TAliyev

I guess I hoped them to be based on all the noise and praises on the net... My bad. I placed too much trust in other people's opinions... I guess I prefer a "thousand words" .... more "privacy"... even with just words I get so much extra noise here... do not want to expose my bare skin to the sun

I have turned things off this morning. CW4s are wonderful, excellent but not magical speakers... In my opinion they are severely overpriced for what they deliver and how they are designed/built. I enjoy listening to those big boys...although still have not managed to get the center of the sound image where I want it to be...will continue my positioning/tilting/toeing experiments..

So, my CW4s crossed beyond 100 hours of continuous playing... And they are still playing as of this moment. Not sure how much longer I am going to be keeping this marathon. I will probably stop this "madness" tomorrow Highs came down significantly. Sometimes I am not even sure if tweeters are emitting any sounds, but they do Mids are smooth and even. Almost not like horns.... But when the voice is compared against SVS Ultras it becomes more obvious that horns are there Bass.... It is strong and natural and complete but I am not sure about the "change" from the original (pre-burn-in) sound. I have been splitting the music feeding time between Yamaha A-S2100 and McIntosh MA252 (Y is about 70% and M is about 30%). Yamaha provides tighter bass and a bit airier highs with crisp but flat mids. McIntosh provides lesser emphasis/power in the bass department (well defined though), slightly more forward mids and a tiny bit softer highs. Yamaha feels a bit more 3D than McIntosh, while the later is more focused, with better articulated/pronounced vocals. I use Foobar2000 via SMSL M500 DAC. When used with DSD:ASIO driver, Yamaha provides better 3D sound image (huge sound wall but cannot pinpoint instrument location). McIntosh works better with plain / direct ASIO driver, very focused, you can hear where the sound is coming from... Differences are relatively minor, but well noticeable.

I sit enough during the workday.... Standing while listening to the music helps me to keep the balance and blood circulation

My inner voice ... and I tend to trust it ... The upward tilt has improved the image at my targeted "standing listening" area ... I'd rather have them sitting flat as it is a hassle to keep them tilted..

My targeted "listening" area is 12 to 24 feet away from the speaker line and is at the "standing" not "sitting" ear level. The image currently centers at about 8-9 feet away from the speaker line and at about sitting ear position.... The current position: tweeter centers are about 10 feet apart, tilted upward by about 2 degrees and inward by the same 2 degrees. I may need to increase the upward tilt to 5 degrees, but this might be too much for the proper footing of those speakers ... Inward angle will need to be increased as well...and I tried, but it did not seem to work, meaning it did not shift center of the image neither closer nor farther from the speaker line...

At this point I have about 80+ hours of burn-in on my CW4s. Will keep them running for another 24 hours or so before giving my amps a break There are improvements in the sound...Most pronounced improvements happened within the first 30 hours, then things took slower path but still progressing: -smoother highs -cleaner mids -very pronounced bass Are they good? Yes Do I like them? Yes Do they worth the money I paid? Debatable, but likely No "End of the Journey" speakers? No I have a few questions for Cornwall IV owners ONLY: How far away is the "joy spot" (or G-Spot) from the front line of your CW4 speakers? I am talking about the area where the sound image centers and you hear singer's voice right in the middle between speakers instead of in those speakers? Are you tilting your CW4s upward? If so, then how significant is the angle? In my setting the G-Spot is closer to the speaker line than I need, and changes in toeing do not seem to be shifting that "sound center" area farther or closer.... My previous Heresy 2s were throwing that G-Spot farther away....and wider....

Adding an extended factory burn-in increases costs and prices enormously. Again, we are not talking about drivers only but crossover boards as well. To do this right, the assembled unit needs to be processed as a whole... Only custom and semi-custom manufacturers do this type of pre-cooking... Zu Audio would be a good example. They do 600 hours factory burn-in to their speakers https://www.zuaudio.com/ Why do we need to be told "The Truth" by a voice from the skies, government podium or TV instead of believing our own eyes and ears?!

Any/all semiconductor based equipment is afflicted by termochemical changes with use time. Just because it is settled, it does not mean that things get better… they can get worse…and they often do… I have seen enough dead computer parts which stopped working with time due to various semiconductor failures… Also, the changes in performance are minor enough and the number of parts is high enough that humans do not notice “the settling” unless carefully studying the equipment… or it fails… Just because somebody uses the word “science” it does not mean that there is anything scientific about the statement being made…

I do not care for idols, false gods or prophets.. We all have our opinions..... I am expressing my own observations and experiences, and somebody else's believes are not going to change what I see or hear.... The speakers are afflicted by the same plague as amps and dacs...electronics/capacitors inside... It takes time for those to chemically settle under the electrical current and temperature caused by it's flow. Also, the wood needs to acclimate to the local humidity, which affects resonance and vibration characteristics... I pushed speakers further apart and tilted them a bit more up by about another degree or two. Tweeter centers are about 10.5 feet apart now.

Not sure about the rest of the distinguished members of this forum, but in my personal universe speakers' break-in exist...and is audibly detectable and proven.... But that is just in my universe.... The multiverse is endless... Cronwalls have been playing nonstop for about 48 hours now...

My fellows audio enthusiasts, Thank you for your welcoming words, support, opinions and recommendations. We all have our experiences, viewpoints and ideas, and it is wonderful to have a place where we can share those with each other. I absolutely intend to enjoy those speakers no matter what I may think of them. Will try to keep you informed about my experiences and evolved opinions about my new toys once I accumulate enough of those

My initial post/question was about the reasoning behind a price gap difference between H/F/C. Then, while understanding that I will be paying a significant premium for wood and air, I still went and bought CW4s.... This got to tell you a lot about my mental capacity and ability to resist "big toy" impulses.... ... It is hard to believe that I am still married to my first wife and have kids beyond their college ages...

I am not here to advertise my home 6.5 feet is between inner lower corners, so between tweeter centers I have about 8.5+ feet. Ceilings are 7.5-8 feet . I have CW4 in the same room and position where my H2s were (H2s were raised by about a foot from the floor and tilted angled in about the same way as CW4 )... So CW4 tweeters are at about the same position where H2 tweeters were...

Yes, I bought CW4. While they sound "big" in my setting, they do not sound as big as they actually/physically/visually are (and my room is pretty large). Obviously this is a very subjective statement... Their voices are not as "clean/transparent" as I'd want them to be at this price point. I will need to play a little bit with positioning but since they are very large, I do not have much flexibility in this regard. I may tilting them a bit more up/down/left/right shift from the wall by an inch or two but nothing more beyond that. Still, they are new and have not went through the break-in (100 hours or so)... and I do believe in speaker/amp/dac break-in time performance changes.... based on my own experience with various audio equipment pieces. They do sound bigger than Heresies II I had (and remember, those were commercial/stage ported variations, not sealed "home" versions). But when those H2s were supported by my sub, together they were sounding very full and complete.... I had other issues / complains with their voices, but not sound fullness/ 3D imaging (with sub support) ... At this point I still believe that new ported H4 supported by a decent (but not overly large) sub would provide the best flexibility/performance/return on investment in Heresy/Forte/Cornwall group...... But I bought Cornwalls ..... so I could "see" my upgrade from H2s .. ...(see my post above about idiots and smarts) Still my CW4s have not been broken-in yet...