How much burn-in for Soliloquy 5.3s


Hi,

I recently purchased a demo pair of Soliloquy 5.3s, which I figured might have enough hours on them (dealer said he thought they had about 50 hrs) to sound reasonably good out of the box. Wrong! They sound absolutely horrible; very compressed, bass muddy and distant, treble subdued to the point of being almost not existant. At one point I actually thought the tweeter was nonfunctional since I could barely hear any extension at all. I hope I didn't make a big mistake. Anyway, I am hoping that folks out there with experience with these might be able shed some light (sound!) on what I can expect.
cody_the_cat

Showing 4 responses by cody_the_cat

Thanks to everyone who responded. I will definitely stick it out and report back to all with impressions. I do in fact have the old drivers since the date stamp on the back of the speakers is 1999. Kind of wierd that a pair of 5.3s manufactured in 1999 sat on a show room floor all this time!

I would also be interested in people's opinion on the new "i" series and how they compare.
Oh, by the way, I would also be interested in knowing what interconnects and speaker cables folks are using. I swithed out Kimber Silver streaks that were used on my Musical Fidelity A3cr amp/pream and Musical Hall Maverick for Signal Cables (a cheaper alternative). I currently am using Kimber 8TC/4TC biwire but based on Jimd's reponse may switch that out as well.

Thanks.
I recently found out (through Audioasylum.com) that Soliloquy installed a bad bacth of crossovers in their speakers some years ago and was wondering: 1) if anybody else heard the same thing, 2) if so, what year(s) did these duds get released, and 3) did the bad crossovers have something to do with low and high pass on the crossover????

Also, when connecting for biwiring does the low freq. cable connect to the upper or lower binding posts. The posts are not marked and the tweeter is situated beneath the bass drivers.
YOU GUYS WERE RIGHT!!!!!!
I managed to log about another 150 hrs (beyond the 50 the dealer said were on them) on my Soliloquy 5.3s. The sound has improved significantly; treble sweetly extended, the bass deep and firm, and with alot more air between the instruments. They are most impressive when the volume control on my 150 w Musical Fidelity A3cr preamp is cranked to about the 10:00 o'clock position. Man those mid drivers are pumping and the bass is phenomenal for such a small floorstander. With another 150 hours I am anticipating alot more mid level resolution. By the way, I just purchased a pair of Analysis Plus Oval 12 biwires to see how this configuration sounds. I hope it will help to open up the sound and improve inner detail, particularly in the mid range. I will keep my Kimber 8TC/4TC biwire just in case.

Thanks again for your urging to perservere with these speakers - it was worth it. I must say, though, that I do miss my PBN Montana SP IIs and can not help comparing them. Admittedly the Montanas cost $1500 more than the Sol 5.3s, but in the end the Sols may be a contender.