[Tyson]

A local Denverite (Gary) has a pair of the Excelarray's from Selah Audio, and was gracious enough to allow a total stranger (me) to come over and have a listen to them.  Thanks to Brad V for hooking us up, I'm very glad I went.

Gary has the one thing I lust after, a dedicated listening room.  Man I'm jealous of you guys that have this.  One day I will.  But back to Gary's system.  It is very nice, and very simple - an Accuphase DP-65 CD player feeding directly in to a Spectron Musician amp, which powers the 2 excelarrays.  Quality stuff.  Cabling was XLO speaker wire, and a braided silver interconnect with XLR connectors.

So, I'm sure everyone is dying to know what I thought of them.  I thought they were excellent.  I mean, really excellent.  With 2 reservations, I thought they were among the top 5 speakers I've heard, ever.  Let me describe what I found imressive about them before getting to my couple of reservations.  I though they were amazingly dynamic.  Incredibly dynamic.  Their level of detail was stupendous.  Their recreation of ambiance and "space" was among the very best I've ever heard.  Soundstage was likewise extremely impressive.  But, the most impressive was the blend between the woofers and the ribbon driver.  It was absolutely seamless.  This absolutely the most coherent speaker I've heard that uses a ribbon tweeter and cone mids.  Kudos to the designer, he did a perfect job on this.  

These are not laid back, lush, rounded, seductive speakers, they are get up and boogie, grab you by the seat of your pants, get you immediately involved in the music type of speakers.  Which leads me to one of my reservations about their sound - they were bright.  I'm not sure if it was the speakers themselves, the associated equipment, or the room (which had a bit of slap echo), but they definitely were agressive sounding at tipped up toward the upper mids/lower treble area.  They might have sounded a little more balanced if they played deeper in the bass (which leads me to my second reservation).  They play upper bass extremely well, and some midbass, but the midbass is not as powerful as the upper bass.  The low bass was MIA, but I gather that is by design.  I think a pair of subs might balance out his sound a bit, and some room treatment could go a long way to getting rid of the brightness I heard.

So, I know the next question everyone is going to ask is "how do they compare to the RM40's".  A valid question, but one I will answer only with the caveats that his system and setup are very different than mine, and that the following are only my IMPRESSIONS.  To really, truly evaluate both speakers fairly, a side-by-side comparison would have to be done, and done over an extended period, so that there wasn't a bias toward whichever speaker the listner was "used to".

Given those caveats, I would say it's a tie.  The Excelerray's did some things better than the 40's, and the 40's did some things better than the Excelerrays.   The area that the Excelarray's were better is in the lower mids area, they tracked dynamics better than the 40's do, so that the lower strings of a plucked guitar really pop out at you, and male vocals like Johnny Cash sound even more grizzled than via the 40's.  The area I think the 40's are better is the ribbon mids and tweeters are sweeter and smoother sounding, and they play down to low bass with power.  I also thought the Excelarrays created "space" and soundstage depth better while the 40's have better width on the soundstage, but I'm almost certain that this is a room issue, less that a speaker issue, since his speakers were about 5 feet from the back wall, and mine are 1 foot from the back wall, while I have more open area to the sides (see why I lust after a dedicated listening room )  Areas that I thought both speakers were even - detail is amazing through both speakers, easily 2 of the most transparent speakers I've listened to.  Overall dynamics are amazing on both speakers, but then again, that's what you get when you have a lot of drivers working together.  Cohesiveness is just about perfect on both speakers, you really don't hear seperate drivers playing, it's a seamless integrated sound.

So, as you can tell, I really enjoyed listening to his system.  That snap and pop it had to the lower mids coupled with it's already impressive dynamic capabilities everywhere else, made it all (the music) sound very impressive!

Other fun stuff - I brought over some of my gear to give a listen to, and boy am I glad I did.  Gary asked me to bring over my AVA Transcendance 7 preamp, and I also took along my Mensa DIO, the Scott Nixon DAC, 2 runs of Bybee'd Nitro's, and the Bolder bybee'd Power Bar.

We hook up the AVA and the Mensa at the same time, and I have to say the sound was noticably better, more relaxed, fuller bodied, and more dynamic.  I was shocked.  We thought it might be because we made 2 changes at once, so we hooked up the Accuphase to one input of the AVA and the Mensa to the other, so we could do some real time switching while playing music.  With the Accuphase hooked up to the AVA, the sound was better than without the AVA in the system, that is certain.  More body to the sound, deeper soundstage, but without giving up any transparency or detail.  Very nice.  Then we switched back and forth between the Mensa and the Accuphase a few times, and it became apparent that the Mensa was a bit more full bodied, slightly more dynamic, greater soundstage depth, and a more natural sound.  We were BOTH shocked by this.  I mean, the Accuphase is a damn fine player, and I never, ever expected the Mensa to even equal it, let alone surpass it in a few areas.  I would have been perfectly content if the Mensa was "close" to the Accuphase.  Needless to say I'm ecstatic now.

And the AVA was the other big eye opener.  I know it is a good pre compared to other pre's I've heard, but for it to not give up any transparency, to lose no details at all, when compared to NO preamp, that is truly amazing.  I think Gary was mighty impressed with this little pre too.

Next, we added in the Scott Nixon DAC, which is a PITA since we have to reverse the speaker leads to do it.  After a couple of songs, it was obvious it did the "liquid midrange" tube thing very well, but it quashed dynamics, rounded transients, vieled detail, and was a bit opaque compared to both the Mensa and the Accuphase.  It is a "nice" sounding unit, but it is certainly colored and less than fully transparent.  Plus, there was a slight band of brightness to the sound that wasn't present w/the Mensa or the Accuphase.

Then we played with serveral combinations and permutations of the M80's and the bybee'd nitro's to various gear, and came up with the conclusion that the nitro was smoother and sweeter, and the M80 was more forward and had stronger bass.

Then we tried the Bolder Power Strip hooked up to his Accuphase directly driving the Spectron amp, but in his system it did not make much of a difference in sound - his power must be pretty good/clean, while in my system the power bar makes a nice difference in sound w/my very crappy AC.

That pretty much sums it up, if we're very lucky maybe Gary will happen by to offer his thoughts (but I'm not sure if he knows the address for AC).  All in all it was a very fun afternoon.  I invited Gary to come over to my place next Saturday, so maybe we'll have a Spectron vs FetVALVE amp comparison to post. . .

[Brad V]

Hi Tyson,

It sounds like you had fun.

Gary called me after you left. Gary had also called me several days ago, as he was leary about having you coming over so soon. He just got into the new house and hadn't gotten things dialed in yet. He said that things were sounding bright and not like he heard at my house or his old house before the move. It sounds like he definitely needs some room tunes to tame some higher end brightness.

I think you wrote a very good review of what you heard. The Excelarray's are like a microscope. They expose everything you have in your system. I had a complete SS system and when I moved to the Excelarray's, things were a little too on the Accurate and dry side. When I moved to the ARC SP-6A tube preamp things started to get sweeter in the mids. Then when Hantra let me borrow his Audionote SET amp, I heard the real magic. Hantra and others have heard my system thru the transformation and I believe they were all truly amazed at the differences of each improvement.

Another difference between my setup and Gary's is my speakers are like 7 feet from the sidewalls, thus keeping things from getting too bright. Gary's going to try and borrow a AudioNote tomorrow and if my suspicions are correct, he'll see was a tube amp and/or SET will do for his system. Couple this with him adding the old name room tunes, he'll alleviate the only things you preferred better in your system. The one thing left to take care of is adding a subwoofer for the very low bass. If you can, you need to go back for a listen, once he has those things worked out.

Gary was very impressed by your Van Alstine Preamp.

Keep me posted.

Have a great day,

Brad

[Pez]

Interesting comments T. It sounds like there's a new speaker that needs some recognition (well new to us at least)

[Tyson]

Brad
Yes, subs, room treatment, and smoother/less aggressive sounding equipment and he's "there".  Hell, apart from the brightness it's better than 99.9% of the systems I've heard.

Jason,
Yep, they are the real deal, I was impressed (obviously).

[Tyson]

Listening at Gary's today inspired me to play around a bit with my own setup.  I pulled the speakers out a bit more and tried to see if I could get the whole "air" and depth thing he had going on so well in his system.  

The rear of my speakers are now 2 feet from the rear wall, and close enough to my seat that I'm on the verge of the drivers not having enough distance from me to integrate properly.  But, it did add some depth.  

Still, I wasn't getting the air that he was, so I figured, what the hell, I'll turn up the tweeter pot a bit.  I haven't really messed with the settings since I put in the bybee jumper to bypass the switch connecting the mids and highs on my speakers.  

So, first I rotated the mids up to about 11 o'clock, thats better, more snap to the mids than before, the bass isn't obscuring the lower mids like it was a bit before.  But still not the proper air and ambiance.  So, the tweeter pot gets rotated from 8 o'clock to 9 o'clock.  Definitely better, but still not quite there.  Rotate it up to 10 o'clock, BAM, there it is!  

The funny thing is that I've had the speaker set this high before, and it sounded too bright and too light in the lower mids/upper bass.  My theory is that bypassing the switch and adding the bybee filter allows the mids and tweets to play cleaner and clearer, with less hash and noise, so that they can be turned up and not sound like they are dominating the sound over the bass.  

Anyway, I'm pretty stoked about the sound I'm getting now.  If I hadn't gone over to Gary's, I would not have been able to zero in on where my speakers were weak with the way I had them set up, and it might have taken weeks to get around to it and get it done only by ear w/no reference to any other ultra transparent systems.  So, not only did I have a blast hanging out with Gary listening to his system, but I also have benefitted quite a bit in my own system by using his as a reference to do some more tuning against.  Don't know if Gary is going to happen by to read this, but if you do, THANK YOU

[Tyson]

More comments.  To add to my previous post, I still don't have the full depth like Gary does, and I'm "really" jonesing for a dedicated room.

Also, one other thing is that the Excelarrays will play louder than the RM40's before getting congested and confused sounding.  Granted, this is VERY loud, but there it is.  It is undoubtedly a limitation of having the mid ribbons of the 40s crossed over so low, they simply run out of excursion at some point, while a stack of mid woofers would still be coasting.

[Brad V]

It definitely pays to hear other system. I was lucky enough to hear the same exact speakers in 4 different people's homes. I learned so much about speaker positioning and what tubes had to offer.

The big things I learned, that may or may not be true for all situation is:
1) Speakers close to the wall reinforce the bass and kill soundstage depth, midrange and highs
2) Speakers further out from the wall behind them, improves soundstage depth, midrange and highs
3) Speakers further out from the sidewalls, improves soundstage width
4) Tubes added much more image specificity to the instruments and singers. Push/Pulls improved on SS and Digital, however SETs took it the the best level
5) The best sounds will come from speakers pulled far into the room and far away from sidewalls, coupled with subwoofers. Trying to get everything out of just one pair of speakers is almost impossible.

Tyson, if you pulled your speakers 4 feet into the room like Gary, I believe you would hear a much less bass extent.

Have a great day,

Brad

[jackman]

Great review!  I've decided to get my Smart DIO upgraded to Mensa and my AVA Fetvalve Preamp upgraded to Transcendance level.  Too bad you couldn't lug over the AVA amplifier.  It would be interesting to hear it up against that Spectron (which is an excellent amp).  

I wish I had the room for the Excellerays!  Great job capturing what you heard.  Impressive stuff!

Jackman

[Ernest]

Tyson,

Fantastic review!

Any chance you could write a review guide?  Maybe a checkpoint type list of things to do and listen for?  Even suggest music to use?  I think I would get a lot more reviews written if I had something like that to work from.

Thanks,

Ernest

[JoshK]

Very good review Tyson!  My guess is that the Excelarray is a little more sensitive to room setup than even most speakers because they are dipoles.  

I am interested to see what you think of the Spectron.  My guess is that you might not really like it at first unless you retune the RM40's to it, but then you have had enough practice and experience with this that you would be able to quickly enough.  My first impression of the spectron was a bit mixed until I retuned.  I had never heard an amp with as much extention in both ends cleanly as it has and it left me a bit puzzled in what to think at first.  (fwiw, I think you recent retuning is close to what you'll need for the Spectron...that is close to what I've got here.)

[Brad V]

Hi Josh,

>>> Very good review Tyson! My guess is that the Excelarray is a little more sensitive to room setup than even most speakers because they are dipoles.

The Excelarray's aren't dipoles. Also since a line array in general loads a room so easily, they are much easier to setup than other speakers. Bass modes are a thing of the past with most line array's. I just plopped mine down when I got them and no room modes at all. Gary did the same thing in his other house. I think there is definitely something funky going on with his new place and possibly it is the L Area in his basement room.

Again, they are the easiest to just put anywhere and good sound, however like any other speaker, you have to move them around to get the best possible.

Have a great day,

Brad

[JoshK]

Thanks Brad, I had thought the ribbon was dipole and the midwoofers were enclosed.

[Pez]

The big things I learned, that may or may not be true for all situation is:
1) Speakers close to the wall reinforce the bass and kill soundstage depth, midrange and highs
2) Speakers further out from the wall behind them, improves soundstage depth, midrange and highs
3) Speakers further out from the sidewalls ...

HA!!!! It's very interesting that you said this Brad.  Guess what I just did yesterday (before reading your post) ? I moved my speakers even further away from the wall, something I have done in the past but with less than ideal results. What happened the first time I moved the 626's closer was an overbloated midrange and a rolled off harsh treble reproduction.  This time was different because I have the 626's angle down a bit so that the tweeter points at the listening chair instead of over it like they naturally do when placed on stands that make the soundstage/image sound proper. Any way results: deeper soundstage, better midrange, and highs.  

[Brad V]

Hi Josh,

The ribbons are monopole and the mid/bass is in an enclosed cabinet. Actually each Seas Excel W18 drivers is in its on enclosure, separated by a shelf between drivers.

Have a great day,

Brad

[Rick Craig]

A local Denverite (Gary) has a pair of the Excelarray's from Selah Audio, and was gracious enough to allow a total stranger (me) to come over and have a listen to them.  Thanks to Brad V for hooking us up, I'm very glad I went.

Gary has the one thing I lust after, a dedicated listening room.  Man I'm jealous of you guys that have this.  One day I will.  But back to Gary's system.  It is very nice, and very simple - an Accuphase DP-65 CD player feeding directly in to a Spectron Musician amp, which powers  ...

Thanks for the review. What recordings were you using for the session? This may shed a little light on what you were hearing. The side wall distance can affect the upper end of the speaker as well as the room acoustics. I've listened to the Excelarray in two different rooms and didn't find it to be too bright; in fact, if anything it was slightly laid back in the top octave. I really strive for neutrality in all my designs so I'm guessing that it's a room issue. One nice thing is that the ribbons can be placed on the inside if the side walls are too near to the speaker.

The bass extension is designed for subwoofer augmentation. If you look at the "statement" systems of respected speaker companies many do the same thing. IMO that's the best way to go; however, for some listeners they prefer to not use subwoofers. The Excelarray can be modified for a larger vented enclosure but the cabinet becomes much larger and the midrange could be compromised. Even if you do that the lowest octave still wouldn't be that audible unless a subwoofer is added.

Thanks again for your kind comments.

Rick Craig
Selah Audio

[Tyson]

I tried several, from Johnny Cash's latest "The Man Comes Around", to the Liszt Piano Sonata performed by Pogerolich, to Patricia Barber's Cafe Blue, to Mahler's Symphony #2 performed by Abaddo and the Chicago Symphony, to Alycia Key's "Songs in A Minor" and Natalie Merchant's "Mother Land".  The system sounded bright on all recordings, but it did get better when we inserted some Bolder cables, the Mensa DIO, and the AVA preamp in to the system.  Perhaps a change of amp would have been something else to try, as that was the only thing left that we could have possibly changed in the system (besides the speakers themselves.  My feeling is that it's either a room issue (most likely), or the speakers are too bright for my tastes (also possible).  The only way to be certain is to treat the room and do another listening session. . . But, it doesn't really matter what "I" think of the system, what matters is what Brad thinks, and he seemed pretty happy with them.  I don't know if I'd go with the "room tunes", if those mean the Michael green room pack, since Brad's room definitely had some echo problems.  I'd say a pack of room treatment from someone like 8th nerve for the corners and seams, and some flat acoustic foam to place behind the back of the rugs he has already hung.

I feel kind of bad caryying on this conversation entirely from my perspective, I wish Gary knew about this thread so that he could maybe offer some comments as well. . .

[Brad V]

Hi Tyson,

>>>
if those mean the Michael green room pack, since Brad's room definitely had some echo problems. I'd say a pack of room treatment from someone like 8th nerve for the corners and seams, and some flat acoustic foam to place behind the back of the rugs he has already hung.

I feel kind of bad caryying on this conversation entirely from my perspective, I wish Gary knew about this thread so that he could maybe offer some comments as well. . .
>>>

I believe you meant Gary's room had some echo problems, as mine aren't bright at all.

Also, Gary knows about the thread and is having a hard time getting back into Audiocircle. He signed up when Audiocircle first started and his password had been inactivated. He sent an email to the powers that be, about getting back into it. Maybe he'll be back in today.

Also, it isn't just your perspective on the brightness, as Gary also hears the brightness in this new room. He didn't hear it at my house, where he had 2 to 3 days of full listening. He also didn't hear it at his other house. It is just at his new house, where he has had the Excelarray's set up for approx 2 weeks.

Have a great day,

Brad

[thepogue]

it's always great to get outta the house and check another system out. One on the main benefactors is our own systems when we get back home (i.e. you repositioning your speakers). It's kinda like going abroad then coming back home...it's a fresh look that's needed now and again. great review brudda!

Peace, Pogue

[HarleyMYK]

One thing that has not been mentioned is the cost comparison of the two speakers (Excelarray and RM40).  This is always one of my benchmarks for any audio gear.  

I did not see any price on the Selah web page.  Are the Excelarrays also in $5,000 range (assembled and shipped)?

[Brad V]

The Excelarray's come in different stages. Fully built with a veneer like Curly Maple or Cherry is $6,000.00.

I can say that the price of the raw parts are much more expensive than the VMPS's.

Also, I could be wrong, however I believe that once Gary gets his room treated and playing thru some tube gear like Tyson likes, Tyson will have more pluses for the Excelarray's than the VMPS's. The only thing I believe the VMPS's will have over the Excelarray's, is that they will play lower.

Just my 2 cents,

Brad