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Neolith review just popped through the door in the form of Hi-Fi News and Record Review.

Priced higher in the UK than I would have thought. £80K. Ken Kessler endeavours to say that is good value. He rates it 90%.

The technical report is far from good - but I think the FR measurements are far from fair. The quoted sensitivity is 90DB, but HFN reckon that it is really around the 84/85 DB mark. Impedance at 10.3KHz is 0.6Ohm, 1.1 Ohm at 113 Hz and 1.3 Ohm at 50 Hz. 0.43 at 20 Hz. You defo need some amps for this, LOL.

Frequency response at 1 and 2 m show a marked downward trend, with a lot of peak to peak variance and a big difference between the two distances. At 1 m I can see a max peak to peak of 15DB on the plots. I personally think it is pointless measuring huge planars at those distances. I'd be far more comfortable with 5 m measurements.

Just thought I'd make people aware the review is available. Wilson Alexandria and Apogee Scintilla are also mentioned.
 
Frequency response at 1 and 2 m show a marked downward trend, with a lot of peak to peak variance and a big difference between the two distances. At 1 m I can see a max peak to peak of 15DB on the plots. I personally think it is pointless measuring huge planars at those distances. I'd be far more comfortable with 5 m measurements.
Long ago and far away, Gayle Sanders responded to a review of the SL3 with his perspective on the difficulties of measuring large, non-point source speakers, claiming that typical distances used for point sources are not appropriate. See here: http://www.stereophile.com/content/...ker-manufacturers-comment#OztxRb0pOP4lGy3J.97
 
RUR, you don't post that often, but every time you do it's a quality post with great information. Kudos to you for that. Thanks for the link to Gayle's comment. Very insightful.

Justin, I suspect you feel as I do: that the Neolith is undoubtedly a great speaker with the right setup, but to call it a "good value" at that price stretches credulity.
 
The only thing that supports that level of pricing is walking around the Munich show where far greater sins are committed in terms of VFM.

Absolute Sounds, the distributor here, might be being a bit greedy.
 
Priced higher in the UK than I would have thought. £80K.

Are you sure that is correct?

They are $USD 80k. I certainly hope they haven't just substituted a $ for a £; but it wouldn't surprise me.

They are $AUD 130,000. $USD80,000 = $AUD110,000 - not too outrageous, but still a pretty little $AUD20,000 to the distributor for every pair sold. Nice way to make money if you can get it!
 
Yes - £79,500 is the price according to Hi-Fi News. It is also quoted in the actual review text. I predict it won't really sell here at that price.

My first post - I also put it on What's Best forum, where it has been mysteriously deleted! Interesting...
 
Makes you wonder where the target market really is, if indeed there is one.

Still, it serves as a flagship. They will sell some and the highest quantities may go elsewhere.
 
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Makes you wonder where the target market really is, if indeed there is one.

Still, it serves as a flagship. They will sell some and the highest quantities may go elsewhere.

I wouldn't be so sure. The middle class market is imploding.

I have a friend who builds show cars and does one of a kind restorations. Cars have lost a lot of luster and not nearly as many people care about having a hot rod in the garage, however there are a LOT more millionaires who want a concourse winning level of restoration than there used to be and my friend stays very busy.

To the guy looking at $100,000 speakers the cost is typically secondary. He is ready to make an impulse buy and this is just noise financially

Taking a dart throw at this the demographics for ML buyers are probably pretty high up there.

ML is probably selling their Neolith to the top 0.5-1%
The 15A is maybe a top 1-2%
The 13A-11A maybe top 2-3%

There will be some people in the top 4-5% who consider these speakers a high enough priority save long term for them, but they can't impulse buy.
The disposable income for the bottom 95% of the country is all but non-existent these days.

Their market is skewed far into the area for people with lots of discretionary income. These are luxury items. So you may be surprised to find a flatter distribution curve than you might expect between the 15A, 13A, 11A and the Neolith may not be lagging as far behind as you think.

I could be completely wrong and I have nothing to back this up, but I wouldn't be surprised if this was close.
 

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