New Volti Rival

[EmilC]

 

 

Not cheap at "only" $7900 but a consideration for those with the means.

These were pre-production units at the Capital Audio Fest

 

From Stereophile's Herb Reichert -

"Most of you must know I am a long time fan of Volti Audio's Vittoria horn-loaded loudspeakers. They achieve what I always thought was impossible: a smooth, coherent, hyper-efficient loudspeaker that bubbles with musical life—and never let's on it's a horn speaker. Most folks that heard it agreed except, many wished it was smaller and less expensive. Well, Volti proprietor/engineer, Greg Roberts was listening and at CAF released a smaller, less expensive model, the Rival at only $7900/pair. The sound, while not quite as sweet and sophisticated as the Vittora, was "oh my my" tight fast and textured. The box, the drivers and the music reproduced seemed properly scaled, utterly uncompressed. The new 99dB-sensitive Rival delivered a great portion of the bigger speaker's pleasures. Bravo Volti!

The new Rivals were driven by Border Patrol S20 EXD parallel, single-ended, dual-mono 300B amplifiers ($16,750/pair) and the Border patrol 1543 DAC ($1500). All cables were Triode Wire Labs and sourced from a PI Audio UberBUSS power distribution block."

Edited July 14, 2016 by EmilC

[JJkizak]

Cornwall copy cats.

JJK

[Ave Bona Cornwall]

Cornwall copy cats.

JJK

Greg's version of the Cornscala.  Without going through the whole history lesson, Greg's roots were in restoring Klipsch heritage stuff (he is (or was?) a member of the forum), and ventured out on his own product line using other horns and wiring.  It is very high quality stuff, and when you compare to MSRP of similar high end stuff, it isn't way off base.  I'd never pay MSRP for high end stuff, but that is beside the point.

[Schu]

....

Never mind

Edited July 14, 2016 by Schu

[JJkizak]

 

Cornwall copy cats.

JJK

Greg's version of the Cornscala.  Without going through the whole history lesson, Greg's roots were in restoring Klipsch heritage stuff (he is (or was?) a member of the forum), and ventured out on his own product line using other horns and wiring.  It is very high quality stuff, and when you compare to MSRP of similar high end stuff, it isn't way off base.  I'd never pay MSRP for high end stuff, but that is beside the point.

 

 

No ill will intended.

JJK

[EmilC]

....

Never mind

C'mon Schu. What did you want to say

[Chris A]

For that kind of money, you're well into Klipsch Jubilee (two-way home version) territory.  In case you haven't heard Jubs, it's really no contest.

 

If you can wait, a full-range multiple-entry K-402 horn design is also about the size of a Cornwall or CornScala, and IMO, has much better midbass performance than a Jubilee.  For something smaller than Jubs and Cornwalls, I'd actually recommend something like Danley SH-50s--which would be no contest, too...IMO. 

 

Chris

Edited July 14, 2016 by Chris A

[dtel's wife]

I'm continually amazed how people come to this forum and diss Klipsch!

[Grizzog]

For that kind of money, you're well into Klipsch Jubilee (two-way home version) territory. In case you haven't heard Jubs, it's really no contest.

If you can wait, a full-range multiple-entry K-402 horn design is also about the size of a Cornwall or CornScala, and IMO, has much better midbass performance than a Jubilee. For something smaller than Jubs and Cornwalls, I'd actually recommend something like Danley SH-50s--which would be no contest, too...IMO.

Chris

I would love to hear Jubilees some day. 42" width would be impossible in my current home. Also, having a crossover built or using active crossovers is past my abilities at this moment.

I think those issues are what make the volti options more appealing, especially with the veneers available.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Chris A]

Active crossovers of quality are now cheaper than passive crossovers of quality.  I'd recommend one Xilica 2040 or Yamaha SP2060 24/96 active crossover for highest fidelity.  The settings for Jubilee two-ways are published on this forum.  All you need are four amplifier channels.  For most people, I've found that having two stereo amplifiers to drive them isn't an issue.  It takes minutes to plunk in the settings and sit back for sonic pleasure.  You can also use that active crossover to dial in your speakers and to correct for low frequency room acoustics for no extra cost.

 

The front panel veneer on a Jubilee bass bin is available at very reasonable cost.

 

I don't buy speakers based on how they look...rather how they sound.  But you probably already knew that.  I think that communication on the relative merits of Klipsch higher-end products (Heritage and Jubilee) is needed from time to time to remind people of what they probably haven't heard yet. 

 

Greg's "Volti" products are significantly overpriced and derivative of Klipsch products, unfortunately.  All you're getting for all that money is cabinetry.  The horns and drivers he's selling you are also overpriced--since you can also buy them easily for less money.  Separate your concerns: I'd take my Klipsch down to a good cabinetmaker to get nicer looker boxes--if that were an issue for me.  Even Jubilees could be retrofitted by a cabinetmaker with a veneer face and sides and grill cloths...easily.

 

Danley's product mentioned above is still unique even though the controlling patent has expired (Sound Physics Labs).  Klipsch could probably build multiple-entry horn designs better than Danley--no doubt--but to date they haven't marketed any such products.

 

Chris

Edited July 14, 2016 by Chris A

[twk123]

Active crossovers of quality are now cheaper than passive crossovers of quality.  I'd recommend one Xilica 2040 or Yamaha SP2060 24/96 active crossover for highest fidelity.  The settings for Jubilee two-ways are published on this forum.  All you need are four amplifier channels.  For most people, I've found that having two stereo amplifiers to drive them isn't an issue.  It takes minutes to plunk in the settings and sit back for sonic pleasure.  You can also use that active crossover to dial in your speakers and to correct for low frequency room acoustics for no extra cost.

 

The front panel veneer on a Jubilee bass bin is available at very reasonable cost.

 

I don't buy speakers based on how they look...rather how they sound.  But you probably already knew that.  I think that communication on the relative merits of Klipsch higher-end products (Heritage and Jubilee) is needed from time to time to remind people of what they probably haven't heard yet. 

 

Greg's "Volti" products are significantly overpriced and derivative of Klipsch products, unfortunately.  All you're getting for all that money is cabinetry.  The horns and drivers he's selling you are also overpriced--since you can also buy them easily for less money.  Separate your concerns: I'd take my Klipsch down to a good cabinetmaker to get nicer looker boxes--if that were an issue for me.  Even Jubilees could be retrofitted by a cabinetmaker with a veneer face and sides and grill cloths...easily.

 

Danley's product mentioned above is still unique even though the controlling patent has expired (Sound Physics Labs).  Klipsch could probably build multiple-entry horn designs better than Danley--no doubt--but to date they haven't marketed any such products.

 

Chris

 

I agree with you on the Volti Products. It looks like some Parts Express Horns and most likely JBL 1'' Selenium drivers if I am guessing correctly.

 

I did have a question on the active crossovers- do they turn an analog signal into digital then back to analog? In that case would that have a negative impact if you are running an upstream DAC or for that matter do they make a DAC that takes the digital signal from the beginning and converts it into 2 or 3 crossed over analog signals? Looking at the Yamaha, it looks like it has a digital input but not USB.

[prerich]

I believe that the Volti designs are further evidence that PWK was a man before his time and got most of it right.  Imitation is the greatest form of flattery. 

[tromprof]

 

 

I agree with you on the Volti Products. It looks like some Parts Express Horns and most likely JBL 1'' Selenium drivers if I am guessing correctly.

 

 

Actually Volti makes their own horns which are quite nice. I have three of his large mid tractrix horns in my basement system, and the sound is excellent.  I don't know what drivers he uses and his speakers are expensive (for me anyway) but I don't doubt they are well engineered and put together.  I don't think there is any good reason to crap on his efforts.  

Edited July 14, 2016 by tromprof

[twk123]

 

 

 

I agree with you on the Volti Products. It looks like some Parts Express Horns and most likely JBL 1'' Selenium drivers if I am guessing correctly.

 

 

Actually Volti makes their own horns which are quite nice. I have three of his large mid tractrix horns in my basement system, and the sound is excellent.  I don't know what drivers he uses and his speakers are expensive (for me anyway) but I don't doubt they are well engineered and put together.  I don't think there is any good reason to crap on his efforts.  

 

 

If Volti makes their own horns then I stand corrected and retract my statement as that would make the speakers cohesive and unique enough to warrant being sold commercially under its own brand. I was not commenting on the quality of the speakers, just the price. I believe these do fill an interesting space though as Klipsch as a modern company (Other than the Pro Stuff) has moved almost entirely to 2 way smaller footprint boxes and I think I read somewhere here they have an agreement that the heritage line cannot be modified too much. That leaves a development gap for a larger box Cornwall type 3 way speaker with Tractrix horns rather than exponential. It probably puts Klipsch in a strange spot to develop a speaker like this as it could diminish sales of the Cornwall III but at the same time the Cornwall cannot be updated with the new Tractrix horns.  

[Chris A]

I think you're talking about the home-made midrange horn that's a copy of the other Fastrac/etc curved side-wall midrange horns.  I personally wouldn't use any of those: the polars just aren't very good.  But it probably sounds okay on-axis. 

 

I'd use the K-510 or K-402 instead with a better 2" compression driver and go two-way, using an active crossover to correct for the controlled directivity horn output.

 

If you've got an S/PDIF(TOSLINK) or coaxial digital output on your DAC, you can use that with the Yamaha SP2060 AES3 digital input connector.  There are many solutions available.  That avoids conversion to analog in the path.

 

I don't recommend USB unless you're sure that the power supplied by it has been conditioned on both sides of the interface.  All the issues that I've been seeing with noise problems have been with USB (only)--including, but not limited to miniDSP.  If you can get past that issue, then there are higher priced USB-AES3 units available, making it digital all-the-way.

 

YMMV.

 

Chris

Edited July 14, 2016 by Chris A

[tromprof]

I think you're talking about the home-made midrange horn that's a copy of the other Fastrac/etc curved side-wall midrange horns.  I personally wouldn't use any of those: the polars just aren't very good.  But it probably sounds okay on-axis. 

 

I'd use the K-510 or K-402 instead with a better 2" compression driver and go two-way, using an active crossover to correct for the controlled directivity horn output.

 

If you've got an S/PDIF(TOSLINK) or coaxial digital output on your DAC, you can use that with the Yamaha SP2060 AES3 digital input connector.  There are many solutions available.  That avoids conversion to analog in the path.

 

I don't recommend USB unless you're sure that the power supplied by it has been conditioned on both sides of the interface.  All the issues that I've been seeing with noise problems have been with USB (only)--including, but not limited to miniDSP.  If you can get past that issue, then there are higher priced USB-AES3 units available, making it digital all-the-way.

 

YMMV.

 

Chris

I have the Volti horns on the side channels and center, and they do well there. Yes, I would REALLY like a pair of 402 for the fronts, but the right deal at the right time has not happened yet.

[prerich]

 

 

 

 

I agree with you on the Volti Products. It looks like some Parts Express Horns and most likely JBL 1'' Selenium drivers if I am guessing correctly.

 

 

Actually Volti makes their own horns which are quite nice. I have three of his large mid tractrix horns in my basement system, and the sound is excellent.  I don't know what drivers he uses and his speakers are expensive (for me anyway) but I don't doubt they are well engineered and put together.  I don't think there is any good reason to crap on his efforts.  

 

 

If Volti makes their own horns then I stand corrected and retract my statement as that would make the speakers cohesive and unique enough to warrant being sold commercially under its own brand. I was not commenting on the quality of the speakers, just the price. I believe these do fill an interesting space though as Klipsch as a modern company (Other than the Pro Stuff) has moved almost entirely to 2 way smaller footprint boxes and I think I read somewhere here they have an agreement that the heritage line cannot be modified too much. That leaves a development gap for a larger box Cornwall type 3 way speaker with Tractrix horns rather than exponential. It probably puts Klipsch in a strange spot to develop a speaker like this as it could diminish sales of the Cornwall III but at the same time the Cornwall cannot be updated with the new Tractrix horns.  

 

The Cornwall III does have a Tractrix HF horn but an Exponential MF horn. 

[twk123]

 

I think you're talking about the home-made midrange horn that's a copy of the other Fastrac/etc curved side-wall midrange horns.  I personally wouldn't use any of those: the polars just aren't very good.  But it probably sounds okay on-axis. 

 

I'd use the K-510 or K-402 instead with a better 2" compression driver and go two-way, using an active crossover to correct for the controlled directivity horn output.

 

If you've got an S/PDIF(TOSLINK) or coaxial digital output on your DAC, you can use that with the Yamaha SP2060 AES3 digital input connector.  There are many solutions available.  That avoids conversion to analog in the path.

 

I don't recommend USB unless you're sure that the power supplied by it has been conditioned on both sides of the interface.  All the issues that I've been seeing with noise problems have been with USB (only)--including, but not limited to miniDSP.  If you can get past that issue, then there are higher priced USB-AES3 units available, making it digital all-the-way.

 

YMMV.

 

Chris

I have the Volti horns on the side channels and center, and they do well there. Yes, I would REALLY like a pair of 402 for the fronts, but the right deal at the right time has not happened yet.

 

 

A set of 402 Horns on top of Quartie Pie Bass Bins  with 3 Cinema F-20 subwoofers placed directly in front and one on each side of the listening position is the current horn loaded end game for me.   

[gary p]

Having seen and heard gregs speakers at axpona the last 3 years, I can tell you that they are quality. Very well made. Unfortunately out of my price range. His price point isn't as crazy as you might think as compared to some of the outrageous prices being asked for what is considered high end. 10k or 20k is nothing compared to what is out there.

[YK Thom]

Just read the review of the Rival in the June 2017 Stereophile. The fit and finish look great and would make a good inspiration for those building their own Crites Cornscala (which is what they look like to me). I have considered commissioning the same guy who built my AV unit for a Cornscala build. Not in the immediate or midterm budget though. Seems like PWK's concepts continue to echo through the years.