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Description:
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5 of 5
Reviewed by: texas steve (AudioPhile)
Review Date April 27, 2006
Overall Rating 
5 of 5
Value Rating 5 of 5
Used product for Less than 1 month
Summary:
Purchased HT3s and HTC (center)
Ok, so after one week of use and familiarization I promised you all a review update of my HT3s and HTC pictured above.
Cabinets and wood work;
Appearance of the dye/color, style and overall finish is absolutely excellent. I did not have the HTC (center) hand rubbed as it sits up inside a cabinet above Shakespeare (see pictures at http://www.audiocircle.com/circles/viewtopic.php?t=27255 . The woodwork overall is excellent!
Sound in Stereo mode:
The good: Excellent!
The bad: You can tell that 80% of your Cds suck in quality. So now I have to buy better sounding CDs.!
In pure stereo the sound is excellent - with good recordings you can easily hear the different air and space between instruments, and the very detail sounds in each instrument and voice. The male and female voices are extremely accurate. I took some time with toeing in and distance against back/side wall etc. I ended up 20″ from the back wall, and 35″ from each side will. Toed in at a angle that hit each ear. The listening distance from the HT3s are 13′.
What really strikes me is the detail of the ribbon speaker. The mid an bass is also excellent, (in fact I now only use my Muse 18″ sub you can see it in the picture to the hard right for 5.1 LFE effect the sub you see in the picture to the hard left is used for the surround speakers in movie mode). Listening to Aaron Nevel (sp?) his voice is reproduced with absolutely perfect timber etc. On jazz recordings the detail of cymbals is extraordinary, you can not only hear the smallest wave of sound as the sound travels from one side of the cymbal to the other, you can also hear the distance in air between the snare and the cymbal!
Movies 5:1 etc
The dynamics required for theater of a speaker is powerful. The HT3 and HTC absolutely stand up to it. In movie after movie the speaker handled the excessive drive required by pounding base with ease. The HTC blended seamlessly in sound and although cant handle the same amount of base at the HT3s (I’m considering adding a subwoofer to the HTC for theater only), it did really well. The HTC handles the detail (ribbon again I’m sure) of voice and other sounds as well as the HT3s.
The music in DVDs is astounding! Again the small details that I did not hear before are now there. Ruffling of leaves on trees, small things I did not notice before that now appears. No question, this is a major improvement.
Conclusion:
When you spend this kind of money I have to believe you WANT them to sound and look good. And truthfully you will LOOK for only good things! After all YOU spent all that money sight and sound unheard, a blind leap of faith deep into the cravats of your wallet! And if it did NOT prove out to be a wise choice……………………….
In my opinion, I found some faults (cabinet mentioned above, also remember my speakers were the first or second that Jim did with the new “procedure”) but the sound, fit and overall finish is a 9.0 out of 10. I would give them a 10 if it were not for the few cabinet items mentioned. The CD that Jim sends with the speakers has absolutely excellent material and reproduces the best of the HT3s ability.
They say the “road is paved with good intentions”, in this case blind faith has paved and remapped the boundaries to what wonderful listening that is possible with these speakers.
Happy listening to those who have them, and to those waiting - Keep the faith
Strengths:
very detailed and open
absolutely better with the top grill removed
Beautiful superb build quality - almost museum quality
bass is very tight, defined and deep (don’t need my sub any more)
Weaknesses:
Only one - build time (3 months average)
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