Shahinian Speakers

I was lucky to come across a pair or second-hand Arcs when I was thinking of replacing my ELS57 I listened to Intros and Royd Doublets. I thought the Royds where quite good, and the Intros seemed to have no midrange at all and it was hard to follow the words, and then they put the Arcs on and WOW what a difference I was just listening to the music not auditioning speakers any more, even if they where a third more than I wanted to spend I knew I just had to have them, and they are sitting at home being used every day in a room 11 by 15 feet and I wouldn't swop then for anything, well may be a pair of Obelisks or Hawks. They just melt in to the back ground and play any thing you can throw at them classical, rock, pop, the kids story tapes, films.

The Diapasons are a hard load to drive they go down to 0.9 ohms so even 135s have problems with them but a 500 should be fine, or a pair of 500!!. You MUST go and listen to them and report back.

pete

I really want to hear Arcs at some point.

Tony.

Port hater.

If you are ever in Nottingham come and have a listen to mine. All the Shahinians from the Arc have transmission lines terminated with a ABR.

pete

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If you are ever in Nottingham come and have a listen to mine.

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Thanks very much for the offer, if I am ever in your area I will get in contact.

Tony.

Concerning your questions about Shahinian speakers ... If you want general info on the speakers, rather than me give it here, which would take up a lot of space, you can access their web site which gives you lots of good info - the technical details of their whole range of loudspeakers, service information, contact information, various system recommendations (these are based mainly on the use of big Dynavector and Plinius amps, but I have spoken to them about Naim amps, especially the 500, and I know they are big Naim fans), Music recommendations (largely Dick Shahinians personal likes), and a number of independent reviews. The link to this site is www.shahinianacoustics.com.

I base my own personal view on having listened to Arcs, Obelisks (briefly) and diapasons, but largely through owning a pair of Hawks. I chose these after some serious long term auditioning of many other speakers including Naim, JMLabs mezzo Utopia and various other hi end units. They replaced a pair of Linn Isobariks I had owned for many years. I now run the Hawks in biamped mode via a pair of NAP 500's from a 52/supercap, and I use a CDS2/XPS and a Linn/Armageddon/ARO/Dynavector DVX/prefix(S-boards)/supercap and standard NAC A5 cable, and I also use a NAT01. They are, in my very humble opinion, one of the very best loudspeakers I have ever heard anywhere. They produce a truly wonderful musical experience.. They sound so natural that you really forget that there are any loudspeakers in the room. They have unbelievable depth of clarity and detail, and wonderful touch and weight of sound. Most people who listen to the system are quite stunned by the scale and the unflustered nature of the sound. They are also great on all types of music - it is a myth that they are only good at classical and acoustic stuff - they really rock and they time brilliantly - you just cannot keep your feet still. The other advantage is that there is no "hot seat'.. You don't have one place that you have to sit to get the best result.. They are also relatively fuss free, reasonably tolerant to positioning although they do seem to work best about 12/18 inches away from the wall.. They don't require spikes or anything like that... They are also nice looking pieces of furniture (mine are in Brazilian rosewood with a nice sap flash on the front). One downside is that they take a lot of running in so make sure that when you get a demo, you are listening to a well run in pair.. when I auditioned them I used a demo pair tha had been around for a while.... my own Hawks from new took about 200 hours.

My overall opinions reflect those of mad, bad and dangerous Pete's.. The Arc's and the obelisks possess many of the Hawks attributes, and the Hawks are a perfect scaled down version of the Diapason's and lose very little in comparison (possibly sheer weight of base - the 500's help tremendously here and make up for that). They work well in all sizes and shapes of room (mine is 24ft *14ft with a very high ceiling) - I do know of someone who runs Diapasons (with dynavector amps) with amazing results successfully in an extremely small room with an open staircase at one end. Also, for those who are starting with entry level systems the smaller Shahinians are also a great choice (Elfs and Compasses).

As Pete said, the larger Shahinians are quite difficult to drive.. I used the Hawks initially with a pair of 135's, then biamped with 4 135's (they certainly get the cooling fans going) and then one 500 and now 2 500's.... the 500's deal with the difficult Hawk load with consumate ease, and are a perfect match. They have an impedance that dips to less than 1 Ohm at around 13Khz. so you need 135's to drive the Hawks and would suggest that the 500 would be necessary for the Diapasons (only heard these with Dynavectors amps). The smaller ones (Arcs, Obelisks) can run off 180's or 250's. They also all work best with Naim cables.

What else can I say but give yourself a treat and get a demo. They are based out on Long Island so not too far for you to go. They are fantastic people, true enthusiasts about music - much like JV was - in fact Dick Shahinian and Julian had a very good relationship.

For people who live in the UK, I live in Southampton and with prior arrangement I am willing to let anyone who is serious about Shahinian listen to my stuff. Also an excellent dealer, himself a Shahinian enthusiast who personally uses them, and can demonstrate and supply them, is Phil March at Phonography in Ringwood. Also John Burns at Pear Audio, who is the UK distributor is a veritable fountain of knowledge on Shahinian Speakers, and an extremely helpfull man.

Greg, I hope this helps you.. if you want to discuss more then you can e-mail me as well as the forum.

best wishes and good listening.

Ton

Tony- my system is pretty similar to yours. I'm running cds2, 01, lp12, aro, armageddon dynavector
17d2 mk 2, 52 snaxo/sc 4 x 135 and sbls on Mana.
I could try the hawks biamped with the 4 x 135's.

Greg

Cheers
Goose

Goose, my cartridge is a Dynavector DRT XV1 (not as I said a DVX - which does not exist! I was obviously dreaming). I do not know of the cartridge you mentioned (HX 1.2) - do you have some additional details as it does not seem to figure in their current range.

Cheers
Ton

By the way Goose, FYI, you might want to check out a very honest review of the XV1 at www.tnt-audio.com/sorgenti/xv1_e.html, which also reviews the Dynavector PHA-100 at the same time, and includes some comment from the eminent Dr Tominari himself...

Cheers
Tony