I heard these speakers at the CES and can't agree more with you. The sound was great. Unfortunately the price isn't.
German Physiks - A huge "wow"
I just wanted to share with my fellow audiophiles my adoration for a pair of German Physik Carbon mkIV I recently purchased. I am not a dealer or distributor, just a consumer/audiophile.
I have owned many of the finest speakers we are all aware of, and most have been excellent.
What I am hearing from the German Physiks is a cohesiveness/continuousness that I have never heard from any other loudspeaker. Imaging is excellent but not "razor sharp"..just natural like a live performance.
As if you painted a soundstage from speaker to speaker with a single stroke of your brush.
Detail and transparency are included, without the slightest
hint of etchiness or fatige; Image stability with a large "sweetspot". I just received them on Saturday and my significant other had to pry me away for meals...I best be careful!
These speakers and this line are too fine to be ignored. However, they are expensive, especially with our terribly weak dollar...I feel fortunate that I was able to make the purchase.
I would urge all to have a listen if possible, even if out of your price range. After 23 years as an audiophile, I didn't believe I could be totally surprised and bowled over by the presentation of any new loudspeaker....I was wrong.
Good listening to all and stay well!
I have owned many of the finest speakers we are all aware of, and most have been excellent.
What I am hearing from the German Physiks is a cohesiveness/continuousness that I have never heard from any other loudspeaker. Imaging is excellent but not "razor sharp"..just natural like a live performance.
As if you painted a soundstage from speaker to speaker with a single stroke of your brush.
Detail and transparency are included, without the slightest
hint of etchiness or fatige; Image stability with a large "sweetspot". I just received them on Saturday and my significant other had to pry me away for meals...I best be careful!
These speakers and this line are too fine to be ignored. However, they are expensive, especially with our terribly weak dollar...I feel fortunate that I was able to make the purchase.
I would urge all to have a listen if possible, even if out of your price range. After 23 years as an audiophile, I didn't believe I could be totally surprised and bowled over by the presentation of any new loudspeaker....I was wrong.
Good listening to all and stay well!
22 responses Add your response
One of them Looks like the most expensive egg timer.Have the egg buy the farm. Its nice to see a company catering for the common man. I'll get my order In.lol As Audiogon is a high end site, I just wonder how many goners could afford to actually buy a pair? 1-3%? I hope they are at the 2008 Denver show. Thank you poster for sharing. |
Gentlemen: I believe The German Physik line now sells from about $30k -over 200k. FYI The Carbon mkIV retails (at current exchange rate) at around 50k. It is the DDD omnidirectional driver that provides the magic, available in all models, the basic model the HRS 120. Still very expensive..but very special! Check out the website which has been recently updated for all models. Just google German Physik. |
Even the 30k one would still have to be (for me) be very special, and the big one would have to have a sound 'to die for', actually It wouldn't matter how It sounded because It will never adorn my listening room,lol They are on my list of 'must listen to' at the forth coming Denver show, assuming they will be there. |
I have been listening to my German Physics surround system ,main Loreley ,center Borderland, and rear are the Legatos, for the past 5 years. For the first time in fifty years as an audiophile I can enjoy listening to large scale symphonic music ,nothing I have heard can even come close. Details of my system can be seen on virtual systems. |
The HRS-120 is not overboard on pricing - starting at $19,495.00/pr for the fine grain veneer version. It's almost full-range. In a moderate room it will give you 30Hz to 21.5kHz. It's not chump-change, but then again I don't think there's anything else that could possibly touch it at anywhere near the price. Of course, I am biased ... ;-) since I distribute GP in North America. Still - I'd never have taken the risk of bringing something like this into the stable if it weren't phenomenal. Jeff Fritz did a little review on the HRS-120 HERE where he had lots of nice things to say about them: They produced the most expansive, most three-dimensional soundstage Ive yet heard in my room. Not too shabby. |
I've got two rooms reserved for RMAF so far, and I may be showing up with a GP Unicorn for one of them. This is a 1-way loudspeaker using a Carbon DDD in a special bass horn. I expect we'll get response from the low 30's through 24kHz from that single, point-source, omni driver. We'll probably give it 25 watts of Vitus power (model SS-010, pure Class-A, zero feedback, single output device per channel) and feed it from the new Vitus SCD-010 CD player. The other room ... haven't decided what we'll put in there yet. |
Csommovigo, i'm interested to find out more abt the German Physiks HRS 120 speakers (for a 2nd system). wondering if you could share some of yr expertise/opinions in the following areas: a) what sorts of associated equip/cables/etc. hv you found to work well with these speakers & why? b) how large a room would you recommend the HRS 120 speakers be used in? c) how fussy are they in terms of room placement, as well as placement in relation to the listener? thks in advance!! |
Hi Alexsee, The HRS-120 is fairly versatile - one of those "just right" speakers for most rooms. If you've got 300sqft or under, HRS-120 would likely be very happy there. Placement is fairly easy as well - give them at least 1.0m off of any boundary wall. The distance from phantom-center to the listening post should be 1.0 to 1.2x the distance between the speakers. Tweak from there. Absorbent material on the front wall is not recommended. Amps: High Current, 100w into 4 Ohms minimum. Speaker Cable: Low resistance cables work best Chris |
I own a pair of Ohm Walsh 5 Series 3 speakers and have had a similar experience as MusicDesign describes with the GP's with the Ohms. I suspect the Ohms are much cheaper and more within the price range of many on this site. If GP sounds good to you but are out of your price range, you might want to consider the Ohms. Ohm is a US company based in Brooklyn, NY that has been in the speaker business for almost 40 years now I think. They currently only sell factory direct (no dealers or distributors) and offer some attractive in-home trial options to help mitigate the risk. |
I visited Ramy last Saturday while in D.C. - let me just say that Ramy is a very gracious host with a stunning, STUNNING system. He has managed to assemble one of the most musically satisfying system my ears have had the pleasure to soak in. Ramy - thanks again for inviting us over! We enjoyed our time immensely. Chris |
I wanted to mention that I owned a pair of German Physiks HRS-120 with the carbon fiber cabinets, but regular drivers. I found them to be very nice, but ill suited to my large room. My other speakers, Audio Physic Avanti III fill the room better and were preferred in my system. I think the HRS-120 would be killer in a small room though. |
