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AVI's new floorstanders and subs or three way in two boxes as it may be.

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arthur

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Ok, so, Goaded by Tony I've started this thread.

There is a photo in another thread which reminded me of these new speakers.

I have nothing but utter respect for AVI's non active speakers; I have a pair of the truly splendid Trios and I've also owned and loved their NuNeutrons, Pro Nine's and Bigga Trons.

They are the best balanced speakers I've heard to date and excellent vfm.

I have not heard the ADM 9's, but I imagine they are pretty damn good despite the naysayers here and elswhere.

But to the point;

Has anyone heard the new floorstanders with or without the accompanying subs (or third driver in seperate box)?

Is anyone planning on a listen or even buying a pair?

I do plan on getting a listen but not alas until employment is settled down again.

So I'm relying on others for my fix. If as I hope they sound like active versions of the Trio/Brio then they may well be all the speaker I will ever need.
 
jc bum said they were not finished prototypes i believe....you'll have to wait or trust the ears of people who hate avi slagging them off without hearing them.... ;)
 
Yeh darryl I'm expecting the non-listening people to pile in with diatribe before long.

As far as I know though the first ones were/are due for delivery about nowish so someone will have a pair soon, perhaps even someone here :eek::eek:

Ps, jc bum??? :D:D:D I did chortle a lot.
 
Jeez Louise, Arthur.

You might as well place a 10 bazillion Gauss Ash magnet in this thread!*

30dgk5j.jpg


What are you thinking, man?

Joe

* In jest, in case anyone is in doubt.
 
Joe P said:
Jeez Louise, Arthur.

You might as well place a 10 bazillion Gauss Ash magnet in this thread!*

30dgk5j.jpg


What are you thinking, man?

Joe

* In jest, in case anyone is in doubt.
Click to expand...

That is exactly what I feared Joe.

However I boldly posted anyway having nads of chilled steel and instruction from on high too.
 
Interesting. I don't know about AVI's speakers but I have their CD player, it's very good, and I had an enormous 200wpc paving slab, that was nice but I sold it last year when I went to valves and won't be going back anytime soon.
 
Hello all!

I must say it's good of old Tone to invite me back to try and drag some of you out of the eighties, but he's wrong to say I give as good as I get. I don't, I get very upset and I find typing a bit of an ordeal made worse when Markus keeps removing all my posts.

As you know, the march of progress is relentless and cutting edge manufacturers like us can't afford to be left behind.

Five years ago when we announced the ADM9s, they sold in substantial quantities straight away and saved the company. Separates had been dying for decades and it caught up with us in 2006.

We've sold several thousand pairs of ADM9s and they still do well, but now you can buy a pair of active Behringers for under £200 and they piss all over some comparatively expensive passive speaker/amp combinations. By the time you get to £500 for a pair of Mackies, hi fi is outclassed. ADMs are better, but more was needed if we're to maintain our position.

For the last two years we've been working with Sinar Baja to improve the performance of their top end drivers. it's been an expensive and time consuming exercise, but together we've done it and new ADM9Ts start shipping early May. Sadly for the first time in four years and because the new drivers are more expensive, the price has risen to £1250, but they are quite a bit better. Active speakers need better drivers than passive ones because the crossover isn't audible, passive ones add a sort of gunge.

However, we've always have a small number of customers who'd like floorstanders. It's not many and they cost a great deal more because of the larger box, so we've resisted. If they were going to cost more, we felt they should should have much better performance.

We've been scouring the planet for better drivers than Sinar Baja make and we've tried considerable numbers, none better and most worse. However the kit/hi end market in the States is huge, probably bigger than hi fi and all sorts of fancy and ludicrously priced drivers are made for it. Most of them BS, but Scanspeak being Danish and a bit special have their Illuminator, which, on paper, looks as though it could be the best made and by a margin.

Therefore to have something to compare with the drivers in the ADMs and to see if they lived up to expectations, we bought some Illuminators. They are bloody incredible, probably as clear as the very best headphones and incredibly smooth and natural. This helped us to decide to make the new ADM40s and to refine and redesign our electronics to match these incredible drivers. I really seriously doubt there is anything better out there and certainly not for the money. You can find speakers in the States for more than $50,000 with the Illuminators in them.

You lot are probably not aware that I'm coming up to my sixty-sixth birthday and could probably retire if I didn't enjoy the job, but instead, AVI is raising the bar again and improving sound quality for sensible money. People appreciate it. Thanks to Darren and Johan, we even have our own forum and an AVI owners club and it's stuff like this that makes the job worthwhile.

I hope this is interesting to a few of you.

Ash
 
Nice comment Ash, and all the best with the '40s. Active systems are certainly more common on the forums than they were a few years ago, and if I had the moulah to start again I would think seriously about the modern, minimalist approach to building a system that actives make possible.
 
Thank Alan, actives are miles better, even the incredibly cheap ones made for the prosumer market.Here's an explanation of the advantages I put on the club site. It's written to be understood by non techies, but you get the picture.

On certain forums, detractors like to belittle the advantages of active speakers and in a subjective playground where measurements can be ignored, they may gain credence, but that shouldn't happen because the difference is considerable.
I'm not going to go through all the advantages, but concentrate on the big ones that are often missed on the many sites that explain the benefits.

1. Passive crossover components are usually no better than 10% tolerance and often 20%. In actives 1% is common.

2. Passive crossovers typically produce about 1% distortion, but it varies with power input and can rise to as much as 10% or more. Any op-amp used as an electronic crossover will have 0.001%, which is between 100 and 1000 times better.

3. Passive crossovers are audible because 2nd order filters don't shut the tweeter up quickly enough below the crossover point. This is the mid band, so you hear it out of step and distorting. You're hearing two drivers one behind the other and one with lots of distortion because it doesn't like reproducing low stuff. Think Kazoo. Active crossovers can have very steep filters so you don't hear them. Ours are 24 dB/octave or 4th order.

4. If speaker terminals are shorted, the cone finds it difficult to move, but not if it isn't. This is called the damping factor and a power amp connected to a voice coil is the same as shorting it and making sure that it only moves when it gets a signal.

In a passive design, the resistance in the crossover components reduce the damping factor before you start, but it's much worse than that! The job of the crossover is to progressively disconnect the driver from the amp and it's effect begins early on, so for much of the time, the cone is free to fly about with almost no restraint. It's about 200 times worse!

In the circumstances it's not diffcult to see why even cheap little Behringers can better comparatively expensive passive speaker/amp combinations.

It's true that there are some very poor actives on sale, but most of the pro audio ones are very good, exceptionally so, when you consider how much they are sold for and what they must cost to make.
 
Indeed, I really rate the Neutrons, a lovely, smooth and easy to listen to speaker. Would seriously consider the active versions were I to get a proper job, and money not to be an issue.
 
The ADM40s will start shipping next week, we've sold all the first batch and most of the second, so there is quite a long waiting list.

New ADM9Ts are not such a problem, there will be a backlog by May. but they are a production item and so will catch up quote quickly.

Ash
 
I recently picked up a pair of ADM9T's and IMO they're the best speakers i've ever heard. I hope to make a trip to Blighty in the summer and if i do, I'll be making it my business to hear the ADM40's..
 
Ash, hello! and congrats, very nice product and design.

Can i kick of with asking you for the spec, driver sizes, cabinet dims and how the sub works?
Also I've not seen the remote, I/O's/backplate or sub come to think of it?
And some pics of the amp packs internal and external would be nice!

I'm not going to buy a pair TBH, but i just think now AVI have put there 'old hat' back on maybe PFM's collective can help get these out within the public domain. :)

Oh yes and maybe the most crucial bit; prices?
 
1.) When do you get the final production release new amplifier plates for the 40s, Ash ?

2.) Given that the 40s use a separate, optional, VLF bass cabinet, can you confirm that the existing AVI sub suits them ?

Am I right in assuming that the existing sub is a dual purpose unit, with sub mode which contains a low pass filter, manual level control, and filter frequency control, normally used with 9s . . .

. . . BUT, also has a LFE input, which is unfiltered, and simply provides a full frequency line level input, which can be connected directly to the 2nd active LF crossover output from the ADM40s, to give full 3-way active performance ?

Of course I do understand that the 40s are 2-way/3-way electronically switchable, and that the performance in 2-way mode is un-compromised.

I hope to visit soon, to listen to the full production version.

JC
 
PS, I'm back with active ATC's again, this time SCM25A pros!! but lets not start a slagfest. So can everyone let Ash/AVI selebrate the ADM40's on here please :)
 
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