?) would indeed get you close to the Carvaggio full woofer sfa!

Sorry to jump in in this conversation but pls Emile do us a favour and with your fantastic skills build us an SGM Extreme video server !

 

[Taiko Audio]

Sorry to jump in in this conversation but pls Emile do us a favour and with your fantastic skills build us an SGM Extreme video server !

I'm considering that!

 

[Taiko Audio]

@LL21 Sounds a bit like what Roon does for exploring music!

As for bass. The 20Hz is a flat frequency response number. Your room is however going to dominate low frequency response. For example, the Botticelli measures flat to 22Hz. But in my room, measured at the seating position relative to 1KHz these are the numbers:
23Hz 0dB
22Hz -0.6dB
20Hz -2.6dB
18Hz -5.7dB
16Hz -8.9dB
13Hz -14dB
10Hz -20dB
So I'm actually not far off the factory specs in room. The Carvaggio full having ~2.5 times the woofer sfa should be capable to load the room even more efficiently at 10Hz as you simply need to move copious amounts of air there. I do have some doubts if my measuring microphone can actually capture 10Hz accurately but the ribbons are moving, I'm feeling it, so it's there. Something eerie about this subterranean information is it creates these effects where you suddenly pause the music thinking somebody dropped something heavy outside of your room to find out its actually in your music

As for powered cone subwoofers we have a difference, you can set the crossover point at a low value and boost the output to get relative more output in that zone to try to work against your natural room roll off. My REL Gibraltar G1 subwoofers for example had 12dB/octave filters, so you could set it to 20Hz, giving you -12dB at 40Hz, then boost the volume by 12dB and force increased sub 40Hz output by pumping hundreds of watts into it. The Velodynes I think had 24dB/octave filters so you could relatively speaking get even more boost there, the Velodynes would sound a bit cleaner doing that as this all comes with massive distortion, an easy 10-20%, which goes less noticed at lower frequencies, so the steeper rolloff helps there. The Rels however did a much better job at blending in with the mains so I much preferred those. In my room however, neither of them were able to load the room even close to Botticelli levels, so you'd indeed need to stack them to create subwoofer towers.

I should add at this point that there are 2 ways you can use the Carvaggio woofers. You can parallel them to have 2 woofers working in parallel up to 500Hz, but you can also split them into 1 going up to 70Hz, and the other doing 70-500Hz. These are 6dB / octave filtered woofers so the 70-500Hz woofer would be 6dB down at 35Hz, 12dB at 17.5Hz, 18dB at 8.75Hz, so it would still increase low bass output used that way, it also gives you the option to increase output on the up to 70Hz subwoofer by for example 1dB still giving you a flat upper bass but increased deep bass output. What you can do playing with this is get that hit the stomach gunshots from John Wick 3 for example as that is not a real subterranean bass event.

 

[Zero000]

Pumping LF test signals into the bass panel will cause immense excursions and stress the speaker clamps, ribbon etc. Watching it is quite an event. Be careful don't go too loud.

While planar magnetics will go really low, the problem they have is creating a loud really low. They simply cannot compete with long throw woofers when it comes to high decibel LF output. But don't get me wrong they can still do a pretty good job. Satisfactory for most

People should be aware of this I think, if they aren't already

 

[Taiko Audio]

Pumping LF test signals into the bass panel will cause immense excursions and stress the speaker clamps, ribbon etc. Watching it is quite an event. Be careful don't go too loud.

While planar magnetics will go really low, the problem they have is creating a loud really low. They simply cannot compete with long throw woofers when it comes to high decibel LF output. But don't get me wrong they can still do a pretty good job. Satisfactory for most

People should be aware of this I think, if they aren't already

While that was surely true for Apogees and similarly constructed planars, I’ll just leave it at, 95dB at a 1W input at 20Hz for the Caravaggio.

You will not break them btw, they are limited to a 20mm xmax at which point the ribbons will hit the perforated steel sheets, which you are going to hear of course but thats it. They are not going to overheat, there are no voice coils in a confined space. The ribbons have a massive cooling area.

Still they sound different of course. As always in hi-fi, auditioning is highly recommended

 

[Zero000]

Well some modern Apogees don't use wooden clamps anymore, and are rather better put together to say the least. So they will take a pounding and I see no reason why the Alsyvox would be superior to these.

Whatever. Without comparative death testing to see which speaker dies first under extreme stress there's no real argument.

 

[Taiko Audio]

I’m not going to get there, I can honestly only suffer through 2-3 tracks maximum at a 105-106dB SPL in room, C weighted, before my ears start shutting down. The Botticellis are still having an easy time then.

 

[spiritofmusic]

So Emile, are the 4- and 6-panel Alsyvox not necessarily for deeper bass, just for maintaining as extended bass in way much bigger rooms than yrs? Or does each of the bigger systems really up (or down, deep down Lol) the ante on sub-20Hz?

 

[Taiko Audio]

I’d say just to fill larger spaces as far as bass goes. The Botticelli can drive rooms from 25 to 100m2 spaces, the Caravaggio 50 to150m2, the Michelangelo 80 to even larger.

The Caracaggio single panel is not much more powerful then the Botticelli but it’s a 4 way which adds a patent pending dual midrange ribbon with a surface area exceeding that of a 15” cone. This translates into lower distortion. Moving up to the 2 panel Caravaggio then gives you the option to go 5 way by having 1 bass panel up to 70Hz and one from 70-500Hz. These will sum for a significant part as they just utilize 1st order crossover slopes. But you can also choose to just drive the woofers in parallel. You can also power the dedicated subwoofer panels separately if you really want to.

 

[LL21]

So Emile, are the 4- and 6-panel Alsyvox not necessarily for deeper bass, just for maintaining as extended bass in way much bigger rooms than yrs? Or does each of the bigger systems really up (or down, deep down Lol) the ante on sub-20Hz?

I’d say just to fill larger spaces as far as bass goes. The Botticelli can drive rooms from 25 to 100m2 spaces, the Caravaggio 50 to150m2, the Michelangelo 80 to even larger.

The Caracaggio single panel is not much more powerful then the Botticelli but it’s a 4 way which adds a patent pending dual midrange ribbon with a surface area exceeding that of a 15” cone. This translates into lower distortion. Moving up to the 2 panel Caravaggio then gives you the option to go 5 way by having 1 bass panel up to 70Hz and one from 70-500Hz. These will sum for a significant part as they just utilize 1st order crossover slopes. But you can also choose to just drive the woofers in parallel. You can also power the dedicated subwoofer panels separately if you really want to.

Somehow, I have to imagine 4-6 panel Alsyvox ABSOLUTELY ups the ante on big bass, spaciousness, scale (ie subterranean bass...how else could anyone look at adding dual stacks of 6 REL subs to an Arrakis which is a similar concept?

 

[Taiko Audio]

Yeah agree, it is why I bought those Wilson XS subs initially, 2*18” each in a huge enclosure, those went well below 20Hz without DSP.

Imho though you should consider these if you want truly state of the art bass. Even the Focal Utopias sound muddy, slow and dirty next to this. And the Rels and Velodynes did versus the Utopias. You can get massive bass, more then sufficient for movies, a heck of a lot cheaper.

 

[Zero000]

I’m not going to get there, I can honestly only suffer through 2-3 tracks maximum at a 105-106dB SPL in room, C weighted, before my ears start shutting down. The Botticellis are still having an easy time then.

That's loud. But try a test tone of pure 23Hz and then see what you get. Nowhere near it is the answer.

Don't get me wrong from what I heard I think the Caravaggio are phenomenal speakers. Honesty is always the best policy, though.

Planar magnetic bass is hard to beat in terms of articulation and speed. Very hard for other technologies to match those two parameters.

 

[Taiko Audio]

i just have to ask, where did you hear them?

 

[Esotar]

That's loud. But try a test tone of pure 23Hz and then see what you get. Nowhere near it is the answer.

Don't get me wrong from what I heard I think the Caravaggio are phenomenal speakers. Honesty is always the best policy, though.

Planar magnetic bass is hard to beat in terms of articulation and speed. Very hard for other technologies to match those two parameters.

I don't know whose opinion is right.

But I'll order Alsyvox Botticelli X instead of Goebel, Magico, Tidal....

 

[Taiko Audio]

I don't know whose opinion is right.

Plenty of opinions If anybody wants to hear them, when it’s a bit safer in the world, you are more then welcome here in The Netherlands.

 

[Zero000]

i just have to ask, where did you hear them?

Hi-Fi Deluxe over the course of a number of visits to the room and a long chat with Daniele with Parmesan and Prosecco. I went on two separate days.

I spent two years working with an Apogee restorer building some bespoke speakers based on Apogee Duettas built to a much higher standard than Apogee achieved themselves. So naturally I was interested.