XSA Labs Vanguard Speaker Review

[dukanvadet]

I am not that skeptical about the driver variation. I recently had to buy a new sb acoustics midwoofer and it measured considerably different from my years old one of the same type. I am going to test a few things to make sure its not just me that f-ed something up but it seems like a driver variation.

 

[Grotti]

I understand the skepticism about the "off spec drivers"/"broken sample" claim here, and based on the review and the insights shared in this discussion, I share that skepticism.

Fortunately, the guiding principle of this forum allows us to put aside our skepticism and simply wait for the maker to ship Amir another sample, and for him to test it. The measurements will tell the tale.

We are talking about the probably "broken sample" for a while now. But shouldn't take the manufacturer care about those possible variations by measuring the drivers before mounting them in the first place? At least the static measurement of Re could have been performed without much effort, which could have revealed a broken driver easily, when the defect (or variation for that matter) is located in the voice coil.

 

[SpeaKa]

I understand the skepticism about the "off spec drivers"/"broken sample" claim here, and based on the review and the insights shared in this discussion, I share that skepticism.

Fortunately, the guiding principle of this forum allows us to put aside our skepticism and simply wait for the maker to ship Amir another sample, and for him to test it. The measurements will tell the tale.

100% agree!

I really appreciate if manufacturers or developers take part in online discussions about their products. But due to tons of sarkastic comments it is not fun at all...

I'm skeptic about the "off spect drivers", too. Especially because of the pictures of the crossover network, that does not come close to what I would expect for such a speaker.

 

[amirm]

There is a massive opportunity cost to measure another sample to the tune of $2000. I have told the company I need to see their measurements showing better measurements before I do more testing. And some idea of new sample being representative of current production.

 

[SpeaKa]

There is a massive opportunity cost to measure another sample to the tune of $2000. I have told the company I need to see their measurements showing better measurements before I do more testing. And some idea of new sample being representative of current production.

And having an Idea of the crossover network would be great, too. I doubt that the used XO is performing what the intention of the developer was...
The prototype of the speaker shows a 5.0mH Inductor. This is nothing I would expect in a 2 way bookshelf speaker...

 

[Endibol]

Rather say the ability to critize which is more important to my eyes, and not simply accept what is written, whatever the autority of the writer

It’s always good to be critical towards things you read as long as you adopt the scientific approach.
The difference between science and beliefs/opinions is that a scientist always looks for facts that falsify his theory, whereas believers only look for facts that confirm their believes and ignore those that don’t.

 

[sarumbear]

I am not that skeptical about the driver variation. I recently had to buy a new sb acoustics midwoofer and it measured considerably different from my years old one of the same type. I am going to test a few things to make sure its not just me that f-ed something up but it seems like a driver variation.

What was the difference?

 

[dukanvadet]

What was the difference?

I am not totally sure whats going on yet but this is how i understand it now:

The blue is the new one, both have some kind of resonance at ≈1,3khz but the new one is stronger and is slightly less sensitive afterwards. It is not a big difference but this also affects off axis, the older one is almost perfect but the new woofer has significant widening around the resonance frequency. This doesnt show in impedance really as both just has a small blip at the same place as is usual with resonances. The new one is green here:

Jeff bagby used the 4 ohm version of the same woofer in his sopranos and has something going on around the same frequency, he says that its diffraction, that might be part of it but from the impedance it seems to me there is also a resonance there. This is bagbys measurements:

Anyway this is not the same problem as on this speaker so might not be relevant. All measurements are taken in the final box, small closed boxes that is as identical as my woodworking skills can do. I know its an odd choice of box but this will be a desktop 2.1 system with the sub close and crossed higher than normal so its almost a 3-way.

 

[sarumbear]

I am not totally sure whats going on yet but this is how i understand it now:
View attachment 301259
The blue is the new one, both have some kind of resonance at ≈1,3khz but the new one is stronger and is slightly less sensitive afterwards. It is not a big difference but this also affects off axis, the older one is almost perfect but the new woofer has significant widening around the resonance frequency. This doesnt show in impedance really as both just has a small blip at the same place as is usual with resonances. The new one is green here:
View attachment 301263
Jeff bagby used the 4 ohm version of the same woofer in his sopranos and has something going on around the same frequency, he says that its diffraction, that might be part of it but from the impedance it seems to me there is also a resonance there. This is bagbys measurements:View attachment 301260
Anyway this is not the same problem as on this speaker so might not be relevant. All measurements are taken in the final box, small closed boxes that is as identical as my woodworking skills can do. I know its an odd choice of box but this will be a desktop 2.1 system with the sub close and crossed higher than normal so its almost a 3-way.

The difference is extremely small. It’s well within the tolerance of the driver, I will say.

 

[dukanvadet]

The difference is extremely small. It’s well within the tolerance of the driver, I will say.

I guess you are right, its not a big difference but the directivity is a problem to me. If i made a crossover according to the older woofer and trough some miracle the other one ended up in amirs klippel it would not look as nice on the fancy color graph. I am not really defending anyone here, i think driver differences can be the cause but its also up to XSA to make sure every speaker is to spec. Bad QC is bad and should affect the review.

 

[hansik]

There is a massive opportunity cost to measure another sample to the tune of $2000. I have told the company I need to see their measurements showing better measurements before I do more testing. And some idea of new sample being representative of current production.

I have a feeling they're working hard on version 1.1 and take advantage of this momentum.

 

[Rick Sykora]

I understand the skepticism about the "off spec drivers"/"broken sample" claim here, and based on the review and the insights shared in this discussion, I share that skepticism.

Fortunately, the guiding principle of this forum allows us to put aside our skepticism and simply wait for the maker to ship Amir another sample, and for him to test it. The measurements will tell the tale.

In this case, suggest we have a right to be skeptical. To have not just one but both drivers to be out of spec is unlikely. That said, both the review sample and a randomly picked inventory sample were not performant. It did not require a Klippel to find and should not have taken an ASR review to do basic quality inspection. XSA Labs is off to very rough start.

Assuming XSA does have driver quality issues, all the inventory needs to be checked and they need to determine how many bad units ended up with customers. The other potential issue is whether known good replacement drivers are readily available. If not, will be a really ugly situation for a startup business. Whether XSA gets Amir to test another sample is a side issue at this point - they need to focus on damage control and righting their ship.

 

[tmtomh]

In this case, suggest we have a right to be skeptical. To have not just one but both drivers to be out of spec is unlikely. That said, both the review sample and a randomly picked inventory sample were not performant. It did not require a Klippel to find and should not have taken an ASR review to do basic quality inspection. XSA Labs is off to very rough start.

Assuming XSA does have a driver quality issues, all the inventory needs to be checked and they need to determine how many bad units ended up with customers. The other potential issue is whether known good replacement drivers are readily available. If not, will be a really ugly situation for a startup business. Whether XSA gets Amir to test another sample is a side issue at this point - they need to focus on damage control and righting their ship.

Good points, agree.

 

[fineMen]

Recovery utility for people who've been exposed to BBC-dip style speakers for to long.

Not quite as it says it's an homage to the BBC's LS3/5. The latter was, if my recolletion doesn't trick me, designed to fill a dedicated room with sound for montoring purposes. The room was an outside broadcasting van. Back in the day it was probably smaller than your humble todays SUV. And monitoring in a different sense than HiFi.

Van is placed on the forecourt of a church, organ concert inside, and some announcements to be also broadcasted via speech microphone. To be monitored was the persistent attachment of all the cables, maybe background noises, and timing of different contributions from pastors and other folks. BBC, England, radio broadcasting, live!

The LS3/5 was a perfect match, even with the restricted bass response due to massive room-gain.

Some people fall for it as a main speaker in domestic use. This is obviously a fallacy.

 

[sarumbear]

Not quite as it says it's an homage to the BBC's LS3/5. The latter was, if my recolletion doesn't trick me, designed to fill a dedicated room with sound for montoring purposes. The room was an outside broadcasting van. Back in the day it was probably smaller than your humble todays SUV. And monitoring in a different sense than HiFi.

Van is placed on the forecourt of a church, organ concert inside, and some announcements to be also broadcasted via speech microphone. To be monitored was the persistent attachment of all the cables, maybe background noises, and timing of different contributions from pastors and other folks. BBC, England, radio broadcasting, live!

The LS3/5 was a perfect match, even with the restricted bass response due to massive room-gain.

Some people fall for it as a main speaker in domestic use. This is obviously a fallacy.

The BBC dip is a myth. It doesn’t exist. Certainly not on the LS3/5A.

Here are the BBC measurements from their 1976 paper. Show me the dip!

http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/rd/pubs/reports/1976-29.pdf

 

[CapMan]

Some people fall for it as a main speaker in domestic use. This is obviously a fallacy.

This seems like a very absolute statement. Are there no circumstances under which a sealed box design of this size might be desirable for a home user?

 

[CDMC]

Not quite as it says it's an homage to the BBC's LS3/5. The latter was, if my recolletion doesn't trick me, designed to fill a dedicated room with sound for montoring purposes. The room was an outside broadcasting van. Back in the day it was probably smaller than your humble todays SUV. And monitoring in a different sense than HiFi.

Van is placed on the forecourt of a church, organ concert inside, and some announcements to be also broadcasted via speech microphone. To be monitored was the persistent attachment of all the cables, maybe background noises, and timing of different contributions from pastors and other folks. BBC, England, radio broadcasting, live!

The LS3/5 was a perfect match, even with the restricted bass response due to massive room-gain.

Some people fall for it as a main speaker in domestic use. This is obviously a fallacy.

If you look up the vans that were used, at least for live TV broadcast, they were actually pretty large, so at least in those, not a lot of transfer function gain:

MCR21 comes back to life

The story of the outside broadcast van that brought the Prince of Wales' investiture to the nation

www.bbc.com

I think more likely was that having extended bass was just not an important design consideration. The vast majority of people listening to BBC broadcasts, where there TV or radio, were listening on either televisions or small table top radios, which themselves had no bass capability. Most important was clear dialog, followed by sounding decent.

 

[sarumbear]

This seems like a very absolute statement. Are there no circumstances under which a sealed box design of this size might be desirable for a home user?

Agreed. A desk is domestic isn't it?

 

[fineMen]

If you look up the vans that were used, at least for live TV broadcast, they were actually pretty large, so at least in those, not a lot of transfer function gain:

MCR21 comes back to life

The story of the outside broadcast van that brought the Prince of Wales' investiture to the nation

www.bbc.com

I think more likely was that having extended bass was just not an important design consideration. The vast majority of people listening to BBC broadcasts, where there TV or radio, were listening on either televisions or small table top radios, which themselves had no bass capability. Most important was clear dialog, followed by sounding decent.

I don't buy the idea that such a van is "big" by today's standards. Two by seven meters maybe, and that is the outside. Some goes to the driver's cabin and so on.
To the second part I would agree perfectly.
It more so makes me wonder why some advanced audiophiles consider the LS3/5 as superior to more general purpose devices. Maybe its sometimes that less is more even with the fidelity. LowFi needs good music to be bearable, which makes me select good music for my beloved LS3/5. Good music => satisfaction from within ...

 

[sarumbear]

It more so makes me wonder why some advanced audiophiles consider the LS3/5 as superior to more general purpose devices.

…of the time.

If you had measured those general purpose speakers of the time you would see that they were not good. LS3/5A was a superior speaker of its time within its design constraints.