What Is So Special About Harbeth?

Harbeth to me Are in the same category like Teckton they look plain ugly

This had me laugh out loud.  A classic, reserved British monitor look is not your cup of tea?  Cool.  But on the same footing as the Tectonic monstrosities?  LOL.

A recent look at a Harbeth XO by GR Research found about 30 components in the XO!  Unfortunately, although this can produce a nice flat frequency response, which will satisfy potential buyers but more importantly be favourably mentioned by the reviewers, will reduce dynamics and micro-detail. Low level nuance also suffers.

This kind of stuff is often claimed in audiophile circles.  But then so is lots of "stuff."

I'd like to see this actually demonstrated, and not just by some audiophile's say-so.

If we are talking regular old anecdotal subjective listening impressions, Thiel's complex crossovers used to get grief from the "don't put too much stuff in the crossover region because blah, blah, blah" crowd.  Yet every Thiel I've had has been world class in it's price range in terms of detail, soundstaging, timbre and dynamics.

Personally I don't rely on audiophile shibboleths - the result is what matters.

And as for the parts quality in the Harbeths (which I have a fair amount of experience listening to), the results are what count.  Engineers will point out that good or clever engineering isn't just "what you can do if handed the best possible parts and budget" but rather being able to achieve excellent performance without having to rely on the most expensive parts.   Which is what Harbeth seems to have done.

Dan Richie in his videos does some interesting and entertaining and educational stuff.  But I am not inclined to ignore that he is a salesman with stuff to sell, and arguments for his own products and services,  as much as anything else.

@prof -- well said!

This reminds me of a story where there was a machine failure at a factory which caused the entire line to shut down. This would have impacted hundreds of production orders and caused severe backlogs. Everyone tried to fix it for hours but couldn't figure out how to get the machine to start again. Finally, a contractor walks in, picks up a specific type of screw, replaces the faulty screw, and gets the machine to start again. He later sends an invoice for $1000 to the factory. The manager asks, "Really? $1000 to replace a screw which probably costs $1?" To which the contractor replies, "yes, $1 to replace the screw and $999 to know which type of screw to use and where to put it."

Love these fables, myths, urban legends.

@arafiq good one!