Magico Ultimate 3

[Al M.]

I hope you forgot the "rolling eyes" at the end of your sentence

I guess leaving that out was precisely the point .

You gotta love dry humor.

 

[christoph]

I guess leaving that out was precisely the point .

You gotta love dry humor.

This only works for us (regular) guys who more or less know each other (virtually) but imagine someone googling and finding that posting (not knowing Jeff and his love for Lamm tubes) and that poor guy ending up with Soul(less)lution and compression drivers icepicking his eardrums

 

[jeff1225]

I hope you forgot the "rolling eyes" at the end of your sentence

Yes....Bonzo gets me.

 

[jeff1225]

This only works for us (regular) guys who more or less know each other (virtually) but imagine someone googling and finding that posting (not knowing Jeff and his love for Lamm tubes) and that poor guy ending up with Soul(less)lution and compression drivers icepicking his eardrums

This system is like many I see on the internet. It’s almost if the buyer goes to the audio dealer and just asks for the most expensive component they sell regardless of system matching.

 

[spiritofmusic]

I guess leaving that out was precisely the point .

You gotta love dry humor.

Jeffrey was so seasick lolling his eyes that he just couldn't hit the right key.

 

[SeagoatLeo]

You must have gotten lucky. I have heard a system with Von Schweikert Ultra 11s and VAC 450s at AXPONA in 2017. The sound was unimpressively mediocre, shall we say. Just goes to show that you cannot necessarily expect great sound at a show. Nonetheless, some reviewers raved about the sound, which speaks to the honesty of reviewers, I guess.

I have no doubt that in more favorable circumstances, such as in a well set-up home setting, the sound from such a system will be vastly better.

The room used my recordings, American Percussion Socity, Paul Price - Breaking the Sound Barrier Vol.1 LP, Ramsey Lewis - Down to Earth CD, June Christy - Double CD This Song is June & Off-Beat I brought my wife to this show. The music sounded about like Harley describes the Ultimate III in 2008-in the room live musicians are performing. My wife was almost tearing up she loved the sound so much. I've been to a dozen shows and have a higher end (not SOTA) system and NEVER heard anything like this before or since. At $1+ million, it ought to do something right. It did nothing wrong but was in a huge ballroom size room.

I heard the VS 100(?) a few years earlier, similar size speaker in a large but regular size hotel room and it lacked the spark of reality (probably couldn't breathe). I could not use either speaker of that size in my listening room, unfortunately.

 

[SeagoatLeo]

The Ultimate was built as a custom design - Robert Hartley told us the full story in an article in TheAbsoluteSound in 2008. https://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/magico-ultimate-loudspeaker-1/

Wow, I vaguely remember reading about this, thanks. However, I am rather surprised that this large system with a quad of amps and who knows how much more gear was crammed into a 19 X 15 X 11 room, which is within 6" of my room dimensions. Shouldn't this system be played in a rather large room with 5000 + cu.ft minimum airspace? I could not imagine all that equipment/speakers in my room. Where would I sit? Just good for one chair? I also noticed the price has escalated by 3 times in 12 years. That's inflation but it is a unique and hugely expensive build.

 

[Alrainbow]

Imagine the cost of showing a speaker like that at an audio show. The room, the shipping, the number of people for the set up, the associated gear. Must be incredible.

Yes best to keep it a secret ...

 

[microstrip]

Solution amps and compression drivers, sounds like a match made in Heaven.

Probably with the help of the Crystal Absolute Dream cables! I have the Dreamline's and they are great - detailed and full bodied.

 

[jeff1225]

Probably with the help of the Crystal Absolute Dream cables! I have the Dreamline's and they are great - detailed and full bodied.

When you went to the store, did you simply ask for "the most expensive cables they had?"

 

[hvbias]

This speaker is totally different from Magico's retail lines of A, S, Q, M Did they think perfection is unrelated to their conventional designs? Wilson, Von Schweikert, B&W, Giya, YP Acoustics, Rockport all have top of the line speakers which are in line with their design philosophies.

I have always wondered this too, I started a thread asking why several years ago: https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/alon-wolf-why-horns-for-his-sota.13476/

 

[Rhapsody]

The Magico Ultimate was conceived close to 20 years ago and has been discontinued for some time. The flagship Magico product is the M9.

 

[microstrip]

You must have gotten lucky. I have heard a system with Von Schweikert Ultra 11s and VAC 450s at AXPONA in 2017. The sound was unimpressively mediocre, shall we say. Just goes to show that you cannot necessarily expect great sound at a show. Nonetheless, some reviewers raved about the sound, which speaks to the honesty of reviewers, I guess. (...)

Al. M,
What is the purpose of the last two lines of your comment? People often valuate differently the sound in shows, I find such comment on reviewers attitude very unfortunate and unfair.

 

[microstrip]

When you went to the store, did you simply ask for "the most expensive cables they had?"

No. I will tell you the story - in the good old days when Audiogon was a great and friendly forum where we could talk freely about high-end irrespective of price, I noticed that one of our current members used the Crystal Dreamline's with my long time favorite preamplifier, the Audio Research REF40 and an amplifier costing $350K. I exchanged a few emails with him concerning their sound quality that triggered my interest and when some used cables showed at a very nice price I got them. They are fabulous, and represent great value for money - the retail price was around one quarter of the price of the Transparent Audio Opus MM2 or Odin's. Curiously they are the intercoonects I am listening today.

 

[GuyB]

This only works for us (regular) guys who more or less know each other (virtually) but imagine someone googling and finding that posting (not knowing Jeff and his love for Lamm tubes) and that poor guy ending up with Soul(less)lution and compression drivers icepicking his eardrums

The soulution amps are among the most silent/quiet amps, if not the most silent/quiet amps on the market. This criteria is extremely important on very high efficiency speakers like the Magico Ultimate 3. They are also fluid and liquid, with no harshness. A good match therefore.

 

[Al M.]

Al. M,
What is the purpose of the last two lines of your comment? People often valuate differently the sound in shows, I find such comment on reviewers attitude very unfortunate and unfair.

Franciso,
In general, I trust some reviewers more than others. Not everything is fine in review land, and as Ron likes to point out, as he has done repeatedly on WBF, there is a lot of hyperbole in this business.

More specifically, I don't trust show reviews. Which reviewer wants to state that a very expensive system sounds just mediocre or even bad at a show? That is why negative reviews of show systems are practically non-existent, or at best, far and few between. I don't believe any of the raves about mega systems at shows.

You always portray an overly rosy view of the high end industry, as if it were a wholly noble undertaking. Yet just like in any human endeavor, there are bad apples and snake oil salesmen. There is a lot of good, but there is also bad. Denying that does not advance our hobby.

 

[jeff1225]

The soulution amps are among the most silent/quiet amps, if not the most silent/quiet amps on the market. This criteria is extremely important on very high efficiency speakers like the Magico Ultimate 3. They are also fluid and liquid, with no harshness. A good match therefore.

The Magico Ultimate was made with Ale compressions drivers. Ale drivers were never designed with the intent that they’d be used with solid state amps.

 

[GuyB]

The Magico Ultimate was made with Ale compressions drivers. Ale drivers were never designed with the intent that they’d be used with solid state amps.

Maybe, but it works.

 

[christoph]

They are also fluid and liquid, with no harshness. A good match therefore.

What speakers being driven by Soulution give/gave you that impression?

 

[GuyB]

What speakers being driven by Soulution give/gave you that impression?

All I used with: Magico, Kharma, Piega, B&W, Sonus Faber...