[PaulFolbrecht]

MUST be the maple finish.  Latest model (after summer '09) desired but will consider older.

[doug s.]

hopefully you were the buyer of these?

http://www.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?spkrfull&1273686760&/Tonian-Labs-TL-D1-


i hope so, cuz i would love to read your comments about them.   

doug s.

[PaulFolbrecht]

I did buy Gary's pair - which will be my 3rd.

The TL-D1s are some of the most remarkable speakers I've ever owned.  They have a way with microdynamic finesse I do not think I have heard exceeded at any price.  They are extremely well-balanced and that ribbon tweeter integrates completely seamlessly.  Weaknesses: No bass below 40 Hz and cannot do loud SPLs in a large room with bass-heavy music.

[doug s.]

I did buy Gary's pair - which will be my 3rd.

The TL-D1s are some of the most remarkable speakers I've ever owned.  They have a way with microdynamic finesse I do not think I have heard exceeded at any price.  They are extremely well-balanced and that ribbon tweeter integrates completely seamlessly.  Weaknesses: No bass below 40 Hz and cannot do loud SPLs in a large room with bass-heavy music.

thanks, paul, for your comments.  so...  how do you think they'd do in a large room, actively crossed over to a pair of good subs, 24db/octave, at ~80hz?  i'd wager that the system would now be capable of low bass and high spl's; and the tonian speakers themselves would sound even better, to boot...    

as an example, my proac tablette 8 reference signatures, cannot play the kodo drummers loudly even in a medium sized room, but crossed over to subs, the system can play anything at any level, even in a very big space.

doug s.

[PaulFolbrecht]

thanks, paul, for your comments.  so...  how do you think they'd do in a large room, actively crossed over to a pair of good subs, 24db/octave, at ~80hz?  i'd wager that the system would now be capable of low bass and high spl's; and the tonian speakers themselves would sound even better, to boot...    

I would wager you are correct on the SPL capabilities but, FYI, I would never do such a thing as I think it would simply ruin the speaker - ruin its magic, that is.  For acoustic music, that is.  The coherency and dynamic expressiveness (mostly what we'd call "microdynamics" but also the transition between the micro & marco domains) of the speaker could not possibly hold if it were not reproducing that 35-80 Hz range.  You'd surely gain bass depth and SPL capabilities, but lose that magic.

Would it be better overall for rock?  Almost certainly.  However, good as it is, I'm not sure the TL-D1 is an ideal rock speaker.  Well, I could be wrong about that - the setup you suggest might be wonderful for rock.  I can't know.  But I am pretty certain about my comments WRT to acoustic music - jazz. 

In addition to the problem with loss of coherency and loss of the particular bass magic of the Tonian driver/cabinet, I have to comment that I have not found active crossovers to be transparent.  Maybe some are.  They sure add a lot of complexity and hassle, though, IMO.  I am sure it may be worth it in some contexts.

IF you want to listen to jazz, or other relatively non-busy acoustic music (by the way, they handle Kodo drums *wonderfully!*), these speakers with a good 45 SET amp or SE transistor amp (Pass) are sure a treat.

That's my long-winded opinion on the matter.

[doug s.]

paul all i can say is that one of my fave acoustic albums - "skip hop & wobble" - never sounded so good until it was played on a system w/active outboard subs thru a (wery transparent, imo) marchand x-over.   the first time i ever heard an acoustic upright bass, right there in my own living room!   



ymmv,

doug s.

[PaulFolbrecht]

What are your subs?

Do you find the Marchand to be nearly transparent?

[doug s.]

paul, i am using a pair of original vmps larger subs, w/upgraded megawoofer drivers.  while i never heard all the speakers crossed over thru the marchands w/o the subs, my first pair of speakers - thiel 3.5's - improved by not having to do the stuff below 80hz.  whatever "veiliing" (if any?) that was imparted by the x-over, it was more than compensated for by the woofer not working as hard.

presently, i am using a deqx dsp x-over - again, it is a matter of the harm done by the eq being less than the benefits of it...

here's an old pic of my old digs, w/the subs & meret re monitors.  (i sure miss the 26x38x8.5 room.)


present set-up, ~18x40 studio apartment; oris horns on modded lascala bass-bins, w/subs adjacent:


the tonian's sound like a "must hear"; especially at their reasonable used pricing...   

doug s.

[jrebman]

Doug,

I completely agree with Paul (as I am the present owner of his second pair ) and think that adding a sub and rolling off the natural lower end of the D1s will rob them of their magic.  And magic they are.  For rocking out it probably wouldn't hurt all that much, but even today as I was listening to some big band jazz, I was completely blown away by the D1's ability to handle everything thrown at it at all the volume I would consider comfortable to listen to (say low 90 dB peaks), and all this with a 3 watt 2A3 amp, but in a small 10' x 16' room.

With the right amp and a great source, and used appropriately, these are just the most wonderful speakers I've ever had.

I've had these since sometime in November and I have to say that that I've never had a pair of speakers so long without me being a ble to find anything about them that bothers me, and in fact, just the opposite -- the simpler and better the rest of my system gets, the better and better these speakers sound.

My two cents.

-- Jim