Pioneer S-1EX Loudspeaker

Zeal:

Optimal space restrictions prevent me from bringing the speakers out into the room as far as I would like. I have ample room on each side (a little better than four feet to each side wall), but only two feet from the front wall (behind the speakers). In this setup, the speakers present a very wide and realistically tall sound-stage with enough depth to suite my tastes. Surprisingly, these bigger speakers image nearly as well as their smaller siblings (the S-2EX), but they don't fully disappear as well as the S-2's. The overall tone and presentation is more believable with the S-1's.

I have the tweeters firing to the sides of my ears with the axis somewhere behind me. My listening sofa sits against a "half-wall" (just a couple of inches higher than the sofa) on the other side of which there is another room which allows sound waves to move well behind the listening position. I have the speakers raked forward by a good half-bubble.

It's too early to know if this is the optimal setup, but it sounds really good to my ears. I'll have John over to provide some "fine-tuning!"

Cheers!

_Ben

No matter where I place them the tweeter sounds a little scratchy and over the top. Any suggestions?

Not sure it has been mentioned that Audio Video Logic is having a substantial sale on these speakers.

Zeal:

Try this... Disconnect one speaker from the amp - either speaker - (turn amp off and remove one set of speaker cables from the amp).

Fire the amp back up and position your ears below the "firing path" of the tweeter (literally get up and move around in the near vicinity of your listening point - squatting low at various heights just below the tweeter's "path."). With the S2's, I found that the brightness (glare) became worse below the tweeter and the treble actually became sweeter just above the tweeter. See what you think.

Next, position yourself at different points to the side ("inside" side) of the tweeter and locate where it sounds the sweetest. With the S2's the treble became less pronounced when my ears where slightly to the side of the tweeter.

In my case, I remedied the annoying glare by raking the speakers forward to the point that the tweeters fired slightly below my ears at the listening position (chair) - and slightly to the outside of the "direct pathway" to each ear (with the axis somewhere very close to, or immediately behind the listening position.

I also have to rake the S-1's forward, where at the right point the treble sounds excellent. Do keep in mind that these speakers are more planer-like in their ability to retrieve detailed treble - to the point that anyone who enjoys a speaker voiced on the warm side or rolled off at a noticeable upper frequency range, likely will not like the presentation of the EX series (which in my opinion, is pretty darn flat. Certainly the flattest I've owned - i.e.: excellent balance).

Let us know if you get the treble tamed.

_Ben

Try this... Disconnect one speaker from the amp - either speaker - (turn amp off and remove one set of speaker cables from the amp).

Meaning , listen to the tweeter only on one speaker? I have mono blocks, so I just leave one turned off. I hope I have that right. Thank you very much for that test. I prefer warm speakers but I know just what you mean when you say "Balanced". These speakers are very planner like and remind me of my Martin Logan's in some ways, good thing I have a subwolfer. Sounds like you have them "Raked" very high in the back. What did you use to do that?