SBL to NBL?

My dealer is using a pair of 135s, while I have a six pack running my NBLs. I went back to the store today for another listen and sure enough the passive DBLs blew me away--and with a CDX/XPS for a source!

I am going to ask for a home dem soon-- Anyone looking for a used pair of Cherry NBLs in the US? Special blow out pricing available!

Chris Bell
DBLs: More important than you think!

Don't let others kid you, the DBLs are BIG! They're imposing but over time you do get used to them. Also, they are easier on the eye if your listening room is big.

Compared to the DBLs, the SBLs are thin sounding. With the 500 in, they will fill out quite a bit, but the SBLs can't really show off the music-playing abilities of the 500.

I'm not a fan of the NBLs -- I will have to follow the lead here and say that you should try the 500 (overkill) or the DBLs (oversized). Sorry to be unhelpful.

Hock

John - I have DBL's in my lounge measuring along a wall of 12 feet wide. When I first got them I thought they were very large and imposing, and thought of another meaning what DBL could stand for ( Divorce By Letter!).

All joking aside, they are large, but because they site up against a wall they do not need "free space" in which to operate in.

My wife now reluctantly accepts them as part of the furniture. Have a home demo; if you want the job done properly, these are for you.

Let me know how you get on.

Trevor Impett - NAP 500 Aspirator

In terms of Naim speakers the NBL,s are better at partnering the Naim electronics.

I found an NBL to be more musical with a 250 than a 500 but the 500 had better imaging soundstage and detail.To be frank I asked the dealer if the 500 was broken or incorrectly connected up.Its the first Naim electronic component that has left me feeling very disappointed.

If you do the demo with the NBL it would be wise to be able to swap between the 250 and the 500 as the 500 is a lot lot more than a 250 or even a brace of 135,s.

Enjoy hooch

quote:

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... which is no real suprise as they are bandwidth limited.

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Oh yeah, having a good argument in place always helps. I'm afraid, the NBL doesn't reach 16 Hz -1dB exactly, not talking about fast transients that are well recognised although there spectral components are way higher than 16 kHz

... bandwidth limited ... great ...

Hooch

quote:

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that the speakers hold everything back which is no real suprise as they are bandwidth limited.

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Not sure I understand what this means, and are there speakers which are not bandwith limited - if so which?

cheers

Nigel

Stereophile classifies its reviews of speakers in this way - any speaker that doesn't have a useful frequency response <30Hz is considered 'bandwidth limited'. That covers a lot of speakers which are truly great (the soon-to-be-mine Virgos fall into the Stereophile class-A bandwidth limited category, although they have plenty of bass).

It's not a bad thing, you know

John

I have hardly read more than 2 or 3 issues and even that's some years ago. Since then I've ceased from reading hifi mags in general and imported mags in particular (too expensive).

However, I still dislike this very arbitrary and unscientifical use of the term.

Among the posters in this forum closed cabinets seem to be generelly preferred over vented cabinets and I'm well familiar with the pros and cons and the neverending discussions. However, I'm gonna dive a little into hifi history before making my final statement. The good old woofer used in the original SBL (not made by Naim themselfes but by Mordaunt Short) was made almost exactly the same by a company named ARC (Alistair Raymon Clark has been working for Mordaunt Short before doing his own business ...). The mature part (not to say old) of the audience might remember the collaboration of ARC and Nytech. When Alistair had finally grown up, he recognised that making money with hifi might not be a safe bet, so he sold the company over to Germany. Of course, all the high end people who have been praising ARC immediately started slamming at the speakers, once they were made in Germany (exactly as before). British high end from a german manufacturer simply wasn't hip to these circles. So, the german manufacturer started to release other concepts to the DIY market, using just the same hand built drivers. That's when I made contact to them, earing some money for my studies. We did a lot of fun stuff for ourselfes too and one of the best speakers I've ever heard was made by a friend of mine. He used the original cone and magnet, but omitted the basket. Instead, the parts were directly mounted to the cabinet, the magnet resting on the inner braces (actually it was me who assembled the units). The treble part was handled by a 28mm ScanSpeak dome tweeter (I forgot which one exactly) using a floating suspension similar to that used with the DBLs. He used a vented cabinet of approx. 36 l with the vent made from plywood (like the rest of the cabinet). Boy, I tell you this piece was soooooo punchy, you wouldn't believe it. Fast and deep, simply stunning. For sure not only louder, but deeper bass than the SBL can provide. I wonder if it would still be considered bandwidth limited by stereophile ... most probably yes.

What's the bottom line (or final statement, as anounced above)? I do get picky when people start talking about the SBL (which I do like a lot) in a way that might be only slightly devaluating (my fault) and I do know that you can have a littel more bandwidth from the same (or a very similar) woofer in a vented cabinet (less suitable for placing it close to a wall though).

Sorry again (for taking your time) but I felt like I should appologise if my posting has been impolite.

Fabia

[This message was edited by Fabian.Robok on MONDAY 13 November 2000 at 15:59.

[This message was edited by Fabian.Robok on MONDAY 13 November 2000 at 16:01.]

I heard NBLs in chicago with a cds2/52/ and two 135s and while I thought the had deep tight powerful base, there was a midrange musicality and realism that my CDX/52/250 Royd Albions had that the NBLs lacked. Needless to say I was a little dissapointed as I didn't think my system at that time would get within ten miles of the NBL set up. So on these grounds I've decided (now that I have a CDS 2) to upgrade my speakers before my 250 as I could see that speakers are in many cases a bigger limitation than the electronics that might be backing them.

dave

For the record on a private email to me by the late Julian Vereker it was mentioned that the frequency was limited to make the speaker more tuneful.I refuse to say any more as the email was is and will be private.

It is true that I tried combining a Stentor sub-woofer with Active SBL,s with mixed sucess.Some music sounded fantastic,some too much bass and some too little.The combination seemed to work well with classical stuff giving a delicious sound to strings.

In trying to screw a bit more out of the SBL,s I had my Amps modified which improved everything a bit better and placed the SBL,s over a pile of Mana which turned out to be far better in results and also cheaper than modifying.

My opinion is that SBL,s are great speakers when compared to SBL,s or cheaper Naim speakers.If you want to spend more, than you can do a lot better.Great thing about SBL,s is that everyone needs to start somewhere.Against NBL,s DBL,s,Wilsons,ATC,s etc!they are lacking.

I still use my Active SBL,s as surroundsound speakers and am happy to endorse them as such.

Speakers at the moment are modified Studio monitors in preference to a domestic speaker.

cheers hooch

[This message was edited by redbug on MONDAY 13 November 2000 at 18:09.]

Every time I do an upgrade, I have a hard time recommending the previous item. When I moved from a 72 to a 102 there was no way I could ever go back. The same goes for passive NBLs. The passive cross-over completly chokes them to death. Only after I went active did I really start to enjoy the NBL and understood the intentions of the designer--and as a result I would have a hard time recommending passive NBLs to anyone-- except maybe wtih a NAP 500.

Dave, I would say live with your system until you can upgrade to DBLs. Even passive, they are that good!

p

I agree with your assesment of upgrades. Now that I have a CDS 2 the CDX/XPS seems rather pointless unless as a stepping stone, as the CDX is already quite good, especially with good stands. I've ordered some Wilson Benesch ACT 2 speakers and we'll see where that takes me. I LOVED the ACT 1s with my system, even more when I jumped to Cardas Neutral cable. They ACT 2 have the same drivers as the 20,000 GBP Bishop (barring the isobaric bass units) and are said to be even better. So I hope this will work out. If it doesn't I'll take a look at some other speakers including the Bishop, the DBLs and Mezzo Utopias before doing anything about my 250. I figure as long as I'm in the realm of relatively easy-to-drive speakers the 250 should be too much of a limitation, especially since I already have a 52 and a CDS2. The ACT 1s also showed me how much I was missing out on with the electronics I already have.

dave

(

NBLs have the tunefulness and pace of SBLs with the weight which John misses.

If I were John I'd try out all the options

SBL active
NBL (same amps)
and passive NAP500 with
SBL
and NBL

I know what I would choose.

If he went for NBL/500 then the DBL needs to be evaluated as well, at which stage room size and WAF become serious factors.

And for Antonelli

D'you wanto to email me re: next London(UK) visit, and you can hear REAL NBLs.

C

Cliff
Trainee Perl Hacker

I've been laying low wrt travel lately but expect to be in the UK sometime after April. I always manage to stop in at least twice a year.

What is this "golden lane" business and are you sure it isn't a "Golden Mews" you are talking about?

I'd be glad to hear "real" NBLS. As I have often said, I am sure they are great speakers with a 500 or an active configuration, but with passive 135s they were certainly not slouches, but they failed to really make much of an impression on me. Call it lack of romanticism. I also found the tabla on the Indian stuff I was listening to a bit over emphasized. This instrument weaves and flutters setting a background rhythm like an irregular heartbeat and should never sound like a drum machine.

davee