Trio15TB NEO in Sweden
LISTENING IMPRESSION
At first when I compared them to my old semi open baffle speakers (Sperrling DP3) I was a bit disappointed. The Sperrlings are built by an eccentric doctor who had his own ideas of how good stereo speakers shall be built (semi open baffle systems etc). I knew they were really good but thought the Trio 15 would be one or two steps up. So I got a bit stressed out when the Sperrlings sounded even better in the mid bass and midrange. But fortunately the disappointment faded away as the Trio drivers got broken in.
Open, refined and with a sweet inviting sound are the first words that comes to me after about 70 hours of breaking in. With a relatively powerful amp the bass is already pretty distinct. Looking forward to see what happens after 200 hours.
After about 200 hours of braking in, the change was big, yes even one or two levels better than the Sperrlings. And I can assure that this was not some Placebo effect after having gotten used to the sound. The Trios got more and more dynamic, smooth and rich. Old RCA recordings, of which music I really liked but was a bit harsh before, became more smooth and enjoyable. So the old review cliche that good equipment reveals bad recordings was not true in this case. My conclusion is that the distortion in bad recordings are not emphasized with good speakers. At the contrary! That was a big reward in itself.
With the OB construction and TB´s you also get a very nice bidirectional sound which makes the music spread more in the room and to other rooms. It was actually a very nice improvement which I do not want to be without in the future. Kind of like being in a jazz club where the music is spread in all directions, as it does with acoustic instruments. With closed baffle the sound kind of stays in the playing room and you need to basically sit in front of the speakers to fully enjoy them. Not so in this case, which I like.
One thing I would like to emphasize is to get powerful amps with high damping factor. This helps keeping the 15″ Eminence drivers in control since there is no closed box to support. I tried them with a powerful class A/B amp with great results while a pair of class D amps worked but did not keep the 15″ drivers in such good control. So if you can, choose a powerful amp with high damping factor. It will bring out the Trio´s a lot more and improve the investment.
It seems as the sound is still improving after 200 hours but I can not tell for sure yet. We´ll see when they reach 400 hours. Since I live in an apartment I had to isolate the speakers during breaking in, so they could be playing during daytime when I worked. I placed them face to face and draped them in blankets. See picture.
H.W., Sweden
