10-year-old Revel Salon2 ?

[steve59]

Lsc, I know what you mean. I went on avs forum with my problem and some salon 2 owners thought I was trolling, many thought it was a room node but when I explained the salon1 had no problems in the deep bass in the same spot I asked revel support via email and they only recommended 500 watts per channel. Considering the number of owners that do fine with less power I have to blame the room. After my experience I like to let potential buyers know my experience, especially on this forum where revel is held in such high regard.

 

[Lsc]

I saw that, and commented.

Just a little hard to believe a company with aspirations to be anything other than just ordinary would be so short sighted to not provide spare parts for loudspeakers that cost as much as they do.

I'm disgusted with the anecdotes in relation to the lack of spare parts these days. But it's all changing, back to the way it was.

In the meantime, anyone buying should get a guarantee in writing ensuring reasonable access to an ongoing availability of replacement parts. Just like the auto industry.

Unfortunately, there are bad experiences and good experiences.

My experience with Revel service have been mostly outstanding. I blew a midrange on my F208 and the dealer was dragging their feet for whatever reason. I contacted Revel and they sent me the midrange within 3 days. Also, I bought a pair of F12 from my buddy where the grills were bowed out (guess it’s a common problem) and Revel sent me 2 new ones - out of warranty period.

My only ho-him experience is when I sold my C208, I didn’t have one of the two binding post jumpers. I contacted Revel and they said they are out of parts with no eta or anything. I understand it’s the Covid era but due to my 2 great experiences with good people on the other end, this was a let down. Maybe it’s a trend?

Still the good outweighed the bad, so far.

 

[Lsc]

Lsc, I know what you mean. I went on avs forum with my problem and some salon 2 owners thought I was trolling, many thought it was a room node but when I explained the salon1 had no problems in the deep bass in the same spot I asked revel support via email and they only recommended 500 watts per channel. Considering the number of owners that do fine with less power I have to blame the room. After my experience I like to let potential buyers know my experience, especially on this forum where revel is held in such high regard.

I understand what you mean. I guess that’s why some people insist on in home demo. Although my personal experience has been that the speaker I listen at the dealer usually sounds worse at home bc I don’t have a $30000 front end driving them

 

[blueone]

My Salon2 that I bought used looks like it’s about 10 years old as it’s made in the USA. It looked flawless when I got it and it still looks brand new. More importantly, the bass from my Salon2 is thundering. The scale and dynamics is incredible and it also has the accuracy and clarity with no listening fatigue. Female vocals, male vocals, strings, organs, guitars, drums, you name it…it sounds amazing on the salons.

Yes, there could be a possibility of it being room dependent or it could possibly have been setup dependent. So, while you may get feedback that’s less than a 10, for me these speakers will hopefully last a long time. At least until salon3 comes out .

This is exactly what I heard when I auditioned the Salon2s for the first time at a dealer. I was bowled over. Awesome bass too. Once I purchased them, I found the awesome bass was impractical to achieve in my room unless I placed the Salon2s closer to the back wall than I wanted for best imaging. After much hand-wringing and placement experimentation, I finally added a subwoofer with DSP capabilities to fill in dips at my listening seat while running the Salon2s full-range. I also experimented with multiple subs using a crossover at various frequencies, but some solo piano recordings didn't sound quite right that way. (I'm a fanatic about that.) The whole experience did turn me into a must-have subwoofers person, but the room dependency for bass with the Salon2s seems magnified compared to other speakers in the same rooms, and I don't know the technical reasons for why that would be the case. In fact, I thought the downward-firing port on the Salon2s would make them less room-dependent than other speakers, but that wasn't what I found.

My Salon2s are in their 12th year, and they still look and sound like new. I've listened to many other speakers in a similar or greater price range over the years, but none of them got me to splurge and move the Salon2s out of my music system. (I'll never sell them. I'll just move them into the L/R positions in our HT room.)

 

[steve59]

I want to add my experience with revel support. In 2015 I emailed asking about replacement drivers for the salon 1 as I was considering a used pair and by the end of the week I was responded to with a detailed reply stating their suppliers still had replacements for everything but the rear tweeter, I gave them an A for that. Before I listed my salon 2 I emailed support with a concern that there was some discoloration on a couple woofers, like somebody used a solvent to clean them. I got a PHONE CALL from a revel engineer telling me KV handed him a woofer from a salon2 and told the man to use every cleaning product he could find on the cone and surround and basically try to wreck it. This tech patiently named a half dozen products he used and said I didn't have to worry about reselling a damaged product because the titanium is pretty robust and some slight color variation from the manufacture process is normal. A++ You can say whatever you want about revel, I have issues with their single speaker testing, but the integrity of the staff at revel is in good hands. Kef only guarantees replacement drivers for their reference speakers for 10 years, so industry normal I think revel goes above.

 

[Lsc]

This is exactly what I heard when I auditioned the Salon2s for the first time at a dealer. I was bowled over. Awesome bass too. Once I purchased them, I found the awesome bass was impractical to achieve in my room unless I placed the Salon2s closer to the back wall than I wanted for best imaging. After much hand-wringing and placement experimentation, I finally added a subwoofer with DSP capabilities to fill in dips at my listening seat while running the Salon2s full-range. I also experimented with multiple subs using a crossover at various frequencies, but some solo piano recordings didn't sound quite right that way. (I'm a fanatic about that.) The whole experience did turn me into a must-have subwoofers person, but the room dependency for bass with the Salon2s seems magnified compared to other speakers in the same rooms, and I don't know the technical reasons for why that would be the case. In fact, I thought the downward-firing port on the Salon2s would make them less room-dependent than other speakers, but that wasn't what I found.

My Salon2s are in their 12th year, and they still look and sound like new. I've listened to many other speakers in a similar or greater price range over the years, but none of them got me to splurge and move the Salon2s out of my music system. (I'll never sell them. I'll just move them into the L/R positions in our HT room.)

I had a similar experience when I bought the F208. I told my buddy that these sounded way better at the dealer probably because their front end was probably in the $20-30k range as they had the studio2 right next to it and moved the F208 in that room to compare for me…while I had the Emotiva UMC-200 and XPR5.

I agree that because the Salon2’s bass goes so low that you have to worry about the room, peaks and nulls. I’m also very very careful with subwoofer integration where there is no midbass suckout and the midbass - low bass transition is smooth and not a big bump on the bottom end.

After these forum comments yesterday, I decided to turn off the sub and listened to various music for about 2-3 hours between last night and today. The top to bottom balance is so good on these salons. I love the fact that even without a sub, you get the power, weight and speed. It throws such a big sound yet you hear every little detail while everything sounding so natural and effortless. Also, it doesn’t seem to matter whether you have the grills on or off (I quickly put all the grills on when my son has friends over). I recall for the F208 and F228Be, there is a clear difference when the grill is on or off. For best results = no grill.

 

[jonfitch]

With the current inflation most used goods are too expensive. I bought a pair of used Salon 2s in 2011 for around $7,000. During the global financial crisis we had a lot of deflation and retail sales took a good 7 years to get back to trend from 2009 highs. These days used goods all costs too much in my opinion.

 

[paulgyro]

With the current inflation most used goods are too expensive. I bought a pair of used Salon 2s in 2011 for around $7,000. During the global financial crisis we had a lot of deflation and retail sales took a good 7 years to get back to trend from 2009 highs. These days used goods all costs too much in my opinion.

I certainly agree you need to get creative for best placement but there are practical limits to what we can do so having the tweeter height spec would be very helpful.

 

[Vintage57]

With a budget of 10k you should seriously check the Neumann KH420, and you won't need a power amp at all.

I paid 8k for mine open box full warranty

 

[nerdoldnerdith]

Hello and thank you for having a look at this,

I have an opportunity to purchase a 10-year-old pair of Salon2 in good condition for roughly half the list price.
I am looking for new high-end loudspeakers - a major, long-term purchase for me - and did not consider this model because : too expensive, somewhat older design nearing end of sales, and most likely unavailable at this time in Europe.
Still, this is uncommon enough here to at least contemplate the possibility.

Does anyone have an idea of how well these speakers hold over time ? What kind of useful life expectancy am I looking at ?
Also, I'd be interested in experiences good and bad with Revel after-sales/servicing in Europe... if any: their presence here seem tenuous at best.

Thanks !

Good speaker design is timeless. The Revel Salon2 is one of the best engineered passive loudspeakers money can buy. If it were possible to improve upon its design Revel would have already done so. As it stands it is among the best speakers I have heard, and I have heard a lot of speakers, including those costing $100,000+.

 

[steve59]

I guess if you listened to 6 figure speakers and say the salon2 are the best then it has to be true. You must be right about revel not being able to improve on the sound since their cheaper speakers sound as good or better in dbt.

 

[nerdoldnerdith]

I guess if you listened to 6 figure speakers and say the salon2 are the best then it has to be true. You must be right about revel not being able to improve on the sound since their cheaper speakers sound as good or better in dbt.

Why the sarcasm? And why are there so many people here hostile to the notion that we can judge loudspeakers by listening to them? I know what I am doing when I listen to an audio system. I know what good sound is.

Revel has never published a double-blind test in which one of their other speakers bested the Salon2. Kevin Voeks, the marketing guy for Revel, said that the F328Be is better in some respects, but there is no evidence that it is a better speaker overall in terms of listener preference. He has an incentive to upsell the F328Be given that the Salon2 is being discontinued because it is no longer profitable to produce.

Revel would not have gone through all the effort to design a cost-no-object speaker like the Salon2 with expensive design elements like a hand-sculpted baffle if such a design could be beaten by something designed to fit within a budget like the F328Be.

 

[Nicolas]

Thought I'd let you know what I ended up doing:
I realized I wasn't comfortable with the notion of purchasing 10 years old speakers for that kind of money, so I let go of the pair that prompted this thread.
I wasn't done with the Salon2 however, and another opportunity presented itself recently: 5 years, pristine state and the finish I liked best for roughly the same price, so I bought those (apparently a few years' difference was all it took).

Right or wrong, the Salon2 are my idea of an extremely well designed/executed passive speaker, and that is something I wished to experience (for me that means live with for a good while).
This may end up not being what I am looking for, and if it comes to that I will sell them and turn to other -much cheaper- options (likely big Neumann/Genelecs or maybe even a line array that I could have the satisfaction to build myself). But I think I will be content to have tried such a "dream" setup.

Anyway, thank you all for your inputs on this matter. I am certainly looking forward to what's coming in terms of sound, once I deal with that room...

 

[steve59]

Why the sarcasm? And why are there so many people here hostile to the notion that we can judge loudspeakers by listening to them? I know what I am doing when I listen to an audio system. I know what good sound is.

Revel has never published a double-blind test in which one of their other speakers bested the Salon2. Kevin Voeks, the marketing guy for Revel, said that the F328Be is better in some respects, but there is no evidence that it is a better speaker overall in terms of listener preference. He has an incentive to upsell the F328Be given that the Salon2 is being discontinued because it is no longer profitable to produce.

Revel would not have gone through all the effort to design a cost-no-object speaker like the Salon2 with expensive design elements like a hand-sculpted baffle if such a design could be beaten by something designed to fit within a budget like the F328Be.

I completely agree with buying what you like by how it sounds. I don't appreciate somebody telling me what they like is absolute and I think revel posted results where the f208 matched the salon 2 and the f228 bested it in some comparisons. On that I don't agree because because when I bought a dealers salon 2's he put the f228be in the same place with the same gear and I found the f228 cabinets kept pulling my attention back to them while the salon 2 did a much better disappearing act.

 

[steve59]

Congrats on your purchase of the salon 2 speakers. I think with sufficient power they could last you a lifetime.

 

[Koeitje]

I saw that, and commented.

Just a little hard to believe a company with aspirations to be anything other than just ordinary would be so short sighted to not provide spare parts for loudspeakers that cost as much as they do.

I'm disgusted with the anecdotes in relation to the lack of spare parts these days. But it's all changing, back to the way it was.

In the meantime, anyone buying should get a guarantee in writing ensuring reasonable access to an ongoing availability of replacement parts. Just like the auto industry.

Revel has got a shit presence all across Europe. The same goes for JBL. Just go to the Dutch website and you only get headphones and Bluetooth speakers. No hifi speakers, no pro-audio, no synthesis.

 

[jhaider]

I think revel posted results where the f208 matched the salon 2 and the f228 bested it in some comparisons.

Studio2, not Salon2.

 

[sarumbear]

I completely agree with buying what you like by how it sounds. I don't appreciate somebody telling me what they like is absolute and I think revel posted results where the f208 matched the salon 2 and the f228 bested it in some comparisons. On that I don't agree because because when I bought a dealers salon 2's he put the f228be in the same place with the same gear and I found the f228 cabinets kept pulling my attention back to them while the salon 2 did a much better disappearing act.

I own a pair of Salon2. I have auditioned, in my room, for a week, both F328Be and F228Be comparing them to the Salon2, at the same time. (I asked a friend to help me moving them!)

Both are great speakers, however to me at least, Salon2 is an awesome speaker, the only speaker so far I cannot fault. Interestingly, I liked F228Be more as F328Be was a bit boomy.

 

[paulgyro]

Studio2, not Salon2.

Do you have a link to the referenced comparison?

 

[Nicolas]

Revel has got a shit presence all across Europe. The same goes for JBL. Just go to the Dutch website and you only get headphones and Bluetooth speakers. No hifi speakers, no pro-audio, no synthesis.

Indeed. Although the Revel benelux distributor (located in the Netherlands) apparently has a decent show-room and most hifi speakers on demo.