Thiel Owners

 If I may add to @tomthiel ‘s comments. I think that it’s important to remember that when we read of empirical statistical reports results, we often don’t get the whole picture. The results might suggest that on average most people don’t seem to perceive time and phase coherence or the lack there of. That doesn’t mean that all didn’t. For some reason, some are more sensitive to this than others. And conversely those others might be more sensitive to other aspects of sound. If I learned anything from this hobby is that while we have remarkably similar hearing; we listen quite differently. For example, one of our regular thread contributors @prof has reported his impressions of various loudspeakers here on Audiogon, and I couldn’t possibly agree more with him on every single occasion, His words could be mine; word for word. Yet, when it comes to amplifier preferences, and to a lesser degree on speaker/listener location, we are worlds apart.
 For what ever reason we tend to have very definite even though subtlety different impressions of listening impressions. Which is why I try and present as much objective evidence as I can when posting.

But what about the facts? Although Thiel claims that the phase is within 15 degrees, I have not been able to see that in any of my measurements. Time coherence on the direct sound is fine and at 10 ft measures within milliseconds. But then there is the indirect sound which is of course determined by the room characteristics. The first order xo have less minimal phase changes, but they are still there. Not to mention that the drivers are have their phase changes and they don't cancel each other out. I have worked on digital active cross overs to approach linear phase +- octave around cross over frequencies and was able to improve the phase coherence but did not have the ability to conduct a blind study to determine differences or improvements. I think we can do nowadays better to really establish the facts of time coherence and listening preferences especially with klippel measurement equipment becoming available. But I don't see the willingness to really find out the facts and integrate it with the subjective experiences. 

^It’s not practical to expect Thiel or any other loudspeaker manufacturers to build speakers that come with their own dedicated rooms.
I’ve suggested before that perhaps flat profile coincidental drivers with compensation for flush wall mounting coupled with DSP could be a solution to the dilemma you’ve pointed out. There might be Doppler effect issues that will need to be addressed with the coincidental drivers, Yes, technology moves on, sometimes applicable progress takes time to catch up.

Even though it took me twenty years of listening mostly to Thiels as my primary speakers, I'm amazed I never heard this relaxed/rightness/ease/naturalness/grace so dramatically until after a month of listening to a very good non-coherent speaker.

Why have all the hundreds of 'golden eared' reviewers over the years, I'd like to think many free from industry obligations, and preconceptions of their minimal understanding of engineering acoustics, and who actually DO have good subjective evaluation skills, never (to my awareness) so much as mentioned such a notable difference in musical presentation?? They sure can dissect the individual elements of and between speakers, and over the years Vandersteens and Thiels have certainly been frequently-enough reviewed for *someone* to mention what we notice.

Then again if it took me twenty years of having them in my home without hearing this characteristic as such, perhaps it really is a subliminal subconscious trait, revealed only after years of acclimation?

^For those that seem to appreciate the difference between coherent and non-coherent speakers, I think it’s a combination of conscious and unconscious appreciation. This might be especially true for the superior transient response, which is consciously self evident, but perhaps unconsciously appreciated as offering perceived superior imaging as well.