Vandersteen VLR Speaker Review

[Holmz]

Perhaps look at this from a musical standpoint rather than just a chart. A tiny effort will show that many ordinary (A=440) musical instruments readily produce tones to 32 Hz. This includes the string bass, the piano, many synthesizers, most bass electric guitars, a contra-bassoon, etc. Tones (to the octave 1 of the musical scale) are in the range of 32 to 65 Hz.

Some pipe organs have 32' stops which produce tones down to 16 Hz (C-0). Most humans cannot hear much below 20 Hz, but the rest of that octave can be gently felt. It is why the builders of these spend huge sums to make those sounds.

Even if you don't listen to such music, consider movie LFEs. Frequencies in the lowest range of hearing may be heard as adding gravitas to a soundtrack. Their use is common.

I provide this, not to argue with you, but to emphasize that what we are doing here is investigating real music, not just tones, sweeps, graphs, and charts. So, for typical music, I argue that research down to 32 Hz is needed, and down to 16 Hz is desirable and not inappropriate. But if your goal is just to reproduce the 'sound' of a pop concert sound system, (arguably) 40-50 Hz is probably all you're going to find there.

Not just -one man's view.

I’ll give you the fundamental, but I am not going to buy a bookshelf to do what a floor stander is needed for.
And 2/3rds to 3/4s of the towers still would like a subwoofer.
To think that a bookshelf should get to 32Hz is starting to border on optimism, and 2 Hz seems like it is around 4 octaves below that!
And also somewhat below the canonical 20Hz.

So to even show an impedance down to 2 Hz is bordering on intentional dishonesty for almost anything but perhaps a rotary subwoofer…
And one risks loosing credibility when they do so.

I would argue it is deviating a ways from science when a bookshelf speaker is tested to 20Hz, much less 3+ octaves below 20 Hz.
It reflects poorly on the tester, and for people to defend it, it can also be postulated as they’re having lost their sense of critical reasoning skills.

Hence I brought it up as Amir specifically said, at the end of post #1, “that recommendations and comments were welcome.”
I assume I am in the minority here, as that plot is being defended.


Here it’s is for review:

…
Oh boy! What the heck is going on here? We have rising chewed up high frequency response. Response is much smoother down low but sensitivity drops like a rock to …
Impedance dips very low at high frequencies:
View attachment 216249
…

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As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.

Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/

I do not know how much more helpful I can be?
I assume that “we” want to be taken as serious adults.

 

[JEarle]

I used to own a pair of these when I was first getting into 'hifi'. I demo'ed them against a pair of Sonus Faber Venere 2.0's, the SF's sounded broken around the crossover and these sounded more correct. My demo was sighted and in different locations in the store, so take that as you will.

The cabinet is beautiful, and they have a *reasonable* amount of bass when pushed up tight against the wall (as was my use case at the time). I used a Bag End Infra 18" sub and crossed them over (both HPF and LPF) around 100Hz if I remember accurately. I never found them overly bright and always used the grills as they are hideous without. I did very much enjoy owning them.

I actually sold them for a 'real hifi setup' that I purchased when I moved to a bigger home with a 'dedicated' listening room in the basement. That consisted of Vandersteen 2ce Sig's, 2 Vandersteen Subs, PS Audio M700's and that Gain Cell preamp thing. Wish I had kept the VLR's and Bag End as for some reason I could never ever make that setup sound good (different room, new house etc). Now I have a pair of 708p's, 2 SVS subs and Dirac down there and it rocks!

***The 'dedicated' listening room with projector etc very very rarely got used. It is now a much nicer looking multipurpose room with a OLED TV, games and the couch spun to a normal couch position. It even occasionally gets used now!

 

[amirm]

More generally, I would like to see your ususal set of comprehensive measurements of (say) any Revel speaker both with and without grilles.

Time on Klippel NFS is not free. Opportunity cost alone is $2,000 assuming my time is free. So unless there is a strong reason to do that, I am not going there.

 

[MarkS]

Well that's a shame, IMO. Just how badly grilles damage the sound is something buyers deserve to know, and something that an independent review site like ASR should consider worthy of investigation.

 

[amirm]

How worthy is it to you?

 

[MarkS]

More worthy than the next DAC that is audibly indistinguishable from all the rest on your blue-green-orange-red scale, or yet another budget bookshelf speaker.

 

[TimoJ]

Time on Klippel NFS is not free. Opportunity cost alone is $2,000 assuming my time is free. So unless there is a strong reason to do that, I am not going there.

I don't understand, don't you own your Klippel and can measure how much you feel like? Or does Klippel charge some extra fee for each measurement?

 

[amirm]

I don't understand, don't you own your Klippel and can measure how much you feel like? Or does Klippel charge some extra fee for each measurement?

You don't know what the term "opportunity cost" means? I could either test the same speaker twice with and without grill, or test two separate speakers. Which do you think is more useful? Having a bit more data for one speaker vs having much data about two?

Also, Klippel NFS is a mechanical beast which means it will wear out and be expensive to fix. So if I don't have to put wear and tear on it, I prefer to do that.

 

[amirm]

More worthy than the next DAC that is audibly indistinguishable from all the rest on your blue-green-orange-red scale, or yet another budget bookshelf speaker.

There you go. You are not happy with anything I do. Makes it easy to ignore your suggestions.

 

[Vovgan]

Time on Klippel NFS is not free. Opportunity cost alone is $2,000 assuming my time is free. So unless there is a strong reason to do that, I am not going there.

It would be interesting to see at least one measurement with and without grill for an otherwise very good speaker. To get a feeling of what is it doing exactly. Thank you!

 

[RandomEar]

It would be interesting to see at least one measurement with and without grill for an otherwise very good speaker. To get a feeling of what is it doing exactly. Thank you!

Absolutely agree. I also don't follow the argument "You don't seem to like what I do, therefore your arguments are invalid." - sounds childish to me.

I think @MarkS has a point that having at least one comparative measurement of a speaker with and without grille is very valuable. And to me, it would also be much more interesting than another transparent DAC being analyzed.

 

[TimoJ]

You don't know what the term "opportunity cost" means? I could either test the same speaker twice with and without grill, or test two separate speakers. Which do you think is more useful? Having a bit more data for one speaker vs having much data about two?

Also, Klippel NFS is a mechanical beast which means it will wear out and be expensive to fix. So if I don't have to put wear and tear on it, I prefer to do that.

Sorry, it was totally unknow term to me. Just looked Wikipedia about it.
I do understand your "one man band" limits and based on that I think it's better to get more tests done than releasing 2-3 very long tests per month. But I still hope some quick measurement with grill on/off could be included.

 

[amirm]

I think @MarkS has a point that having at least one comparative measurement of a speaker with and without grille is very valuable.

If you just want one such comparison, I have already done it. See https://audiosciencereview.com/foru...dale-diamond-220-budget-speaker-review.16752/

 

[Everett T]

More worthy than the next DAC that is audibly indistinguishable from all the rest on your blue-green-orange-red scale, or yet another budget bookshelf speaker.

Feel free to ship him any exotic electronics or speakers you want, he will measure them for free.

 

[Doodski]

Feel free to ship him any exotic electronics or speakers you want, he will measure them for free.

That and contribute a small donation to at least cover the internet bandwidth expense that you incur on @amirm.

 

[Spkrdctr]

I recommend getting the "Major Contributor" tag added to your name. It means you care enough to at least help Amir out. People who come on to the site and "suggest" ideas for Amir end up usually wanting to argue with him. Not everyone of course but a lot do. I find a kind word or a PM does the trick. Amir is always polite and answers with well thought out answers for his personal situation and what he can do with the equipment and time he has. If he was a billionaire he could just hire a few guys to do Klippel tests all day 5 days a week. But alas, Amir is not showing up on any billionaire list I have access to. Rumor is though that he has a great garden!

 

[Doodski]

I recommend getting the "Major Contributor" tag added to your name. It means you care enough to at least help Amir out. People who come on to the site and "suggest" ideas for Amir end up usually wanting to argue with him. Not everyone of course but a lot do. I find a kind word or a PM does the trick. Amir is always polite and answers with well thought out answers for his personal situation and what he can do with the equipment and time he has. If he was a billionaire he could just hire a few guys to do Klippel tests all day 5 days a week. But alas, Amir is not showing up on any billionaire list I have access to. Rumor is though that he has a great garden!

... and a great outdoor pizza oven too.

 

[MZKM]

It would be interesting to see at least one measurement with and without grill for an otherwise very good speaker. To get a feeling of what is it doing exactly. Thank you!

You can sorta tell by the grille how much influence it will have. My infinity towers for instance have thin plastic grilles so there is minimal interaction, and other tower of mine has chunky rectangular edges for its’s grille.

Audioholics has an article with some examples:

Speaker Grilles On Or Off: Which Way Sounds Better?

Do speakers sound better with their grilles on or off? This article compares the two options to scientifically determine which way is best and what other factors can impact sound more dramatically.

www.audioholics.com

 

[Head_Unit]

You could say it's a baffling design...

We COULD have, but DIDN'T, until YOU came along...

 

[Head_Unit]

... and a great outdoor pizza oven too.

Can @amirm use the Klippel to test the uniformity of radiation of the oven? Don't they have an adaptor from sound waves to infrared yet? Hungry stomachs want to know!
...jeez now I'm hungry for pizza, seriously...