[mirekti]

I set this up yesterday. Need to work a bit on cable management, though.
When listening to music I pull them out till the carpet and listen from 3ft away. Ideally, I would add two subs which would fit right behind them once P3ESRs are pulled out, but in a process of moving to another city so...

[mca]

Great looking setup! I love the LIO and Harbeth speakers in white. What do you think of the combo?

[Vinnie R.]

Hi mirekti,

That is one clean looking system, and I'm sure movies sound excellent as well!

Nice job!   

Do you have tape on the floor or some other way of knowing exactly how to place the speakers when you move
them?

Thanks for posting!

Vinnie

[Mitch751]

I am connecting my LIO with Harbeth LS3/5a, the sound quality is very very good, and the soundstage (width and depth) is extremely well ....

I have been looking for a good amp to drive this L3/5a for almost thirty years (have tried Cello performance II, Krell, Luxman etc), and I now believed I have found the best one to drive i.e. LIO !!

[mirekti]

Great looking setup! I love the LIO and Harbeth speakers in white.

Yeah, Vinnie knows it. We had exchanged some 50 mails, and half of them were about LIOs final looks to please my wife (ok, and partially me).
Harbeth's were impossible to find in white, they don't produce them anymore as it was too costly and labor intensive. The problem was, my wife said they could go to living room only if they came in white.
I was at the point to purchase M20.1 and paint them (or give them painted) white, and then on Harbeth's forum light came up and one member pointed them out for sale on another forum. At first it was a pickup only in England, but after telling my story I guess the guy felt sorry for me and shipped them to the US.    ...lucky me.
Anyhow, my wife likes the way system looks like, me to and the most important part it sounds great.

What do you think of the combo?

I've only been using it for few hours, many things still need to settle down and other tried out. First thing I noticed the bass was surprisingly good. It doesn't go too low, but it is fast and clean and low enough to listen to most of the music genres. This is very important to me as boomy bass kill the joy of listening to the music in my case.
I had a plan to add two Rythmik F12G subs to it, but this is on hold for now. One reason being I'll probably have to move to another city.
I would also like that Vinnie comes with an amp which has 80Hz 24dB/octave HFP (F12G has two setting for LPF @24db/octave @50Hz and @80Hz), but it is important to me that it has a switch at the back so I could still use speakers full range but without subs turned on (late night listening), and this is something he is not into at this point in time which I understand and nhf. I guess the market for this is too small and too much work on other projects.

Female voices sound so real, piano is out of this world. Well, all acoustic instruments are best I've heard so far.
The speakers disappear on most of the tracks, I guess this is dependent upon the mixing quality. At the moment my source is Foobar2000 via USB (Kernel Streaming or fo_dsd_asio). At the moment PCM sounds a bit cleaner. I guess this is related to my laptop and quality of on the fly converting from PCM to DSD with fo_dsd_asio. There are few options with dsd_asio I haven't tried out yet so I might be wrong here.
Eventually, the goal is to get NAA device once it gets its turn on Vinnie's development schedule. In that scenario I would setup a separate PC with Roon and HqPlayer to do the PCM to DSD.

All in all, LIO and P3ESR is a very, very nice combo, but I haven't heard many others so it is hard to compare. What gives me a good sign is that I yesterday stayed up till 2.30 AM and the whole day in the office though about going home and listen more. It is extremely seductive system with small footprint and wife friendly (She likes LIO the most, speakers are so so and stands are ugly ).     

Do you have tape on the floor or some other way of knowing exactly how to place the speakers when you move
them?

  No tapes on the floor. I should actually put a hidden camera and tell my wife I would need to stick few tapes on the floor to know the exact position. This would be funny.
Don't get me wrong, my wife is a beautiful person and we get along. It is just our, actually never said, let's say agreement. If one dislikes something the other will "try" not push it. Looks of interior are rather big for her. 

Thanks for posting!

Thank you for all the effort and patience with me (and my wife )!!!
       

[jpm]

A small suggestion - you might want to consider upgrading the Sanus speaker stands at some future point. They do a fine basic job and their weight / design may be well suited to being able to move them into position regularly, but once you're able to let them live in the same spot all the time, you'll probably find that a more solidly constructed pair of mass loaded stands will take your sound up a notch.

[mirekti]

A small suggestion...

Thanks for the advice. What did you have in mind? I put fine white sand in those Sanus and they are quite heavy and sturdy (not so easy to move around).
I pulled the speakers even more from the front wall, some 6ft away, set them almost 4ft apart, toed slightly in and put myself a bit less then 3ft away from each speaker. Wow, some recordings are alive
However, no way they could stay there, I think moving them around will simply be something I'll live with.
BTW, this was the initial idea for the stands, they would also have open plate on top, but the purchase of speakers and LIO came a bit earlier then planned so Sanus was quick and dirty choice. Not bad given their price tag.


 

[jpm]

Thanks for the advice. What did you have in mind? I put fine white sand in those Sanus and they are quite heavy and sturdy (not so easy to move around).
I pulled the speakers even more from the front wall, some 6ft away, set them almost 4ft apart, toed slightly in and put myself a bit less then 3ft away from each speaker. Wow, some recordings are alive
However, no way they could stay there, I think moving them around will simply be something I'll live with.
BTW, this was the initial idea for the stands, they would also have open plate on top, but the purchase of speakers and LIO came a bit earlier then planned so Sanus was quick and dirty choice. Not bad given their price tag.

I have a pair of the same Sanus stands for a pair of my HT satellite speakers which is why I recognized them. They do the job, but I was a bit disappointed by the gauge of metal they use for the top and bottom plate and outright dislike the plastic parts that hold the spikes.

I also tried the inexpensive Pangea 4 post design, and while these do away with plastic parts and allow for increased mass loading, they required the addition of material to function as a gasket to prevent sand from leaking from the seems.

It wasn't until I got a pair of Bryston's Target brand stands that I felt I had what I wanted. IMO you get what you pay for and Target clearly put $ into the materials and build quality. When the MR series are filled with sand they're not going anywhere.

Opinions vary on whether speakers should be coupled to stands or decoupled - I use Blu Tack, others use Uhu tac or modelling clay (who knows, maybe even Play-Doh or Plasticine ...) and it would take some calamity or ram-bumptious Great Dane, to knock the setup over!

An open frame design like the one in the picture might be better for your setup. If Harbeth follow the principles of utilizing cabinet resonance in the the design (I recall this was a factor in LS3/5a design) then the absence of a top plate could be the way to go.

[Vinnie R.]

BTW, this was the initial idea for the stands, they would also have open plate on top

Hi mirekti,

What do you mean by "open plate" on top ?

Do you mean the top plate has a cut-out (so there is less metal on the plate) and is used to connect
the 3 posts?

Also, do a google image search for "LS3/5a stands" and you might get more ideas...

The Sanus stands you have are hard to beat for the money and I use the same with P3ESRs, filled with rice.

Vinnie

[mirekti]

Hi mirekti,

What do you mean by "open plate" on top ?

Do you mean the top plate has a cut-out (so there is less metal on the plate) and is used to connect
the 3 posts?

Also, do a google image search for "LS3/5a stands" and you might get more ideas...

The Sanus stands you have are hard to beat for the money and I use the same with P3ESRs, filled with rice.

Vinnie

Yes, I though of a square which has a cut out in the middle.
Thanks!!

[Sense63]

Here is my set up with the LIO and the Harbeths.  I too was interested in finding a really good stand for the P3's and scoured the net.  I came across the Linn Kan speaker stands and read that the P3's (which is the only sealed box from Harbeth) sound much better on stands that have a top plate.  All the other models sound better with an open top on the stands.  I was extremely lucky to find a pair of the Linn stands locally and set them up.  The sounded very good as they came, but after talking to some audio buddies, they recommended the Herbies square big dot isolation tweak.  Once they were put on, there was a noticeable improvement in the sound.  I was rather surprised as I didn't think the Harbeth/LIO combo could sound any better.  Anyway, I wanted to share as this combo is pretty special.  Happy listening!  Scott

[mirekti]

The sounded very good as they came, but after talking to some audio buddies, they recommended the Herbies square big dot isolation tweak. 

I use round Blue Tack on top of my plates. It keeps the speakers safe on the stands and somewhat isolates them. All in all, I am very pleasant with what I get in the moment. I do have something else on my mind, but need to see if it is feasible. I'll keep you updated on this.

[Vinnie R.]

Hi Scott,

Thanks for posting and sharing your findings with this combo.  Another nice looking system! 

Enjoy it!

Vinnie

[mirekti]

In the mean time two Rythmik F8s were added to the system. I integrated them by using line level outputs on LIO and passed them through miniDSP 2x4 to help out bass handling in the room.
At the moment F8s are crossed at around 70Hz 24dB/octave on the subs crossover and the signal in bottom two octaves is shaped with miniDSP. P3s run full range.
The results are more then I expected. The subs don't cover much of the frequency range, but after listening the combo for some time and switching the subs off I realized how helpful this bass augmentation to P3s they was.



 

[jpm]

What drove your choice of the F8's over the L22?  Was it just a space constraint or were there technical / integration reasons?

[mirekti]

What drove your choice of the F8's over the L22?  Was it just a space constraint or were there technical / integration reasons?

I'd say both, and my thoughts were 8" drivers are a better match P3. L22 would probably work as well.

In my opinion, except for a good quality subs, DSP is a must. It is only applied on subs and under 70Hz so the clarity of P3s is not affected yet every typically sized room benefits a lot from it.

Initially I wanted to go with GR Research 2x8 open baffle subs, but the drivers are out of stock for some time.
However, I am very pleased with F8s so no regrets as of now.

[Vinnie R.]

In the mean time two Rythmik F8s were added to the system. I integrated them by using line level outputs on LIO and passed them through miniDSP 2x4 to help out bass handling in the room.
At the moment F8s are crossed at around 70Hz 24dB/octave on the subs crossover and the signal in bottom two octaves is shaped with miniDSP. P3s run full range.
The results are more then I expected. The subs don't cover much of the frequency range, but after listening the combo for some time and switching the subs off I realized how helpful this bass augmentation to P3s they was.



 

Looking good, mirekti!  Thanks for sharing your updates on this project 

[mirekti]

Well, I was finally able to do the planned changes to my system and I thought it would be ok to share it here.
It didn't end up aesthetically the way I imagined, but I am also not disappointed. The original idea was to make new cabinets for the subs so they appear like P3s big brother and put two pipes (like from the stands in the posts above to bind them), but...
The main thing is, I got the sound I wanted i.e. P3s which sound a tad bigger, and was also able to free them up of struggling to play bottom two octaves.

What you see is in pictures as a black box on top of LIO is a PC running Win + Roon + HQPlayer with Tidal and local library.
Everything is upsampled to DSD128 (max what current DAC supports, and this will be upgraded in June with new DAC module).   
It is a fan less Streacom F5 case which I modded a bit to accommodate Nocuta's 120mm ULN fan which blows the air in through a dust filter for some air flow. It's gonna need it once the new DAC comes in.

Under the PC, there is, of course, LIO with AVC/Tubestage, DAC and a 4 ch amplfier. Two channels are full range and two have HPF @100Hz 24 dB/octave. P3s are connected to those HPF outputs and are placed on Rythmik F8 subwoofers which are LPF @100Hz 24dB/octave. Subs are connected to line level out from LIO and through miniDSP so one can control bass response up to 100Hz and easy integrate them with the room. I actually had to add a small dip around 120Hz. When you look at the P3s bump in the bass region it all makes sense why it was there.

I place myself on a chair between the speakers, put a blanket on the TV (I actually move the TV back on the AC, all the way to the window to get deeper sound stage, but I also have to bring it back post listening to please my better half ), and listen in a near filed. There are some 3ft between the tweeter and my ears. Also, the speakers are bit closer to each other than in the pictures.

All in all, I must say I am very, very happy with this setup. I was at Axpona yesterday and left it with a big smile on my face.
There were many, many rooms which were not able to compete with my setup at all (this is only my opinion of course, many could/can disagree).
I liked Vinnie's room, but on some songs the bass was too strong. Obviously, the room was a small hotel room and one would expect some bass issues. Vinnie's room was surely in the top three rooms there imho (I liked Spatial's new M3s a lot too).
My point in this paragraph. Using miniDSP on F8s between LIO's line level and F8's amp helped me get rid most of the nasty bass issues one could have in a room. Combining miniDSP for lower two octaves, charm of P3s and near field placement brought a system in my living room I can enjoy for hours and hours.

I still cannot believe I was able to create relatively small system with huge sound, put it in my living room and get almost zero complaints from my wife. 








 
   

[timind]

Bravo! That is one beautiful setup you have.

[Vinnie R.]

Congratulations, mirekti!

All your hard work and planning is paying off and now you can listen and enjoy 

Thanks for sharing your updates!

Vinnie