Blumenstein Orcas

I ordered a pair of the rear-mount Orcas with the new fe83sol drivers and a pair of Clark's litz speaker cables a few weeks ago, still waiting on the drivers.

They will sit on a pair of Skylan stands and I'll have to play around with placement, I'm thinking about 8' apart and pulled 3' into the room.

 

I'd suppose its the port filler ball.

 

Mine have the new drivers.

 

I'm starting to think about a nearfield desktop system, and considering the Marlins. I listen mostly to classical, and the Marlins should be a better match than the Orcas for neutral reproduction of live acoustic instruments.

My first question is, how well do these little speakers reproduce orchestral music, say a Mahler symphony? My thought is that being nearfield may mitigate some of the limitations of single 3" drivers.

Are any of you using their Benthic Woofer? At 5.25" it is a woofer (not subwoofer) but it is so small that it can fit on my desktop and should integrate better than a subwoofer on the floor. However, it wouldn't extend as low. One question I have is that using a separate woofer or subwoofer would involve a crossover, which negates the supposed transparency of single driver speakers with no crossovers. Is this a valid consideration?

Finally, looking for updated impressions about your Blumensteins now that you've spent more time with them.

 

Eh I returned my baby benthic.
Hard to integrate especially nearfield with PC monitor in between. Near impossible. Room modes mess up 70hz and below for me.

Orca have no bass below 70hz. I just listen to kpop and I don't care about bass that much so it's ok for me. Live music sounds nice maybe cause of the thicker bamboo. Better than Omega's whatever thin box they use.

I do like orchestral music. If that's your main focus I'd say skip nearfield monitor and just grab a HD800 or go full tower.

 

Looks like you're in a similar situation as @Muse Wanderer was before, except you're limited to nearfield. 3" or even 5" driver just won't do proper bass period, but if space is a big issue a 5" might be good enough. 3" drivers will have huge problems with the very high levels that realistic reproduction of classical music demands, but at the same time the cohesiveness is a big plus. In this case the bigger widebanders are better, but even the Voxativs still struggle a bit at very high levels. On par with a lot of the traditional multi way stuff, but not as good as the best or horn stuff.

Your worries about crossovers messing up the sound aren't without merit, but I'm sure pretty much everyone would prefer a 3"+8" or 10" speaker compared to just a 3" widebander on its own. The high pass filter does help with distortion, too.

 

Thanks for the feedback. I guess the Orcas haven't been completely satisfying for you, and a standard 2-way monitor may have been a better option (I'll have to decide on this for my situation). I wouldn't dismiss nearfield monitors so broadly, because there are many successful systems.

 

My experience with the Orca so far is that they sound better with some space to breathe. Unless you have a very large desktop I am not sure it is the best option.

I haven't listened to much classical yet, but my feeling is that may be a lot to ask from a little driver.

 

I used to have the bookshelf Monitor Audio GX100 speakers that did remarkably well with say Wagner, Bruckner and Mahler. These had 6.5 inch woofers and a ribbon tweeter. Coherence was an issue of course as well as lack of bass extension and a small honk in midrange at the crossover area I could hear. Treble was brightish until I got a Yggdrasil-Rag to pair with them.

At Munich high end I tried a tower 3 inch widebander with back loaded horn from a French company (forgotten its name) and it was underwhelming with the Wagner piece I put through. The dynamics were severely restricted with orchestral forte passages. Even the remarkable Voxativ Due could not reproduce the dynamics of the Gotterdammerung finale without adding distorsion.

I opted for an open baffle speaker to get the best of both worlds (kind of) but if I had limited space I would go back for a good 2 way bookshelf with a woofer at least 6.5" in size. Coherence would be sacrificed to a more life-like dynamics with more extension at both ends.

I strongly suggest to listen to the speakers before purchasing if you are a classical nut like me. It completely changed my perspective prior to acquiring my new speakers.

 

Thanks for everybody's feedback. For a long time, I've been intrigued by the "magic" described by fans of single driver, crossoverless speakers. Coupled with the beautiful woodwork of the Blumensteins, I was really hoping this might work for me. However, realistically it doesn't look like it would be the best fit for me. I'll focus on 2-way monitors, which is a very competitive market with many good performers. I'll post to the nearfield thread as I move further along.

 

Mini update - been using these speakers alot recently after adding in a subwoofer.

I previously thought the small driver worked well with a small section of music with no bass (like acoustic or vocal, maybe some jazz). Kinda wrote them off and didn't use them much for a couple months.

Anyway now have a 10" JL fathom sub, and after playing around with adjustments and settling in at a crossover point of 80hz, I'm am starting to see the magic in these speakers. Probably most of my problem before was the roll of on the low end, top end not habing enough sparkle or splash isnt a gripe. Can listen to most genres again and not feel like I am compromising low end for great image and separation.

I might even go as far as to say I would really recommend these speakers without some help on the low end. Not that these won't work, but there is alot of musical information below the drop off point if the Orcas.

 

That's a serious subwoofer for the little Orcas. Do you run the Orcas full bandwidth or high-pass? After adding the subwoofer, what are the remaining compromises in the setup? I'm not expecting Orcas to play loud, but how about transients and dynamics?

 

Its way way way more sub than I needed, but one popped up on local craigslist that I couldn't let pass me by. I think I would be just as happy with a much less expensive sub. Running the Orca full band, just having the sub pick up the low end.

As far as remaining limitations, the only thing I see missing is maybe top end splash on on cymbals. I think the transients are part of what makes these speakers shine. Live music feels very real. They could probably be a bit more dynamic, but I'm not complaining, these are a single driver wide band speaker. They can sound fast and handle more complex sections, but they are really meant to reproduce fine detail more than knock you into the back of your seat.

These are more intimate speakers to be listening to in a quieter setting. I am using a power amp on them right now, don't be afraid to feed them power. You aren't going to disturb the neighbors, impress kid who mows your lawn how they sound with EDM, make it feel like the Transformer are in your living room, or set them up at little Vinny's Confirmation party. Use them to listen to listen to music paired with a decent quality tube amp and you will be quite happy.

 

Something I discovered about the outboard subwoofer amplifier that Blumenstein sells for their Benthic woofer. As noted on the Blumenstein website, it is a Dayton SA70 subwoofer amplifier packaged into a cabinet. However, if you look customer reviews of SA70 on parts-express.com, its low pass filter is total crap — they can hear vocals on their subwoofer! Therefore it is advisable to use a different sub amp, or different subwoofer altogether.

 

You are right, the magic is in the drivers in an appropriately sized and well built cabinet.

This will be put in queue with all of my other audio projects. I think its only about 8 items back.

 

If you have the means and skill to DIY, it is probably a better idea to just do it yourself. The advantage here is that you get a beautifully finished, tuned, and completed package for a decent price.

I think Josh has done a good job describing what they are good at and what they aren't. The rolled off bass doesn't bother me as much as the lack of detail in the treble (relatively speaking). That is the trade off you make with a small full range driver in a small enclosure. It isn't going to change the world, but I happen to like the things it does well and don't mind sacrificing in some areas.

 

Would those need acoustic damping or are they good straight out of the box? I know my limitations and I am rubbish at those sorts of modifications. The whole package of parts and assembly is easily worth $200. Adding another 50% or so for profit seems reasonable to me when you consider you can buy the Orca for $600.