Kii....the future??
- Thread starter kimbleman
- Start date
Strictly Stereo
Trade: Strictly Stereo
Do you have a reference? I was not aware that Mola Mola had made a speaker.
Purité Audio
Trade: Purite Audio
Mola = Hypex and Kii uses Hypex amps I am not aware of a Mola-Mola loudspeaker?
Keith
Keith
Are you trying to be funny? First, you are comparing 10K of kit to about 20k of kit.
No one claims the Kiis are the best system in the world and in every room. Or that they will play room shaking loud bass in every size room and outperform massive subs in the lower bass. If you want extremely loud, room shaking bass, the Kiis aren't the solution. They are "only" full range. I'm sure for most people in most rooms they would play plenty loud and have all the bass they'd want.
Second, what's the size of your room? I can assure you that your system would sound much worse than the Kiis in my smallish room. Your system would be way too big for the room and sound terrible at my place. I also don't have room for 6 boxes, 2 of which are large speakers. That's part of the reason the Kiis exist. To give a high end sound in a small/medium size room - and to fit in with the room decor also.
Beyond that, it's debatable if someone else would necessarily like the sound of your setup better. You obviously do, but that doesn't mean everyone else would. As the Stereophile reviewer put it, the Kiis are "competitive" with anything he's heard. "Competitive" means quality wise they hold their own, but personal preferences, etc. may mean you'd prefer something else.
Purité Audio
Trade: Purite Audio
Price doesn’t really come into it the Kiis and Dutch and Dutch have replaced much more ‘expensive’ systems, the cardioid bass response makes a huge difference, traditional speakers despite marketing buff are passive drivers in a box.
Keith
Keith
What about with the £2000 each mains cables you sell? Can you measure the difference they make? Would they improve the Kiis?
Arkless Electronics
Trade: Amp design and repairs.
The measurements in the Stereophile review are simply stunning. Close to perfect impulse response, virtually flat to 20Hz! It would be interesting to hear a set.
Imagine the risk in buying a 8 year old second-hand pair though... The technical complication is off the planet! I can't imagine such a thing ever getting old enough to become vintage/classic/retro as it would be nigh on impossible to maintain them in working order for that long. I see it as something for those who can laugh about having to right off a £10K pair of speakers after a few years...
Imagine the risk in buying a 8 year old second-hand pair though... The technical complication is off the planet! I can't imagine such a thing ever getting old enough to become vintage/classic/retro as it would be nigh on impossible to maintain them in working order for that long. I see it as something for those who can laugh about having to right off a £10K pair of speakers after a few years...
Nope, no funny..
I can guarantee that my previous system was not 20 k - infact a lot less £££ than what Kii’s with a decent pre amp would amount to
I don’t listen at ''room shaking bass'’ either - far from it - just at a comfortable level with weight and depth to boot
Thats all that counts
its the same issue with the Devialet Phantom speakers - if you have an issue outside of the warranty period then its game over as they are not serviceable
Purité Audio
Trade: Purite Audio
I believe Devialet has publicly stated that their Phantoms are simply not repairable, within warranty they will replace outside warranty...
The Kiis are repairable,very different.
Keith
The Kiis are repairable,very different.
Keith
Strictly Stereo
Trade: Strictly Stereo
Presumably, you meant Strictly Stereo? We absolutely would not do that. For one thing, the Tellurium Q Ultra Silver mains cable will not fit the Kii Three. That extremely chunky IEC plug will not fit under the lip on the back of the speaker.
We do not push cables here and never will. I firmly believe in sorting out the speakers, amplifier and source first. That is not to say that I think cables are irrelevant or that they all sound the same. They are not and do not, but I would definitely advise against spending £1,900 (or £2,000) on a mains cable for a £5,000 component, at least for any of the components that we sell. You would know that if you took the time to check.
We do of course sell those cables. This is because people sometimes ask to buy them, always people with very high end systems. There is no hard sell here. "Try it and let me know what you think" is about as aggressive as our sales pitch ever gets. We offer 30 day returns so customers can try things out at home and make up their own minds. We will even pay for and arrange the return postage. You may be surprised to learn that nobody has ever sent one of those cables back.
Strictly Stereo
Trade: Strictly Stereo
Not so, Ken. The Kii Three can be repaired and Kii will repair them even after the five year warranty has run out.
Keith, do you believe that this aspect is more important than all other speaker characteristics such as frequency response across the audible range, phase integration across cross-over points, etc.? The reason I ask is it is always the first thing you mention about the Kiis and other similar speaker designs. IMHO there is a lot of build cost (amplifiers and drive units, fighting against the room and the other units) and DSP effort being applied to that specific aspect that could equally be applied to other performance areas with good results.
I have heard the Kiis and found them very impressive at first and a little tiring after a while. I can and do listen to small and large Meridian DSPs all day; they are not perfect but they are preferable (to my ears), commercially competitive (the DSP5200SEs are ~£10k) and have on-board DSP solutions for optimising sound wrt room positioning.
Purité Audio
Trade: Purite Audio
The Kiis nd Dutch&Dutch 8Cs are amongst if not the finest measuring loudspeakers available , that is not to say that passive loudspeakers can’t measure well they can.
But when you compare even well regarded ‘traditional’ loudspeaker active or passive you simply hear more through the 3s/8Cs , because of their respective cardioid implementations you hear more direct and less reflected sound, if you get a chance to A/B them against traditional speakers it is obvious.
Also they are both truly ‘full-range’from relatively compact enclosures and their outputs can be individually adjusted allowing them to be placed almost anywhere in a room and still obtain superb results, in built ‘tone’ controls the 8Cs also have built in EQ should you need it, subwoofer integration again should you need it, designs such as these are the future.
Keith
But when you compare even well regarded ‘traditional’ loudspeaker active or passive you simply hear more through the 3s/8Cs , because of their respective cardioid implementations you hear more direct and less reflected sound, if you get a chance to A/B them against traditional speakers it is obvious.
Also they are both truly ‘full-range’from relatively compact enclosures and their outputs can be individually adjusted allowing them to be placed almost anywhere in a room and still obtain superb results, in built ‘tone’ controls the 8Cs also have built in EQ should you need it, subwoofer integration again should you need it, designs such as these are the future.
Keith
Keith, if that post was meant as a response to mine then, with respect, you did not answer the question at all.
Do you believe that cardioid bass response is the most important aspect of loudspeaker performance?
I don't disagree with you that there is a branch of loudspeaker engineering which is exploiting DSP very effectively to improve in-room, real-world performance, albeit at considerable expense.
Do you believe that cardioid bass response is the most important aspect of loudspeaker performance?
I don't disagree with you that there is a branch of loudspeaker engineering which is exploiting DSP very effectively to improve in-room, real-world performance, albeit at considerable expense.
I'm not sure I agree with your point. They are not really more complicated than 2 speakers, 2 amps, and a DAC as separates with all the cabling. Think of the multiple power supplies, transformers, etc. In the Kiis the electronics are on a few boards, repair is probably just replacing a board in many cases. It is true that the disadvantage is that if you have a problem you have to send the whole unit back for repair. But that is an issue with any component that isn't a total separate or totally modular.
And why shouldn't they last a long time? Almost no moving parts, all the elements are designed to work together, and it's virtually impossible to overdrive them to the point of damage.
It's essentially no different than buying any other modern design solid state component - do you also think all of those will be impossible to maintain?
Of course like all other very high end audio, you run the risk that the small company won't be around at some point. But that isn't unique to Kii.
Arkless Electronics
Trade: Amp design and repairs.
I simply don't believe these will be repairable no matter what assurances are given. The level of complication, miniaturisation, use of probably BGA IC's etc etc means that only the manufacturer will ever be able to fix them and then only by replacing whole boards.
IC's used in them will inevitably become obsolete and no longer manufactured after say 5 years. Unlike older equipment there is no generic replacement for many of the parts in something like this.
I often see ads in the electronics press for new wonder IC's which can save a fortune in parts and labour and result in a much smaller product, but I never use them as past experience says you won't be able to fix it in 10-15 years time.
In my last employed job as an R&D engineer we had huge issues due to IC's that had been specified by previous designers becoming unobtainable. The parts procurement people spent half their time tracing stashes of certain (analogue) chips we needed from obscure suppliers or even ebay and we had to completely redesign a major product to get around the non availability of a compander IC. I ended up designing it as a mixture of discrete and generic op amps so that the problem should never arise again.
Enthusiasts should be aware that the race towards miniaturisation, all digital, class D, SMPS and DSP mean that increasingly kit will become throwaway if it fails. I see it already and often in lots of Chinese made very cheap but complicated gear for pro audio and groups which is almost always more expensive to repair than to replace.... The days of quality kit like a Stereo 20 or a Quad 303 being easily repairable indefinitely are well over with this new gear. Once the 1 year guarantee is over and another 3 - 6 years have passed most of it will be land fill....
IC's used in them will inevitably become obsolete and no longer manufactured after say 5 years. Unlike older equipment there is no generic replacement for many of the parts in something like this.
I often see ads in the electronics press for new wonder IC's which can save a fortune in parts and labour and result in a much smaller product, but I never use them as past experience says you won't be able to fix it in 10-15 years time.
In my last employed job as an R&D engineer we had huge issues due to IC's that had been specified by previous designers becoming unobtainable. The parts procurement people spent half their time tracing stashes of certain (analogue) chips we needed from obscure suppliers or even ebay and we had to completely redesign a major product to get around the non availability of a compander IC. I ended up designing it as a mixture of discrete and generic op amps so that the problem should never arise again.
Enthusiasts should be aware that the race towards miniaturisation, all digital, class D, SMPS and DSP mean that increasingly kit will become throwaway if it fails. I see it already and often in lots of Chinese made very cheap but complicated gear for pro audio and groups which is almost always more expensive to repair than to replace.... The days of quality kit like a Stereo 20 or a Quad 303 being easily repairable indefinitely are well over with this new gear. Once the 1 year guarantee is over and another 3 - 6 years have passed most of it will be land fill....
Arkless Electronics
Trade: Amp design and repairs.
Yes. It's not that it's solid state it's that it's digital and uses VLSI IC's which if you can't get that exact IC then game over. There's usually no equivalent or generic part available. The other issue is that as technology makes stuff smaller and more complicated it tends to get cheaper to manufacture (when mass produced) and to buy but vastly more difficult and time consuming to repair, hence in some cases it's not actually impossible to repair but it's beyond economical repair. I routinely turn away anything that's class D or uses a SMPSU already because although the technology makes it cheaper to buy it is maybe 10 X as difficult and time consuming to repair... It's not that I can't repair it but I ain't going to present a customer with a £600 bill to repair an amp they paid £450 for... and neither am I going to halve my very reasonable hourly rates to make it affordable to the customer. Most repairers will probably tell you the same thing. It's getting towards the point that anyone doing what I do will soon only be taking on "vintage" kit for repair and nothing else... give it another 5-10 years... already here for the type of kit described.. most of us will go out of business or, as I say, specialise in just vintage gear by then.
Hi Fi and guitar amps etc is an area which for years (a couple of decades even) has resisted the march of space age technology because the best way to do things has remained the same way its always been done for the last 50+ years. Personally I think that for now this remains true, as do many others, but we are in the midst of a revolution in which class D, DSP, SMPS etc have fairly recently become good enough, and at a low enough price, to rival the traditional ways of doing things. The end of a long era faces us... they'll be selling hippy wigs in Woolworths next
Purité Audio
Trade: Purite Audio
No perhaps not the most important, but when you combine cardioid with excellent on and off axis response, wide dispersion , low distortion etc etc.
As I mentioned when you hear the 8Cs next to even a well regarded traditional active the improvement in sound quality is obvious.
Keith