Revel C208 Review (Center Speaker)

[amirm]

A bit on question of where you buy from. If you are already using a local dealer to preview the speaker and came to me to buy it, I would say no, you should go to that dealer. If that is not the case, when Harman was its own entity, the rules were quite strict in shipping locally. With Samsung ownership, this has melted away and dealers are able to sell and ship anywhere. Indeed we compete with online dealers now that do that so it makes no sense to have restrictions this way.

I have noticed that during the pandemic, some dealers are going really, really low in prices. You might think this is great for you but there is severe shortage of Revel products right now. As a result, you need your dealer to jump through many hoops to get you product. Or replacement models. When profit margins shrink, you are going to see reluctance on behalf of the dealer to work through this. When people come to me now and ask if they can buy a speaker for a $1 over cost because another dealer is dropping their shorts this way, I warn them what they are getting themselves into and whether they really want to go there. I have had people wait 6+ months for their speakers with delay after delay and tons and tons of work on our side to work the system to get updates on shipping, getting other purchase options for the customer, etc.

I think a lot of dealers are thinking they just put in an order, give Harman your shipping address and they are done. As such, they can live with low margins. Little do they know the hell that you may have to get through to get the customer what they ordered and hours and hours they will be spending on behalf of the customer to get them what they ordered.

 

[Vasr]

I dont understand any of this. Why are people saying B&M, with higher overhead, somehow the folks you can negotiate down? If anything it seems they would be the sort to stick to MSRP more than anything since their service is what I would assume, superior than a simple online retailer? Or is it simply that they are THAT desperate seeing as how B&M is dying, theyre willing to bend over backwards even further?

Many companies impose what is known as MAP (minimum advertised price) pricing on online sales to protect B&M or in many cases just maintain a high price for appearances of a high-tier product/brand.

In the US, it is illegal for any company to force a retailer to sell at a fixed price. So, in theory, any retailer is free to choose to sell at whatever price they like. But MAP is Ok and it is enforced by manufacturers by controlling supply if some dealers don't do that or to take them off of the authorized dealer list.

In online sales, the dealers are typically not set up to do discount negotiation (while they have the MAP pricing for online purchases) or don't have front-line people authorized to negotiate down individually with a customer but many do. So you can call/email some of these online sellers to look for discounts. In B&M, this kind of negotiation is easier to do as it is not an advertised price discount but one-off with each customer.

So, every channel except the manufacturer direct is potentially available for negotiation but some are easier to do than others.

 

[Doodski]

A bit on question of where you buy from. If you are already using a local dealer to preview the speaker and came to me to buy it, I would say no, you should go to that dealer. If that is not the case, when Harman was its own entity, the rules were quite strict in shipping locally. With Samsung ownership, this has melted away and dealers are able to sell and ship anywhere. Indeed we compete with online dealers now that do that so it makes no sense to have restrictions this way.

I have noticed that during the pandemic, some dealers are going really, really low in prices. You might think this is great for you but there is severe shortage of Revel products right now. As a result, you need your dealer to jump through many hoops to get you product. Or replacement models. When profit margins shrink, you are going to see reluctance on behalf of the dealer to work through this. When people come to me now and ask if they can buy a speaker for a $1 over cost because another dealer is dropping their shorts this way, I warn them what they are getting themselves into and whether they really want to go there. I have had people wait 6+ months for their speakers with delay after delay and tons and tons of work on our side to work the system to get updates on shipping, getting other purchase options for the customer, etc.

I think a lot of dealers are thinking they just put in an order, give Harman your shipping address and they are done. As such, they can live with low margins. Little do they know the hell that you may have to get through to get the customer what they ordered and hours and hours they will be spending on behalf of the customer to get them what they ordered.

We used to call it, "Live and die by the backorder."

 

[Vasr]

Center speaker if you have a number of people sitting on the sides of the couch watching. The main listening position is fine with the phantom center, but the side seats on each end of the couch may not have the dialogue centered beneath the screen as the sound appears to come from the closest speaker. If you you have both speakers close to the TV as you have them, then it's not a big deal, but some people have their stereo pair of speakers a bit farther apart than that.

There is an alternative which is a dedicated phantom center with speakers on either side of the screen for smaller screen sizes, not using L and R as the phantom center. The toe-in of those speakers can be adjusted to provide the imaging dispersion one needs depending on the listening area width. The L and R are not affected for their purpose.

This often works better to sync visual stage width with audio stage width than a single center since the distance of the listening position from the L and R and the separation between them varies from one room to another as does the screen size.

A center speaker of this size is good only for very large screening rooms where it can be placed behind an acoustically transparent screen. Kepping it below or above the screen is not optimal unless it can be toed-up or down properly.

That much height is impractical for average HDTV set up in family rooms unless you have nothing in the center (no console or HiFi stack) etc.

 

[JimB]

Look at the frequency response, it’s the same thing. CSD just more easily shows peaks/dips, it doesn’t offer anything new.

Thanks for the link. I don't visualize resonances so well from just the FR. At least for me, seeing the time response, directly, is easier.

 

[Steve Dallas]

Doesn't Crutchfield charge shipping fees for returns?

Yes. I took a gamble on an open box C205 that arrived scratched, and they wanted to charge me $12 plus 10%. A phone call sorted it out, but they do charge by default.

 

[Steve Dallas]

I dont understand any of this. Why are people saying B&M, with higher overhead, somehow the folks you can negotiate down? If anything it seems they would be the sort to stick to MSRP more than anything since their service is what I would assume, superior than a simple online retailer? Or is it simply that they are THAT desperate seeing as how B&M is dying, theyre willing to bend over backwards even further?

I don't have an answer for you, but when I bought my F206s from a B&M, the salesman said he could not discount the speakers, but he could throw in the center channel at no charge. So, I got $1000 off the front 3 and saved the sales tax on that $1000.

 

[Alice of Old Vincennes]

I'm new blood with respect to this sorta stuff (going on 30). Yard sales really can't be seen here in NYC. And haggling works in pawn shops, but any big box retailers? Not a chance unless you know you're in the market for a product that's been sitting on store shelves without many purchasers.

Though if Rolex authorized dealers can pull backroom shady deals (oh you want that Daytona in stainless steel for MSRP? Come buy a few of these others first, and then we'll sell you the Daytona), then I suppose large speaker purchases can also be sold at some negotiated price.

I just assumed these sorts of speakers that perform well, would have more demand, and so less of a reason to have to deal with customers trying to haggle. Meh, what do I know.

Big box generally will not haggle. Small appliance stores will match big box on price with employee repairmen. You can haggle prices with Revel dealers and pick up. Revel dealers are 200 miles away from me. Make a day or overnight trip. Gets me out of town.

 

[Steve Dallas]

Loose thoughts: Nice center speaker, interestingly not ported. I think this, and also the better off-axis than on-axis response, is a good concept. This is not the kind of speaker you would put behind a screen, so it will always be a bit off axis unless you intentionally tilt it. The non-ported design and lack of deep bass keep THD at bay - and the deep bass is probably "better off" with the subs and large main speakers, because nobody will buy large a 2000$ sub for a small system.

Revel advertises their centers as sealed boxes to make them more compatible with placement against walls and inside cabinets. They are relying on boundary gain to fill in the bass. Mine is crossed at 80Hz and blends perfectly, so it appears to work as designed.

 

[ctrl]

*edit it does look like I wasn't thinking clearly and they are to far apart. maybe 12-14" center to center so they would truly act as one at approx. 250-275hrz.

Yep, there is inter woofer interference.
The acoustic centers of the midrange and woofer are so close together that there is only little lobing.
But because the two woofers are so far apart, there is inter woofer interference too. This causes the filter slopes of the angular frequency responses to fall more steeply, which in turn is the main cause (aside of lobing) of the dip around 400Hz.

In addition, there are the edge diffraction effects described in post#75, which mainly affect the axis frequency response.

It would make more sense to put the woofers side by side on one side of the speaker, of course as you said that wouldn't look good to any number of buyers.

It would be best to use only one woofer. With two woofers next to each other, the lobing is increasing.
Or 3.5 way with low crossover frequency for the woofer furthest from the midrange.

 

[ace_xp2]

Setting aside the power issues, smaller woofers (and so less total distance) should also fix this issue right? It seems better on the Infinity R263, is this why?

 

[boblinds]

Loose thoughts: Nice center speaker, interestingly not ported. I think this, and also the better off-axis than on-axis response, isn-p a good concept. This is not the kind of speaker you would put behind a screen, so it will always be a bit off axis unless you intentionally tilt it.

The floor stand that Revel makes for this speaker (separate purchase) does tilt the speaker upward.

 

[amirm]

It also tilts up if you put it on a flat surface.

 

[Robbo99999]

We used to call it, "Live and die by the backorder."

I believe this is what is happening at the place I ordered my RTX 3080 Graphics Card!

 

[Lsc]

The C208 is an excellent center channel. I’ve had it since 2013. Since then I’ve replaced my mains from F208 to the F228Be. While I’m still thinking about getting the C426Be, I’m in no hurry. One because the MSRP of the C426Be is a whopping $4500 and two because the C208 sounds so good that my movie watching experience is perfectly enjoyable with the C208.

Also, the markup on speakers like Revel is 100%. And while some dealers will lie to you saying they can’t discount on Revels because there are other manufacturers where you actually can’t or they really do enforce a price floor, Revel doesn’t. My local dealer is stuck on 10% discount- so I’ll probably never buy anything from him .

 

[Spocko]

There is an alternative which is a dedicated phantom center with speakers on either side of the screen for smaller screen sizes, not using L and R as the phantom center. The toe-in of those speakers can be adjusted to provide the imaging dispersion one needs depending on the listening area width. The L and R are not affected for their purpose.

This often works better to sync visual stage width with audio stage width than a single center since the distance of the listening position from the L and R and the separation between them varies from one room to another as does the screen size.

A center speaker of this size is good only for very large screening rooms where it can be placed behind an acoustically transparent screen. Kepping it below or above the screen is not optimal unless it can be toed-up or down properly.

That much height is impractical for average HDTV set up in family rooms unless you have nothing in the center (no console or HiFi stack) etc.

YES! Are you referring to time intensity trading and “extreme toe-in” as suggested by Hsu Research for their constant directivity coaxial speakers? https://www.audioholics.com/bookshelf-speaker-reviews/ccb-8-bookshelf this approach improves the phantom center channel presence for those sitting on the sides but does require a specific type of constant directivity narrower dispersion speaker as discussed in the article

 

[ctrl]

Setting aside the power issues, smaller woofers (and so less total distance) should also fix this issue right? It seems better on the Infinity R263, is this why?

When the two woofers are closer together, the inter driver interference shifts to higher frequencies.
If the crossover frequency remains the same, then there is an advantage.

With the RC263, however, the crossover frequency seems to be slightly higher than with the C208, so there is not really an advantage - rather the contrary.

What is better solved by the RC263 speaker is the influence of the edge diffraction. The effect is only very weak with the RC263.
On the other hand, the angular frequency responses at higher frequencies are not quite as even as with the C208.

C208 RC263

 

[Vasr]

YES! Are you referring to time intensity trading and “extreme toe-in” as suggested by Hsu Research for their constant directivity coaxial speakers? https://www.audioholics.com/bookshelf-speaker-reviews/ccb-8-bookshelf this approach improves the phantom center channel presence for those sitting on the sides but does require a specific type of constant directivity narrower dispersion speaker as discussed in the article

I have been using the far simpler $325 MMG-Ws wall-mounted which is very easy to adjust because it swivels on its mount and will be unobtrusively flat against the wall when not in use. Has to be crossed-over with a sub although typically there isn't much content in low frequencies in HT. These are wired in series for about 10ohms impedance and not very efficient, so you do need some reasonable power in the amps (or if you have extra amp channels, you can feed them separately with the same C input to both channels of the amp).

https://www.magnepan.com/model_MMGW

Not for the measurement obsessed but the sound for HT center channel is extremely clear given the best performance of these planar speakers is in that center channel range (especially when adjusted with room eq) and accommodates a very wide listening area.

 

[Bsinger]

I wonder what that distortion sounds like vs. other distortion characteristics

smell the glove, great album

 

[Spocko]

View attachment 118533

smell the glove, great album

Sounds like the name of a gastropub!