Thiel Owners

• Bad (compromised) information is in some ways more harmful than no information. Real anechoic chamber or outdoor measurements are expensive and Stereophile et al choose to side-step that expense without, in my opinion, proper contextualization / education for their readers.

I agree that JA often fails to include a few simple statements that can help the reader interpret the graphs, including how the measurements might be misleading of actual performance. IMO, the quality of that publication has slipped over the years.

It is impolite for manufacturers to raise such issues in print, thereby becoming complicit in the misleading measurements.

I recall at least two examples where Stereophile printed measurements provided by the manufacturer (Vandersteen and Avalon) but, yeah, risky for manufacturers to push back.

Thiel seems to have generally measured quite well, despite the limitations of the Stereophile methods.

A lot of manufacturers diss Stereophile and Atkinson for measurements that don't go their way.  But nonetheless, I am grateful for the work JA has done.  Even if flawed in ways, he's given us an amazing, wide-ranging body of work in terms of measurements of speakers and other audio gear, and attempts to correlate measurements to sound.  I can't think of any gathering of data on high end gear that approaches what JA has provided to the paying public.  (And even now, online, for free).

@prof 
Tom Thiel described Thiel Audio’s measurements earlier in this thread, maybe February-May?

Excellent discussion, as always, Guys. Tom- not vicious at all. Truthful.
Jim's attention to the finer details and search for accuracy has certainly paid off in any of his loudspeaker models, IMO.  I was fortunate in those early CS 2.4 auditioning days to have the Vandy 2Ce and 2Ci speakers plus a pair of Triangle Celius speakers to switch off from one another and shoot-out against the CS 2.4 same room.  Thiel came out as the winner to my ears for its rich sound and presentation. 

Happy Listening!

prof

I enjoy JA's measurements, as well as, Paul Miller of HiFi News & Record Review. These gentlemen are class acts to the Audio press. Each leaves the reader with an impressive body of work.

Happy Listening!