Yeah unfortunately its not the same SVS from 10 yrs ago. Its just another company run by a CEO that just wants profits. It use to be audio enthusiasts that wanted to put out quality stuff and now its a race to the bottom to just make a profit. All of these refreshes just makes me think they found another way to save money and charge more.
I sort of knew it was going to be a trainwreck as soon as I saw a flat baffle with sharp edges. There's pretty much no way to not have bad diffraction problems with that kind of setup.
This one was painful to watch. Sometimes I wonder if it is better to save (Danny’s) engineering talent on new designs or towards existing designs with “good bones.” This one felt like the proverbial attempt to “polish a turd.” However, public exposure of crappy engineering is worth the watch. I’d be ashamed to release something so troubled to market as an engineer/designer. But today marketing and product reviewers can sell deficiencies to an unaware public. Thank you Danny for exposing not just the cheese, but the turd designs.
I wonder if the designers for a range of speakers start off with the biggest model in the range and then are left with compromised designs further down the range as they tied into drivers and cabinet styling more suited to those larger models?
Wow!! Essentially, it is a complete redesign! Never heard an SVS bookshelf. No ambition to. Then I remember the accolades that were heaped upon these by other reviewers. Geesh!! 😮
I have the previous gen model, along with the matching center. I found out pretty quickly there's nothing "ultra" about them. Granted I think the cabinets do look nice. Nicely finished and are constructed well enough. I bought and assembled Danny's upgrade kit for the bookshelf speakers. It was a huge step in the right direction for my 2 channel listening. They are not perfect, but at least respectable now. I'm really interested in the recently announced NX-Bravo...... I may take the plunge with those, we'll see.
Danny , I don’t know if you have heard of VAF or Duntech audio in Australia, but both of them resorted to using felt pads stuck to the cones in strategic places to alleviate and dampen bad distortion in the upper frequencies of their mid bass drivers..with excellent results
Learn so much valuable truth here watching the videos. However, I still cannot figure out who in their right mind would privately ship GR heavy speakers and then pay for an upgrade, then pay return shipping. This is such a niche market to begin with, who are these customers?
Lots of people! Sometimes the cost of shipping and new parts gets result that are far better than spending money on new speakers that are just as bad and also loaded with cheesy parts.
I figure people that have in the past ( and now present ) bought speakers and were happy with them. I think now due to the continues videos of GR Research criticizing these variety of speakers, people are now looking at their purchase and thinking, maybe they are not as good as I thought. Should I send them to Danny to evaluate and possibly upgrade them. So starts the stream ! The upside is GR Research can improve performance on these loudspeakers at a cost, unfortunately a cost above what they paid for the speakers. Near all loudspeakers could use a crossover upgrade but as Danny says, they are built to a price point, though no excuse for bad designing.
The advantage goes to those whom purchased the same product and can now buy the upgrade. That's to the person who made the investment to send in theirs to GR. Maybe ya like the looks of a specific speaker and GR has an available upgrade. Buy new and upgrade. I am one of those who took advantage of this process. Thanks Danny!
That frequency graph shows it's about +/- 3db from 92db. I was honestly expecting it to be far worse when you labeled it a mess. All your crossover appears to have done was lower the response at 2 and 3khz by about 3db, without getting rid of the 4db rise from 3 to 5khz which is now closer to a 5db rise over the 3khz response with your crossover "upgrade" since you notched down the response from 2 to 3khz.
The biggest gains are not from a change in frequency response, or even cleaning up the spectral decay. The biggest gains are from getting the junk parts out of the signal path and replacing them with high quality parts.
The answer to all of this is go DIY and guarantee quality parts all the way. There are a few great companies, like GR Research, Troels Gravesen, SB Acoustics to name a couple.
These are expensive speakers. For the same money, you can pick up the Ascend Acoustics Sierra-1 V2, which are very well-designed. Or, for half the cost, the new Elac Debut 3.0 would be a great choice.
I was going to get some SVS Ultra Evolution Pinnacle Towers until I saw the reviews. Ended up getting way better Arendal 1723 Tower THX speakers for two-thirds the price
@@joblo1978 Me too. I believe they have iron nuts holding the binding posts and at least one iron core inductor, one high value electrolytic and sandcast resistors.
@@Harrisongrey19 No guess. There is a 1723 Tower teardown video on YT where the iron nuts are demonstrated with a magnet and you can see the crossover components in the video and Arendal's website. I am not surprised by the electrolytic as it is 200uf, a similar value polycap would be six times the size and multiple times the cost.
"Well, we can go with the engineers recommendation, or we can use this woofer for an extra $12 profit per speaker" Guess which driver they go with.... every single time?
You can also use a half round file and round over the inside radius and with a little elbow grease file the inside of the woofer hole and if you don't have a small trim router. Then take your measurements and you might not need to use a notch filter and use less parts.
Perfect response does not always equate to a perfect perception of sound, every human ear is different, every recording is different and those are the nuances people either love or hate between speaker designs just like there are varied tastes in music. Between all amplifier and speaker combinations, the perfect system is really one that sounds best to the listener. Some people listen more to the music, some people listen more to the equipment and some people just listen to opinons.
It seems like "this dog don't hunt" in stock form, and it makes more sense to start again with something else. If the speaker is this poorly designed, why try to turn a "sow's ear" into a silk purse?
These are marketed really well. There will be a lot of these out there in the market and many of those owners would be interested it stepping up the performance.
Nice work! Those tweeter centered flat baffles are horrible to make it work. I always wonder why they don’t just move the drivers vertically stacked closest possible toward the top plate.
Yes, they will. Their marketing team must have one of the highest budgets in the business. That, and free shipping(both ways) causes a mediocre speaker to be priced like a much higher quality speaker.
Those drivers seem to be designed well enough for their 3 way tower design. It has a smaller driver for midrange so those troublesome ranges would be avoided in that design.
@@ryanchappell5962 Maybe, but what other issues will pop up? When a company clearly doesn't care about frequency response or X over parts quality, I can't trust any of their products. No matter how good the commercials make them look.
I was thinking the same thing but there are 2 problems with that. Why would you want a 5-1/2" woofer in a 3 -way. And secondly, SVS would use more crappy parts in the x-over making the sound more congested though flatter response.
"The SVS Ultra Evolution Bookshelf speaker is one of the best I have ever heard, and I can't recommend them enough." "See my affiliate link below." - Andrew Robinson
Andrew Robinson's shilling is embarrassingly obvious - what is a concerning is that he has an audience who believe the drivel & nonsense that he's projecting - Hillary supporters ?
The woofer doesn’t bother me much. That hump is indicative of a stiffer cone. It just needed a better crossover and prob a 4th order acoustic xo. That tweeter sucks bad. Interesting as well since cheap good tweeters can be found relatively easily today.
I've got a pair of the previous SVS Ultra and I've trialed a pair of broken in set of the new Evolutions. The old model is far better than the new. The old version is a bit harsh for music listening, I found the new version hard to listen to after 15 min. I agree the YT reviewers just blindly assume that thes are better. Not a musical speaker by any means. Made for loud movies and to match with thier subs.
@@dannyrichie9743 depends on who you are talking to, the customer was nice or the devil 😜 Nowadays it's one of the better/best soccer teams in Germany - after a Investor took over and bought the best of the best - a very controversial team 😜
Wonder if they actually test and measure these speakers over at SVS before they release them to the public. If what you say here is true, this is a major stain on once 'respectable' speaker company. Maybe they should stick to what they know and know well - building Subwoofers.
Danny - is there an alternate way of rounding off the woofer hole interior edge of the baffle aside from a router? I would imagine a standard file might work but anything else? Thanks!
Use a coarse wood rasp. You can then use a finer file or coarse to finer sandpaper. A technique may be to leave more material near where screws enter, but that's a bit more work
Pretty cool. I know I keep posting this but how about an upgrade for the classic ADS L810's? It's a selfish request because I'm refinishing a pair and although they sound pretty good the crossover wasn't built from great stuff.
@@dannyrichie9743 I might reach out to you about that. For the time being, I'm refinishing the cabinets because someone appears to have put polyurethane on them with a ragged push broom and the fabric on the grills is pretty grim. I'm guessing folks use the email on the company website to set this up?
In a Czech review there are measurements and the drivers' measurements do no match yours. They are normal, expected. What if there are two series of Ultra Edition? One for magazines and reviewers and another for stores? No designer would use drivers with such bad measurements, so logic dictates that the change was made later.
The bass reflex response is very well done (Czech measurements), which indicates that the designer did the job. Surely the problem came later, when he had no control over the manufacturing.
@@dannyrichie9743 Well then the most plausible explanation is that the magazines and reviewers received some with drivers without such obvious problems.
This hobby is highly subjective. I’m sure there are a lot of people out there that hate the sound of person x’s speakers, no matter how “well” they measure.
Qudos for the tenacity. But some jobs are not worth the effort. What's that saying? "You can't make a silk purse out of a pig's ear". Would be interesting if the customer could blind A/B them at home, and choose which they prefer. It's like fashion... Personal taste is a peculiar thing!
A couple of years ago, Scientific American did a special issue on the genetics of the Axlotl. Turns out, evolution is not always kind... or even rational. And sometimes downright sadistic. The axlotl is a victim of evolution, not a product of it. Sometimes I look at these speakers and think, "maybe a different tweeter", or "maybe a different woofer". And sometimes I think, "maybe a different box". And then there are those times which I think, "maybe just replace it all with a different manufacturer". I'll be honest with you... Richie finds a lot of drivers that simply should never have been produced, let alone matched with anything, let alone sold as part of any speaker system. And then on very rare occasion, he finds a driver that looks like it came right out of an "ideal driver" textbook. And that's usually when I find they are either $250 each, or haven't been produced in 20 some odd years.
Why are speaker companies making so many mistakes ? I understand cost is always a factor but these are cabinet design mistakes as well as component issues . Surely when a company gets its first proto-type they must see these things .Rounding the faces of the inside of where the woofer sits cant cost much . Or seeing the Grill is detracting from the performance..design a new grill . .....Or do they even care?
Sometimes it's a mistake and sometimes it's based on the preferences of the designers. Despite what you'd think, most of the time they've listened to these speakers extensively and decided they were competitive within their class. In real world AB tests, there's no guarantee the best specs will win.
@@bryedeWhen the final product is a compromise between accounting department, lifestyle designers and often very capable engineers tasked with making it work within the constraints imposed by the first two, guess who gets the mucky end of the stick?
they could also not be give enough time to get it right, or use those website crossover calculators and skip the crossover deign completely. just order the parts and put it in....
of course they do, many do not have any comparisons or refence to tell the difference. you can call that blissfully ignorant consumer. they do not know what they are missing.
SVS clearly has patterned it's business model using Klipsch as the template. Amazing box design's (The current offerings) insulted by cost restraint incompetence. Yep sounds exactly like Klipsch. What does this say about the rest of the line? It says all "Evolution" speakers (bookshelves & Tower's) have the industry standard 25.00 crossovers. Buyer's should know this before spending thousands on these 25.00 crossovers. The tower's are just gorgeous. Intentionally ruined by a manufacturer to pad their bank accounts.
So….. two choices then. Understand that +/-2-2.5db variance in FR on a speaker that has a decent enough DI that DSP can flatten quite easily ….or…. Buy your kit to flatten the FR that will go through Audyssey or Dirac anyway. Your jadedness with companies using inexpensive parts really came through in this video. No offense at all my man but I guarantee their cash flow is far greater than yours. You ~barely~ improved the FR. I know without a doubt that if you worked for this company, you’d be a huge asset to them. You’re clearly a highly intelligent designer. But SVS has clearly developed speakers that people love and highly desire. They’re a household name among anyone in the industry. You definitely helped this speaker with your efforts but we’re talking about an impact made that is already fixed with DSP that the speaker is very likely going to be used with anyway. I just don’t see what the point was for all the effort. The stored energy? That’s about it. Again, very helpful. The main issue with the entire Ultra Evo line is the instantaneous compression issues in the tweeter and in the models with a midwoofer that makes them warm/bright during very loud peaks. This is entirely unfixable without a complete redesign of the tweeter and midwoofer. This info was grabbed from Klippel measurements.
You can't fix ferrous parts in the signal path and the degrading effect of all of those cheap parts with DSP. DSP is basically a glorified EQ. The life is still sucked away with the parts in them. Bose is also a household name and has had great cash flow from their marketing efforts. That does not mean they have great products.
"The strongest argument against democracy is a 5 minute conversation with an average voter" -- Winston Churchill Much the same goes for audio. "Popular" does not necessarily mean good. In fact, it's often quite bad. "Beats" by Dre, is a shining example of this.
The poor tweeter placement and lack of a roundover or chamfer is inexcusable. It’s basic speaker design stuff. DSP is not gonna fix this speaker either.
@@alexw890 Actually, if you check out the Klippel measurements for the speaker, you'll see that despite its design, it has decent enough directivity that when DSP and acoustic treatment, it will work just fine. Believe me, SVS knows enough about speaker design to know where they can cut cost without losing too much performance. They know that for those that are serious about audio, they're going to have treatment in their room and they're going to be powered by electronics that have DSP. The main issue for the Ultra Evo line is actually it's instantaneous compression issues. i.e. when it's hitting loud peaks (gun shots, other fx, loud orchestral crescendos, etc...) there's a very bright peak and a very dark suck out in the 1.5k-2k region where the tweeter crosses over that's very nasty. That's unfixable in its current state. It would require a tweeter redesign. What's most impressive however is the extremely low distortion they've managed to build into the new speakers. Like, we're talking under 1% even all the way to 96db. That's phenomenal for the price bracket.
@@dannyrichie9743 Can you show me the measurements for the "life" you are talking about? I'm not trying to be combative but if you're going to argue a point for something that I didn't even bring up, it helps to give an example or point me to an URL. I'd love to read/see it. Seriously. No sarcasm. I'd love to see the measured effect that good parts have versus non-good parts. I saw in your video where you changed the crossover point and it got rid of some of the stored energy in the woofer. That's awesome! That's measurable and helpful. However, an active speaker using DSP could do the same thing.
Nice insights but I don´t really understand why offering an upgrade kit for a badly designed speaker to get it ´more or less´ right. I wouldn´t bother and buy other speakers 🤷
These are well marketed and sold. So there will be many people that buy them and want to make them better. We have sold a LOT of upgrades for their Ultra product line. So there is a demand for the upgrades.
It would be cool if GR research made a 4 channel or 6 channel dsp amp. You could just program the DSP as a crossover and offer the file for each speaker upgrade that the user can load up. You would sell a lot of those amps. It probably wouldn’t be any more expensive than all these HQ crossover parts. Not only that but the user can have some additional dsp flexibility for room correction or high pass filtering for sub integration.
@@lloyd.8272 I’m not talking about DSP as an EQ. I’m talking about DSP as a crossover. With a dsp crossover (separate amp for each driver) you can absolutely solve some of these problems because you can use steeper slopes without a crazy parts count that would get super expensive. The woofer has a lot of cone breakup so the 2nd order passive crossover does not filter that out. With DSP, you can use an 8th order filter if you want. You can do baffle step, notches and all sorts of stuff with no parts at all. The purists may say that passive is the only way to go but I always feel like I need some kind of EQ anyway and most people do since they don’t have perfect rooms. If you are thinking that the problems can’t be solved with EQ then you are absolutely right but when you take control of the individual drivers, you can actually control exactly how they overlap. I’ve been doing this for a decade manually using REW and a measurement microphone. It absolutely works. All that being said, I would prefer a tweeter with a lower crossover point because I think it sounds better.
@@dannyrichie9743 If you don't need a "big" center channel, why couldn't a guy just lay an NX-Bravo on it's side? Vertical response looks great! Dialogue clarity should be excellent off to the side..
@@will5879 We are working on making a NX-Bravo style center in the next couple weeks, we're waiting on the test cabinet to do the crossover work for it and the matching tower.
@@dannyrichie9743 In my own use case... 99% of the time there are only two movie watchers, one seated dead center (me), and the other well off center to the left (spouse). I would tilt it with the tweeter to the left, taking advantage of the "good vertical". It was just an idea. Curious to see what you come up with, most center channels (including my current one), are an ugly mess off axis. Dialogue suffers of course, the exact opposite of what I want..
I wanted to love these speakers. They look great. Then I heard them and ran away. Diamond dust is a marketing gimmick and they are way too fatiguing. If you think these are bad, wait till you hear the towers. Horrific.
. If the answer is "Yes" then the answer you seek is, the difference is a speaker sound WITH a somewhat flat response versus a speaker WITHOUT a flat'ish response. If the answer is "No" then you need to listen to a whole bunch of different types of speakers to know what different types tend to sound like. Get it? Acid Jazz, Funk & Brass 🔈🔉🔊
I suggest you to lunch your own perfect brand of loudspeakers . Nowadays it’s a very big challenge to compete . SVS have years of research and development to a product be called mess.
We do have our own products. They are at a little higher performance level than the budget level products we do upgrades for. Years of research and development resulted in this? Did you watch the video? These were a bit of a mess.
Is it common that people buy speakers without listening to them? If thats the case you just send them back if you dont like them right? This diy stuff must be for people who really like to mess with stuff just for fun or is it possible to love the looks of a speaker so much that you want to fix the sound yourself instead of selling/returning it? I respect this mans knowledge and it seems like he knows his stuff, but come on.. If you like a speaker you like it and if not you get rid of it. If you want expensive quality parts inside you buy a quality speaker. These upgrades also cost alot of money..
@@dannyrichie9743 I hear you. And my meaning was not to "shit on" different kits or try to undermine this guys talent in any way, but is it really a way to get the best shit possible for your money? If so.. I rest my case and apologize! 🇸🇪
My thoughts also, why trying to fix a bad design and paying even more for the ´fix´. Don´t buy them in the first place and if you have they are not worth it. Anyway, don´t think many SVS owners watch this channel 😊
@@justasimplefox yep it's the business... actually after upgrading, means changing, quasi all the components, you end up just keeping the wooden box but you pay full price PLUS the upgrade kit... kinna ridiculous...
Marketing hyperbole struck again. Thanks for opening our eyes (and ears), Danny, although I am not personally at risk of buying any of that cheesy stuff.
hmmm, he kinda rudely blasts practically everyone else's speakers, but his we are to believe are better. Well after watching Jay's videos and thinking objectively you have to wonder. These other companies spent hundreds or thousands of hours in r&d for a price point. Maybe the speakers are great and crossovers are cheap. I have a hard time one someone wants you to believe they are the only one. These other companies are very large in comparison to his tiny company.
It's an odd mix of measurements and standard audiophile sales with a strong opinion. But then I find many audiophiles are like that. I'm not of the belief that simply changing to slightly technically better crossover components is going to fix a speaker with issues. This SVS upgrade kit is not one I'd be using. Some of the other ones, maybe. But then again I'm unlikely to have such speakers unless they were a decent 2nd hand buy. The GR speakers are mostly something I'd be more likely to consider
Materials & manufacturing cost for the whole speaker is typically between 20-25% of retail cost. So SVS likely paid in the $240-300 range for each pair of speakers based the $1200USD prices I'm seeing online. But keep in mind with a retail sales model, you've got to pay all for the shipping, warehousing, advertising, etc and the wages of every set of hands that handle the speaker.
@@dannyrichie9743 So you're suggesting they would ignore them to meet a particular price point... Or they felt they were good enough? Did you hear any gross anomalies when actually listening or you just went by the numbers you saw. Can't recall hearing you mention how they actually sound...
There's indeed not a lot of "Ultra" inside. ...BTW, that T-shirt is kinda ugly... Didn't they stock any of these "green 'n white for a lifetime" Werder shirts?
LOL...The only things "Ultra" about this speaker are the name and price!
LOVE these upgrade videos Danny.
SVS and their marketing team are the only Stars in their lineup. For the price anyway.
Marketing takes up a lot of that budget that undercuts parts and r and d.
Yeah unfortunately its not the same SVS from 10 yrs ago. Its just another company run by a CEO that just wants profits. It use to be audio enthusiasts that wanted to put out quality stuff and now its a race to the bottom to just make a profit. All of these refreshes just makes me think they found another way to save money and charge more.
@@chadmorris946 They look shiny though. I think my endgame will either be sopra 1 or atc 40
@@WILLIAMMORALES-gw1zz My end game would be Seaton Sound Cat 12s in the front and Cat 8s for surrounds
@@chadmorris946 Those look really sweet.
Goes to show Brand and looks can be deceiving let alone reviews. Enlightening TY Danny
Danny, very good job! Also I like your idea about two options for crossover parts (budget set and hight performance one)
I sort of knew it was going to be a trainwreck as soon as I saw a flat baffle with sharp edges. There's pretty much no way to not have bad diffraction problems with that kind of setup.
This one was painful to watch. Sometimes I wonder if it is better to save (Danny’s) engineering talent on new designs or towards existing designs with “good bones.” This one felt like the proverbial attempt to “polish a turd.”
However, public exposure of crappy engineering is worth the watch. I’d be ashamed to release something so troubled to market as an engineer/designer. But today marketing and product reviewers can sell deficiencies to an unaware public. Thank you Danny for exposing not just the cheese, but the turd designs.
I wonder if the designers for a range of speakers start off with the biggest model in the range and then are left with compromised designs further down the range as they tied into drivers and cabinet styling more suited to those larger models?
I was looking at the Nano version of this speaker. I'm very happy with my Triangle BR02 that were $299 a year or so ago.
Wow!! Essentially, it is a complete redesign! Never heard an SVS bookshelf. No ambition to. Then I remember the accolades that were heaped upon these by other reviewers. Geesh!! 😮
I have the previous gen model, along with the matching center. I found out pretty quickly there's nothing "ultra" about them. Granted I think the cabinets do look nice. Nicely finished and are constructed well enough. I bought and assembled Danny's upgrade kit for the bookshelf speakers. It was a huge step in the right direction for my 2 channel listening. They are not perfect, but at least respectable now. I'm really interested in the recently announced NX-Bravo...... I may take the plunge with those, we'll see.
Yikes!! Good job on this. This being relatively inexpensive would be a good positive experience to get more performance from out of the box.
I've used a dremel with a little sanding drum to smooth those edges behind the woofer or even a fine rounded rasp.
every other cheaply made ... like Klipsch... There really is so much crap in the low end big name stuff!
There is a blank ton of supposed high end and ultra high end crap too
Great work as always, but you overlooked the fact that the baffle is curved and that’s why it’s such a great speaker 😂
Yeah, that did make it great. ;-)
Once you have to change drivers to fix it, along with a new crossover its just dung. It's sell it on and get something better time.
Danny , I don’t know if you have heard of VAF or Duntech audio in Australia, but both of them resorted to using felt pads stuck to the cones in strategic places to alleviate and dampen bad distortion in the upper frequencies of their mid bass drivers..with excellent results
And around the tweeters
Learn so much valuable truth here watching the videos. However, I still cannot figure out who in their right mind would privately ship GR heavy speakers and then pay for an upgrade, then pay return shipping. This is such a niche market to begin with, who are these customers?
Lots of people! Sometimes the cost of shipping and new parts gets result that are far better than spending money on new speakers that are just as bad and also loaded with cheesy parts.
I figure people that have in the past ( and now present ) bought speakers and were happy with them. I think now due to the continues videos of GR Research criticizing these variety of speakers, people are now looking at their purchase and thinking, maybe they are not as good as I thought. Should I send them to Danny to evaluate and possibly upgrade them. So starts the stream ! The upside is GR Research can improve performance on these loudspeakers at a cost, unfortunately a cost above what they paid for the speakers. Near all loudspeakers could use a crossover upgrade but as Danny says, they are built to a price point, though no excuse for bad designing.
The advantage goes to those whom purchased the same product and can now buy the upgrade. That's to the person who made the investment to send in theirs to GR. Maybe ya like the looks of a specific speaker and GR has an available upgrade. Buy new and upgrade. I am one of those who took advantage of this process. Thanks Danny!
@@rnomarcuzee8217they’re saving hours and sometimes days of individual research with their kits
That frequency graph shows it's about +/- 3db from 92db. I was honestly expecting it to be far worse when you labeled it a mess. All your crossover appears to have done was lower the response at 2 and 3khz by about 3db, without getting rid of the 4db rise from 3 to 5khz which is now closer to a 5db rise over the 3khz response with your crossover "upgrade" since you notched down the response from 2 to 3khz.
The biggest gains are not from a change in frequency response, or even cleaning up the spectral decay. The biggest gains are from getting the junk parts out of the signal path and replacing them with high quality parts.
The answer to all of this is go DIY and guarantee quality parts all the way. There are a few great companies, like GR Research, Troels Gravesen, SB Acoustics to name a couple.
These are expensive speakers. For the same money, you can pick up the Ascend Acoustics Sierra-1 V2, which are very well-designed. Or, for half the cost, the new Elac Debut 3.0 would be a great choice.
Well, for that type and size speaker, our X-LS Encore is a much better choice than all of those.
@@dannyrichie9743Do you sell them in EU? Or maybe someone is distributing for you here?
@@stormtrooper9404 We ship products that way every week.
I was going to get some SVS Ultra Evolution Pinnacle Towers until I saw the reviews. Ended up getting way better Arendal 1723 Tower THX speakers for two-thirds the price
I’m eager to see GR Research get some Arendals in.
Me too @@joblo1978
@@joblo1978 Me too. I believe they have iron nuts holding the binding posts and at least one iron core inductor, one high value electrolytic and sandcast resistors.
@@mddawson1so that’s a guess on everything… hmmm
@@Harrisongrey19 No guess. There is a 1723 Tower teardown video on YT where the iron nuts are demonstrated with a magnet and you can see the crossover components in the video and Arendal's website. I am not surprised by the electrolytic as it is 200uf, a similar value polycap would be six times the size and multiple times the cost.
Oh my. Shots fired 😂
180 ballistic missile shots 😮
Yet again Danny has brought home the prodigal son and has fed him with the fatted calf
Excellent work!
i did get one of their subs on sale and am very pleased so there is that.
The woofer's response looks like a factory reject's. How did the designer even sign off on that?
"Well, we can go with the engineers recommendation, or we can use this woofer for an extra $12 profit per speaker"
Guess which driver they go with.... every single time?
Designer was on a lunch break at that time. By the time he or she came back, the deal was sealed and signed by the Marketing dept.
I’ll save you all the time “ it’s cheesy, it’s bad, here’s my fix, buy it now”
I wish I could swap out the tweeter with a planar magnetic design.
Ironically, it's the new diamond tweeter that SVS markets heavily.
You can also use a half round file and round over the inside radius and with a little elbow grease file the inside of the woofer hole and if you don't have a small trim router. Then take your measurements and you might not need to use a notch filter and use less parts.
Perfect response does not always equate to a perfect perception of sound, every human ear is different, every recording is different and those are the nuances people either love or hate between speaker designs just like there are varied tastes in music. Between all amplifier and speaker combinations, the perfect system is really one that sounds best to the listener. Some people listen more to the music, some people listen more to the equipment and some people just listen to opinons.
Yeah, but in this case you are never going to get there with parts this cheesy regardless of the response.
SVS probably pay 50 bucks in china to get them made, HIFI is mostly BS and sales hype by paid reviewers.
Surely you agree that there is a baseline where a speaker sounds good to the majority of listeners.
@@nitronut7774Exactly, most ´reviewers´ here are as guilty as the manufacturers. Seems there´s no escape anymore to all the BS and hype.
It seems like "this dog don't hunt" in stock form, and it makes more sense to start again with something else. If the speaker is this poorly designed, why try to turn a "sow's ear" into a silk purse?
These are marketed really well. There will be a lot of these out there in the market and many of those owners would be interested it stepping up the performance.
SVS manufacturers their own drivers.
That T-Shirt elicited a hearty laugh - "Dorfverein" ! Ha, so funny to see it worn by an American.
Nice work! Those tweeter centered flat baffles are horrible to make it work. I always wonder why they don’t just move the drivers vertically stacked closest possible toward the top plate.
SVS will sell every pair they make ,
Yes, they will. Their marketing team must have one of the highest budgets in the business. That, and free shipping(both ways) causes a mediocre speaker to be priced like a much higher quality speaker.
For sure and they’ll never have any losses they only built the speakers for $15.
True. Danny gonna sell a lot of kits for this one 😉
Those drivers seem to be designed well enough for their 3 way tower design. It has a smaller driver for midrange so those troublesome ranges would be avoided in that design.
@@ryanchappell5962 Maybe, but what other issues will pop up? When a company clearly doesn't care about frequency response or X over parts quality, I can't trust any of their products. No matter how good the commercials make them look.
I was thinking the same thing but there are 2 problems with that. Why would you want a 5-1/2" woofer in a 3 -way.
And secondly, SVS would use more crappy parts in the x-over making the sound more congested though flatter response.
@@dextermorgan1 can’t argue with that! Seems like they are most interested in making something that looks nice.
@@Chuck-- I think their big tower uses at least 4 of them but it’s also expensive enough that you can get much better for less.
"The SVS Ultra Evolution Bookshelf speaker is one of the best I have ever heard, and I can't recommend them enough." "See my affiliate link below." - Andrew Robinson
Well those who heed Andrew Robinson's advice deserve all they get. Sorry had to say it. :(
I think I'll trust Danny I'm sure speaker sounds fine for average person😅
Not a danny fan but affilliate links on other folks sites? Getting desperate Andrew? Erin and ASR taking all your views? Mystery girl thing is cringe.
Those unsuspecting poor souls heeding Andrew's advise deserve all they get. They have been warned by many people before, but ignored the advice.
Andrew Robinson's shilling is embarrassingly obvious - what is a concerning is that he has an audience who believe the drivel & nonsense that he's projecting - Hillary supporters ?
Andrew Robinson raves on about the floor stander from the same range,they must be great if he says so,😂
The woofer doesn’t bother me much. That hump is indicative of a stiffer cone. It just needed a better crossover and prob a 4th order acoustic xo. That tweeter sucks bad. Interesting as well since cheap good tweeters can be found relatively easily today.
I've got a pair of the previous SVS Ultra and I've trialed a pair of broken in set of the new Evolutions. The old model is far better than the new. The old version is a bit harsh for music listening, I found the new version hard to listen to after 15 min. I agree the YT reviewers just blindly assume that thes are better. Not a musical speaker by any means. Made for loud movies and to match with thier subs.
Damn this shirt 🙀 Greetings from Germany!
A customer sent it to me.
@@dannyrichie9743 depends on who you are talking to, the customer was nice or the devil 😜 Nowadays it's one of the better/best soccer teams in Germany - after a Investor took over and bought the best of the best - a very controversial team 😜
@@Chestnutspread Interesting... I wish we got all of the games over here.
@@dannyrichie9743 And I know a lot of guys who take free days only to watch the superbowl live 😜
@Chestnutspread I heard they are trying to get a new coach. An American named Ted Lasso.
Wonder if they actually test and measure these speakers over at SVS before they release them to the public. If what you say here is true, this is a major stain on once 'respectable' speaker company. Maybe they should stick to what they know and know well - building Subwoofers.
Respectable? You can´t be serious 😅
Thanks😊
Does that "time alignment" baffle even do anything?
No, they are not time aligned.
Klipsch catching stray, LOLS....
Danny - is there an alternate way of rounding off the woofer hole interior edge of the baffle aside from a router? I would imagine a standard file might work but anything else? Thanks!
I use a Dremel tool to round the rear woofer opening. Works like a champ.
If you have a steady hand then what ChicagoRob2 suggested will work.
Use a coarse wood rasp. You can then use a finer file or coarse to finer sandpaper. A technique may be to leave more material near where screws enter, but that's a bit more work
That's crazy. Did SVS even check the frequency response after designing the speakers?
Good question.
Why would any company bring in top flight REAL TALENT when so many lie down out there for very low grade performance
legend
Crazy. Their old ultra stuff was recieved pretty positively from a design aspect by you. This seems like a step in the wrong direction for SVS.
That's true.
Pretty cool. I know I keep posting this but how about an upgrade for the classic ADS L810's? It's a selfish request because I'm refinishing a pair and although they sound pretty good the crossover wasn't built from great stuff.
Send one in.
@@dannyrichie9743 I might reach out to you about that. For the time being, I'm refinishing the cabinets because someone appears to have put polyurethane on them with a ragged push broom and the fabric on the grills is pretty grim. I'm guessing folks use the email on the company website to set this up?
@@tmdillon1969 Yes, you can reach me that way.
In a Czech review there are measurements and the drivers' measurements do no match yours. They are normal, expected. What if there are two series of Ultra Edition? One for magazines and reviewers and another for stores?
No designer would use drivers with such bad measurements, so logic dictates that the change was made later.
The bass reflex response is very well done (Czech measurements), which indicates that the designer did the job. Surely the problem came later, when he had no control over the manufacturing.
These are production units. I also measured two of them.
@@dannyrichie9743 Well then the most plausible explanation is that the magazines and reviewers received some with drivers without such obvious problems.
@@matytinman Or they are not the trained listeners that they think they are.
This hobby is highly subjective. I’m sure there are a lot of people out there that hate the sound of person x’s speakers, no matter how “well” they measure.
Danny, have you ever messed with Arendal speakers?
I heard a pair at New Record Day.
Qudos for the tenacity. But some jobs are not worth the effort. What's that saying? "You can't make a silk purse out of a pig's ear".
Would be interesting if the customer could blind A/B them at home, and choose which they prefer.
It's like fashion... Personal taste is a peculiar thing!
A couple of years ago, Scientific American did a special issue on the genetics of the Axlotl. Turns out, evolution is not always kind... or even rational. And sometimes downright sadistic. The axlotl is a victim of evolution, not a product of it.
Sometimes I look at these speakers and think, "maybe a different tweeter", or "maybe a different woofer". And sometimes I think, "maybe a different box".
And then there are those times which I think, "maybe just replace it all with a different manufacturer".
I'll be honest with you... Richie finds a lot of drivers that simply should never have been produced, let alone matched with anything, let alone sold as part of any speaker system. And then on very rare occasion, he finds a driver that looks like it came right out of an "ideal driver" textbook. And that's usually when I find they are either $250 each, or haven't been produced in 20 some odd years.
Why are speaker companies making so many mistakes ? I understand cost is always a factor but these are cabinet design mistakes as well as component issues . Surely when a company gets its first proto-type they must see these things .Rounding the faces of the inside of where the woofer sits cant cost much . Or seeing the Grill is detracting from the performance..design a new grill . .....Or do they even care?
They don´t care, 100% marketing and more than enough fools fall for it so no need changing their business plan 😊
I don't think they care, bottomline is does it sell? does it make us lots of money? The answer to both is yes. What incentive is left?
Sometimes it's a mistake and sometimes it's based on the preferences of the designers. Despite what you'd think, most of the time they've listened to these speakers extensively and decided they were competitive within their class. In real world AB tests, there's no guarantee the best specs will win.
@@bryedeWhen the final product is a compromise between accounting department, lifestyle designers and often very capable engineers tasked with making it work within the constraints imposed by the first two, guess who gets the mucky end of the stick?
@@justasimplefox They bait the buyer with their “time-aligned” baffle and fancy cabinet, knowing the consumer will go for it, hook, line, and sinker.
Danny what about the SVS towers????
These are the ones we've designed upgrades for so far. gr-research.com/product-category/svs-upgrades/
Sometimes I think the designers don't know what they are doing or don't care.
they could also not be give enough time to get it right, or use those website crossover calculators and skip the crossover deign completely. just order the parts and put it in....
My goodness! Even with your fix, I still wouldn't buy it. So many other better options out there.
try Heco!
They keep getting away with it!!!!
of course they do, many do not have any comparisons or refence to tell the difference.
you can call that blissfully ignorant consumer. they do not know what they are missing.
SVS clearly has patterned it's business model using Klipsch as the template. Amazing box design's (The current offerings) insulted by cost restraint incompetence. Yep sounds exactly like Klipsch. What does this say about the rest of the line? It says all "Evolution" speakers (bookshelves & Tower's) have the industry standard 25.00 crossovers. Buyer's should know this before spending thousands on these 25.00 crossovers. The tower's are just gorgeous. Intentionally ruined by a manufacturer to pad their bank accounts.
So….. two choices then. Understand that +/-2-2.5db variance in FR on a speaker that has a decent enough DI that DSP can flatten quite easily ….or…. Buy your kit to flatten the FR that will go through Audyssey or Dirac anyway.
Your jadedness with companies using inexpensive parts really came through in this video. No offense at all my man but I guarantee their cash flow is far greater than yours. You ~barely~ improved the FR.
I know without a doubt that if you worked for this company, you’d be a huge asset to them. You’re clearly a highly intelligent designer. But SVS has clearly developed speakers that people love and highly desire. They’re a household name among anyone in the industry.
You definitely helped this speaker with your efforts but we’re talking about an impact made that is already fixed with DSP that the speaker is very likely going to be used with anyway. I just don’t see what the point was for all the effort. The stored energy? That’s about it. Again, very helpful.
The main issue with the entire Ultra Evo line is the instantaneous compression issues in the tweeter and in the models with a midwoofer that makes them warm/bright during very loud peaks. This is entirely unfixable without a complete redesign of the tweeter and midwoofer. This info was grabbed from Klippel measurements.
You can't fix ferrous parts in the signal path and the degrading effect of all of those cheap parts with DSP. DSP is basically a glorified EQ. The life is still sucked away with the parts in them.
Bose is also a household name and has had great cash flow from their marketing efforts. That does not mean they have great products.
"The strongest argument against democracy is a 5 minute conversation with an average voter"
-- Winston Churchill
Much the same goes for audio. "Popular" does not necessarily mean good. In fact, it's often quite bad.
"Beats" by Dre, is a shining example of this.
The poor tweeter placement and lack of a roundover or chamfer is inexcusable. It’s basic speaker design stuff. DSP is not gonna fix this speaker either.
@@alexw890 Actually, if you check out the Klippel measurements for the speaker, you'll see that despite its design, it has decent enough directivity that when DSP and acoustic treatment, it will work just fine.
Believe me, SVS knows enough about speaker design to know where they can cut cost without losing too much performance. They know that for those that are serious about audio, they're going to have treatment in their room and they're going to be powered by electronics that have DSP.
The main issue for the Ultra Evo line is actually it's instantaneous compression issues. i.e. when it's hitting loud peaks (gun shots, other fx, loud orchestral crescendos, etc...) there's a very bright peak and a very dark suck out in the 1.5k-2k region where the tweeter crosses over that's very nasty. That's unfixable in its current state. It would require a tweeter redesign.
What's most impressive however is the extremely low distortion they've managed to build into the new speakers. Like, we're talking under 1% even all the way to 96db. That's phenomenal for the price bracket.
@@dannyrichie9743 Can you show me the measurements for the "life" you are talking about? I'm not trying to be combative but if you're going to argue a point for something that I didn't even bring up, it helps to give an example or point me to an URL.
I'd love to read/see it. Seriously. No sarcasm. I'd love to see the measured effect that good parts have versus non-good parts. I saw in your video where you changed the crossover point and it got rid of some of the stored energy in the woofer. That's awesome! That's measurable and helpful. However, an active speaker using DSP could do the same thing.
I mean theyre ”time aligned” right? They have to be great! 😑
Nice insights but I don´t really understand why offering an upgrade kit for a badly designed speaker to get it ´more or less´ right. I wouldn´t bother and buy other speakers 🤷
These are well marketed and sold. So there will be many people that buy them and want to make them better. We have sold a LOT of upgrades for their Ultra product line. So there is a demand for the upgrades.
@@dannyrichie9743Strange but you are probably right 😊
It would be cool if GR research made a 4 channel or 6 channel dsp amp. You could just program the DSP as a crossover and offer the file for each speaker upgrade that the user can load up.
You would sell a lot of those amps. It probably wouldn’t be any more expensive than all these HQ crossover parts. Not only that but the user can have some additional dsp flexibility for room correction or high pass filtering for sub integration.
Sure, but that brings it's own set of signals path challenges.
Naw, JLA cr-1 active crossover 😎
Dsp won’t fix the problems with the speaker.
Rich Hollis from Hollis Audio Labs has that solution done right.
@@lloyd.8272 I’m not talking about DSP as an EQ. I’m talking about DSP as a crossover. With a dsp crossover (separate amp for each driver) you can absolutely solve some of these problems because you can use steeper slopes without a crazy parts count that would get super expensive. The woofer has a lot of cone breakup so the 2nd order passive crossover does not filter that out. With DSP, you can use an 8th order filter if you want. You can do baffle step, notches and all sorts of stuff with no parts at all.
The purists may say that passive is the only way to go but I always feel like I need some kind of EQ anyway and most people do since they don’t have perfect rooms.
If you are thinking that the problems can’t be solved with EQ then you are absolutely right but when you take control of the individual drivers, you can actually control exactly how they overlap. I’ve been doing this for a decade manually using REW and a measurement microphone. It absolutely works. All that being said, I would prefer a tweeter with a lower crossover point because I think it sounds better.
Danny show us ur new nx center
This one? gr-research.com/product/nx-center/
@@dannyrichie9743 If you don't need a "big" center channel, why couldn't a guy just lay an NX-Bravo on it's side? Vertical response looks great! Dialogue clarity should be excellent off to the side..
@@will5879 Then the off axis response would be uneven left to right.
@@will5879 We are working on making a NX-Bravo style center in the next couple weeks, we're waiting on the test cabinet to do the crossover work for it and the matching tower.
@@dannyrichie9743 In my own use case... 99% of the time there are only two movie watchers, one seated dead center (me), and the other well off center to the left (spouse). I would tilt it with the tweeter to the left, taking advantage of the "good vertical". It was just an idea. Curious to see what you come up with, most center channels (including my current one), are an ugly mess off axis. Dialogue suffers of course, the exact opposite of what I want..
I wanted to love these speakers. They look great. Then I heard them and ran away. Diamond dust is a marketing gimmick and they are way too fatiguing. If you think these are bad, wait till you hear the towers. Horrific.
What is the sound difference ? Please tell us.
. Can you imagine the sound difference between a 15 inch woofer compared to a 6 inch woofer?
. If the answer is "Yes" then the answer you seek is, the difference is a speaker sound WITH a somewhat flat response versus a speaker WITHOUT a flat'ish response.
If the answer is "No" then you need to listen to a whole bunch of different types of speakers to know what different types tend to sound like. Get it?
Acid Jazz, Funk & Brass 🔈🔉🔊
For 15 minutes & 5 seconds he told you what the sound difference is.
I nearly bought a pair of SVS Ultra bookshelves a few years ago. So glad I didn't 🤣
I suggest you to lunch your own perfect brand of loudspeakers .
Nowadays it’s a very big challenge to compete .
SVS have years of research and development to a product be called mess.
We do have our own products. They are at a little higher performance level than the budget level products we do upgrades for. Years of research and development resulted in this? Did you watch the video? These were a bit of a mess.
Danny has some very well designed speakers on his website. Excellent designs.
He does have an extensive line of DIY Kits that are well designed and you can get them finished for a price too
Buy ELAC Velas instead.
:-) Try looking inside of those too.
Is it common that people buy speakers without listening to them? If thats the case you just send them back if you dont like them right? This diy stuff must be for people who really like to mess with stuff just for fun or is it possible to love the looks of a speaker so much that you want to fix the sound yourself instead of selling/returning it? I respect this mans knowledge and it seems like he knows his stuff, but come on.. If you like a speaker you like it and if not you get rid of it. If you want expensive quality parts inside you buy a quality speaker. These upgrades also cost alot of money..
The upgrades are cheap compared to what you'd have to pay for a speaker that already has this level of quality inside.
@@dannyrichie9743 I hear you. And my meaning was not to "shit on" different kits or try to undermine this guys talent in any way, but is it really a way to get the best shit possible for your money? If so.. I rest my case and apologize! 🇸🇪
@@dannyrichie9743 That's true, but in some cases I don't think having that level of quality inside some of the speakers is worth it :)
Don't buy it. DONE.
My thoughts also, why trying to fix a bad design and paying even more for the ´fix´. Don´t buy them in the first place and if you have they are not worth it. Anyway, don´t think many SVS owners watch this channel 😊
@@justasimplefox yep it's the business... actually after upgrading, means changing, quasi all the components, you end up just keeping the wooden box but you pay full price PLUS the upgrade kit... kinna ridiculous...
I'll stick w\ my Martin Logon and Wavecrest. Great and affordable.
Its just amazes me how bad some of this commercial stuff is. In the end its just overpriced junk IMO.
Marketing hyperbole struck again. Thanks for opening our eyes (and ears), Danny, although I am not personally at risk of buying any of that cheesy stuff.
The company acts like this speaker and its design is the second coming of Christ!🤔🤫🙄🤪
Erin’s Audio Corner didn’t like the big towers, either. The frequency response was like the stormy seas.
@@ChicagoRob2 SVS is mainly a subwoofer company so it's ALL ABOUT THE BASS. what else do you expect =)
hmmm, he kinda rudely blasts practically everyone else's speakers, but his we are to believe are better. Well after watching Jay's videos and thinking objectively you have to wonder. These other companies spent hundreds or thousands of hours in r&d for a price point. Maybe the speakers are great and crossovers are cheap. I have a hard time one someone wants you to believe they are the only one. These other companies are very large in comparison to his tiny company.
new to this?
Sadly, like many people, your conception is far from reality.
It's an odd mix of measurements and standard audiophile sales with a strong opinion. But then I find many audiophiles are like that.
I'm not of the belief that simply changing to slightly technically better crossover components is going to fix a speaker with issues. This SVS upgrade kit is not one I'd be using. Some of the other ones, maybe. But then again I'm unlikely to have such speakers unless they were a decent 2nd hand buy.
The GR speakers are mostly something I'd be more likely to consider
Overpriced piece of junk! Those speakers retail for over $1500! Insane! The total component cost is probably less than $200
Materials & manufacturing cost for the whole speaker is typically between 20-25% of retail cost. So SVS likely paid in the $240-300 range for each pair of speakers based the $1200USD prices I'm seeing online. But keep in mind with a retail sales model, you've got to pay all for the shipping, warehousing, advertising, etc and the wages of every set of hands that handle the speaker.
I use half round moulding to build a "frame" around the outside to kill diffraction.
Quarter rounding the cabinet baffle face edges is what's needed. Get rid of the moulding.
Acid Jazz, Funk & Brass 🔈🔉🔊
A speaker really designed in an anechoic chamber is going to pkay great in your anechoy living room 😅
What makes you think that?
.....Oh Danny..... SVS does not stand for ... " Sounds Very Shitty "...
C'mon dude... Dont be so picky. 😅😅😅
He sells kits.
@perlman-t2g ... I really needed you to tell me.. as if its a hidden fact.
#paperweight
Train 🚆 wreck svs, go figure 😮
I'm never buying a non gr-research speaker again. Magneplanars are an exception of course.
There's plenty of non-GR speakers that are great too. You're just not going to see an upgrade kit for speakers that don't need an upgrade kit
Just throw them in the garbage 🗑! Svs is yucky 🤮 😒 🙄 😑 😐 🙃 🤮
The comments already contain Sounds Very Shitty.
So the persons designing this speaker wouldn't have seen the same measurements that you do?.... Something is amiss here 🤔
Yes they would....
@@dannyrichie9743 So you're suggesting they would ignore them to meet a particular price point... Or they felt they were good enough? Did you hear any gross anomalies when actually listening or you just went by the numbers you saw. Can't recall hearing you mention how they actually sound...
I think Danny was not up to the task to make correct conclusions because SVS is way ahead of all of us 😅
@@justasimplefox Please explain
@@justasimplefox They have obviously "ultra evolved" from us mere mortals....
There's indeed not a lot of "Ultra" inside. ...BTW, that T-shirt is kinda ugly... Didn't they stock any of these "green 'n white for a lifetime" Werder shirts?
The passion for building a decent loudspeaker 📢 is scarce theses days. Thank Zeus we have GR here. 🫵💎👂🎵🫡