Wilson Speakers & Reviewers

I love my Sabrina’s as well.  Proper set-up is key.   I’m using Levinson amps, and I’m happy with the combination.

@wspohn - Agreed.  I picked up my Sophias as store demos (~61% of new price) when the model 3's came out. $17K just wasn't in the cards, and is just too much IMO for speakers.  That said, Wilson is hardly the industry leader in ridiculously priced audio jewelry.  There are people who spend as much on speaker *cables* as my Sophias cost...

@johnnie22 - you miss the point entirely. I'm not pushing Wilson speakers (as I said, their W/P line prior to the Sasha don't appeal to me at all), or making any claims about the "quality" of their sound, or their value against any other brand, merely giving *my* own preferences.  What you or Ken Kessler prefer has no relevance to, or affect on, my preferences, nor should mine affect yours.  Frankly, if one needs "support" from some "authority" for one's audio choices, as you seem to, then sound is not the primary basis of those choices.  I was simply sharing my experience with Wilsons in response to the OP, not foraging for audiophile approbation.

And you're apparently operating under the false assumption that I haven't listened to other speakers, and so am ignorant of the choices available. Sorry to disabuse you of that rash assumption, but I spent a number of years listening to many, many speakers before buying the Sophias, and sound and $$$ were the only deciding points.  I listened to my B&W 802s for 20 years before making the move, and have been auditioning "high end" speakers for well over 40 years.

@gpkid - I've yet to hear the Sabrinas - glad you enjoy them.  Nice to see Wilson design something a bit more accessible to more folks (i.e. sub $30K!!).  Yes, for all the Wilsons I've heard, setup is more critical than most brands, and - at least in my setup - the sweet spot is smaller than I would like, but in the sweet spot, bliss...they have just the presentation/sound that *I* like.  They ain't going anywhere!

I too have the Max 2's and they were a real PITA to set up. Lucky for me I knew the hassle expected, as I have had WP's before(and still do), and knew what I was getting into in regards to placement. My experience with Wilsons is that for them to sound their best, placement is CRITICAL. I spent a lot of time with the Maxx's to optimize placement, and due to the weight of them (as opposed to the WP's) on a carpeted floor, it was a difficult task. That being said, once I found the "sweet spot" for them, I am very happy.

Agree that set up is critical for these speakers, but didn't think it was a huge deal to do despite the fact that dealers take courses and charge you to come out and expertly set them up.

The manual that comes with the speakers is well written and detailed on the matter of set up and if you have a friend with a laser level/range finder as I did, there is no big problem getting the angle of the head unit correct as well as the distance to the listener's head within a centimeter or so.

At something like 450 lbs. per speaker, believe me, they don't move around once they are set up!

I haven't heard a lot of speakers that better them but would love the opportunity to listen to them on the same system using a couple of speakers I have heard that are very, very good, including the Magico S5 and the Vandersteen 7.

keithahughes: I don’t buy on opinion, I just don’t want to be odd-man out....

As someone who used to defend Wilson, I was getting knocked-down in forums. So I went on a search and came to the same conclusion as ’gpgr4blu’ above. Compared to other brands, Wilson’s freq. response was not accurate and tonal balance out of whack.

(2) others above -’mzkmxcv’ and ’tutetibiimperes’ echo these thoughts.

It seems people who like Wilson are simply not aware of other brands -like Emerald Physics, Spatial or PureAudioProject horns. Or Tekton. Or Devore O-series, or, or , or....