Wilson Chronosonic - why?

[Ron Texas]

A speaker system which costs as much as a house in a big city. Guess I'll have to pass.

 

[ferrellms]

How do those fools get so much money to be parted with, anyway?

That's what I wanna know, dang it!

Have you ever seen the bills that dentists and doctors send to your insurance company? Not to mention good old daddy.

 

[phoenixdogfan]

I've never thought those systems, especially the bigger Wilsons, sounded particularly good. To me systems like the IRS, the Wilson Maxx's, and the Porizeli Pipedreams, to name just three I've heard, all sound like they are multiple speakers lashed together playing different ranges of the audible frequency range with three, four, or five different voices. They generally can get very loud, they may have one or two regions where they sound very 'expensive', but as overall systems, they never seem to sound coherent and unified. The bass in particular always seems overblown . I think that's because in the audio showroom, the sales force attempts to show where all that money went in creating the system, and huge, overwhelming, bombastic bass is the proof for the dumb and monied that no expense was spared in making the product. To that end. high end showrooms make no attempt to use dsp to control room nulls and especially peaks caused by standing waves, so these systems more often that not sound incredibly turgid to anyone with experience on what real music sounds like. But the target market isn't musicians, really experienced audio professionals or seasoned audiophiles, but rather nouveau riche professionals and coke dealers, and as long as their new $800k system stands over seven feet tall, has amps made entirely of aircraft aluminum the size of top loading deep freezes, and burps 16hz sound waves at 125 db, they're happy.

And the Wilson's drive Maybachs. So it goes.

 

[MattHooper]

Wilson doesn't do anything "small":

Wilson Audio's Mezzo CSC Center Channel Speaker is One Beast of a Loudspeaker

Wilson Audio's Mezzo CSC Center Channel Loudspeaker tips the scale at over 200 pounds and $21,000. Overkill to say the least.

www.ecoustics.com

Lovely looking center channel, isn't it?

Makes me want to duck and cover!

 

[fpitas]

Wilson doesn't do anything "small":

Wilson Audio's Mezzo CSC Center Channel Speaker is One Beast of a Loudspeaker

Wilson Audio's Mezzo CSC Center Channel Loudspeaker tips the scale at over 200 pounds and $21,000. Overkill to say the least.

www.ecoustics.com

Lovely looking center channel, isn't it?

Makes me want to duck and cover!

Some high-end speakers are gorgeous. Not those.

 

[Penelinfi]

Maybe they are selling them to people who aren't so great with technology, or just love fiddling with mechanical adjustments. Like how people enjoy putting on a record.
Now you can adjust each driver minutely and go to "hear" the difference . It feels like you did something more than when you do it on a phone screen, despite the phone being an easier, flexible method (with the active system)

 

[phoenixdogfan]

Wilson doesn't do anything "small":

Wilson Audio's Mezzo CSC Center Channel Speaker is One Beast of a Loudspeaker

Wilson Audio's Mezzo CSC Center Channel Loudspeaker tips the scale at over 200 pounds and $21,000. Overkill to say the least.

www.ecoustics.com

Lovely looking center channel, isn't it?


Makes me want to duck and cover

Wilson doesn't do anything "small":

Wilson Audio's Mezzo CSC Center Channel Speaker is One Beast of a Loudspeaker

Wilson Audio's Mezzo CSC Center Channel Loudspeaker tips the scale at over 200 pounds and $21,000. Overkill to say the least.

www.ecoustics.com

Lovely looking center channel, isn't it?

Makes me want to duck and cover!

Looks like something that can move rapidly on those four feet and maybe suck small living things into its intake port. Watch out for your Yorkie if you ever get one of those. Never let it out of your sight! You've been warned!

 

[Galliardist]

... but on looking, I find that anyone in the EU at least can have their own Wilsons at a surprisingly reasonable cost!

Wilson – Music for Everyone

wilson-hifi.eu

Not sure how they got away with this one, maybe they have gone under the radar. They appear to be a Polish company

 

[antcollinet]

My issue is the design doesn't make sense compared to the problem it solves

They are fugly too.

 

[TonyJZX]

i would imagine the places that sell these speakers to clients never ever just sell the speakers alone... these places are selling an entire setup for close to seven figures and that obviously includes an amp that is approved by David Wilson... maybe something from d'agostino? gryphon?

very very few people are buying the speakers by themselves to hook up even an AHB2

 

[antcollinet]

i would imagine the places that sell these speakers to clients never ever just sell the speakers alone... these places are selling an entire setup for close to seven figures and that obviously includes an amp that is approved by David Wilson... maybe something from d'agostino? gryphon?

very very few people are buying the speakers by themselves to hook up even an AHB2

I'd love to hear them driven by something like a Fosi V3

Especially if the salesman was convnced it was a big Macintosh or something.

 

[Beave]

About 15 years ago I visited a dealer that prominently carried Wilson Audio speakers. One of the employees said that they sold one or two pairs of the most expensive Wilsons each year, and that was enough to keep the store in business (they have since closed shop, so maybe the Wilson sales slowed down for them?). He said that sometimes for these super expensive sales, the buyer is often not the person who will actually own them - because that person is too rich/busy to go speaker shopping. Instead, the buyer is a personal assistant or decorator or something similar for that ultra-wealthy person, and they have been tasked with buying the best stereo system they can find. To them, best simply equates to most expensive.

 

[TonyJZX]

there's a few articles out there on this end of the market... sort of like the Robb Report for audio setups

they're detailed and the pics are of the type you see in vanity fair

some billionaire wants the best for his $20 mil. plus mansion and he knows something about high end audio enough to be dangerous and so his personal assistant will arrange it all and a team rolls up in a high roof Ford Transit and they will setup your gear and maybe run your assistant thru basic usage

these speakers i imagine have alignment and azimuth adjustment and all that... this is what those onsite guys do

this is a consult and to me its over the top but should be no surprise to you that super high end hifi places love this shit

 

[Short38]

Wilsonism as a design philosophy is spreading. Has anyone examined the Xchair? Not sure the frequency response of this device but it provides infinite butt and back adjustments.

 

[Chrispy]

I've never thought those systems, especially the bigger Wilsons, sounded particularly good. To me systems like the IRS, the Wilson Maxx's, and the Porizeli Pipedreams, to name just three I've heard, all sound like they are multiple speakers lashed together playing different ranges of the audible frequency range with three, four, or five different voices. They generally can get very loud, they may have one or two regions where they sound very 'expensive', but as overall systems, they never seem to sound coherent and unified. The bass in particular always seems overblown . I think that's because in the audio showroom, the sales force attempts to show where all that money went in creating the system, and huge, overwhelming, bombastic bass is the proof for the dumb and monied that no expense was spared in making the product. To that end. high end showrooms make no attempt to use dsp to control room nulls and especially peaks caused by standing waves, so these systems more often that not sound incredibly turgid to anyone with experience on what real music sounds like. But the target market isn't musicians, really experienced audio professionals or seasoned audiophiles, but rather nouveau riche professionals and coke dealers, and as long as their new $800k system stands over seven feet tall, has amps made entirely of aircraft aluminum the size of top loading deep freezes, and burps 16hz sound waves at 125 db, they're happy.

And the Wilson's drive Maybachs. So it goes.

I'd just short cut that and say nothing Wilson does is particularly great except in the odd aesthetic sense to impress.....and even then that is for the odd ***** squad

 

[Keith_W]

these speakers i imagine have alignment and azimuth adjustment and all that... this is what those onsite guys do

I spoke to the Wilson distributor for Australia at a recent show. I asked him how they do their time alignment when they set their speakers up in the room. Answer: they have charts and tables that tell them how much to physically move each driver module depending on room geometry. No microphone and no audio measurements are taken. The only measurements taken are with a tape measure.

 

[Beave]

Wilson doesn't do anything "small":

Wilson Audio's Mezzo CSC Center Channel Speaker is One Beast of a Loudspeaker

Wilson Audio's Mezzo CSC Center Channel Loudspeaker tips the scale at over 200 pounds and $21,000. Overkill to say the least.

www.ecoustics.com

Lovely looking center channel, isn't it?

Makes me want to duck and cover!

That thing killed a bunch of people in the movie Robocop: