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Rega RS7 Versus Harbeth Super HL5 loudspeakers

I am awaiting the arrival of naim 112/150 for a trial on the Harbeths. If I can get a little bit more speed and transparency and bite then it may become excellent. However I am sure there is more to 'musicality' than just speed. The Rega's seem to get the micro and macro dynamic shifts spot on allowing one to hear the true pitch of notes and contributing greatly i have no doubt to timbral qualities. Along with timing I am sure these add up to provoke that emotional connection with the brain. The instruments and vocalists may sound overall tonally artificial/'lean', but this may in the end be a non essential chemical ingredient if understanding the structure and theme of a musical piece is your main goal, as opposed to wanting to hear the realistic presence of instruments whose foundation is partly dependent on getting the tone right.
 
I still think open baffles are the most exciting speakers I have heard. Building them is simplicity itself, but getting them to sound musical would take lots and lots of hours.The cone drivers need to be on the warm sounding side and hemp cone is the way to go. How you get them to sound musical from there on i am not sure. I do know that they have remarkable microdynamics (and macro) and this is sinmilar in some ways to the Rega's.

here is what i managed to build

http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/multi-way/142186-my-first-open-baffle-speaker-print.html
 
audiojoy said:
I am awaiting the arrival of naim 112/150 for a trial on the Harbeths. If I can get a little bit more speed and transparency and bite then it may become excellent. However I am sure there is more to 'musicality' than just speed. The Rega's seem to get the micro and macro dynamic shifts spot on allowing one to hear the true pitch of notes and contributing greatly i have no doubt to timbral qualities. Along with timing I am sure these add up to provoke that emotional connection with the brain. The instruments and vocalists may sound overall tonally artificial/'lean', but this may in the end be a non essential chemical ingredient if understanding the structure and theme of a musical piece is your main goal, as opposed to wanting to hear the realistic presence of instruments whose foundation is partly dependent on getting the tone right.
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In my opinion you should aim for 202-200 in Naim separates. I've been using Exposure gear with harbeth with very good effect. Of course there's a lot more in musicality than just speed and attack.
 
I Just don't get how someone goes from front loaded horns with active bass to little boxes with 6" woofers. Sure, there maybe integration problems with the AG's (which can be minimimised) but one produces noise and the other projects it.
 
I'd love comparing my Brio-R with a Naim pre/power.
It was a tough game the 5i vs Brio - both VFM with their pro's and con

Not sure I'd run for a Nac 112 though, at least a 122 but 152/155 or the older say 140/62. amazing kit

Never got on with RS7 or the Harbeths, room too small I guess
 
audiojoy said:
I have moved the rega to the back of the room. It has probably the best bass production i have ever encountered from any speaker and its musicality is excellent. However next to the Harbeth it sounds crude unrefined overlie bright and it has a metallic tinge to its treble which also comes across as one note!!
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Yeah, this is an odd comparison to figure out. It's like Bambi vs. Godzilla.

Comparing Rega speakers to Harbeth? Really?
 
After further listening and thought I have put my harbeths up for sale. The harbeths are a bit like godzilla..........

big,colourful, a little slow at times and a little confused but with great presence and scale
 
audiojoy said:
After further listening and thought I have put my harbeths up for sale. The harbeths are a bit like godzilla..........

big,colourful, a little slow at times and a little confused but with great presence and scale
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Glad you made the call.

FWIW I tried half a dozen amps on the Harbeth SHL5 and once owned the Rega Elicit/Harbeth combination. To my ears this combination is a tad smooth and "slow". Tried to persevere with the system for a while and had to decide which had to go, the Rega or the Harbeth. In the end, the Elicit made way for some Naims. The Naim amps improved things a little by bringing some verve and excitement back into the system, though the inherent smoothness of the Harbeth will always be prevalent. Some folks like that though.

The Rega RS7 seems intriguing. Perhaps the upbeat presentation has done it for you.
 
Plutox said:
It's mainly the proprietary cone material. Polypropylene, Bextrene and paper all have their characteristic sound - Harbeth use their own substance that does seem to work well.

Harbeth HF is demonstrably about right. Just listen to the sibilance content of human voices. Adding as little as .5dB at 12kHz can render a female voice rather unnatural.

If you feel you desire a little extra HF, it's probably achieved far more easily by the use of a small amount of controlled boost (i.e. a tone control, shock! horror!).

Are you of the iPod generation? Over toppy speakers seems, to me, to be a plague amongst many contemporary designs.
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Yes, the proprietary cone material of the Harbeth appears to be unique and has worked out well in promoting natural sound presentation.

You may be right there that a control boost or equalizer may help bring out some HF or raw sound of acoutic/electric guitars, but yes it's a horror to incorporate these devices into the system. Will leave it as that.

Haven't touched an iPod in my life. I'm old school and still use a CD player and turntable.
 
dzeikei said:
The fastest of them and most fun was C7 because of the lift in the upper bass region.
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dzeikei, I promise you that this effect was from either your room, your amps, or your source, not from the speakers. I know this because I've had all sorts of diffferent bass responses from my C7's, depending on positioning, amps and source. Height is crucial, and you really need to get the stands right to avoid any boom. Also if you are using Naim you will get an upper bass hump, and that includes their cd players (although very slight). I've used Naim, I've had the wrongs stands, the wrong positions etc, but if you get it right there is no bass problem. In fact the 7's are if anything a little lean in the upper bass, especially in comparison to the richer and frutier SHL5's. I would warn that if you have room-related bass issues with 7's they will be trebled with the 5's.
 
Elephantears said:
dzeikei, I promise you that this effect was from either your room, your amps, or your source, not from the speakers. I know this because I've had all sorts of diffferent bass responses from my C7's, depending on positioning, amps and source. Height is crucial, and you really need to get the stands right to avoid any boom. Also if you are using Naim you will get an upper bass hump, and that includes their cd players (although very slight). I've used Naim, I've had the wrongs stands, the wrong positions etc, but if you get it right there is no bass problem. In fact the 7's are if anything a little lean in the upper bass, especially in comparison to the richer and frutier SHL5's. I would warn that if you have room-related bass issues with 7's they will be trebled with the 5's.
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I wouldn't call that upper bass lift a problem with 7's. Actually it's caused partly by Naim or Exposure amplification in it's part of the fun you are going to get with these amps. This was not a problem in my opinion as it made the sound feel like more upbeat and I liked it! I've not heard the same drive from SHL5's though but I wouldn't call them slow either. In the same room with the same amps and stands the 5's did not have that lift on upper bass.
 
Really, that's peculiar. You say you were using the same stands for both speakers; perhaps that's the reason - they would be too low for the 7's if they were the right height for the 5's. The main cause of bass lift I've had with the 7's was when I had stands that were too low.
 
Ryder

the Regas are simply superb in their accurate portrayal of the music as a series of notes in time. Voice technique is so much more obvious, interaction between musicians is so much more obvious with correctly protrayed tunes that have an emotional impact.
 
audiojoy said:
I have tonight moved the RS7 speakers so that the bass drivers face inwards....boy what a fussy speaker. This Evened the tone out by filling in the midrange a fair bit and taming the brightness overall. Could not do much about the high frequency monochrome sound coming out of them though. But what did improve even further was its musicality. Its ability for you to see into the techniques used by the musician and vocalist in performing their arts. The emotional content if you like. Probably the most revealing speaker I have heard from this aspect ... within a very synergistic system set up of course.

If it had a better quality tweeter and a more fleshed out midrange this could have been a great speaker.

Within the limits of the manufacturing process it seems getting accurate tone and timbre will always be at the expense of speed?????
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No, because "speed" doesn't exist. It's a mythical hi-fi beast that has no relation to real music and how real instruments create sound. The inaccuracy that many relate to as speed is simply an emphasis of upper mid/lower treble that accentuates the leading edge of notes over their natural envelope and decay. Often accentuated by over damped and unextended bass performance. In essence a lot of modern speakers have gone too far in compensating for the tendency of old speakers to have too much upper/mid bass, usually in the form of resonance. Of course removing resonance will make a speaker more transparent and open, allowing better insight in to what the musicians are playing. But often modern speakers just suck out all of the upper/mid bass response to try and compensate for their resonant cabinets. Modern cabinets haven't improved in the last 10-15 years they're just as resonant because they use exactly the same construction and materials as they did back then.
 
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