Vienna Acoustics (1 Viewer)

[Andre_Y]

Hello All

Anyone out there own a pair of Beethoven by Vienna Acoustics. If so please give me your opinon of them.

 

[Tony Genovese]

Slow bass, musical if you like a rolled-off sound. I'd describe the sound as rather sweet, but not very accurate. They do a good job of taking the edge off of bad digital, but ultimately I found them too inaccurate to keep.

 

[Kenneth Harden]

Listened to some movie stuff on them "I, Robot" and they don't have the sort of punch you get from Klipsch or other more dynamic speakers.

Pssssss, new ones coming out soon, but you didn't hear it from me

 

[Lewis Besze]

I found them very good in every respect,soundstage,tonal balance,looks.I don't own one since I couldn't afford them but, in that price range they would be on my short list for sure.

 

[Evan M.]

I have to agree with Lewis on this one. They make excellent speakers. Many people use them for classical music. I personaly would not use them for movies....not a lot of impact. For music though they are very nice and relaxed. If you listen to a lot of rock or Jazz/Funk I would opt for something else. I believe Viennas are all hand made and assembled....I might be wrong though.

 

[Mary M S]

I disagree regarding accuracy, and find them highly spot on across the frequency range and with a varity of recordings.. When careful to set up for the room correctly you will get some excellent imaging out of a pair. A great strength of the B's, are the higher frequencies, whereas many other speakers fatigue my ears terribly within a quarter hour, I absolutely love the Beethoven’s silk domes. Secondly the midrange is fantastically accurate when rendering vocals.
If I can just skip the audio-eese terminology (I'm not really qualified) and attempt to describe how these make me feel.
They often (when the recording is very good) and with certain instrumentation do create the atmosphere the naming of the entire VA line are meant to evoke... Fine wine, waltzing, a Viennese night (as I imagine night in Vienna to be) A famous composer debuting his new and great work. The notes of a Live orchestration drifting through French doors out over the water. Master craftsmanship and aged estate caliber wood instruments.. Their tone, (voice) can be rich and clear.

While pics of the Beethoven’s are rather boring. In your home you will find the construction of the enclosures to be of as high grade as well-built grand pianos. Beautiful and serene in their simplicity. If your taste runs to modern the new Schönberg series are garnering high praise from reviewers for looks alone; particularly when paired with wall hung plasma setups. VA knows how to make their cabinets look good and you can be sure of usually high levels of quality construction, and very good inert properties.

I think two things are vital to setting up Beethoven’s for heavy HT usage. Out of the box, most owners would be extremely pleased with 2-channel particularly if their tastes run to classical/jazz/blues, Blue Man Group, Peter Gabriel, Chris Rea gravel-ing out “The Road to Hell” anything …with lot of strings and drums (and female soloists).

If you run rock, (acid or classic) techno and Mainstream Hollywood blockbusters, these speakers will not suit unless you can provide them with very good power levels. All the mega high-end flagship receivers I have ever heard them paired with did not do these speakers justice. (Forget the 91 sensitivity rating).

If you want to blast LOTR and FIGHT CLUB through these speakers you need an amp. They pair beautifully with my Outlaw 200x7 770. Secondly you need a sub. I was shocked at what an SVS PC-Ultra did for rounding out HT with the Vienna’s leading the forefront..

With the brute force taken care of by Outlaw and SVS, I have refinement; I have a velvet wrapped hammer for HT.
I love my current setup.

Compared them in demo rooms during purchase to: Martin Logans B&W’s Sonus Faber, Polk, Klipsch
(all the readily available B&M main lines). Unfortunately I have not heard many many speakers I would love to demo, which are a little harder to access, Internet only sales, etc.

 

[Scott Oliver]

Nice post Mary.

 

[Andre_Y]

Well.... Thanks for all the responses. I have listen to them. I used Rite of Strings cd by Stanly Clark and some AA. I found them to be warm and airy. Truely a delightful speaker. Just wanted to know what some of you thought of them. I also find them to be well make. Thank you all again.

 

[Scott_N]

I think VA's have very refined sound that is well suited for the listener but maybe not the rocker. The highs are nicely extended without being forward and they get the midrange right. I could easily live with a pair of their speakers in my 2-channel system.

 

[John Garcia]

Haven't heard the Beethovens, but I sat for some time with the Motzarts with my own CDs & SACDs and I loved them. Very musical, and while they do lack a little punch, they aren't geared for SLAM, they are subtle and detailed with very clear midrange rather than going after extended, bloated bass. I auditioned with a Denon 2900 and B&K separates.

In the same price category, I would recommend you listen to the Joseph Audio RM25Si Signatures (edit - not the 7, the 25s!) Smaller, slightly lower MSRP, but an excellent speaker as well.

 

[Scott_N]

There are many quality floorstanders in the Beethovens price range. The Energy Veritas 2.4i, Totem Forest, Tetra Live 405, Revel F30, Von Schweikert VR-4 JR, Montana SP-3, Dali Helicon 400, and the Amphion Xenon to name a few.

 

[Joey_V]

I listened to them at tweeter during my previous auditions and they are very airy indeed! Truly a remarkable speaker!

 

[Robert_Dufresne]

Andre

It is not true to say that a speaker will do better with classical music or rock or HT. A speaker does not know what kind of music or sound it is reproducing . Some classical peaces of music are as chalenging for a speaker as any movie soundtrack .

A great speaker will accurately reproduce any sound or music. That is wy they call it HIFI

 

[Lewis Besze]

It is true from a subjective POV. I know where you're coming from though, it's obvious that the speaker don't know what's being played,nor anyone suggests that a speaker knowingly play rock badly.It is simply a subjective observation,that some speakers are better suited to certain type of music,based on some people's listening evaluation.I agree that a truely great speaker will excell at any type of material.

 

[Robert_Dufresne]

Lewis I think you are wright. We must factor in the subjective aspect of music listening.

 

[Mary M S]

I think touchy feely has its place in describing our gear. After all we are not clinical during the emotional responses we feel when listening to music and movies, on the system of our choice. And I do myself feel I hear tonal characteristics voice timber whathave you between speakers... But we should always attempt to blend stats with our personal experiences.

It is VERY HARD to find bench testing on many speakers, unless one of the mags does a shootout. I finally found one very old review of the Beethoven’s with some stats by Brent Butterworth, from Home Theater.

Been too busy over Christmas to post, Andre you have have prob moved on. But here it is:

“..acoustics bass and kick drum on the jazz stuff I listened to sounded nearly perfect; the 7-inch woofers even had enough extension to sound good on most of the rock CD’s I tried. Truly bass intense material like the Holly Cole CD, the Jurassic Park DTS laserdisc, and Jongen’s “Symphony Concertante” for orchestra and organ revealed that there’s not much oomph in the Beethoven’s bottom octave (20 to 40HZ): this is the only place this speaker gives up any ground..”

“Beethoven’s treble and narrow front profile give it outstanding imaging and soundstaging. The imaging ranks with the best I’ve ever heard, and the soundstage may be the widest I’ve heard from a direct-radiating speaker, producing a wraparound effect more like what I’m used to with bipolar speakers.”

“World Saxophone Quartet’s Metamorphosis- four sax players blasting out wild improvisations over and R&B riff and frantic African percussion. This cut’s basically three min. of relentless, high-energy midrange; a lot of speakers sound pretty nasty on it, but the Beethoven’s came through just fine…the coloration in the midrange is so low as to be insignificant.”

CFG Labs measure:

“Beethoven exhibits a very flat response throughout most of the audio range, with a dip of about 4db between 3.025 Hz and 3,450 Hz. This dip is crossover related: we suspect it won’t be audible from a normal seated position. Bass response solid down to 35 Hz with a 6 dB drop by 20 Hz. (why I run an SVS PC-Ultra with mine!). The treble rises to a mild peak a 10.8 kHz and 7.5 dB from there to 20 kHZ. Sensitivity is good at 90dB (1watt/1 meter). (notice the distance on this rating?! Again I personally feel the Beethoven’s need good power levels) The impedance runs between 4.9 and 5.8 ohms from 100 Hz to 980 Hz, and remains above 7ohms otherwise.

Maestro Center measured +/- 4.5 dB between 100 Hz and 20 kHz, so although it may display some occasional coloration due to this slightly uneven response, its overall tonal balance is very neutral. Bass response falls off at about 8 dB/octave below 60 Hz. Sensitivity is 89 dB, and while impedance drops to 5 ohms between 100 Hz and 300 Hz, it measures above 7 ohms below 120 Hz and above 900 Hz.”

I definitely consider my Center the weakest link of the 3, and would replace it with another Beethoven if I had the luxury of RP / Speaker behind Screen/ and all the room that requires!
Realize that very minor changes have been made to the Beethoven’s since this old review. Woofers are still made from XPP with reinforcing ribs. But I know some minor changes were made particularly in the woof area in subsequent years production of Beethovens. This set used a “2.1-kilohertz crossover between mid/woofs and the tweeter and 90-Hertz between mid/woofs and woofs. (Idea here Beethoven’s will work more like a set of mnimoitors and a subwoofer. Crossovers don’t affect most of the midrange). Filters are 12 decibels per octave on the tweeter, 6 dB/ octave on everything else.” Powered during this review, with variety of electronics including Krell’s KAV-250a amp and KAV-250p preamp, B&K AVP-4050 preamp/processor and a HK Signature 5-Channel amp to a Yamaha RX-V990 receiver.