AudioCircle
Industry Circles => Spatial Audio => Topic started by: Bingenito on 4 Aug 2023, 01:01 pm
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As the subject of the thread indicates the intent here is to support what I believe to be a great American brand in the HiFi industry. At the risk of seeming critical I would like to make some observations and offer free advice.
For starters I owned the latest edition of the X4 and really loved that speaker. I did end up selling but only to spend nearly 10x to beat that speaker and for the asking price of the X4 you would be hard pressed to come close to it (assuming you set it up correctly in the right room, not stuffed near walls with an entertainment center and TV and firing into the side of a sofa with an asymmetrical room and glass coffee table)...
That said it has been over a month since the announcement of the sale of Spatial Audio Lab. Since that time no company posts here, nothing new on the web page or YouTube. Like many of you I am seeing 6-8 Spatial speakers for sale and that is a good amount for a small company (e.g. portfolio run off). For this reason I highly recommend any sort PR campaign. Understanding that it is a small business and likely at capacity... potential consider an Intern like Audio Excellence Canada does on YouTube by partnering with a local school.
No news is not good news and is not inspiring brand confidence. The great thing about 2023 is that you can post anything that is <1-5 mins and cater to the public's A.D.D. and keep the word out regarding these amazing speakers. Again this is meant in the most positive way because I like many care about American small businesses and their employees.
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With the sale, I am sure they are planning and getting their new vision, products, and plans in order. Folks selling speakers might be for another reason but I might think they are worried about the company closing with Clayton selling, they should address this concern which may well be unfounded. As far as the speakers go, their ability to reproduce a live event in your room is as good as any speakers I've owned for over 40 years. They do sound different due to being open baffles in design, but in my experience, the Shappire M3 sounds like a panel/electrostatic speaker but on steroids. I had a friend and audiophile over who has $$$$$$ in gear and speakers and he said these sound like a direct feed from the microphone and open like a panel speaker. Everything is present in the room. He has had many systems over my 40 years of knowing him, he got more experience with different brands of gear and speakers than salespeople have.
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It's not like there hasn't been any news since the announcement of the sale. There have been several lengthy and exceptionally informative threads about Spatial's tube amp and tube preamp offerings here on AC and on Audiogon. Within those threads, there was mention of the new Q series of speakers which debuted at a major audio show recently and are listed on their website as forthcoming end of summer. The website is currently accepting orders. Clayton has been very open about the sale and the future of the company. It appears as though great things are happening. Not sure what else the new owners need to say or do.
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Given the more personal connection that AC is likely to engender among owners and he strong association between Spatial and its highly respected founder, it seems natural to me that there will be folks who will value reassurance. Having said that, it can be a tricky balance to get right but continued regular participation here from Spatial will be key.
Personally I don't think an intern posting updates will come close to matching Clayton's participation, but the new owners will want to figure something out.
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I think we would all agree that we're loyal Spatial owners. The company will have very big shoe's to fill when it comes to Clayton. With all the uncertainty in the world today, and not knowing if all is well, I would have to agree with Bingenito. They should throw the dog a bone, more out of us having concern than anything.
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Hey guys,
The support and confidence we receive from the Audiophile community is highly valued and we appreciate your input. Our focus in the last few months has been to get the X4 back in serial production and service the orders that we have in-house. The company operations are now running smoothly and we have started shipping X4s now that they are in full production. I will endeavor to be more engaged on the forums now that we are getting caught up. You are welcome to contact me directly with any questions or comments: support@spatialaudiolab.com or call 435-640-1294.
We introduced a very interesting new design at the Seattle Audio show recently called the Q6. This a 2-way dipole design using a wideband mid/treble driver. The crossover point is 400Hz, which provide outstanding coherence and imaging. The Q6 is the best sounding speaker we have developed in the history of the company in the $5000 price class, while still being American made with top level build quality, such as premium crossover parts, WBT binding posts, etc. So, we are excited to start production in the next several months. We will announce the order availability of the Q6 very soon.
CLAYTON SHAW
Spatial Audio Lab
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As we all know, society has evolved to short sound bytes … and the influencers and media have figured it out… promote yourself by staying in touch… with great frequency. For those who choose not to do so, it’s not so much that they become less relevant as becoming less remembered.
I would encourage Spatial to post at least weekly… even if the updates are small.
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Great update Clayton!
As RonN5 states very well… and I agree with him- it helps to play the numbers game in marketing. We are all here to support the brand just drop some breadcrumbs!
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We introduced a very interesting new design at the Seattle Audio show recently called the Q6. This a 2-way dipole design using a wideband mid/treble driver. The crossover point is 400Hz, which provide outstanding coherence and imaging. The Q6 is the best sounding speaker we have developed in the history of the company in the $5000 price class, while still being American made with top level build quality, such as premium crossover parts, WBT binding posts, etc. So, we are excited to start production in the next several months. We will announce the order availability of the Q6 very soon.
CLAYTON SHAW
Spatial Audio Lab
As I stated in threads about the audio show, that Q6 is no lie. It is about 2/3 the size of the X line speakers and sounded wonderful.
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To clarify the intern comment was for A/V production like AE Canada does on YouTube. It may take 5 minutes for an employee, designer, CNC operator to speak to the camera but then 1 hour of gear setup/ take down and 2 hours of editing that nobody has time for.
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To clarify the intern comment was for A/V production like AE Canada does on YouTube. It may take 5 minutes for an employee, designer, CNC operator to speak to the camera but then 1 hour of gear setup/ take down and 2 hours of editing that nobody has time for.
Having an intern to shoot video is an excellent idea. I've been into photography for years (kinda getting out of it lately) but if I would go to a track to shoot motocross, there's a lot of pretty talented young people out there that would love to have an opportunity to show off their skills.
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New ownership may be a positive for Spatial, especially if Clayton remains with the company. From a marketing perspective, look at another, larger, direct-to-consumer brand, PS Audio, for inspiration. Paul’s Youtube videos are very basic but some folks love them. Their magazine has some excellent articles, and even Octave Records gives them profile and street cred.
But here’s the thing. It has to be a CONSISTENT effort. That’s what makes PS Audio’s marketing strategy successful. Since moving to a DTC sales model, it feels like it has barely missed a beat. Pick a marketing tool, do it well, and then wash, rinse, dry and repeat. Having great products (like Spatial) is only one leg holding up the stool of success.
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New ownership may be a positive for Spatial, especially if Clayton remains with the company. From a marketing perspective, look at another, larger, direct-to-consumer brand, PS Audio, for inspiration. Paul’s Youtube videos are very basic but some folks love them. Their magazine has some excellent articles, and even Octave Records gives them profile and street cred.
But here’s the thing. It has to be a CONSISTENT effort. That’s what makes PS Audio’s marketing strategy successful. Since moving to a DTC sales model, it feels like it has barely missed a beat. Pick a marketing tool, do it well, and then wash, rinse, dry and repeat. Having great products (like Spatial) is only one leg holding up the stool of success.
See new post from Spatial Audio.
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See new post from Spatial Audio.
Good stuff, although I have to admit, adding other electronics to the mix when the company has struggled to deliver on orders for just one model of speaker is a head scratcher for me.
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Good stuff, although I have to admit, adding other electronics to the mix when the company has struggled to deliver on orders for just one model of speaker is a head scratcher for me.
I’m not privy to any details but my impression is Spatial is setting up well to recover from the contracted position they’re coming out of (health, supply chain, Covid boom/bust, etc). Being the same age as Clayton I can’t imagine how exhausting it would be to keep up the pace required to run a small company in good times, let alone a company that is stressed.
The current and announced speaker line is significantly streamlined. The DS collaboration offers synergistic amplification that’s dependent on a different (though maybe no less volatile) supply chain.
As a product strategy it appears to be similar to other manufacturers that have or are developing systems offerings (Emotiva, PS Audio, Bryston, Daniel Hertz, etc).
Who knows where this will lead or what they have planned long term. Hopefully Spatial will find success with more people more narrowly focused and hopefully more stable supply chain and economic conditions.
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As a product strategy it appears to be similar to other manufacturers that have or are developing systems offerings (Emotiva, PS Audio, Bryston, Daniel Hertz, etc).
Yeah, it's typical for a speaker company to diversify into components and vice-versa. The unique difference is that Spatial is partnering with unconventional tube amp designers to mate with their unconventional speakers.
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I disagree, it’s not typical. And those companies that do diversify, like PS Audio and Bryston, are usually well-established. Let’s face it - Spatial is at a pretty critical point. Getting all those X4 orders filled should be its singular focus, not building amps for Don Sachs. Heck, my Spatials are an absolute breeze to drive. There are dozens of SS and tube amps that fit the bill. My XA25 (and XA30.5 before that) are but two examples of suitable amps.
My comments come from a good place. My M3 Sapphires are pretty much perfect for my room, system, and listening tastes. I occasionally get requests from other Toronto audiophiles for a demo and often oblige. I’m downright evangelical in my belief that many audiophiles, especially those with less-than-ideal rooms, should give open baffles a try.
I wish Spatial great success, and that’s why I chime in with some non-fawning comments.
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There are dozens of SS and tube amps that fit the bill. My XA25 (and XA30.5 before that) are but two examples of suitable amps.
My 30 year old 18wpc Naim Nait2 had a rip roaring time with my X3s recently. Currently off being serviced and upgraded, I know the X3s will give me every detail of what's restored and improved in the Nait2 when I get it back.
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I disagree, it’s not typical. And those companies that do diversify, like PS Audio and Bryston, are usually well-established. Let’s face it - Spatial is at a pretty critical point. Getting all those X4 orders filled should be its singular focus, not building amps for Don Sachs. Heck, my Spatials are an absolute breeze to drive. There are dozens of SS and tube amps that fit the bill. My XA25 (and XA30.5 before that) are but two examples of suitable amps.
My comments come from a good place. My M3 Sapphires are pretty much perfect for my room, system, and listening tastes. I occasionally get requests from other Toronto audiophiles for a demo and often oblige. I’m downright evangelical in my belief that many audiophiles, especially those with less-than-ideal rooms, should give open baffles a try.
I wish Spatial great success, and that’s why I chime in with some non-fawning comments.
I have upgraded my room acoustics and this week I get my last delivery from GIK to complete my room. This evening as I like to do, I played an Ella recording of her and a piano doing Gershwin songs. I've not played it in a while and not with my new room treatments. The Sapphires M3 reproduced the piano like I never heard with the lower registers firm and present along with Ella sounding full and right in the room with a Piano. The sound was open, yet with weight and body, and the bottom end of the panel just being so deep, firm low, and detailed. These panels do both diffusion and absorption and adding my bass traps in the corners just made everything come together which I expected. I could stop right now and just enjoy the reproduction from my system and the Sapphires and again this reinforces the utmost importance of spending money on your room and proper setup. Picture of my setup with my bass traps just sitting on the floor in the corners. These will be replaced by Demi Bass traps that will sit in the floor corners and butt right up to the bottom of the impression series panels, then I have 2 more 4" panels coming which will replace each of the 2" panels on the side wall by each corner, so both front wall and side wall will be 4" panels which will improve the sound even a touch more, the panels that they replace will go above my windows below the ceiling and the other on a side wall after the rack so to balance out with the hall way to my left that is open air, I have no wall behind me where I sit.
(https://www.audiocircle.com/image.php?id=256070)
(https://www.audiocircle.com/image.php?id=256071)
(https://www.audiocircle.com/image.php?id=256072)
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I agree with Tangram's claimed utility in expressing "non-fawning comments" and puzzlement over Spatial's decision to "partner" to produce $20K monoblocks. Consider David Whitt's comment, in part, "...From a business standpoint, we won’t bite off more than we can swallow in what many people are forecasting to be a challenging economy. (Hope for the best - plan for the worst.) We are committed to a measured investment and growth plan that ensures continuity of operations and building confidence in our ability to deliver outstanding value." Not an obvious retail ploy to undertake production of $20K monoblocks in a "challenging economy."
I recall Clayton's comment, "I don't want to just make toys for rich guys." OK. Motivations can change. Granted. But it would be nice if Spatial would attend to its current customer base by, for instance, offering X-over upgrades as many seem to desire. Count me in. Given the marketing copy dedicated to Spatial's no-holds-barred X-over upgrade in the X series, I concur with those who've suggested the inherent business opportunity.
Regardless, I just hope my M3's continue to perform as, overall, they're the most satisfying speaks I've owned in 45 years.
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You don't need to wait for a speaker company to offer crossover upgrades. It's fairly simple to do on your own.
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I see that it looks pretty simple, but for those of us that have never done this, plus don't want to ruin a several thousand dollar investment, experimenting is a tough sell.
I have tried my hand at diy streamers, and made 2 nice ones based on a detailed diy post that was posted to audiophilestyle. I also completed a dc cable diy based on a step by step post on audiophilestyle.
If you want to post something like that with photos, a purchasing list and explanation of the reasoning behind each decision, you would have some grateful members here.
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I see that it looks pretty simple, but for those of us that have never done this, plus don't want to ruin a several thousand dollar investment, experimenting is a tough sell.
I have tried my hand at diy streamers, and made 2 nice ones based on a detailed diy post that was posted to audiophilestyle. I also completed a dc cable diy based on a step by step post on audiophilestyle.
If you want to post something like that with photos, a purchasing list and explanation of the reasoning behind each decision, you would have some grateful members here.
If you're going to do a crossover upgrade get info from the designer, he knows where the crossover points should be plus different parts can and will mess up the balance of its sound for instance if you have resistors in the circuit design to work with what comes after and you put in say a dale metal film which would be a better part then all you have is more high frequency being passed through where the design after that were designed for say carbon film the end result would be overly bright sound. It is more complicated than just using better parts, yes, you can change the sound with any mod, and the result is a crap shoot if you like it. Call Spatial and pay them to build 2 new crossovers and then send them to you and offer to send the old ones back, They may be willing to do that, or they might say leave well enough alone if you enjoy what you currently have. I worked for Sony, and I can tell you the voice a product was about the circuit design and the parts chosen they have to work as one.
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Additionally a factory crossover upgrade will most likely increase the speaker’s resale value. A home brew (regardless of the parts and expertise of the speaker owner) will most likely decrease the resale value or leave it more or less the same.
I’ve been trading for forty years and it’s hard to get more than a given piece’s resale value regardless of the expensive coupling caps, crossover parts or tube upgrades. Kind of like a three bedroom, two bath house in any given area. They are pretty much worth what they are worth. Of course many are not concerned too much with resale value.
There has been plenty of times I’ve tried to sell an amp with $400 worth of upgraded coupling caps for $50.00 more than the going rate. No bites. Pull out the caps and mark it down 50 bucks and it’s gone in a day.
As far as $20K mono-blocks; seems a small market with lots of competition at that price point. So maybe it won’t distract too much from the building and selling of fairly affordable speakers. Time will tell and I wish the new owners of Spatial well.
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I agree and would like a factory offering, was just responding to the suggestion a spatial audio speaker owner should experiment with crossovers because of the easiness of doing so.
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Additionally a factory crossover upgrade will most likely increase the speaker’s resale value. A home brew (regardless of the parts and expertise of the speaker owner) will most like decrease the resale value or leave it more or less the same.
I’ve been trading for forty years and it’s hard to get more than a given piece’s resale value regardless of the expensive coupling caps, crossover parts or tube upgrades. Kind of like a three bedroom, two bath house in any given area. They are pretty much worth what they are worth. Of course many are not concerned too much with resale value.
There has been plenty of times I’ve tried to sell an amp with $400 worth of upgraded coupling caps for $50.00 more than the going rate. No bites. Pull out the caps and mark it down 50 bucks and it’s gone in a day.
As far as $20K mono-blocks; seems a small market with lots of competition at that price point. So maybe it won’t distract too much from the building and selling fairly affordable speakers. Time will tell and I wish the new
owners of Spatial well.
Years and years ago, I tried a mod of my preamp, when I received it back and played it and even after 2 weeks it sounded like a receiver would or preamp if you turned the treble control up, and the bass control downward. The business that offered the mod said Well we took the mid-bass hump away, something I heard from other modders over the years, more cleaner detail sound. That it was, my dealer would not even take it on trade, and gave me some good advice, do you think someone who did this modification would know more about the design than Audio Research? Krell or Mark Levinson.? You brought this unit from us because you like its sound, no you don't, lesson learned he said. Had to sell it at a huge loss. I never buy a modified product because you have no idea if you like it or not.
As far as messing with the crossover, I guy came by my house who owns the Sapphires M3 said he had a good way of improving the sound, and went into the crossover and added Mudolf caps the best ones made, closed up the crossover and we played the speakers they sound like elevated highs, and forward, he said give it a few weeks I did, he came back and took them out and hook up what was in there before, balance was back. I never wrote about this because I saw no need it was something I tried. Again, much better parts for sure, but it screwed up the balance of the speaker, the guy must like that sound though, but hey that is on him if he does. If I heard my speakers sound like that if I went to his house to buy them from him and would not have done so, never heard a speaker sound so out of balance in my life.
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Mr Big, I have always wanted to know what is in the crossover of my M3's but haven't brought myself to open it up to see. Apparently you have. My understanding is there are two inductors and one cap? What did you see when you went inside? (type/manufacturer/mounting/etc.). Pictures if you have them would be awesome.
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Mr Big, I have always wanted to know what is in the crossover of my M3's but haven't brought myself to open it up to see. Apparently you have. My understanding is there are two inductors and one cap? What did you see when you went inside? (type/manufacturer/mounting/etc.). Pictures if you have them would be awesome.
I never took pictures, I looked inside when the guy had the crossover box open, but I really did not look long enough to remember.
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You can expect the markup to be pretty steep for factory crossover upgrades. The premium parts aren't cheap and they need to be stocked (requires a substantial up-front cost), larger enclosures may need to be custom-built, then there are assembly costs, marketing, packaging, etc. Then the manufacturer has to rely on the owner to remove/bypass the existing crossover and replace it with the new one (soldering is required). That's risky for the manufacturer, plus the time required on customer service calls to walk some buyers through the process. Offering upgraded crossovers may not be a good business decision unless they could generate a sizeable ROI, so a 4-figure sales price per pair would not be unrealistic. And you can forget about recouping your money on the resale.
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You can expect the markup to be pretty steep for factory crossover upgrades. The premium parts aren't cheap and they need to be stocked (requires a substantial up-front cost), larger enclosures may need to be custom-built, then there are assembly costs, marketing, packaging, etc. Then the manufacturer has to rely on the owner to remove/bypass the existing crossover and replace it with the new one (soldering is required). That's risky for the manufacturer, plus the time required on customer service calls to walk some buyers through the process. Offering upgraded crossovers may not be a good business decision unless they could generate a sizeable ROI, so a 4-figure sales price per pair would not be unrealistic. And you can forget about recouping your money on the resale.
They could easy do it in an exchange program where customers send in their old crossover boxes they charge for a new box with crossover and send that out customer receives screws it back into the speakers reconnects and ready to enjoy. We did that with car audio repairs while I was at Sony, one day turnaround time with the customer receiving a working unit within a few days. We had stock ready to go. One in and one out, the one in got repaired tested and put back into stock for outbound. All fords, Chryslers, and others used Sony car radio with their name on it but they were Sony.
The do owe the customers replacement for the M100 tweeter if it goes bad, so they would have to use the current tweeter. So, they could make money both ways while taking care of their many customers which they have a legal and customer service obligation to do.
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Many (most?) of the premium quality capacitors and inductors used for high-end passive crossovers are larger (sometimes significantly) than the more economical parts often used for base-level speakers. I don't know which parts Spatial is using, but I expect upgraded parts that are enough better than the stock parts to make a worthwhile upgrade are not going to fit in the same space, and will require an external box.
So in addition to the electronic components themselves, the vendor has to supply a box and additional cables and connectors, and these have to be high enough quality to not detract from the base speaker.
Just as an example, Alsyvox offers external crossover upgrades for some of their line. Their speakers are dipole planar-magnetic speakers similar in concept to Magnepans, but a couple steps up in quality (both sound quality and finish) and price. The external crossover upgrade for their Botticelli model retails for $29,400. You might think this is ludicrous, but when you add up the cost of the components, high quality box, connectors, cables, assembly, shipping, etc., it is not an unrealistic markup.
For a more modestly priced speaker system like the Spatials, the "upgrade" parts probably do not have to be as high-end in order to make a difference, but the price ratio (Alsyvox's upgrade crossover is approximately 30% of the base speaker price) is not at all unrealistic and may even be on the low side for speakers like the Spatials (which offer excellent performance for the price already).
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For a more modestly priced speaker system like the Spatials, the "upgrade" parts probably do not have to be as high-end in order to make a difference, but the price ratio (Alsyvox's upgrade crossover is approximately 30% of the base speaker price) is not at all unrealistic and may even be on the low side for speakers like the Spatials (which offer excellent performance for the price already).
Yeah -- and to put it more bluntly -- a good crossover upgrade probably won't be cost-effective, either for the manufacturer or the buyer, and the minor improvement in sound quality won't justify the high cost. It's an unrealistic expectation. My speakers originally had decent crossover parts and I probably spent around $1,000 to replace only the capacitors (Sonicaps) with higher quality ones (huge and heavy and barely fit into the cabinets!!) and added bypass caps. If a manufacturer sent me comparable upgraded crossovers to install, the price would have been something like $2,500 which is well over half the cost of my speakers. That's why crossover upgrades often only make cents if you DIY.
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It may be relevant that the current offering on X4s is $6800 for Premium and $9800 for Ultra, the difference being a crossover upgrade and a different base. The crossover "box" appears to be larger on the Ultra. So, that is $2000 ADDITIONAL for upgraded crossover parts(less whatever stand difference is).
I believe the newsletter said that the majority of their current orders for the X4 opt for the ULTRA.
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It may be relevant that the current offering on X4s is $6800 for Premium and $9800 for Ultra, the difference being a crossover upgrade and a different base. The crossover "box" appears to be larger on the Ultra. So, that is $2000 ADDITIONAL for upgraded crossover parts(less whatever stand difference is).
I believe the newsletter said that the majority of their current orders for the X4 opt for the ULTRA.
Good observation. Based on this statement, it's probably a partial upgrade: "By employing copper foil inductors and oil-impregnated film capacitors, we have achieved a remarkable balance of revealing detail and musicality."
Are the improved caps on the tweeter circuit only? Which brand of caps do they use? Any bypass caps? I'm not being critical of a partial crossover upgrade, just pointing out that it would be nice to know where the additional $2K is going. Heck, I wanted to add copper foil inductors on my DIY speakers, but they wouldn't fit on the crossover board. Someday, I might build external crossovers, but the enclosure would be half the size of the darn speakers. :lol:
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Mr Big, I have always wanted to know what is in the crossover of my M3's but haven't brought myself to open it up to see. Apparently you have. My understanding is there are two inductors and one cap? What did you see when you went inside? (type/manufacturer/mounting/etc.). Pictures if you have them would be awesome.
Well I had laid my M3 Sapphires down to do some work on my IsoAcoustics feet. I decided to satisfy my curiosity and look inside the crossover. I was surprised to find there were more components than I thought there would be (Spatial touted the "minimal" crossover on the M3 Sapphire). The components are of "good" quality. There are cored inductors manufactured by Erse who claim they rival air core? So not what I was expecting but I am not compelled to "upgrade" anything.
(https://www.audiocircle.com/image.php?id=256559)
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Thanks for taking the plunge for the rest of us
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Well I had laid my M3 Sapphires down to do some work on my IsoAcoustics feet. I decided to satisfy my curiosity and look inside the crossover. I was surprised to find there were more components than I thought there would be (Spatial touted the "minimal" crossover on the M3 Sapphire). The components are of "good" quality. There are cored inductors manufactured by Erse who claim they rival air core? So not what I was expecting but I am not compelled to "upgrade" anything.
(https://www.audiocircle.com/image.php?id=256559)
That is a very nice crossover and not an afterthought. Kudos to Clayton. I've seen a lot more expensive speakers as good and lesser. You can change the part, but you better know that you will also change the balance and yes, it will sound different, like any mod that swaps out parts for better without having the background to read a schematic, the background to understand the circuit and its design. I let a guy come over and switch out the capacitor with a very high-quality Supreme Mundorf Capacitor he swore the detail was so much better, we played the same track and it took me less than 30 seconds to say it sound like crap, the up mids to the highs were so out of balance to the mid-bass and low end that the speaker sounded like a shill transistor radio, yes, there was more detail, and yes it was easy to hear, and also easy to know it threw the speaker out of wack, a little unsoldering and putting the stock part back in and all was in balance again. it the old days a mod guy would say that he took out the mid-bass hump to explain the brightness. After that he wanted to add a resistor to the tweeter saying it smoothed it out highs it did and also took all the air away, the guy actually reviewed these speakers and was a Quad owner like me. Again I said to myself leave well enough alone, if you enjoy them don't screw with it.
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Well I had laid my M3 Sapphires down to do some work on my IsoAcoustics feet. I decided to satisfy my curiosity and look inside the crossover. I was surprised to find there were more components than I thought there would be (Spatial touted the "minimal" crossover on the M3 Sapphire). The components are of "good" quality. There are cored inductors manufactured by Erse who claim they rival air core? So not what I was expecting but I am not compelled to "upgrade" anything.
(https://www.audiocircle.com/image.php?id=256559)
This crossover actually is very simple. I suspect the three ferrite core inductors are in series to create an effective 30mH. So you can think of these as a single component. I'm assuming that these are on the woofer circuit. Changing these to air-core inductors might be a small improvement, but they would be WAY bigger. Jantzen makes 14ga 15mH air-core inductors which 91mm (~3.5in) in diameter and 62mm (~2.5in) tall. Foil inductors would be even better, but even larger. 10mH 14ga are 149mm x 37mm and you'd need three for each crossover.
The one part that I would be most interested in replacing is the electrolytic cap in the lower left. But again, a replacement film cap is likely to be much larger which would probably necessitate an external crossover. And it looks like this cap is already bypassed with a film cap which provides some of the benefit.
Changing the two film caps could also change the sound to your liking, but the differences will be more subtle and could certainly result in a sonic signature that you don't like.
If you are interested in upgrading your crossover, I'd suggest talking to Clayton. He is well aware of the value of quality crossover parts and might be willing to provide some guidance. But it's likely to cost you upwards of $1000 or more for the pair to get an appreciable improvement.
If it were me and I wanted to pursue this, I'd build a completely new set of crossovers in a separate external box so that I could switch back to the stock units to compare after the new crossovers were well broken in. Many of the more exotic film caps take hundreds of hours before they sound their best.
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Two of the Caps are Audyn.
(https://www.audiocircle.com/image.php?id=256585)
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I would be surprised if Spatial Audio entertained performing crossover upgrades for Spatial owners? They are a speaker manufacturer and it’s rare that a speaker manufacturer will support continuous speaker upgrades to their existing owners. They primarily want to sell speakers, not upgrades after they leave their shop. I can understand a DIY project, but not so much from the speaker manufacturer. Companies that manufacture preamps and amps sometimes offer upgrades to existing customers. I know Conrad Johnson used to offer Teflon cap upgrades to existing customers and D’Agostino will currently do upgrades as well. I don’t think most speaker manufacturers like Klipsch, B&W, Magnepan, KEF, Magico, Wilson Audio, and so on would support doing upgrades for existing customers. They want to sell the new product with all of their revised offerings. We’ll see if Spatial responds to the request of existing owners on this forum.