How the heck does Devialet do it?

[leonroy]

This is probably longer than you want to watch but shows how easy it is to get into! And how beautifully made and expensively tooled, so cheap compared to Kii and D&D IMO for the engineering involved.

Fascinating video thanks for sharing that - At 16:50 mark - I cannot believe they’re using cheap Lelon capacitors throughout that speaker.

 

[leonroy]

So odd the heresay against Devialet Phantoms on this forum. I owned the Devialet Phantom Silvers for several months and the Gold for a year. I had them side by side with my KEF Reference 1 speakers. I also compared them to the older KEF Reference Model 4-2 which has ridiculous specs which rival the KEF Blades.

The Phantom Silvers absolutely smoked the KEF Reference 1s in SPL and low frequency. For ballads, guitar, piano the KEF Reference 1 came out slightly ahead. Fire up Daft Punk though (or heck any Jazz with a double bass) and you're looking at basketball sized speakers which competed with the much larger KEF Reference Model 4-2 at a fraction of the size and price.

My listening room's in the basement. Playing at ~60% volume I could hear and feel the Phantoms two floors up. The Phantom Silvers are tuned for bass emphasis, the Golds on the other hand had the bass dialled down considerably and are clearly targeting the audiophile market. I could hear little between the Golds and my KEF speakers in all type of music.

How do Devialet generate such prodiguous volume and low distortion from such a small speaker? Well this video by Peter Pee shows the woofer excursion at 3.4cm 7mm below. And that's for the Reactor 600. The larger Phantom speakers have a signifiantly larger bass driver and likely a much deeper excursion. I've certainly not seen a woofer move that much on any speaker I've ever seen and it does that at moderate volumes:

As for how does it measure, well see for yourselves:
SoundStageNetwork.com | SoundStage.com - NRC Measurements: Devialet Gold Phantom Loudspeakers

Here're the measurements for the KEF Reference 1 which I compared them to:
SoundStageNetwork.com | SoundStage.com - NRC Measurements: KEF Reference 1 Loudspeakers

Edit: thanks @The New Version for correcting the excursion figure

 

[EAXAE]

Well this video by Peter Pee shows the woofer excursion at 3.4cm below.

It shows 7 mm of excursion, not 3.4 cm.

 

[stevenswall]

So odd the heresay against Devialet Phantoms on this forum."

It's hard for people to see something smaller and in many cases cheaper that what they have that outperforms it onand off axis, and with bass extension.

In r/audiophile people won't show me better measurements, they just say it's a "lifestyle" speaker as an empty epithet so they can dismiss it.

Frankly, most speakers sound like garbage compared to a Phantom, and I'd have stopped with them if the app and connectivity were flawless. Instead, I returned them for my current system, which Devialet could likely beat for the price if they came out with room correction and a sub.

 

[maverickronin]

if the app and connectivity were flawless.

That is exactly what confines it to being a "lifestyle" speaker though. Add some proper analog and digital inputs and its a proper hifi active like the Kii or D&D.

 

[stevenswall]

That is exactly what confines it to being a "lifestyle" speaker though. Add some proper analog and digital inputs and its a proper hifi active like the Kii or D&D.

Nobody who calls it a lifestyle speaker seems to mention that or have owned it. They look at the product page, assume the bass is bloated, and associate it with Beats by Dre and Bose. Unfortunate.

I do wish they had one with XLR inputs. I've contacted Devialet multiple times about their custom installer ones that I think have phoenix connectors. I never end up getting a response though and they dodge the price.

 

[maverickronin]

Nobody who calls it a lifestyle speaker seems to mention that or have owned it. They look at the product page, assume the bass is bloated, and associate it with Beats by Dre and Bose. Unfortunate.

Well they're at least playing the odds. Were/are there any other "good" ones besides these before the homepod or the nest?

If you show them some measurements and they ignore them, then yeah, they're just being irrational.

 

[q3cpma]

Well they're at least playing the odds. Were/are there any other "good" ones besides these before the homepod or the nest?

If you show them some measurements and they ignore them, then yeah, they're just being irrational.

The big Cabasse Pearls may be good too.

 

[maverickronin]

The big Cabasse Pearls may be good too.

Those do look like they could measure well. I'd just seen pictures of them before so I didn't know they were burdened with those kinds of "features".

 

[Plan9]

Please refer to my seminal work on the subject, The Assholeness of Physics, Vols. VII–XIII.

Form and Function but unfortunately ugly won.

 

[richard12511]

It's hard for people to see something smaller and in many cases cheaper that what they have that outperforms it onand off axis, and with bass extension.

In r/audiophile people won't show me better measurements, they just say it's a "lifestyle" speaker as an empty epithet so they can dismiss it.

Frankly, most speakers sound like garbage compared to a Phantom, and I'd have stopped with them if the app and connectivity were flawless. Instead, I returned them for my current system, which Devialet could likely beat for the price if they came out with room correction and a sub.

Excluding the bass, the measurements look good, but not great, at least for the price. The only exceptional thing is the bass extension, which is incredible, for sure. The on axis and LW are fairly smooth/flat but not near SOTA. The directivity control is also pretty bad, as it hardly controls directivity at all below 1000Hz, though maybe that's somewhat desirable for a single speaker in some use cases).

I don't see any reason why the Devialet's with a sub and RC would beat your 8260s w/GLM. The Genelecs control directivity to a much lower frequency, and their on/off axis response is much better.

Using these measurements as a reference.

 

[RobL]

Is it true Devialet won’t repair these outside of warranty? Would be a deal breaker for me on something this complex.

 

[stevenswall]

Excluding the bass, the measurements look good, but not great, at least for the price. The only exceptional thing is the bass extension, which is incredible, for sure. The on axis and LW are fairly smooth/flat but not near SOTA. The directivity control is also pretty bad, as it hardly controls directivity at all below 1000Hz, though maybe that's somewhat desirable for a single speaker in some use cases).

I don't see any reason why the Devialet's with a sub and RC would beat your 8260s w/GLM. The Genelecs control directivity to a much lower frequency, and their on/off axis response is much better.

Using these measurements as a reference.

Vertical dispersion is important to me and non-coaxial speakers sound broken off axis for my use cases in a living room.

I just look at the Devialet as having wide dispersion with roll off. If they had a sub for $2500 and two reactors can be had for $2500, then we're at 1/3 the price of new Genelec monitors+subwoofer.

If my OLED TV color shifted as much as most speakers do when I stand up to get water, grab food, a remote, etc. I'd return it and buy something where the engineers paid attention to such an obvious issue that could be fixed without an audible drawback.

The Kii Three and Dutch & Dutch 8C are two such speakers. Can't accept a crippling issue (lobeing) that is so abundantly apparent in the measurements, yet the engineers simply can't be bothered.

90% of the time I'm sure they'd be incredible, and a notable upgrade... But when I'm playing Mario Kart sitting on the floor with cousins, or doing yoga, or lying on the couch, or standing up to get more food, I think I'd wish I had the Phantoms and not something that intermittently sounds physically broken. At the price and not having that issue for me counts for a lot for the Phantoms, but I'm sure many aren't bothered by irregular vertical dispersion as much.

 

[RoA]

I recently heard some Reactors at Harrods. Impressive imho for such a tiny speaker. Looked lovely in black too. They sounded almost full range in a very large, open space at lowish volume, free standing.

Ignore at your own peril.

I may get a set of the larger models to compare to (replace?) my Formation Duo's.

 

[Koeitje]

I think the question should be why Devialet makes them so ugly. I've never heard them and I'm sure they sound fantastic, but I simply can't stand the look of them.

 

[YSC]

I personally thinks it's amazing they did go so low with such a small footprint and being concentric in mids and highs! but it still lose at the latency and ease of use front as they are wireless and need a not too friendly app front....

With other manufacturers in the pro market not doing something similar I bet it's more related to the optimization of bass, in a traditional 2.1/2.2 setup you can deal with room modes pretty well and optimize them according to your room/studio, while great anechoically, the Devilate Phantom lose for the freedom of placement to kill off the room modes, and the high excursion drivers (definitely looks more than 7mm on each side when going real low) makes using as a lifestyle product or say in crampy space a trouble as you won't know say if your wife/kids put something next to them thinking it's ok then the bass driver thump itself into the object...

 

[RoA]

I think the question should be why Devialet makes them so ugly. I've never heard them and I'm sure they sound fantastic, but I simply can't stand the look of them.

Beauty is in the ...

 

[Koeitje]

Beauty is in the ...

I guess some people like white plastics, I prefer speakers that don't look like they are designed by Oral-B.

 

[RoA]

I guess some people like white plastics, I prefer speakers that don't look like they are designed by Oral-B.

What about one that looks like an Albino Minion?

https://linksharing.samsungcloud.com/9MM6KyphBcjI

 

[Phantomuser]

I have a pair of Phantom Silver's,I bought them new 5 years ago.
They sounded incredible then and they still do .
People who have never even heard them putting them down is just ridiculous.