As promised earlier, I wish to write a more comprehensive review on Agoria which to me and many many audiophiles longing for a pair of ultimate speaker is a major technological breakthrough in many aspects both on the build and sonical performance.
In the next 6 sections, I will use 6 LP/CDs to help me describing the various characteristics of Agoria and explain why I believe it is 'The One' for me.
IN this section, I provide some basic information below which is extracted from the Tidal website but it is quite interesting when I bring all the data into a table below:
CDSE Agoria Sunray
Woofer 2 x 9" 2 x 11" 4 x 9"
Sub-bass Radia ---- 2 x 11" ----
Midrange 1 x 7" 2 x 7" 2 x 7"
Tweeter 1 x1.2" 1 x 1.2" 1 x 1.2"
Amongst the three, Agoria has the most number of drivers, larger size bass drivers, the highest density per meter in height and a new and proprietary cabinet technology.
Because of this new cabinet technology, the vibration control and damping control of Agoria have been improved by leaps and it helps in the imaging precision and minimise the phase difference when signals are channeled through all these drivers harmoniously.
Marvel, thanks for reply. Does K-10 still have enough gain at 1 o'clock. Over the years I found, that it can be just a matter of gain matching, rather then insufficient gain. If all the power is there (I think that even designer Robert Koch suggested somewhere himself to open volume knob more), then there should be enough of the raw power needed.
Why the change from K-70 to Analog Domain? Interesting transition as it seems, these are two completely different power amps by technology used...
No problem. I can be called Mr. Takumi, but this is quite a name to behold . Thanks for nice invitation. It bosh pleasure and honour to be here. This is the place of most demanding audio connoisseurs on the planet. I have both highest respect and expectations from you guys .
I'm far away from you guys. Europe it is.
My system consists of Mactone MH-300 B power amp, Lamm LL2 preamp, Tom Evans phono, my Reference turntable (I might post pictures someday here), Lampizator level 4 DAC, LessLoss cabling and power filter, Alto extremo feet and tons of other stuff...
I'm exploring the territory of Takumi K-10 to move up the ladder and after the years of search perhaps finally move to solid state pream. K-10 seems to be one of few do exactly that. Takumi K-70 is out of reach for now, but certainly of more then interest.
Marvel is not doing his homework. The review in Part 1 is no more than a copy and paste of facts from the website. Where is the beef? You got to work harder, man. You have a pair of killer speakers in your end.
Raymond, I went for a vacation for the last two weeks....yes I should work harder in the following weeks to report more on Agoria....the first report will be out this week which was half wriitten before I went on vacation....sorry for the laziness....
Source: Ikeda 9TT, Da Vinci Virtu, Gabriel turntable, Trinity phono
Vekian Opus transport/DAC with ABC, Neodio transport/DAC
Amps: Robert Koda K10 pre, Analog Domain Calysto power
Part 1 of 6: Vocals
In general, the voices have more ‘fresh’ and ‘meat’ from Agoria. For those who are familiar with how voice is produced from human, it is a combination of the vibration of the vocal chord and the reverberation of the sound inside the chamber between the nose and the beyond the human tongue. For a veteran singer, s/he will make best use of his/her abdomen to cause more reverberation inside the chamber making a prolonged voice without sounding too tight and dry. Agoria is able to depict such sound produced from the chamber airing through the nose. I am sure people who know how to sing would understand my sluggish description. If the balance is tilted more towards the bass compartment, the ‘nose sound’ would be more prominent making the voice too ‘decorated’ and ‘thick’. On the other hand, if the speaker is leaning more on the treble side, the voice would be just like only from the vocal chord.
The 4th cut on the Sissel in Symphony is the most popular recording that I use to test the softness of the treble without which the sound would just be ‘ringing’ inside the ear only causing unpleasant and itchy effect. From Agoria, the treble extension is endless but yet is silky smooth. When a lot of people talk about image focus, we tend to put our attention to the point where the sound is produced: mouth, but under Agoria, I can sense not just the mouth but the head and the physical height of Sissel standing in front of the music band on the stage. Calysto mates extremely well with Agoria delivering ample power to all the drivers with exceedingly synchronous speed. Obviously this cannot yield the result without the perfect integration and compliment of different loadings among the total 16 drivers!
Joan Baez is always my favourite folk song singer and her LP and CD on Diamond & Rust in the Bullring are my reference recording for a long long time. Only that the LP is so scarce that I normally take the Cd for auditioning in other systems leaving the LP at home most of the time. Joan Baez has a magnetic voice to die for! In this live recording, there were many cuts which Joan was singing together with the audience in the Bullring, the atmosphere is so captivating under Agoria that I feel like part of the audience singing and clapping my hands with the others sitting right next to me. I remember I did make similar comment when I added some exotic components in my system, it is the Agoria which makes THE biggest advancement in such ‘virtual reality’. Put it this way, Agoria transforms all the individual contributions into one bigger sum which is unheard of previously. I played the whole LP Side A and B then the whole CD and every cut reassures me that Agoria is capable of re-creating not just the ‘original’ Joan Baez but also the Bullring and the audience. Bass foundation is fundamentally affecting one’s perception on the ‘surrounding’, the ‘ambience’ and the sheer size of the recording venue without which, the differentiation between live recording and recording from a studio becomes blurred!
The last CD I used was the Proprius “Now the Green Blade Riseth” by the Stockholm Cathedral Choir. It is the favourite music of my wife and has been used for her blind test whenever I have changed cables and gears. Because she is so familiar with the voices inside the CD, she could always point out the changes, albeit minute, from a sonical perspective. Her feedback on using Agoria to play this CD was the cathedral becomes more vividly presented with the hollow sound of what a cathedral is like when we were there in our previous tours in Europe. The ‘grandeur’ of the space and separation of the rows of the performers are more solidly re-created. To me, the voices of the boys on the front row, ladies on the 2nd row and gentlemen on the 3rd row have more space and when all were singing in orchestra, it is like listening to a symphony of voices with clear spatial differential of various voice groups. The ‘tonality’ of different voice groups can be heard clearly, again, with mellowness properly balanced with clarity and transparency. I guess not a lot of people know how many people were there in the Stockholm Cathedral Choir, my own feeling of hearing this CD under Agoria is there appears more people than in any of my previous setup, ie. more point sources can be heard while previously they all came intermingled.
Although I have done some minute adjustment on the positioning of the speaker, I still believe I need more help in finetuning it, at this stage, I am already thrilled by the completeness of the soundstage constructed by Agoria/Calysto which appears to be totally independent of the less than ideal room acoustics in my listening area. Compared to the soundstage of AE1, I think I have made a very significant step forward.
To conclude this section, Agoria has a much more linear response to the entire frequency range of human voices. It fills up the energy, particularly on the bass, more fully in my room leading to a more engulfing effect of the soundstage.
In my childhood, whenever there was heavy raining, I thought it was God playing piano because when the big raindrops strike on different surfaces in the balcony, be them plastic basin, tin cover or glass window, they created various sound symphonizing together like some sort of a rhythm (depending on how heaving is the rain). It was perhaps my very first experience on musical enjoyment leading to my subsequent fond interest in listening to piano music.
When I first set up my vinyl system, I bought many LPs on piano but was not genuinely satisfied with the quality of the music produced compared to my CD playback. Not only did my system lacking in the transient and speed, the scale and tonality of the piano were always not as vivid as compared to the CD playback. Over the years, my system evolves gradually in tandem with my listening skills, the enjoyment on piano music out of my vinyl setup has been considerably enhanced. As a result, piano music is always a standing member in the panel for my evaluation of any change in my system. Out of my many favourite piano music, I have selected 6 recordings to help me to explain better the contributions of Agoria in the overall performance of my system.
Jun Fukamachi at Steinway. The imaging depicted by Agoria is significantly more focused and sharp. Not only could I feel the swift shift from lower keys to upper keys in terms of physical positioning in the virtual keyboard between the 2 speakers, I could feel the touching of the hands of Fukamachi onto various keys pacing precisely according to his own interpretation of the Chopin Nocturne. The scale of the Steinway piano is more concretely presented with much authenticity! With the change of the speaker, the distance between Fukamachi san and myself seems to be closer due to the much clearer resolution on the tonality and speed.
On the Mercury LP Encore by Byron Janis which is a live recording in Moscow, Agoria throws out a huge soundstage making me feel like one of the audience in the concert hall. Byron played many pieces by various composers and had earned endless applause by the audience. The space of the concert hall was huge but argument sake, I am not saying Agoria can put me into a virtual space comparable to the actual size of the concert hall. It is only the soundstage thrown out by Agoria has grown bigger piercing through sideway and up. Every keynote from the piano darted into my body plain with clarity and weight.
The 3rd recording I used was the Mazart Fantaisies et Rondos by my most favourite pianist, Maria Joao Pires. This Denon recording was made at the young age of Pires and of all the Mozart piano music, I like Pires’ interpretation the most. It carries the joyful melodic theme of Mozart which is best presented in the hands of a youngster like Pires. The piano sonata was produced not with much dramatic effect or profoundity, under Agoria, Pires played with more harmonic subtlety and brittle texture. Again, resolution and coherence are top top notch on Agoria which push my enjoyment of this LP, which I have listened to more than 100 times, to the highest level!
Another female pianist whom I like most is Kabi Laretei, one of the most renowned Swedish pianist. I used two of her LPs for this review both comprised of various pieces by Mozart, Chopin, Grieg, Debussy and Beethoven… Her specific talent, as perceived by me, is on the warmth and caring feel by her touchings. Everytime I listen to her performance, my mind seems to enter into a ‘maintenance mode’ where every nerve in the brain appears to be washed and cleaned by her music. Very soothing and refreshing! Again, under Agoria, the scent of her enticing music almost put in the ‘sleep mode’ unwinding all my tension and stress. If I use Argerich to contrast with Kabi, the latter’s skill is more on the smoothness and transition from one keynote to another chaining up everything in the pathway rather than trying to cast every keynote either in phrases or individually. Both types of skills are attractive depending on the category of music being played. With Agoria, I would not have much difficulty in differentiating who the performer is.
The last record I used was a piano concerto Rachmaninov Concerto No. 4 by the Italian artist, Michelangeli. The opening orchestral groups of movements were marching towards me with authority followed by the piano soloist pressing further forward in the soundstage of unprecedented scale. I was deeply impressed by the grandeur of the thematic tempo. Although I am not so familiar with Michelangeli, his expression and interpretation on Rachmaninov (Side A) and Ravel (Side were distinctively different thus stimulating me to find out more about these two composers. Without Agoria, I don’t think I can be so acute in noting the difference in the musical intentions of the two composers even though they were presented by the same pianist. To this end, Agoria can be better described as a tool like a microscope to dissect everything in the music passage without any twisting or coloration.
To summarise this section, piano music under Agoria has a fuller scale and weight. Focuses are not only on the pinpoint type of imaging on keyboards, but also on the 3-dimension of the piano itself, this is more apparent to me when listening to piano sonatas. From the building up of the climax to the dissolving into the rippling harmonics, everything is so seamlessly sewed together to form a coherent piano musical flow. Bass authenticity is top notch delivering a solid soundstage and a progressive marching feel in many of the records I described above.
Thanks for the good work. May I request a session on Jazz/Rock?
In your next writeup, can you put some more ink referencing the interaction of the Agoria with your acoustics? This will allow us to have a better grasp on the whole picture. Your left channel is extremely closed to the side wall. How will such constraint mitigate the projection of "soundstage"? Are you referring to better depth or instead of better width upon the Agoria is setup? Had you ever experimented the position of different jumpers at the back? This speaker has immense resolving power and endless possibilities of being driven.
I have many questions as usual. I hope you can address at least some of them.
Comments
Congrats on your newest acquisition.
I must make it a point to listen to the Agoria the next time I am in HK. But the way it is selling, I think I will have to wait for yours to arrive!
Your CDSE already sounded very nice when I was at your place a year back. Have there been any changes to your setup?
I really look forward to your "unprecedentedly comprehensive report" on Agoria.
Where are you located? Should you be called Mr.Takumi instead?
What is your current system config? I enjoy talking to new fellow. Speak up more!
Introduction.
As promised earlier, I wish to write a more comprehensive review on Agoria which to me and many many audiophiles longing for a pair of ultimate speaker is a major technological breakthrough in many aspects both on the build and sonical performance.
In the next 6 sections, I will use 6 LP/CDs to help me describing the various characteristics of Agoria and explain why I believe it is 'The One' for me.
IN this section, I provide some basic information below which is extracted from the Tidal website but it is quite interesting when I bring all the data into a table below:
CDSE Agoria Sunray
Woofer 2 x 9" 2 x 11" 4 x 9"
Sub-bass Radia ---- 2 x 11" ----
Midrange 1 x 7" 2 x 7" 2 x 7"
Tweeter 1 x1.2" 1 x 1.2" 1 x 1.2"
Cabinet RMD TIRALIT RMD-ND
Height 1.3m 1.69m 1.99m
Weight 230Kg 410Kg 520Kg
Amongst the three, Agoria has the most number of drivers, larger size bass drivers, the highest density per meter in height and a new and proprietary cabinet technology.
Because of this new cabinet technology, the vibration control and damping control of Agoria have been improved by leaps and it helps in the imaging precision and minimise the phase difference when signals are channeled through all these drivers harmoniously.
Why the change from K-70 to Analog Domain? Interesting transition as it seems, these are two completely different power amps by technology used...
Thanks
No problem. I can be called Mr. Takumi, but this is quite a name to behold
I'm far away from you guys. Europe it is.
My system consists of Mactone MH-300 B power amp, Lamm LL2 preamp, Tom Evans phono, my Reference turntable (I might post pictures someday here), Lampizator level 4 DAC, LessLoss cabling and power filter, Alto extremo feet and tons of other stuff...
I'm exploring the territory of Takumi K-10 to move up the ladder and after the years of search perhaps finally move to solid state pream. K-10 seems to be one of few do exactly that. Takumi K-70 is out of reach for now, but certainly of more then interest.
Source: Ikeda 9TT, Da Vinci Virtu, Gabriel turntable, Trinity phono
Vekian Opus transport/DAC with ABC, Neodio transport/DAC
Amps: Robert Koda K10 pre, Analog Domain Calysto power
Part 1 of 6: Vocals
In general, the voices have more ‘fresh’ and ‘meat’ from Agoria. For those who are familiar with how voice is produced from human, it is a combination of the vibration of the vocal chord and the reverberation of the sound inside the chamber between the nose and the beyond the human tongue. For a veteran singer, s/he will make best use of his/her abdomen to cause more reverberation inside the chamber making a prolonged voice without sounding too tight and dry. Agoria is able to depict such sound produced from the chamber airing through the nose. I am sure people who know how to sing would understand my sluggish description. If the balance is tilted more towards the bass compartment, the ‘nose sound’ would be more prominent making the voice too ‘decorated’ and ‘thick’. On the other hand, if the speaker is leaning more on the treble side, the voice would be just like only from the vocal chord.
The 4th cut on the Sissel in Symphony is the most popular recording that I use to test the softness of the treble without which the sound would just be ‘ringing’ inside the ear only causing unpleasant and itchy effect. From Agoria, the treble extension is endless but yet is silky smooth. When a lot of people talk about image focus, we tend to put our attention to the point where the sound is produced: mouth, but under Agoria, I can sense not just the mouth but the head and the physical height of Sissel standing in front of the music band on the stage. Calysto mates extremely well with Agoria delivering ample power to all the drivers with exceedingly synchronous speed. Obviously this cannot yield the result without the perfect integration and compliment of different loadings among the total 16 drivers!
Joan Baez is always my favourite folk song singer and her LP and CD on Diamond & Rust in the Bullring are my reference recording for a long long time. Only that the LP is so scarce that I normally take the Cd for auditioning in other systems leaving the LP at home most of the time. Joan Baez has a magnetic voice to die for! In this live recording, there were many cuts which Joan was singing together with the audience in the Bullring, the atmosphere is so captivating under Agoria that I feel like part of the audience singing and clapping my hands with the others sitting right next to me. I remember I did make similar comment when I added some exotic components in my system, it is the Agoria which makes THE biggest advancement in such ‘virtual reality’. Put it this way, Agoria transforms all the individual contributions into one bigger sum which is unheard of previously. I played the whole LP Side A and B then the whole CD and every cut reassures me that Agoria is capable of re-creating not just the ‘original’ Joan Baez but also the Bullring and the audience. Bass foundation is fundamentally affecting one’s perception on the ‘surrounding’, the ‘ambience’ and the sheer size of the recording venue without which, the differentiation between live recording and recording from a studio becomes blurred!
The last CD I used was the Proprius “Now the Green Blade Riseth” by the Stockholm Cathedral Choir. It is the favourite music of my wife and has been used for her blind test whenever I have changed cables and gears. Because she is so familiar with the voices inside the CD, she could always point out the changes, albeit minute, from a sonical perspective. Her feedback on using Agoria to play this CD was the cathedral becomes more vividly presented with the hollow sound of what a cathedral is like when we were there in our previous tours in Europe. The ‘grandeur’ of the space and separation of the rows of the performers are more solidly re-created. To me, the voices of the boys on the front row, ladies on the 2nd row and gentlemen on the 3rd row have more space and when all were singing in orchestra, it is like listening to a symphony of voices with clear spatial differential of various voice groups. The ‘tonality’ of different voice groups can be heard clearly, again, with mellowness properly balanced with clarity and transparency. I guess not a lot of people know how many people were there in the Stockholm Cathedral Choir, my own feeling of hearing this CD under Agoria is there appears more people than in any of my previous setup, ie. more point sources can be heard while previously they all came intermingled.
Although I have done some minute adjustment on the positioning of the speaker, I still believe I need more help in finetuning it, at this stage, I am already thrilled by the completeness of the soundstage constructed by Agoria/Calysto which appears to be totally independent of the less than ideal room acoustics in my listening area. Compared to the soundstage of AE1, I think I have made a very significant step forward.
To conclude this section, Agoria has a much more linear response to the entire frequency range of human voices. It fills up the energy, particularly on the bass, more fully in my room leading to a more engulfing effect of the soundstage.
In my childhood, whenever there was heavy raining, I thought it was God playing piano because when the big raindrops strike on different surfaces in the balcony, be them plastic basin, tin cover or glass window, they created various sound symphonizing together like some sort of a rhythm (depending on how heaving is the rain). It was perhaps my very first experience on musical enjoyment leading to my subsequent fond interest in listening to piano music.
When I first set up my vinyl system, I bought many LPs on piano but was not genuinely satisfied with the quality of the music produced compared to my CD playback. Not only did my system lacking in the transient and speed, the scale and tonality of the piano were always not as vivid as compared to the CD playback. Over the years, my system evolves gradually in tandem with my listening skills, the enjoyment on piano music out of my vinyl setup has been considerably enhanced. As a result, piano music is always a standing member in the panel for my evaluation of any change in my system. Out of my many favourite piano music, I have selected 6 recordings to help me to explain better the contributions of Agoria in the overall performance of my system.
Jun Fukamachi at Steinway. The imaging depicted by Agoria is significantly more focused and sharp. Not only could I feel the swift shift from lower keys to upper keys in terms of physical positioning in the virtual keyboard between the 2 speakers, I could feel the touching of the hands of Fukamachi onto various keys pacing precisely according to his own interpretation of the Chopin Nocturne. The scale of the Steinway piano is more concretely presented with much authenticity! With the change of the speaker, the distance between Fukamachi san and myself seems to be closer due to the much clearer resolution on the tonality and speed.
On the Mercury LP Encore by Byron Janis which is a live recording in Moscow, Agoria throws out a huge soundstage making me feel like one of the audience in the concert hall. Byron played many pieces by various composers and had earned endless applause by the audience. The space of the concert hall was huge but argument sake, I am not saying Agoria can put me into a virtual space comparable to the actual size of the concert hall. It is only the soundstage thrown out by Agoria has grown bigger piercing through sideway and up. Every keynote from the piano darted into my body plain with clarity and weight.
The 3rd recording I used was the Mazart Fantaisies et Rondos by my most favourite pianist, Maria Joao Pires. This Denon recording was made at the young age of Pires and of all the Mozart piano music, I like Pires’ interpretation the most. It carries the joyful melodic theme of Mozart which is best presented in the hands of a youngster like Pires. The piano sonata was produced not with much dramatic effect or profoundity, under Agoria, Pires played with more harmonic subtlety and brittle texture. Again, resolution and coherence are top top notch on Agoria which push my enjoyment of this LP, which I have listened to more than 100 times, to the highest level!
Another female pianist whom I like most is Kabi Laretei, one of the most renowned Swedish pianist. I used two of her LPs for this review both comprised of various pieces by Mozart, Chopin, Grieg, Debussy and Beethoven… Her specific talent, as perceived by me, is on the warmth and caring feel by her touchings. Everytime I listen to her performance, my mind seems to enter into a ‘maintenance mode’ where every nerve in the brain appears to be washed and cleaned by her music. Very soothing and refreshing! Again, under Agoria, the scent of her enticing music almost put in the ‘sleep mode’ unwinding all my tension and stress. If I use Argerich to contrast with Kabi, the latter’s skill is more on the smoothness and transition from one keynote to another chaining up everything in the pathway rather than trying to cast every keynote either in phrases or individually. Both types of skills are attractive depending on the category of music being played. With Agoria, I would not have much difficulty in differentiating who the performer is.
The last record I used was a piano concerto Rachmaninov Concerto No. 4 by the Italian artist, Michelangeli. The opening orchestral groups of movements were marching towards me with authority followed by the piano soloist pressing further forward in the soundstage of unprecedented scale. I was deeply impressed by the grandeur of the thematic tempo. Although I am not so familiar with Michelangeli, his expression and interpretation on Rachmaninov (Side A) and Ravel (Side
To summarise this section, piano music under Agoria has a fuller scale and weight. Focuses are not only on the pinpoint type of imaging on keyboards, but also on the 3-dimension of the piano itself, this is more apparent to me when listening to piano sonatas. From the building up of the climax to the dissolving into the rippling harmonics, everything is so seamlessly sewed together to form a coherent piano musical flow. Bass authenticity is top notch delivering a solid soundstage and a progressive marching feel in many of the records I described above.
Thanks for the good work. May I request a session on Jazz/Rock?
In your next writeup, can you put some more ink referencing the interaction of the Agoria with your acoustics? This will allow us to have a better grasp on the whole picture. Your left channel is extremely closed to the side wall. How will such constraint mitigate the projection of "soundstage"? Are you referring to better depth or instead of better width upon the Agoria is setup? Had you ever experimented the position of different jumpers at the back? This speaker has immense resolving power and endless possibilities of being driven.
I have many questions as usual. I hope you can address at least some of them.
Thanks, roger out.