Future Addition, a little extreme

[Lex]

I hesitated to make an advance announcement, since I haven't paid for them yet, and things can happen when sellers are involved. Hopefully, he won't change his mind, and hopefully, he will deliver as promised. I feel I have a quality seller to deal with here, and I am counting on this being a good transaction. Do we have a sweating icon?

A couple of people have pryed my news out of me already, so I might as well show them to you all, officially. The news is of my pending purchase of a pair of 1994 Sonus faber Extrema. The pair weighs 375 pounds, bringing new meaning to the words "Bookshelf Speakers", lol.

I'm giddy with anticipation of receiving one of the finest Sonus fabers ever built. I'd estimate that the Sonus faber Amati Homage at 20K would best the 10-12K Extrema. The Electra Amator II might get close. But that's about it. Even the new Cremona from my reading is no match for the mighty Extrema. The finances are arranged, the seller has my name on them. All systems go.

They do lack a little on the lowest octave, of course, characteristic of most 2 way speakers. But they will go pretty low, around 40 hz. I will be using sub support for home theater, and most of my music will be just great through them without a sub.

It remains to be seen how well my Solo center will integrate with them. But it will have to integrate for a while, as these bad boys are setting me back some rather serious coin. I'll be paying for them for a good while.

According to what I have read, mine will be 1 of 1000 pairs built total. The model is out of production now. So,it's like, if you want them, better not wait much longer on the used market. They don't show up often. Mine are coming with the factory available (at that time) stands. The stands along listed for 1200.00. 8O

It's rather fitting, that the Extrema was the first Sonus faber speaker I ever saw. My local dealer had a pair back in the late 90s, that I saw down there. This was a bit before my foray into true high end audio. In fact, at 10K, all I could do was say, WHOA, those little speakers, ok, not so little, are 10K?!? I really and truly expect these speakers to one day go back up to the value they cost new. There's just nothing else like them, very unusual, and artistic transducers of fine audio- I sure remember them being the sexiest speaker I'd ever seen. Now, I will be able to see them daily, as soon as all goes through. :B








Lex
"There's speakers, then there's Sonus faber"




Cable Guy DVD Collection

[Burke Strickland]

Congratulations, Lex! It's good that you are finally getting the "speakers of your dreams". From the pictures, they are an awesome sight -- I imagine they sound incredible! Hope the deal goes through smoothly and you get to begin enjoying them soon.

Burke

PS -- at 375 pounds, does a forklift come as part of the package? :>) Seriously, I hope you will be getting some assistance moving those around and hoisting them up on the stands! (BTW, those stands look pretty nice, too.)

[sfdoddsy]

Congrats,

The Extremas are probably the best SFs built.

Are they the ones in the pictures? I thought the factory stands were different, but it's been a while since I heard a pair.

Steve




Steve's DIY Dipoles

[Kevin_McC]

Wow, congratulations! 375 pounds? Is that with or without the stands?

Is it just my browser or do the pictures overlap the replies for everyone else? I know in the other thread speakers of the house. I could see the pictures but they covered up all the replies that followed? Do I need to change a setting or something?

[Kevin P]

Wow, cool looking speakers there Lex! At first glance it looked like the woofer was too big for the enclosure so it bulges out, but with those side panels it looks nice.

375 pounds? Dang, my towers don't even weigh that much. :E

What are the dimensions? Driver sizes? Just trying to get a feel for the size of these puppies. Definitely not bookshelf speakers unless you have reinforced steel bookshelves! 8O

KJP




Official Computer Geek and Techno-Wiz Guru of HTGuide - Visit Tower of Power
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[JonMarsh]

If it's your heart's desire, I hope you pull it off, and they're everything and more that your hope for!

Best regards,

Jon




Earth First!
_______________________________
We'll screw up the other planets later....

[SiliGoose]

Wow! Hernia speakers!

375 lbs must include the stands, right?

They are very, very nice Lex. Can you post a 3/4 picture? Perhaps put something next to them so we can judge scale (perhaps next to your other Sonus speakers?)?

Finally, can you carry them up and down the stairs thirty or forty times and then post pictures of your hospital room?




-Sili

[Lex]

Well, those drew a little response in a hurry.

I'll address what everyone says a little later on. But yes, it is the ones pictured, and I've looked at several other people's extrema's and those are the factory stands.

I'm pretty sure 375 is with the stands. I think the speakers are around 185 pounds for the pair. But I could be wrong. I will get you all some dimensions on them when I can.

thanks guys!
Lex




Cable Guy DVD Collection

[Andrew Pratt]

nice little speakers doug I thought my M8a's were heavy but I think you've got me beat now...which means please be careful when moving those beasts

[Lex]

Quoting my seller, with great info he provided:

The Extremas have a very small footprint for their size and frequency response. Each factory stand is contructed with 6 discrete 3-1/4 x 3-1/4 x 21" square steel pillars welded to a floor plinth of 11 x 16 x 1/2" thick steel plate. The plinth is threaded for the factory spikes which are fully adjustable, even when the speakers are fully set-up and operational, (this is critical to final setup). The pillars are filled with a concrete composite which uses lead shot and sand as part of the mix.

The speakers themselves are 27cm Wide x 55cm Deep x 46cm High
(10-5/8" W x 21-21/32" D x 18-1/2" H on the baffle face).

Allowing for an additional 1/2" for spikes makes the speaker with stand about 40-1/2" high x 10-5/8 wide (11"W at the floor plinth) x 22" deep (16" D at the floor plinth)

The bottom of the speakers and the top of the stands have very thin sheets of stiff felt glued to them with epoxy . The felt to felt contact coupled with the weight of the speakers provides an ingeneous coupling method which is amazingly rigid and effective.

The speakers weigh ~90 pounds (40kg) each, and combined with the stands which weigh ~110 pounds each, each speaker and stand weighs approximately 200 pounds.

The original owner had the speakers in a room only 10' x 12' and they sounded marvelous.

Personally I have had the extremas in three different rooms, the first and third setups were in 10-1/2' wide living rooms firing into an open concept dining room. The second venue was in a 12'x14' second floor bedroom. I was intimately familiar with the Extremas in all four systems and environments (I think my buddy finally sold them to me so I wouldn't live at his house all the time), and I never felt that the Extremas, once they were properly set up, were hampered by the rooms. Of course the larger rooms allowed the Extremas to be shown in a more spectacular light, but you
never thought you were missing something in the 10 x 12 room either.

One thing to remember, all the Sonus Faber Speakers were designed by Italians and originally for use in Italian and European Homes. In most European apartments and houses, a room of 12 x 14 would be an unusually large room regardless of the function.

On the other hand, I have also heard the Extremas work surprizingly well in a dedicated 16 x 20 x 12 listening room, but I would doubt much larger rooms, or multifunction rooms (eg living rooms) as big as 16x20x12 would be viable.

Here is a link for more information on the Extremas

http://www.mysoundroom.com/sfextrema.htm

One of the 'secrets' to the Extremas excellence is the fact that there is no capacitor used in the first order crossover to the tweeter, a very unusual design, and to my knowledge singularly unique (even among all other Sonus Faber designs). Much of the clarity and transparancy of the Extrema is due to the use of this 'sine-cap' crossover design used in conjunction with the Dynaudio Esotar tweeter, a driver that many consider the finest dynamic tweeter in the world.

Lex




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[John Holmes]

Very nice Lex!!! I hope it all works out for ya.




"I came here, to chew bubble gum and kickass. And I'm all out of bubble gum!!!" My DVD's

[KS]

Congratulations Lex, don't you love the anticipation of a new purchase! I'll bet you take a day or two off just to play with them. Keep us all informed.

Ken

[Lex]

Thanks guys. yeah, I loved everything except the shelling out the bucks.

Sili, they aren't at my house yet, so I can't shoot scale photos. But a post of mine up there does have the dimensions. That should help get an idea of the scale. They aren't small, that's for sure. Each speaker weighs close to 100 pounds, So, it's gonna be about like picking up my HPA-2 amp. The good news is, it's smaller in diameter. the bad news is, I have to do this conscious of the drivers at all times.

The stands, may weigh 150 pounds each, filled with concrete and lead shot. But at least I don't have to hoist those up in the air, lol. (Well, unless I want to bench press them a few times first. )

I've been told by one person, they won't integrate to well with my Concert line speakers. I hope he's wrong. I personally, think they will be ok, but I'll reserve final judgement until I hear them. I mean, at worst, their a little warmer sounding than my Solo center. But generally, you don't hear much from the mains while dialogue is going anyway.

It's been said the new Cremona are cleaner sounding, more articulate in some ways, but lack the warmth and detail of the older speakers such as Extrema. An experienced Sf person (Hyperion) over at AA had this to say. He's a bonafied Sf expert. But I think as you read, his arguement for Cremona, really sounds more like an arguement for the Extrema more than positives for Cremona, at least a good bit of it does to me anyway-

Extrema is more detailed and more refined on top. It is more open sounding and more resolving. The mids is richer, warmer and woodier -maybe this is that magic that they are talking about. The Extrema sounds big and explosive. Organic and lively at the same time which is how music sounds like. Coherence however is the question mark. The Extrema's treble is so good that it just upstages the midband and the bass. The bass extension is good, and there is good weight but definition and dynamics are merely fair. They are not easy to drive too and more often than not, sounds small, lazy and dynamically compressed with underpowered amplifiers. Oh the Extremas are 85lbs and their six pillar stands are 125 lbs or so. They are finicky about positioning and must be carefully setup. They are better for farfield listening too, otherwise the treble will be too prominent at nearfield.

Cremona sounds leaner, dryer and crisper sounding than Extrema. The highs are thinner and slightly brittle but at least you won't be able to localize treble sounds as coming from the tweeter as you would with the Extrema, even if you are near. Like all Sonus fabers, the Cremona still has a warm and rich midrange, just not as much as the Extrema's so no problem here. The bass is where the Cremona is simply better. 4 dedicated woofers can move a lot more air than a passive radiator no matter how you design a speaker. The power of the drum kit is returned to the kick drum and the bigger drums which tend to get lost with Extrema which tend to emphasize the smaller drums and cymbals instead. They don't sound as BIG as the Extremas do however. The Cremona seems easy to drive and not fussy with partnering components.

Finally, the Cremona has more in common with the Concert series speakers than the Extrema. In short, they will integrate better, although Cremona center and Cremona Auditor surrounds would be more ideal.

Extrema sounds more integrated with Minima Amator or Electa Amator surrounds.

Anyway, I'm taking everything he said with a grain of salt. Yes, he's intelligent on Sonus faber. But each person see's and hears things a bit different. So, in the end, the only opinion that will matter will be my own. If I am to disappointed, then the GPs could come back to my theater, and the Extremas to my 2 channel environment. But it's that move, that would necessitate a new amp and pre-amp in there, as my 30 watt tube integrated would come up woefully short driving the Extrema-

Lex




Cable Guy DVD Collection

[Chas_T]

Doug,

Much luck with your new babies!! Twins?? :P

Also, what brand of speaker wires will you be using?? :LOL:

The speaker cables your put together for me are marvelous. I am enjoying them very much.

Happy listening with your new toys!!!

Charles

[Burke Strickland]

Also, what brand of speaker wires will you be using??

He'll probably just pull something off a spool of wire he happens to have laying about. :>)

Burke

PS -- don't try this at home; the spools of wire Lex has laying about are probably not what most of us would typically have. :>)

[Chris D]

:banana:




CHRIS
Luke: "Hey, I'm not such a bad pilot myself, you know"

[Kevin P]

He'll probably just pull something off a spool of wire he happens to have laying about. :>)

Yeah, Lex's spools of wire don't come from Home Depot like us poor slobs' spools of wire.

I'm surprised you're going to use these babies in your HT system rather than the 2-channel. It sounds like these will sing in 2 channel but might not mate well with your other speakers?

If you do decide to put them in your 2 channel system, here's the amp for you:

ASL Hurricane 200 DT Monoblock



Since you already took out a 2nd mortgage to buy the speakers, these amps shouldn't be too much of a stretch, right?




Official Computer Geek and Techno-Wiz Guru of HTGuide - Visit Tower of Power
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[Eduardo]

After reading this post I realized I went through a full range of emotions.

8O :drool: :boobies: :drool: :B :cry:

Seriously - Congratulations. I'm sure you'll enjoy them to the fullest

http://home.nc.rr.com/ejimenez

[Lex]

Thanks guys. It dawned on me that I didn't post a final thanks for all the comments post.

Kevin, that would be nice, about 200 watts of tube power, whether antique sound labs, I dunno. For now, it's solid state all the way, HPA-2 250 watts @ 8 ohms, and 500 watts @ 4 ohms. 8O

Now, I will look like a hog with 2 threads on my new babies, yes Charles, twins! I'm falling in love with a set of 100 pound twins. :LOL:

Lex