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Life after Harbeth.......Proac Tablette Anniversary

R

Robby

pfm Member
So having sold the Harbeth's on I was on the hunt for a small speaker to replace them.

I wanted to move away from Harbeth for a number of reasons and so demoed the Tablette 10, Anniversaries and Ophidian Mojo's at a local dealer. And yes I know there is a long list of companies that produce small speakers but I have owned a variant of most of them over the years. They did not last for a reason.

Long story short I went with the Anniversaries which arrived yesterday. The speakers are in the rosewood finish and look great.

I have been very pleasantly surprised by how they sound too. In many ways they actually sound fuller than the Harbeths and have significantly more punch and drive. The 30.1's sound much more laid back by comparison but a little more refined.

It's early days yet and I need to do some more tweaking - getting the stands filled and optimally positioned for a start but it is looking favourable.
 
That's not too surprising; the M30.1 are the most laid back sound of the Harbeths, due to the slightly recessed presence region. Moving to a smaller speaker often brings a punchier sound, and most smaller speakers are voiced with a more forward presence region to allow the sound to leap out of the box. I'll be interested to hear your impressions when you've spent some more time with them and listened to a wide range of music.
 
M30.1. That's comprehensible as it's my least favourite speaker. The Proac Anniversaries sounding fuller than the M30.1? The M30.1s are some of the thickest or fullest sounding speakers I have heard. Laid back is the key word to describe the M30.1.

The Anniversaries sound better than the Tablette 10s?
 
ryder said:
M30.1. That's comprehensible as it's my least favourite speaker. The Proac Anniversaries sounding fuller than the M30.1? The M30.1s are some of the thickest or fullest sounding speakers I have heard. Laid back is the key word to describe the M30.1.

The Anniversaries sound better than the Tablette 10s?
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Strangely, the 30/1's are my favourite Harbeths (after the P3ESR's). Had the 7's and 5's and didn't get on with either.

Fuller sounding was the wrong choice of words. The soundstage feels bigger is what I meant to say - not fuller as in bloated and warm.

I preferred the sound of the Anniversaries to the 10's in the dealer dem room albeit the sound of the Anniversaries is far better in my lounge than when I demoed them.

The 10's we just too lightweight for me although, again, I suspect not in ideal conditions or on the best stands when I listened to them.
 
Elephantears said:
I'll be interested to hear your impressions when you've spent some more time with them and listened to a wide range of music.
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Will feed back when I have a few more hours on them.

I will say though that they have given me a whole new respect for the Croft amps I have.
 
Proac tablette anniversaries are great and easily beat harbeth p3esrs in my system on which I mainly play rock of various kinds .I have had them a few years now and have no desire to change
 
Cool! I'm considering the HMS2.1s for mine as I'm getting no joy looking for some Target R2s ATM - apparently they can be mass-loaded to near 55kg each!!

Are you hearing any benefits/improvement's over previous stands/supports?
 
Robby said:
Strangely, the 30/1's are my favourite Harbeths (after the P3ESR's). Had the 7's and 5's and didn't get on with either.

Fuller sounding was the wrong choice of words. The soundstage feels bigger is what I meant to say - not fuller as in bloated and warm.

I preferred the sound of the Anniversaries to the 10's in the dealer dem room albeit the sound of the Anniversaries is far better in my lounge than when I demoed them.

The 10's we just too lightweight for me although, again, I suspect not in ideal conditions or on the best stands when I listened to them.
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Thanks for the clarification. Not a surprise you prefer the 30.1s over the Compact 7ES3 and Super HL5s. A matter of preference. Now I can understand where you are coming from. If you say the soundstage of the Proac Anniversary is larger than the Harbeth M30.1s, that I can surely relate. Most speakers will sound more expansive than the Harbeth irrespective of models. The Super HL5s actually sound more expansive than the 30.1 with a larger soundstage but I presume the Proac's open, expansive and detailed sound coupled by the signature 3-D imaging effect may have given it the edge over the warmer signature of the Harbeth.

My dealer also suggested the Anniversary to be better than the Tablette 10s. However, the 10s are getting great reviews at the moment. Perhaps the shoebox size is a plus point, and their capability of close placement to the wall.
 
Cereal Killer said:
ProAc take an age to loosen up. my SM100s are only just starting to do so after a week of fair to moderate use.
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You can speed up the process by putting the speakers head to head almost touching and reverse polarity of one of the speakers. Crank the volume to 9-10 o'clock with bass heavy music for a few hours. You won't hear the bass that much but the surround and spider will loosen up pretty fast!

IMO, a driver will never be completely burn-in if always played at low volume no matter how many hours it have been played. I could be wrong...
 
So, I thought I would give a very quick update on the Tablettes now that I am a week in to owning them and had them playing, on average, for around 10 hours a day and so should be pretty much run in now.

Worth mentioning that I have them on Atacama HMS 1.1 stands that have not been filled in any way - waiting for the filler to arrive - and so the sound signature may differ slightly once I have done this.

The main plus points for the speakers against the Harbeths I had are detail, imaging, soundstage and bass.

They can portray a soundstage like few other speakers I have heard and the imaging is amazing with performers in the room. Any panning of effects on certain tracks is eerie the way they move around the soundstage.

The bass is superb and really drives the music along - much better than the Harbeth's in this regard.

Downsides? The major one for me is in the midrange realism. They simply cannot match the Harbeths for this on piano or voice. Piano sounds a little metallic to my ears no matter what the volume level.

Maybe this will change once the stands are filled - I will find out.

The Croft Pre/Power I have seems to be a great match although it does run out of steam relatively quickly.

I will report back when I have a few more hours on them.
 
One other thing to mention is how ruthless the Tablette can be with poor recordings.

With the Harbeths it was as if there was a filter in them that made most recordings palatable (or boringly similar as some have complained before).
 
Robby said:
how ruthless the Tablette can be with poor recordings.
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This always rings alarm bells for me. It always makes me ask; what do you mean by poor recordings? And why do you have them in your collection? If there is something about that recording that still appeals to you, something musically valuable, it is the job of the reproduction system to represent it, bringing out the musical value.
 
Robby said:
So, I thought I would give a very quick update on the Tablettes now that I am a week in to owning them and had them playing, on average, for around 10 hours a day and so should be pretty much run in now.

Worth mentioning that I have them on Atacama HMS 1.1 stands that have not been filled in any way - waiting for the filler to arrive - and so the sound signature may differ slightly once I have done this.

The main plus points for the speakers against the Harbeths I had are detail, imaging, soundstage and bass.

They can portray a soundstage like few other speakers I have heard and the imaging is amazing with performers in the room. Any panning of effects on certain tracks is eerie the way they move around the soundstage.

The bass is superb and really drives the music along - much better than the Harbeth's in this regard.

Downsides? The major one for me is in the midrange realism. They simply cannot match the Harbeths for this on piano or voice. Piano sounds a little metallic to my ears no matter what the volume level.

Maybe this will change once the stands are filled - I will find out.

The Croft Pre/Power I have seems to be a great match although it does run out of steam relatively quickly.

I will report back when I have a few more hours on them.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't expect the filling of the stands to change the "metallic hardness", not for the better.
It's the ProAc house sound, they like to run the tweeters a few dB too hot.
The narrow baffle also means wider dispersion and the resulting gain from side-wall reflections.
 
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