Yes but still match to the R series in terms of distortion and directivity. But if we ignore the KEF, ELAC is not a bad speaker at all.
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The "other" German Speaker Manufacturers (Canton, Magnat, Heco, Quadral, ...) - Where do they stand?
- Thread starter Gurkerl
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The passive R7 $2450/ea is more than twice the price of the active Navis at $2000/pair. The Navis (I listed because you said there were no Elac coax speakers) has, quoting from their website:
- Tri-Amp Pure Analog Amplifier, employing three separate amps for each transducer: a 160-watt BASH AB amplifier for the woofer, a 100-watt BASH AB amplifier for the midrange, and a 40-watt Class AB amplifier for the tweeter.
- Local inputs include balanced XLR, RCA and Wireless, when used with ELAC’s Discovery Connect wireless transmitter to stream Discovery, Spotify Connect, Bluetooth, AirPlay and Roon
Not having to buy an amp and being able to stream represents a very good deal. The additional $3000 dollars could buy a nice music server or subwoofer if one wanted. The specs speak for themselves.
BrokenEnglishGuy
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May be more fair to compare a floorstanding vs floorstanding?
Navi floorstanding it's at 5399 vs 4500 R7
Not a expert on these specs but here is another report on the active and streaming featured Elac Navis ARF-51 active floorstander now sold at $2000/ea 80% of the passive KEF. So thanks for the correction; the bookshelf Navis is $2k/pr . ARF-51 was one tested in the German publication posted by Crosstalk. Also not trying to pick a fight. I don't own the KEF or Elacs.
www.hifinews.com
ELAC Navis ARF-51 Active Loudspeaker Lab Report
Lab Report Achieving a smooth treble response is a familiar issue with concentric drive unit arrays. The cone of the midrange section forms a horn for the tweeter, and finding a cone and roll surround profile which provides good control of cone breakup behaviour while also loading the tweeter...
www.hifinews.com
with R7 you can choose a better quality amp with more SNR and use DSP to tune it your needs. Distortion like you always say is important when it comes to eq. ELAC is better than other German brands alteast
but Geithain with only 15 inch woofers has this advantage. But consider their price. They are way more expensive. Dollar to dollar, a comparable bookshelf geitian has no advantage over KEf r sereis.
If you open up a canton you see no quality advantage over a KEF. I had a Vento 896 and the woofers were made of plastic and cables were were the cheapest possible ones inside. The Crossover was well made, but again with very basic components. The cabins rattled all the time with bass, although it wasnt audibly distorting anything. So, I wont equate made in Germany to quality when it comes to audio.
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It's not just quality of the product (though the sound was indeed favourable and Vento measurements I can find are good), but also the probable working conditions of the company in a region that is more inclined towards good working conditions.
Plastic frames, cable price and "basic components" does not relate to quality and reliability and all. Focus less on appearances and materials.
Cabinets "rattling all the time" seem entirely common unless extreme measures like constrained layer damping, bracing, use of extreme enclosure materials like aluminium are used. The glossy and curved cabinets aren't easy to manufacture. I thought them adequately dead acoustically - this was the .2 series. Frankly it seems like you are dismissing a speaker design based on very flawed heuristics.
BrokenEnglishGuy
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What does mean cabinet rattling all the time?
My r7s are layer damping + bracing and i don't hear any weird thing.. only the drivers making sound not the cabinet, even at high spl
R Series is totally inert in that respect. Canton's cabinets vibrate with bass, but it doesnt create audible artifacts though. The inert cabins of canton are only on the reference K series. But again, like you pointed earlier, all cantons have 3% distortion at 2-3khz which is audible. I would completely ignore this company's product line unless they fix this. Idiot reviewers dnt hear it somehow.! Thats the part where ASR helps. I am pretty sure the vento will not get good reviews here when amir measures them... !
Modern speakers like KEF do not rattle at the same price.
BrokenEnglishGuy
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Im not sure why these References bookshelfs/floorstanding have the same 2khz~3khz distortion, i saw the Reference 9k 8k 7k with the same kind of high distortion, i would accept it only in their 2-way bookshelf, but in their 3-way floorstanding? nope..
well, maybe that's the reason why canton doesn't say anything about distortion in their specs..
all cantons below this range has the same problem. This was their top most floorstanders below their Reference series until recently.
From the response I think they are using the exact same crossover until Reference 1 K between midrange and tweeter, or their ceramic tweeter design is flawed totally. For less (see the sticker price of Canton here !!!!! ) buy the KEF or ELAC or something else get done with it.
BUT SEE THE HYPOCRISY IN STEREOPLAYS PREFERENCE RATING; They know the Canton is worse from measurements but they still rate it high for normal people who do not understand the meaurement.
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BrokenEnglishGuy
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To be honest i was interested in Canton's until i saw how these measures in distortion..
I notice Canton launch a new Vento series and changed the ceramic thing
now the drivers are Titanium Graphit
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No reference K series is still Ceramic Tungsten drivers+Ceramic Tweeters- everything similar materials.(Their top of the line) The Vento sereis sits below them. They never had ceramic drivers instead it was titanium+Ceramic tweeters. The older vento Series had Aluminium+Ceramic tweeters. Even older Vento - Alumium+ Aluminium Tweeters. Now new one has Titanium Graphite+ Ceramic tweeters. All cantons cross at 3khz.
Vento 80x series - Aluminum Drivers + Alu Tweeters + Front port
Vento 8x0 series - Aluminum Drivers + Alu Tweeters - Downfiring port
Vento 8x0.2 series - Aluminum Drivers + Ceramic Tweeters - Downfiring port
Vento 8x6 series - Titanium Drivers + Ceramic Tweeters - Downfiring port
Vento 8x6.2 series - Titanium Drivers(Screws of drivers covered) + Ceramic Tweeters - Downfiring port(Improvement somewhere as bass extension is better)
Vento 30, 90 ... (2022 Series) Titanium Graphit + Ceramic tweeters again
Reference series historically was alumium + aluminum , then aluminum + Ceramic and then now Ceramic + Ceramic.
Subjective people who thinks Ceramic drivers are superior will think they are getting a bargain, as even diy ceramic drivers you can buy are very expensive(for no reason, checkout brands like accuton)https://www.lautsprechershop.de/hifi/accuton_en.htm
Apparently most canton drivers have double magnets in Reference K series. So most people who do not look measuremets think , oh I am getting a better magnet, I am getting a better material cone, better designed cabinet for the price. I think subjective reviews should be banned!
BrokenEnglishGuy
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Hope they improve the 2khz-3khz peak distortion, i don't know if it's the tweeter or their mid range, the crossover it's at 3000khz so it's hard to tell
But it's canton problem not the material, for example the accuton mid range ceramic doesn't have that problem
It could be their crossover design too may be drivers themselves may not be that bad. I still don't get it why reviewers (every single German magazine) rate them over KEF despite its clear from measurements that they are flawed in comparison.
BrokenEnglishGuy
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Well, Canton is from Germany so it's not rare that german magazines put these german speaker very well, Whathifi always like Kef speakers
But measurements speak for themself, for example here you can clearly see:
F3 48HZ
F6 42HZ
while Stereode claim Reference 9k F3 at 31hz, wow !!! a bookshelf who plays like a subwoofer.. but their towers cannot play as their bookshelf? lol
These measurementes are low quality, at 3khz stereode claim 0.1% of distortion Canton 9k, which is fake like their sub bass output. The distortion at 3khz@90dB it's about 1,2-1,5%.
If we look another review from stereode, Canton reference 8k.
The floorstanding have less sub bass? also the distortion at 3khz it's 0.3% vs 0,1% from Reference 9k.
The r11 have 82% vs canton 8k 81%
In stereoplay, way better measurements than stereode
Kef r7 score 3200 euros:
Canton 7k 5200 euros:
60 vs 61, maybe the R11 have 61 of score because the r11 have a little bit of more sub bass than r7.
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stereo.de's measurements are not accurate. See 896.2(haha... Timing , what a joke, we know its nonsense already from the other thread!)-. Also see the lower Cutoff of both measured by two different sites! Again would distortion change with the usage of different amplifiers they used for testing. Both never mentioned what did they use for testing.
I think if they had rated KEF lower, someone would have sued them as its provable. I think even though they may not like it, i think they were pressured to give Kef good ratings as measurements speaks for KEF always. Also 81% for Canton 8k which is a tiny tower vs R11 (82%) is soemthing hard to digest. How can a tiny tower be so close in technically to a large tower like R11? I guess from this I think we can safely say many of those companies listed as top players here arent performing on measurements and nothing beats the KEF imo in terms of technical advancement.
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