So, it's been three days since the T1's arrived and were unpacked from the extremely comprehensive packaging. Just as well, as one of the boxes has a hole in the end right into the polystyrene - but no damage to the speaker.

These are replacing 18x year old Dynaudio Finales, a near full range kit speaker over 60 inches tall. The listening room is actually the family lounge, which is fairly large with a few soft furnishings, carpet over suspended floor, but no curtains on the large picture windows. I've attached a photo taken from the kitchen area. The PLP is a couch just in front of the red cutting board which is in the foreground (leaning against a 3.5 foot wall 'separating' the kitchen from the living area). Depending on where I place the speakers, the distance to the listening location is 10.5 to 9ft from the front plane of the speakers. The speaker sits across the corner of the room so there are no walls parallel to the sides / rear of the speakers.

Listening thus far has been a combination of background and semi-critical; I've not been able to sit down and relax over the last few days due to a bad back.

This means positioning is still a work in progress. I tend to move things around when the family is out of the house prior to critical listening, so the couch you see next to the LH speaker 'disappears' (as does the one near the RH speaker), and I move them further into the room. I haven't spiked them yet. I suspect I'll use either no, or cut down spikes (shorten the threads via a hacksaw), on the front in order to angle the tweeters correctly.

Why go through all this? Well, first impressions have been extremely positive.

Cohesive, coherent sound. Smooth but not smoothed over. Detail with delicacy. Slam with control.

I can hear things I haven't heard before. Extremely delicate finger work from Buddy Guy on 'Folk Singer'. Pinpoint imaging of Robert Plant and Alison Krauss voices respective to each other on 'Raising Sand'. I can hear things I could hear from the Dynaudios - the crickets on 'Roadhouses and Automobiles', but in a more cohesive, natural way. The sometimes nasal tones from Roberta Flack on 'The First Time......) has gone.

The only area the Dyn's have been better is the helicopter sound effect on The Wall, but the T1's are waaay better on the bells / chimes on DSOTM.

I'm getting bass down to 20Hz in my room without major tweaking or spikes (Stereophile test rip). It sounds a bit down in level to my nearly vintage 'ear meter' measuring equipment, but it is there. The Dyn's made it to 30Hz before flapping in the breeze. Interestingly the bass is not overblown, and certainly not there unless the recording calls for it.

Bass output level on the T1's is set between 10 - 11 and I'll tweak this after further breaking in, experimenting with positioning, toe-in and tweeter angles, and adding the spikes.

I auditioned Focal 1028Be's, Thiel 2.4's and Kef R's of some sort. The Kef's were rubbish, the Thiels better in many ways (but not all) than the Dyn's, but not enough to buy them. The Focals were good but a bit screechy with overblown bass, although they were in an unfamiliar room with Naim electronics. The Focal's are also 40% more expensive in NZ than the T1's so I didn't pursue them.

I've got some mates coming around this weekend for a decent listen (sans family), and hopefully one will bring his 1028Be's for a direct comparison.

More break-in and tuning to do, and more reporting to come.

Cheers

Quick Bass Questions:

1. Do you have connections to the sub woofer inputs on the Triton Ones?

2. With your amps/receivers - do you have the option to provide "analog bass"signals directly to your Triton One Sub inputs?

Hi Chcmuzza, great report and I am glad we have a Kiwi on here!!!!!
Your system is becoming really great and should sound wonderful when you get it dialed in!
I appreciate your adding a picture, and I hope you don't mind if we try to give you some suggestions.
OK?
I would say that curtains would be a BIG help for the sound.
I don't think the Focals that your friend has will be much of a competition to the Triton Ones.
Have a great time showing off to friends, and I hope your back gets better soon so you can move those speakers and furniture around until you get perfection.
And please keep us informed on how it is working out.
Happy listening,
God Bless,
Wayne

Not sure I can take my eyes off of the view long enough to look at the speakers... WOW!!! Very nice! Great description of your initial impressions. My T1s sounded great right out of the box and may have changed a little with break in, but not much. Hopefully you have some furniture sliders if you're moving them a lot with a bad back. I look forward to hearing and seeing more (your system and the view).

Cheers,

T Cobe

Hi Arthur

No, no separate bass connection, and yes, I run directly from the analogue outputs of a Perreaux power amp to the T1's. As mentioned this is a 2x channel music system and philosophically I like a simple signal path.

I did agonise over the powered woofers, but remembered the Meridian M2 active systems from all those years ago and how good they sounded.

No regrets on this approach so far .

Cheers

Thanks for the input folks.

It is a great view. We have been here 5 years and I never tire of it.

Luckily the furniture slides easily on the carpet. In terms of curtains I agree they would make a difference to the sound but we will be moving at the end of the year, so I'll (probably) lose the view but gain a listening room. The T1's are drawing me in to the music so the view is becoming secondary!

I'll report back next weekend.

Cheers