I'm a designer and maker of speakers and, maaan!, I have to tell you, I love your videos. Always agree with your thoughts about crossovers, components etc... Great job!
This just continues to reinforce how good my decision was to build a set of Danny’s X-MTM Encore speakers and to not spend the kind of money those cost and get lesser performance. Thanks for posting. Danny, all of these expensive speaker you test all come with a plate with its model and manufacturer on it so people know who designed and built them. How about a brass plate for the “GR Research X-MTM Encore” and for your other other designs? The X-MTMs are too darn good to not have a sign that brags about who designed them.
About 8 years ago I used to own a pair of the Vienna Acoustics Beethoven Concert Grand speakers. I really liked them a lot. I'd like to see and hear your take on them.
Agreed, I've had a pair for 25 years roughly and still use them. I've taken good care of them, and the surrounds are perfectly intact as they were on day one.
I would love to have you review their more expensive speakers that have flat diaphragm midranges with concentrically mounted tweeters. The Imperial Series LISZT is one, and the Klimt Series Music is another. They are big speakers and expensive to ship. I like the idea in theory of having such a physically coherent design, but I have never heard one, let alone measured one.
Just wondering if you could show freq response of speakers down to 40 or 50Hz. I wish to see some insights on how the enclosure was built as well as ports effects. Thanks.
@@Edwin-E at those lower frequencies, you're measuring the room more than you're measuring the speakers. So unless he's got a fully anechoic room down to the low frequencies, he's right for leaving that part of the frequency response out of the graph.
I appreciate you knowledge on all things speakers, and was wondering if you could explain the difference between the construction of a mid-bass woofer and sub-woofer. Besides the frequency range each drive can play, what characteristics of each contribute to that range variation? Thank you.
it's the voice coil and membrane design. for sub bass frequencies you typically want long travel, big magnets and heavy cones. preferably with very good bracing.
Funny you talked about the coils falling off since I had the same experience. I picked up a pair of their "Bach" speakers at a thrift store last year for $20, untested. Got them home, no high frequencies out of one speaker, the other had no sound at all. I opened them up and the coil had fallen off the crossover on one, so I had to re-glue it back on. Both of them had loose cable clips, so the tweeters weren't even connected. They're fixed now and sound quite good
I laughed when you reached over and touched the speaker. In the opening my brain registered those speakers as being about 6 feet behind you and much much larger
I'm not in the bit surprised by your findings with these speakers. I was going to buy a pair of Vienna Acoustic Grand speakers many years ago, but i remembered a review done on some. The reviewer ran his own tests on them, he mentioned he found some unusual results
...Also add the Wharfedale Evo 4.2 into the mix of speakers I mentioned in my recent post. Probably not for everybody, but I'm intrigued by the design and look. Let us know if you've checked them out yet.👍
I live in los angels California. Where can I go to find these speakers? Best Buy used to carry them but they stopped and I don't know where to go to find the vienna speakers.
Great job ! I I agree with everyting in this video. Because of the great reviews, I bought a new VA Mozart Grand SE. I had them for exactly 1 week. I sold them immediately…. were my biggest disappointment in hifi! Plastic transducers are without dynamics, they have a dull sound without color. They had an extreme predominance of bass, but everything was blended into one thick soup. I bought for 2,700 €, after 1 week sold for 2,000 €! My worst investment in hifi…
Would love to have reps or designer's of these speakers or others that Danny shreds apart and defend or explain their design/ measurements of their flawed speaker 👍
Many new new speakers have bloated mids and highs, so in a short listening session they sound fantastic! Get them home and in a long session listener fatigue sets in and they quickly go up for sale.
Dear Danny I love your videos. What is the optimal way to design for acousti centers to be closer together? U put the tweeter in the middle and one driver on top and one the bottom? Like a tweeter sandwich?????
@@dannyrichie9743 I was thinking 2 X 15 inch woofers, 1 x 8 inch dipole magnetostatic midrange/ upper midrange driver and a dipole magnetostatic tweeter and last but not least your open baffle with the 110 degrees flange.
I used to sell these back in the day . One of their selling points were the "hand assembled " crossovers. Their cabinets were one of their other selling points as well. Looking forward to see what you can do. I know sumiko took over them , maybe production change ?
Measurements aren’t everything trust me. Vienna’s are great speakers and they were designed to sound like the engineering team intended and I believe they did a great job. I’m currently in search of a pair of the Beethoven baby grand for myself
I own a pair of Mozart Grand but mine are the SE version (symphony edition). To my ears they sound fantastic. Maybe the SE edition fixed the the problem areas of the plain grand version? My SEs actually came as a "Matched Pair"
The ones we have here to evaluate are not the symphony edition, just the standard Mozart Grand. I actually made a joke "watch the cheaper version measure better" and sure enough... It measure pretty well.
@@316RC That's the key word - Demoed. VA speakers have a particular voicing, they certainly aren't flat and measurements should not overule our ears when it comes musical enjoyment.
The Absolute Sound gave Mozart Grand Editors Choice Award, can’t remember the year(s) but they granted this recognition more then once. Would be interesting to hear from people who actually listen to them.
So, a set of $AU6000 speakers has mediocre xovers and crap design engineering. Does not surprise me at all. Vienna Acoustics spend it on fancy web site and marketing their beloved enclosure quality....go figure! I'll always build my own.
The Mozart Grand and Mozart Grand SE are rich, laid back speakers. Tonally they are beautiful, catering to music lovers rather than people who pick apart charts.
I have a full setup of Vienna acoustics speakers i want to just get a couple of woofers replace with OEM stock replacements. I cant seam to find anywhere that sells the VA Bach tower speaker replacements, any suggestions?
John Atkinson also noted issues in his measurements of the Mozart. He found you could correct much of it by inverting the polarity of the tweeter at the binding posts. The old Stereophile review is online.
@@dannyrichie9743 Yes, agreed but it did improve the suck out in John's case. I looked at all the Stereophile measurements of Vienna Acoustics speakers I could find online and they all have major issues. As you say, it's really hard to understand what they are trying to achieve. Great video, thanks!
The manufacturer recommended listening to the Mozart 15 degrees off axis, which made the on axis response closer to the green line, that is, takes out that dip. What I did was flip the tweeter leads, as they were wired out of phase originally, and replaced some of the caps and wiring. That created a better speaker. I no longer own them, fyi.
I suspect that the 'upgraded' Grand model was produced after Sumiko took over. Founder and chief designer, Peter Gansterer may no longer be in charge of final decisions regarding engineering and component selection. It's likely that the bean counters and sales department now control decision making. If so, look for Vienna Acoustic's speakers to over time, decline in performance.
Sumiko took over Vienna Acoustics ages ago. Perhaps you mean McIntosh who now owns Sumiko. Regardless, The Mozart Grand and it's terrible crossover has been around for about 10yrs. I've seen discussion of its horrible frequency response before.
Do you ever get calls from the companies when you find these major issues? It is amazing that this company would let a speaker out with specs like this.
@@MD-md4th that was kind of my point. These companies must be able to do the same tests Danny does. I, humble diy'r that I am, have the equipment to do these tests.
Hi Sir, I am just a Hi-fi enthusiast and have no technical knowledge about speaker designs but always DIY with other people's design. Your videos always concentrate on frequency measurements and nothing about how the speakers actually sound and I am just wondering is measuring the dips and hums of a speaker tells the whole story of how good that speaker sounds. Would there be occasions that a speaker can sound fantastic but the measurements are not up to par? Thank you..
“Would there be occasions that a speaker can sound fantastic but the measurements are not up to par?” Absolutely! The Mozart Grands sound fantastic with a suitable amp. There is much more to a speaker than how the frequency response graph looks.
VA generally have that bloat and spectral decay around 1100hz, it's intended to beef out and and overly exaggerate that frequency area. It's a design choice not an error. Certain music choices and instruments come across as very believable as a result, for instance classical music has an authentic body to it, the winds in an orchestra like the bassoon, bass clarinet, or a contralto have a laid on thick weight to them. That is VA's heritage, they over guild the lily somewhat but it's not without certain benefits...flat, they are not.
Agreed. I have a set of newer Bach, the ones with the floating tweeter & rear ported. With every improvement I've done to my system, they've reacted positively. They are very sensitive to changes in your system, meaning equipment and cable changes. I'm a multi-instrumentalist and I find them very pleasing to listen to. I love their vocal presentation and they're very musical. They have an amazing bottom end for their size as well. They're rarely fatiguing unless you have harshness in your system somewhere.
Meassuring frecqincys.. In diagram.. Show numbers in Hz and so on... We can use this as a guide line... But in The end it is The combo that counts... What ouer ears hear...amplifier... Cables do miracles.. They can almost make a pig sing beautyful... Thanks for The session and info 🙏🧙♂️
lol I thought you were pointing to the graph that just left the screen like they do on the TV weather, until it dawned on me you were actually pointing at the real drivers.
A speaker designer once told me that the 2-3k region is where harsher sounds live and also where the woofer and tweeter overlap area is…an area where human hearing is super sensitive to driver overlap challenges…so that is why dips are intentionally voiced into the 2-3k area by so many passive speaker makers.
But, when you go see an orchestra play they are not putting filters on the instruments to drop their output in the 2k-3k range…. I have had excellent results using 4th order crossovers for the midrange tweeter crossover point, with a flat response.
@@terryforsythe8083 Their instruments are also not being asked to play 20hz to 20k…passive speaker design is the management of compromises. Ideally the response is probably flat with no filtering and a single point source. But that technology does not exist of course. We also know that phase is important and we have to be careful of making that issue worse with a high ordered crossover.
@@seanb3303 phase is important, which is why I have used 4th order Linkwitz-Riley or Bessel filters, tuned for the specific components. Carefully designed 4th order filters can provide for good alignment of the drivers' group delays in the crossover region while achieving a flat frequency response. Also, the 24 dB/octave drop off they provide keep the crossover band fairly narrow - quickly drop the midrange (or woofer) out of the tweeter's operating frequencies and vice-versa.
@@1997inspire it does not look like the Mozart is made any longer, but Stereophile lists the 1997 price at $2,500. There certainly was room in that budget for 4th order crossovers using air core inductors and high quality capacitors. I used to have a fixture to wind my own inductors - it is a quick process and the amount of magnet wire for the values needed for a 2.6 kHz crossover point is not that much.
That's what makes it special: here you get the plain scientific objectivity. All the others do subjective psychoacoustics. I am glad this one channel is purely devoted to the indisputable theoretical aspects, so that you yourself might benefit in your very own practical perception. Yours, not his. ;-)
@@oleplanthafer7034 yes agreed. Omission of the subjective in hifi is a problem though seeing that the end result of any speaker design is a subjective end experience. A general statement such as "despite all the cheap components and poor measurements this speaker doesn't sound that bad to my ears" or " to my ears the poor measurements and parts are really evident upon listening". We hifi geeks know that both these things can be true. That would really take the series up a level lol
Both are rather old moldels (implementations), with the Mozart to the right even older, maybe 20 to 25 year old models. Don't know..... Might just have been different people involved in design?
We buy these hotrod speakers, get it home, look under the hood, and find a Brigs & Straton with an oil leak... After watching many of these videos from Danny, I think I will save my money and build one of the many kits out there that Danny and others offer. Danny has certainly opened my eyes, I knew it was bad, but this is ridiculous.
And to whoever owns the Mozart Grand speakers, they just lost half their resale value. It would be interesting to look up some reviews on them and see what the industry critics had to say about them. ;)
you'd expect it to be the other way around for speakers that are twice/half as expensive, it's bad when you pay twice as much and sadly get half the speaker.
I own a pair since 2007. Set up properly in a decent room they sound beautiful, nothing sounds enhanced. Very natural sounding speakers, especially when listening to acoustic instruments. I will add that when the source is mastered well they sound great, but when mastered poorly they will let you know.
That's very strange... These two are quite old models, maybe there's something wrong with them? Vienna Acoustics is quite a respectable brand, and at least their newer versions of their speakers get really good reviews, and the ones I've tried sound really good...
I don't think this is a case of cutting cost. You can use cheaper parts and get a good frequency response. It won't be all it can be, but should sound good with a variety of music. It's so odd looking. Like they wanted classical to have a house sound. I like a jack of all trades speaker. My mood determines what I listen to.
Seems like the cheaper speaker is better because it already has some upgraded components in the crossover. I'd bet if the owner sent in the other speaker which had a different crossover it'd measure worse and more like the expensive model
The cheaper one just had some caps that had been upgraded. That doesn't effect any of the measurements. The problem with the Grand model was the ringing issues with the woofers. That issue has nothing to do with the parts used in the crossover.
Having recently acquired a used pair of Mozart Grand’s, I’m really surprised. in the few weeks I’ve had mine, I’ve been nothing but astonished. I’ve got a pair of GR’s too (AV-1’s, which I love), so I know how neutral speakers should sound. I wonder if something’s up with this particular pair….
I have a pair of VA Haydn bookshelf speakers. Tiny things, but the tweeters are of exceptional quality, and the woofer, for a 5.5" puts out some very strong output. Perfection on a desktop, though I'm sure you guys could make them even better.
It doesnt surprise me in the least often in a range of speakers the more expensive ones are worse than the cheaper ones I dont think they even compare by listening or measurements just presume the customer will pay extra and believe it will be better
I love Wienna Mozart Grand speakers.They are fantastic sounding speakers with a warm and musical sound.I can listen to them for hours and hours.First off all you must listen to them and then make a review how bad they are.I hawe owned a lot of good speakers in the past but these ones i will never replace!!!
@@vittoriomartinidonati65 Mozart Grand mk2(speakers in video) with Acoustics Preference(Slovenia high fidelity company) mono block amps 300 w on 4 ohm.Crazy good synergy.Speakers cables Silent Wire LS12 .Van Den HUL the first Ultimate mk2 rca interconnects from LOxjie D50(dac) to IFI ITUBE2(preamp and tube buffer).From IFI ITUBE2 to mono block amps with QED Audio 40 Signature rca.PC-Audirvana studio,Tidal,Fidelizer pro,Audiophile Optimizer with Audioquest CARBON usb to dac and Furutech tp 80e and .................
Yeah I just got them and I think they sound amazing. They are so easy to listen to. Love how vocals and percussions sound on them. I think he needs to check his gear and review that because there’s definitely something wrong there.
The only tower with 2 woofers that play the same range I've heard that works is the JBL Studio 570. It sounds like a single 12" driver, not 2 separate 5.25" drivers. They do better than the 590's in this regard, despite the 590's being a 2.5 way. The Sony SSCS3 towers are cheap again, but I know if I get them I'll just wish the whole time they were a 3.5 way. So I'd probably just stick to the bookshelf version I have already.
The Mozart Grand is a newer model. Chronologically, it's Mozart, Mozart Grand and Mozart Grand SE (current version). The next model up in the line is the Baby Beethoven Grand.
OMGoodness. I want to say OMG but cannot. Faith tells me no no. What the heck. Supposedly a reputable company. Ding Dang Dong. Sounds like a witches brew was used in making these speakers. Thank you sir, again and again.
and choosing the right hifi equipment is not easy. price does NOT determine the quality we have seen too many times! factories of firms are only looking for and making the most mulug money and do not care what they do for and achieve this
Mozart - sounds like someone has already tweaked it, did one, then sold the pair of speakers with one totally different to the other which of course would have caused problems for the current owner.
Lol, some purposely buy speakers for longer tweeter decay. Are they "wrong"??? Nope It takes years to understand speaker measurements and what designers are trying to achieve. Not everything is so simple as, "it measured poorly on this particular aspect and is therefore poor quality."
