Focal Aria 906 Speaker Review

[daftcombo]

Come on man. I am in Issy Les Moulineaux.

I'll send you a PM!

 

[renaudrenaud]

I'll send you a PM!

You have an answer!

 

[Voo]

Kanta is still relatively new. So it won't be replaced anytime soon.

The slatefiber cone (also pretty sexy looking, I agree) replaced the last drivers that were NOT made by Focal. The old Chorus line imported drivers from another manufacturer (you can see that in the factory tour video). I'm assuming slatefiber cones are even cheaper to produce than the flax cones.

I auditioned the chora's and they sound so close to the revel f35's or f36....which I didnt care for either. aria's sound pretty dang good...I own the 948's. they sound thin but my in room measurements when I took out of box no eq or dsp....IDK...they sound thin...so I add subs. this rew from -30 to -5 on avr no eq...large, no sub...

 

[GelbeMusik]

It seems they are positioning themselves more and more as a "lifestyle" company.

In the 80s some German company came up with cones made from otherwise useless crab shell, research was funded by government as a recycling idea ( is was actually green .. the material ). There was Gorlich with soft styrofoam plus thin aluminium foil on both sides, we have honeycomb made from a variety of materials and mixes, woven material, most recent even woven PP and so many more. Point is, there is actually no final solution found. Harbeth took public funds again to uselessly reinvent the plastic cone, after KEF and other back in the 80s had cobex as that final product, TPX came next ...

Lately I've got NOS Adire Audio Extremis 6.8 with good old black (doped) PP as a cone material. Guess what, it works perfectly. No resonances to speak of, no intermodulation from flexing or what people always tell. It withstands the pressure and acceleration of +/-14mm x-max used in a 9 litre box with no acoustic sign of any strain, go figure!

And now this Focal woofer, which is said to be top notch optimized suffers from pest and cholera at the same time:

- resonance at about 4.5kHz which makes a peak in THD at about 1,5kHz, where it is in theory most easily heard
- high distortion in upper bass range, where it is not expected, when driven dynamically, sub is useless due to that

Focal was founded around their iconic concave / reversed dome tweeters, which have some other problems, directivity wise ...

 

[Voo]

In the 80s some German company came up with cones made from otherwise useless crab shell, research was funded by government as a recycling idea ( is was actually green .. the material ). There was Gorlich with soft styrofoam plus thin aluminium foil on both sides, we have honeycomb made from a variety of materials and mixes, woven material, most recent even woven PP and so many more. Point is, there is actually no final solution found. Harbeth took public funds again to uselessly reinvent the plastic cone, after KEF and other back in the 80s had cobex as that final product, TPX came next ...

Lately I've got NOS Adire Audio Extremis 6.8 with good old black (doped) PP as a cone material. Guess what, it works perfectly. No resonances to speak of, no intermodulation from flexing or what people always tell. It withstands the pressure and acceleration of +/-14mm x-max used in a 9 litre box with no acoustic sign of any strain, go figure!

And now this Focal woofer, which is said to be top notch optimized suffers from pest and cholera at the same time:

- resonance at about 4.5kHz which makes a peak in THD at about 1,5kHz, where it is in theory most easily heard
- high distortion in upper bass range, where it is not expected, when driven dynamically, sub is useless due to that

Focal was founded around their iconic concave / reversed dome tweeters, which have some other problems, directivity wise ...

your points are sound....but somehow these arias sound really good. especially when compared to others. I have demo'd 3x now to upgrade arias...its hard to do for price.

 

[QMuse]

You have an answer!

 

[RichB]

I would be to hard on the "instruction" manual & if I wrote it for the common audio person I would tell them to remove that strap for bi-wiring knowing that they might easily get confused and leave it there while bi-amping - just safer to say pull it.
Obviously bi-amping has some potential advantages as you discussed.
Since the speaker is designed for bi-amping why not at least mention bi-wiring is an option in the manual, average folks will be curious about using the two post sets. I know some folks who understand that bi-wiring doesn't likely improve the SQ in anyway and they will do this just because wire is cheap and now you have two runs so extra gauge. Does it sound better this way - who cares, wire is cheap.

The main reason I advocate that all speakers have this option is so Amir and others can easily measure the drivers independently.

I use Canare 4S11 combining two leads which is effectively 11 gauge but run two per speakers. So, bi-wired and bi-amped

- Rich

 

[Xyrium]

Love that wire. Somehow it's thick but still very flexible. Canare and Mogami are no-bs companies. They just sell wire and assemblies....and it works...no claims for magic. Also, they provide full disclosure on every conceivable measured aspect of their products in the spec sheets.

 

[VintageFlanker]

I use Canare 4S11 combining two leads which is effectively 11 gauge but run two per speakers. So, bi-wired and bi-amped

Or just Star Quad single wired in my case:

 

[GelbeMusik]

your points are sound....but somehow these arias sound really good. especially when compared to others. I have demo'd 3x now to upgrade arias...its hard to do for price.

It's only because people start raving. There's no need to. Lots of caveats. ( And misconceptions.)

 

[QMuse]

Can I go too?

Well of course you can. I mean, it was you guys who invented "ménage à trois", right?

 

[Voo]

It's only because people start raving. There's no need to. Lots of caveats. ( And misconceptions.)

I agree. somehow I like to have many speakers...over a dozen today and looking for more.

 

[mhardy6647]

+1

I think bass and treble electrons must be different --- and they know it.
It must be a quantum mechanical kinda thing...

 

[Voo]

when it comes to cables...check out alibaba for all the nordost, kimber, whatever for pennies on dollar.

 

[mhardy6647]

In the 80s some German company came up with cones made from otherwise useless crab shell,

As -- I reckon -- the token* glycobiologist in the room I will mention at this point that crustacean shells are composed of chitin, which is a polymer (polysaccharide, to be specific) made of long linear chains of N-acetylglucosamine in beta(1,4) linkage. Chitin is tough stuff, but boiling in acid will depolymerize and de-N-acetylate chitin, yielding glucosamine.

structural unit of chitin (borrowed from Wiki-p).

20150730_145430 by Mark Hardy, on Flickr

Chitin is, in a broad sense, analogous to cellulose (which is a polymer of glucose in beta(1,4) linkage) -- and, of course, cellulose is the raw material in paper.

____________
* as opposed to the tokin' glycobiologist...

 

[PierreV]

Chitin is, in a broad sense, analogous to cellulose (which is a polymer of glucose in beta(1,4) linkage) -- and, of course, cellulose is the raw material in paper.

and makes up 92% of flax fibers!

 

[renaudrenaud]

Well of course you can. I mean, it was you guys who invented "ménage à trois", right?

I guess you're jealous.

 

[napilopez]

The distortion sky-rockets above 100Hz @96dB, so a sub wouldn't help too much. For lower levels the THD is decent. The peak of 3rd harmonic at 1,5kHz isn't. Obviously the new cone material doesn't do too well regarding resonances. I question the use of "natural" material with such high-tech low volume product anyway. Greenwashing?

Hmm -- it doesn't show in Amir's nearfield woofer measurement:

Not saying you're wrong but Despite the nearfield measurement exagerating the SPL level, the prominence of the peak in the other measurements would make me think it would show up here, no? Or maybe it just doesn't manifest at this level since the 108dB peak at 2cm (just guessing the distance here) is only about 74dB @1m.

Could it be related to the inverted dome tweeter design working low and shallow crossovers instead? Focal also tweaks the drivers for every cabinet so I'm not sure these distortion measurements can be taken as evidence it's purely related to the material. The chora shows a similar distortion around the 1.5khz region.

I somehow feel the flax hasnt been a huge hit for focal...wonder if aria and kanta gonna get replaced soon? otherwise why would focal produce the chora w/out the very inexpensive flax...

How so? I believe The Aria has long been Focal's best selling speaker and it's been around since I think 2013. Then they released the Kanta, some HT and some studio models with flax, so that seems like a success.

I don't think the Kanta is going anywhere anytime soon as it's a fairly recent release. But I can see the Aria getting replaced cuz it's old and doesn't seem to fit very well with the company's current more minimal/clean aesthetic.

Kanta is still relatively new. So it won't be replaced anytime soon.

The slatefiber cone (also pretty sexy looking, I agree) replaced the last drivers that were NOT made by Focal. The old Chorus line imported drivers from another manufacturer (you can see that in the factory tour video). I'm assuming slatefiber cones are even cheaper to produce than the flax cones.

Personally, I dislike the looks of the Chora's cabinets and the Kanta "plastic" baffle (so ugly!).
Sopra looks cool though. Seen them all in person, was too chicken to ask for a sound demo though.

Speaking of course personally as well, I think the Kanta line are some of the best looking speakers money can buy! I love the matte finish that looks almost ceramic and sculpture-like shape The Sopras are gorgeous in their wood finishes, but I'm not a big fan of the glossy car paint colorways.

Meanwhile I actually think the Arias are the ugliest in the entire line They kind of just look like a hodgepodge of materials... glossy top, vinyl wood-looking sides, plastic waveguide, metal trim ring, flax drivers, and the worst offender, a 'leather effect' front. I'd take the Choras sharp lines and more modern colorways any time. Blue drivers!!

Focal was founded around their iconic concave / reversed dome tweeters, which have some other problems, directivity wise ...

How so? There are very few two-way designs with such wide directivity high up while remaining solid around the crossover horizontally. There's the dip past 10kHz but I think that's largely inconsequential, and the company has managed to mate the tweeters well with larger woofers without using small midranges or significant directivity-narrowing waveguides. I think the Sopra 1 is probably the best implementation of the design (that we have measurements of at least).

Soundstage network:

 

[QMuse]

I guess you're jealous.

You bet i am. Going to Paris to listen to some good speakers, what's there not to be jealous about?

 

[Aerith Gainsborough]

Well, this speaker is shipped back. I can hack this to happen with a fake microphone calibration maybe. Can someone give me a excel spreadsheet with a handful of sample points for the crossover you want me to try?

I measured with the crossover setting on (80Hz) and off using my AVR and this is what happened to the frequency response.
Measuring distance was 50cm from the center of the Woofer.

I attached the exported measurements and the calculated attenuation between the curves in excel form.

Filter seems to be -12dB/octave.

Perhaps this could be of assistance?