GR Research Speaker Upgrade Review (Sierra-2EX V2)

[GM3]

This one of Danny’s upgrades actually makes sense—repurposing the supertweeter as a regular tweeter, and then the original tweeter as a “fill driver” to boost frequencies at the crossover region between the woofer and tweeter. Creative engineering.

If he didn't go full snake-oil and used normal components, that would be perfectly fine. But would not be nearly as profitable...

IMHO, GR Research's model has a lot of similarities to a fishing scam. Send out thousands and thousands of emails, and if there's just one or two victims who falls for it, it's worth it. He's selling scam power cables & snake-oil, dozens of upgrades for a dozen brands... Someone who knows little might be impressed from all the upgrades, videos, etc., think it's a reliable company, buy one and there you go, wasted $500 for products with incredibly high profit margins, be it a magic box that does nothing, a $400 power cable, crossover kit, etc. Just takes a few victims to be profitable. Even if 99.9% knew better...

Selling 'real' non snake oil crossover upgrades wouldn't be nearly as profitable. (But see parts express, madisound, solen.ca, etc.)

 

[YSC]

results kinda expected, but my geekiness just can't stop me from reading the whole review

 

[Herbert Shooler]

Awesome!!! somebody at GR will be blowing a gasket.

 

[kemmler3D]

He will almost certainly claim some combination of faulty measurements or faulty installation of the kit. Danny’s fan base treat him as if he’s doing some sort of philanthropy, when the truth is probably that no reputable speaker manufacturer would ever consider hiring him as a consultant.

Indeed... You see folks like Andrew Jones where they get hired in part just to put their name on something. Skills to pay the bills and not much controversy about their role in the industry. If Danny really did improve all these speakers so much, you'd have to think he was turning down offers from big names pretty regularly... Because otherwise where is the "GR edition" of this or that speaker?

 

[NTTY]

Many thanks to @amirm and Dave for the efforts and time spend on this review! This is why I love ASR.

 

[kemmler3D]

If he didn't go full snake-oil and used normal components, that would be perfectly fine. But would not be nearly as profitable...

IMHO, GR Research's model has a lot of similarities to a fishing scam. Send out thousands and thousands of emails, and if there's just one or two victims who falls for it, it's worth it. He's selling scam power cables & snake-oil, dozens of upgrades for a dozen brands... Someone who knows little might be impressed from all the upgrades, videos, etc., think it's a reliable company, buy one and there you go, wasted $500 for products with incredibly high profit margins, be it a magic box that does nothing, a $400 power cable, crossover kit, etc. Just takes a few victims to be profitable. Even if 99.9% knew better...

Selling 'real' non snake oil crossover upgrades wouldn't be nearly as profitable. (But see parts express, madisound, solen.ca, etc.)

Yes. I guess this is why (according to some other comments) he doesn't even test his designs in real speakers? It's related to SEO spam... You just crank out a million products and wait for someone to buy. That's not really an illegitimate strategy as far as it goes - for aftermarket accessories and upgrades you generally need a broad install base if you want to get anywhere... It's just the slapdash "upgrade"-but-not aspect that stinks.

Selling real crossover upgrades isn't really a thing because if you can design a better crossover than the original designer, you're almost a better speaker designer by definition... In which case you'd probably make more money designing speakers. But that's a lot of work ... Lots of inventory cost... Risk... You have to market your own brand instead of leeching off someone else's reputation... Etc.

 

[Redman43]

Another player in the industry whose entire business idea can be summed up in "how to replicate audio cable industry and separate fools from their money"

 

[Mark609]

Are you the guy on the Ascend forums that kept trying to downplay this issue as just "drama"?

Yep, and that it was, drama. Never downplayed the real issue if that's your flame. Did you not notice Dave finally closed the drama down?

Now, the drama is here. Enjoy the theater.

 

[DatSpeakerTho]

Awesome!!! somebody at GR will be blowing a gasket.

Wait until they start getting cease and desists from speaker companies I sent emails to showcasing Dannys use of copyright images. Mofi responded to me really fast.

Yep, and that it was, drama. Never downplayed the real issue if that's your flame. Did you not notice Dave finally closed the drama down?

Now, the drama is here. Enjoy the theater.

Dave closed the thread because there were no new developments, not because any sort of drama.

Im sure its very easy to label this all as drama when you have no stake. Its a lot different when its your company and your products being mishandled.

If you feel this all drama, perhaps engaging with it isnt a great use of your time. You've expressed apathy towards the issue on ascends forums, why bring that here as well? Do you have anything constructive to add?

 

[Chester]

Wait until they start getting cease and desists from speaker companies I sent emails to showcasing Dannys use of copyright images. Mofi responded to me really fast.

I find this quite petty, I have to say. Yes the man is quite disagreeable and appears to sell meaningless “upgrade” kits, but to be honest, if a person is stupid enough to believe what he says and mess up a competently designed speaker they paid good money for, I kind of think that’s on them.

Great review and work by all involved exposing what is going on here but you’re taking too much pleasure in all of this for my taste.

 

[dfuller]

Is there anything in that bag that might produce a shelf?

The only thing that comes to mind is if the new woofer LPF has a different ESR value for the series capacitors... But +2dB seems surprisingly high to me.

ETA: this is not the case. The caps Ascend uses are the lower ESR of the two and all are film types.

 

[DatSpeakerTho]

I find this quite petty, I have to say. Yes the man is quite disagreeable and appears to sell meaningless “upgrade” kits, but to be honest, if a person is stupid enough to believe what he says and mess up a competently designed speaker they paid good money for, I kind of think that’s on them.

Great review and work by all involved exposing what is going on here but you’re taking too much pleasure in all of this for my taste.

He's stealing copyrighted works. I am calling that out. If he didn't want that to happen, maybe he shouldn't break the law. Some of the companies seemed happy to know about this. You support breaking copyright? You support when he stole Ascends images? You think Ascend sending a request to have it removed was also petty? You sure have a strange line drawn here for what is petty.

Great review and work by all involved exposing what is going on here but you’re taking too much pleasure in all of this for my taste.

I don't do things to appease your taste, so that's fine.

We've really come full circle though, now people are suggesting the scammer deserves some sort of respect he doesn't afford anyone else?

I personally dont feel those ignorant to the inner workings of this hobby deserve to be scammed, perhaps I am alone in this view.

 

[Vladimir Filevski]

Overdamped room will give you almost same as gated measuremnts (close to anechoic)

No, it will not. Have you ever measured a loudspeaker in a room?

and empty room will gain over speaker response few dB.

No, it will not. Have you ever been in a real room, where people are actually living? No real room is so empty.

Clio is very nice tool for speaker designer to do deep speaker research if he understands what he is doing.

Yes.

There is nothing what Clio cannot do what Klippel NFS can for speaker measutrements.

Well, what about anechoic measurements down to 20 Hz in a ordinary (largish) room?

Would be great if guys who do not have Clio will leave comments starting "I never used Clio but I know..."

I am using CLIO from 1997, from the model 4 through 7, 12 and now 14.

My view on topic: "before" and "after" both are non-optimal designs. Good 2-way should not have more then 3 capacitors, 2 coils and 3 resistors.

Nonsense.

 

[dfuller]

Honestly the whole concept of "complex crossover bad" is, in a phrase, nonsensical. As long as the impedance and phase curve isn't causing problems with the amp, it doesn't matter - only the output matters.

 

[Chester]

We've really come full circle though, now people are suggesting the scammer deserves some sort of respect he doesn't afford anyone else? Ooook then.

I suggested no such thing.

 

[Salt]

I've been telling the guy that his test gear is grossly inadequate for years -- he uses some elderly Clio system from Italy which is to a Klippel NFS what a rusty Fiat 500 is to a Mercedes-Benz S-Class.

Both are Oldtimers Here

 

[Jim Taylor]

if a person is stupid enough to believe what he says and mess up a competently designed speaker they paid good money for, I kind of think that’s on them.

It's the customers that create people like Danny Richie......'Not the other way around. A lot of ignorance from the people spending money in this goofy industry.

Our modern life is complex. Drugs, electronic devices, foodstuffs et al. have potential downsides. Exceedingly few people have authoritative knowledge in all areas of our lives. One may be an authority in electronics, but be abysmally ignorant in pharmaceutical matters. Another may be an expert at food contamination, but woefully ignorant regarding vehicle design and operation.

Nobody knows everything, but I think it's safe to assume that everyone wants to avoid a "lemon". To do this, they rely on the testimony of experts, and then follow the instructions of those experts.
Scam artists are fully aware of this tendency in the human race. They are more than willing to use their powers of persuasion and their willingness to lie like cheap rugs to extract money from customers who are worried and nervous. And if the customers weren't worried and nervous before they met the scam artists, then they certainly are after they meet the scam artists.

We at ASR pick up on the scams in the audio industry, but there are scams in all sorts of areas of human activity. Audio is only a minor one in the larger scheme of things.

Pick an area of knowledge in which you have no expertise. Do you think it is acceptable for some scam artist to take advantage of you in that area? Do you think you deserve to be scammed simply because you exhibit ignorance in that area? After all, everyone is ignorant of something.

Yes, I wish more people had a deep and wide-ranging education. And yes, I wish more were satisfied with what they have. That would cure much of the problem with scam artists. But the human race isn't made that way. Too many people are busy with trying to get through life, save money, raise their children and find time to relax from the hectic pace. I don't think that means that scamming is acceptable, and I don't think it means that people "deserve" to be scammed.

Just my opinion.

 

[Vladimir Filevski]

Bashing Danny Richie about this "downgrade mod" is well deserved. But I have seen measurements of several other GR modifications and they are much better than the original (I haven't seen them all), so I am at loss why this hatred? I am not discussing how cost-effective are his modifications - I am sure they could be cheaper with optimal selection of brands and models of components.
Somebody raised the question - If Danny Richie is so good, why he is not working as a speaker designer, maybe in a well-established large speaker company? But the real question is - why some loudspeakers from well-known brands measure so poorly? Even I made several modifications of some loudspeaker models from well-known brands, and the difference was night-and-day, only with small modification of the crossover.

 

[madrac]

I'd be surprised if he had a very big business doing this. You can't sell too many of anything that requires the customer to solder it. If he had a big shop he would fairly likely be getting the crossovers assembled at a factory.

agreed. I think in one of Danny's rebuttal videos to Dave/Ascend is that only 1 kit was sold for the EX, and that was to the customer who sent it to Ascend to figure out. Apparently, Danny also has v2 of the EX kit where he moved the x-over point up to RAAL's recommended point.

 

[Kevinfc]

Old Danny takes another one on the chin.