Vandersteen - Owners & Discussion Thread

[audiofeline]

Any other Vandersteen owners here?

I have enjoyed a pair of 2ci since the 1980's, and still have no complaints about them.  They do benefit from careful positioning, there are good guides in the manuals.

 

Manuals can be downloaded here:

https://www.vandersteen.com/

[darthlaker]

1 hour ago, audiofeline said:

Any other Vandersteen owners here?

I have enjoyed a pair of 2ci since the 1980's, and still have no complaints about them.  They do benefit from careful positioning, there are good guides in the manuals.

 

Manuals can be downloaded here:

https://www.vandersteen.com/

Hey af, congrats on being a Vandy owner. They are amazingly musical and neutral speakers at all price points.

 

I have a pair of Vandy Sevens and L.O.V.E. them - I used to have a pair of Vandy 5A's and before that had Thiel 3.7s and Thiel 2.4s......

 

 

[audiofeline]

I've been surprised that Vandy's are not as well-known in Aust. as they should be.  

[darthlaker]

20 minutes ago, audiofeline said:

I've been surprised that Vandy's are not as well-known in Aust. as they should be.  

Yea, same here.

 

For the past 11 years at worldwide Hi-fi shows (USA shows and Munich (and a few other shows in Europe)), Vandersteen rooms have consistently won best room or one of the best rooms. And their rooms ain't the most expensive either!

 

The Oz distributor should be doing a lot more to promote them....

 

Sigh

 

 

 

 

[darthlaker]

Also, if you are ever in SA, please drop me a line - you are welcome to pop over for a listen!

 

 

 

[Waza]

G'day @audiofeline @darthlaker......I'm a happy owner of the VLR CT's and totally agree with all the comments above, I remember when I first inquired about them one of the retailers had few words about them and said maybe try contacting our other store!! Anyway yes the Aus distributors/retailers could do more. Due to space constraints I was looking for a speaker that could be placed fairly close to walls with not too much compromise in sound quality, hence a bit googling and some threads on OS forums.......I took a chance and bought them unseen and without a listen!! LOL. 

[darthlaker]

4 hours ago, Waza said:

G'day @audiofeline @darthlaker......I'm a happy owner of the VLR CT's and totally agree with all the comments above, I remember when I first inquired about them one of the retailers had few words about them and said maybe try contacting our other store!! Anyway yes the Aus distributors/retailers could do more. Due to space constraints I was looking for a speaker that could be placed fairly close to walls with not too much compromise in sound quality, hence a bit googling and some threads on OS forums.......I took a chance and bought them unseen and without a listen!! LOL. 

Awesome you have a pair of VLR CT's. And VERY VERY VERY average service (to put it mildly) from the Aussie retailer. I am not really surprised though based on first and second hand experiences. Will say no more.

 

You have a very special set of speakers. Enjoy!

 

[hazzac181]

Hi all, 

I've begun my journey into the realm of semi serious Hi-Fi gear with the acquisition of some Vandersteen 1C floorstanders and a Moon by Simaudio 250i (i-1) amplifier. Source is a Cambridge Audio DACMagic 100 connected to my laptop streaming Tidal for the most part. 

 

Unfortunately the Vandersteen units arrived damaged by courier, with one of the tweeters having to be repaired. Listening to them in the shop after repair impressed me greatly - the sound produced was crisp and balanced to my ears. 

 

Having extensively followed Vandersteen's instructions regarding room placement and position, I set up the system in my lounge only to find the Vandersteen's sounded truly awful. There was a complete absence of bass, the mids were muddy and treble was so overly bright and harsh that it was quite draining to listen to. 

 

I have since tried every possible position within the lounge (moving the speakers to another room is not an option, even for the purposes of testing) to avail. I do not have speaker spikes, but compensated with a couple of concrete pavers underneath in some of my tests, which only seemed to accentuate the harshness in the high tones. 

 

My question is, is there anything I can do to rectify the sound? I know Vandersteen speakers are somewhat fussy with placement, and I fear the combination of an old, wooden (albeit carpeted) floor on stumps, lost of glass and little flexibility in speaker placement is not helping at all. I also fear that maybe my amplifier is not a good match for the Vandersteen's. I don't have another amplifier to test with. I'm at a loss - any input would be valued at this stage. Let me know if I've neglected to include any pertinent info and I'll edit the post. 

 

Thanks all

 

 

[lenticularis]

The burning question is what are the differences between your source, amp and cabling; and those used in the sholp where you heard them after repair?

[Pops110]

I would be checking all of your cables to make sure nothing is wired out of phase.

[pete_mac]

Just now, Pops110 said:

I would be checking all of your cables to make sure nothing is wired out of phase.

 

x 2 - the absence of bass is a tell-tale sign,

[hazzac181]

56 minutes ago, lenticularis said:

The burning question is what are the differences between your source, amp and cabling; and those used in the sholp where you heard them after repair?

Not sure I understand the first half of the question. All interconnects were made by Bill's Affordable Cables, who I believe is a member on this forum. 

 

Speaker repairer was Boyd from Total Recoil Speaker Repair in Melbourne, who is well regarded as far as I'm aware.

[hazzac181]

27 minutes ago, Pops110 said:

I would be checking all of your cables to make sure nothing is wired out of phase.

I've checked and rechecked the speaker cables. Polarity is fine, unless I've had an utter brainfart 

[Telecine]

22 minutes ago, hazzac181 said:

I've checked and rechecked the speaker cables. Polarity is fine, unless I've had an utter brainfart 

Check again, anything is possible.

[hazzac181]

I've checked, double checked and rechecked speaker cabling. 

 

Negative (with blue marking on wire) to negative. Positive to positive. Red to red, black to black. 

 

I'm absolutely certain I have this right! 

[sakabatou]

Try it the other way then.

I heard a pair of speakers at a dealer once that were internally wired out of phase. I couldn't believe it, but checked the wires myself. 

 

It actually sounded normal when the wires were reversed.

[Telecine]

Can you provide a photo of the rear of the speakers showing the binding posts and contour controls.

[hazzac181]

1 minute ago, sakabatou said:

Try it the other way then.

I heard a pair of speakers at a dealer once that were internally wired out of phase. I couldn't believe it, but checked the wires myself. 

 

It actually sounded normal when the wires were reversed.

This was my next port of call. I tried reversing both, to no avail. Would you reverse polarity of one speaker at a time, or both at once for the purposes of testing? 

 

Uneducated question: do I risk any damage to my amplifier by reversing polarity?

[sakabatou]

Just one.

There shouldn't be any trouble. People sometimes don't notice for a long time. It just sounds bad 

[hazzac181]

6 minutes ago, Telecine said:

Can you provide a photo of the rear of the speakers showing the binding posts and contour controls.

Sure. First image is of the left speaker, second is of the right

[gillmaverick]

1 hour ago, hazzac181 said:

Not sure I understand the first half of the question. All interconnects were made by Bill's Affordable Cables, who I believe is a member on this forum. 

 

Speaker repairer was Boyd from Total Recoil Speaker Repair in Melbourne, who is well regarded as far as I'm aware.

Hi Mate ,

Are Bills cables brand new ?. I mean how many hours have you had  them running ?. Not Sure which ones yoiu are using but I am using Bill's  Solid Silver cable and It needs break in time to sound best.

[hazzac181]

3 minutes ago, gillmaverick said:

Hi Mate ,

Are Bills cables brand new ?. I mean how many hours have you had  them running ?. Not Sure which ones yoiu are using but I am using Bill's  Solid Silver cable and It needs break in time to sound best.

They are new, and have had ~15 hours run in. They are Bill's cheapest option, unsure how they are titled now. Shouldn't make that much of a difference I would've thought – the comparison between listening in the shop and listening in my lounge was staggering, rather than subtle

[Topman_Chief]

1 hour ago, hazzac181 said:

Not sure I understand the first half of the question. All interconnects were made by Bill's Affordable Cables, who I believe is a member on this forum. 

 

Speaker repairer was Boyd from Total Recoil Speaker Repair in Melbourne, who is well regarded as far as I'm aware.

I think the question was focused on whether it was your dac/amp/cables in the repairer store, or theirs. If it was theirs, then there is a chance it is something further up your chain than the cables and speakers. 

[Telecine]

1 minute ago, hazzac181 said:

They are new, and have had ~15 hours run in. They are Bill's cheapest option, unsure how they are titled now. Shouldn't make that much of a difference I would've thought – the comparison between listening in the shop and listening in my lounge was staggering, rather than subtle

Can you provide a photo of the back of the amp showing your connections.

[hazzac181]

1 minute ago, Topman_Chief said:

I think the question was focused on whether it was your dac/amp/cables in the repairer store, or theirs. If it was theirs, then there is a chance it is something further up your chain than the cables and speakers. 

Theirs. I am calling the shop tomorrow to ask him which amp/source he was using. My suspicion is it is just an awful combination of room and amp for the type of sound I like (which I would describe as meaty and full).