Is Focal speakers any good ?
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Joined: Oct 2003
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From: Miami
Focal makes great speakers, I had a set of Utopia's, their top of the line components. List price was $1200, so when you say $289 pricey, your missing the point.
Anyways, like someone else said for $289 a set you can get much better speakers. I just bought a set of CDT eurosports, I think you can get them for $399 now, and I actually prefer them over the Utopia's. Only for two reasons.
1. Their midbass drivers are much better than the Utopia's.
2. I paid almost twice as much for the Utopia's as I did for the CDT's, in our car with all the associated noise (windnoise, road noise, engine), you wont get any benefit out of going for the $1000 speakers over the $500 speakers.
Thats my take on it. If I had a BMW 745 LI which is built like a tank and is alot better insulated from exterior noise, then thats a different story.
Anyways, like someone else said for $289 a set you can get much better speakers. I just bought a set of CDT eurosports, I think you can get them for $399 now, and I actually prefer them over the Utopia's. Only for two reasons.
1. Their midbass drivers are much better than the Utopia's.
2. I paid almost twice as much for the Utopia's as I did for the CDT's, in our car with all the associated noise (windnoise, road noise, engine), you wont get any benefit out of going for the $1000 speakers over the $500 speakers.
Thats my take on it. If I had a BMW 745 LI which is built like a tank and is alot better insulated from exterior noise, then thats a different story.
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From: Bay Area
I have heard that another good value these days is the Alpine Type X (SPX-177R). It uses a modified Vifa wood pulp cone midbass and a modified Vifa ring radiator tweeter, plus a supposedly excellent passive xover with tweeter phase and off axis compensation. The funny thing is with the crazy internet competition you can find these for $220 or less all day long, that's pretty close to what it would cost you to buy similar raw Vifa drivers from Madisound!
However if you are getting these professionally installed they will likely charge you considerably more. Plus I have never heard these, YMMV.
Peter
However if you are getting these professionally installed they will likely charge you considerably more. Plus I have never heard these, YMMV.
Peter
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From: Huntingon Beach/Irvine
Originally Posted by Orthonormal,Dec 8 2005, 03:50 PM
Watts is precisely about how loud speakers will get. If you want to know about accuracy & bass response, power is not your spec. RMS, peak, continuous, none of the above. There are crappy sounding amps with high power ratings and great sounding amps with low power ratings.
I was just curious if NFRs2000NYC thought that an external amp was still a necessity with a higher-powered/higher-quality head unit, or if it was more of an either/or. I thought my setup with the Alpine 9833 and 87dB woofers sounded very good and didn't need an external amp. But I only use my stereo for listening to when I'm driving, not for SPL competitions or advertising my presence/coolness to drivers a block down the road.
I was just curious if NFRs2000NYC thought that an external amp was still a necessity with a higher-powered/higher-quality head unit, or if it was more of an either/or. I thought my setup with the Alpine 9833 and 87dB woofers sounded very good and didn't need an external amp. But I only use my stereo for listening to when I'm driving, not for SPL competitions or advertising my presence/coolness to drivers a block down the road.
More accurately watts isn't ONLY about how loud speakers will get.
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