Ascend Acoustics sierra lx vs Revel m106 ? Thoughts ?

[norman bates]

The lx goes deeper on graphs..

Ascend Acoustics Sierra-1 V2 - Review & Measurements by Erin

If you go to spinorama and compare the Sierra 1 v2 to the LX, you can see exactly where the LX "thumps" the 1 V2.

www.audiosciencereview.com

and from TurtlePaul on the thread above post 91
"I own Revel speakers. They are very good. I have owned Ascend speakers in the past. If you look at Madisound, you can see the Seas Prestige Titan drivers, which Ascend uses a derivative of for the LX (with motor changes to the woofer) and the SB Acoustic aluminum drivers which Revel uses a derivative of in the Performa 3 series (with custom tweeter waveguides).

The Ascend Sierra LX and the Revel m106 are both 6” 2-way speakers which you can buy for <$1,500 a pair right now. On Madisound, drivers in the Ascend are $200 for the woofer and $93 for the tweeter. The drivers for the m106 are $85 for the woofer and $55 for the tweeter. You can see a similar parts list for Philharmonic (which I have also owned) which has a 3-way with ribbon tweeters for less than $2k. and can sell a 2-way bookshelf with the ceramic coated SB drivers for $850.

That is the difference of one needing dealer mark-up and one not. In my mind, audio dealers are going the way of travel agents."

I guess I'm curious if the ascend would be more revealing (do we have a graph for that ?) than the revel m106..............................

Like micro detail.................

 

[Matias]

LX goes significantly deeper and would be my choice. Other wise they measure similarly in dispersion.

Easily compare loudspeakers measurements

www.spinorama.org

 

[kyuu]

Are you planning to use these without a subwoofer? Then the Sierra LX is a great choice due to its decent extension. However, with a subwoofer the extension is unnecessary and they plainly traded sensitivity for extension here. For use with a subwoofer, there are better options. I would choose to get the CMT-340SE2 Mini Towers plus a subwoofer, myself, for example. Much better sensitivity, the dual woofers will almost certainly have better power handling (read: lower distortion), and enough extension to cross to a sub at ~80-90Hz.

I'm kind of disregarding the Revel M106 because they don't seem to be available much of anywhere anymore, and I'm not sure they're competitive these days at MSRP. At the sale prices you used to see, they were often a great option.

I would add that someone adding up estimated BOMs from part prices they looked up online and attempting to derive value from that is not really being terribly helpful. There's a lot more that goes into a speaker, and its pricing, than the drivers. Also they complain about dealer markup, but seem to fail to take into account that people buying Revels from a dealer rarely pay MSRP.

 

[norman bates]

Great thoughts !!!!!!!!

My background noise is under 30db and I doubt I get over 60db for when I would use it.

I enjoy old receivers, not a huge fan of subs.........

 

[moonthink]

I didn't have the LX, but I had the Sierra 1-V2 at the same time I got my M106's. Those 2 were very a very close battle to me. In the end, I stuck with the M106's, they were just great at everything and were not super picky about placement. The Sierra's (in my opinion) looked better, and definitely had more low end extension, but they were finicky about placement, better with certain styles of music vs others, and (again in my opinion) did not perform as well as the M106's at lower volumes.

Like you, I typically listen in the 55-65db range, and 75db is loud to me. The Revel seemed to scale better, sounding good and full at even low volumes. The Sierra's were better at louder volumes, so the choice for me was obvious. I think it's important to note that I also have 2 SVS PB-1000's in my listening room, and the Revels integrated better with them. In fact, I was never satisfied with the handoff from the Sierras to my subs -- it just never seemed right.

 

[kemmler3D]

I just want to point out that retail price of a driver is not necessarily a great indicator of OEM price, nor is it a perfect guide to quality.

 

[jonfitch]

I think for 2-channel M105 should be compared with Sierra LX (both paired with sub) is a better comparison, as the directivity of the M105 is far superior to the M106.

 

[ShadowBoxer]

the directivity of the M105 is far superior to the M106.

Based on...?

 

[kyuu]

Based on...?

View attachment 518577

Um, which is which on that graph? The legend that tells us which color is for which speaker is cut off. I would guess the green is for the M105 just because the directivity error through the crossover region is smaller, which is what I would expect given the smaller woofer.

 

[ShadowBoxer]

Solid: M105 (first)
Dashed: M106 (second)

Std Spinorama.org

These two plots indicate one DI is "far superior" than the other?

 

[kyuu]

For some reason I'm finding it hard to parse that graph, even after recreating it on spinorama.org myself. But after going through the contour maps and other measures, yeah I'd have to concur that the difference in directivities between the M105 and M106 are pretty marginal.