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wilson vs competitor battle demo

Hi folks, I have red something unbelivable in the latest TAS. During the January CES in Vegas David Wilson from Wilson Audio did a "battle demo" with Sophia speakers and another (anonymous) speakers from a competitor as the contestants. The competitor's speakers were a bit more expensive than the Sophia's. He drove his Sophia's with a $1000 Parasound amplifier and used an Apple iPod as source. The competitor's speakers were driven by a $7k Krell amplifier and the source was a Krell KPS-25 CD-player/preamp. The Wilsons won the battle demo by a margin! How is this possible folks? Should we all buy Wilson speakers and make no more expensive investments into amplifiers and CD/record players? Have Wilson speakers becoming a sort of panachea? This is scary!
dazzdax
themadmilkman
182 posts
 
B&W-- don't know which model.

A friend of mine went to the demo. I, unfortunately, was out eating lunch at the time.
themadmilkman
182 posts
 
Just drug up a thread on it over at avsforum, apparently they were Signature 800s.
dazzdax OP
599 posts
 
If it is true that the competitor's speakers were B&W 800 Signatures then it is more surprising that the combination of B&W reference speakers with Krell electronics sounds inferior to the Wilsons with Parasound amp and an Appel iPod. This still sounds ridiculous to me. Something MUST be wrong.
dodgealum
1,399 posts
 
I'm not going to comment on the demo showdown, although I would agree with some of the posters that system synergy is a very important variable. I have listenend extensively to the Wilson Sophia driven with quality but not outrageously expensive electronics and IMHO (and to respond to Thom y) they are most assuredly NOT detailed, analytical, etc. They are one of the most musically involving speakers I have ever heard. They don't do anything particularly well but rather just sound so right and so involving. Something like my old favorites the Spendor SP100. They didn't do anything well, either. Do not misinterpret--these are somewhat different sounding speakers--but the Wilson's have that same ability to have you forget the hifi and get drawn into the music. A really great speaker that moves the Vandy 5 off the top of my wish list--and by a healthy margin.
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