Usher BE-10, BE-20 ?
Suteetat -- Sun, 11/23/2008 - 23:21
Hi, I am a long time lurker of this forum and have been a reader of Absolute Sound on and off for
about 20 years. I am in a process of replacing my trustworthy Martin Logan Monolithe III. After
listening to several speakers including ML Summit, 3A Grand Veena, Quad 2905, my favorite speakers so far
are Usher BE-10. Pricewise over here in Thailand, all these speakers are within a couple of
thousands dollars of each other. The dealer is getting in a pair of Usher BE-20 in the next few weeks.
From what I read in your review, Be-10 is more suitable for smaller room (which was the case with
showroom for BE-10). My living room is roughly 22x24x9ft with quite a bit of furnitures, grandpiano, CD cases on
one side wall, bookcases on the rear wall, carpeted floor etc. What is considered medium to large room?
I was only able to audit Grand Veena in my apartment. All other speakers were auditioned in various
show rooms with many unfamiliar equipments so it was really quite difficult to compare.
I listen to a lot of solo piano all the way up to Mahler symphonies, lots of operas including Wagner
quite a bit of vocal music and lieders but not so much jazz, pop, rock etc. I feel Usher is the most
versatile of the bunch and can handle large scale music as well as solo piano very well. Female vocal
is quite sensational. I really thought initially that Quads 2905 would be my next speakers but
Mahler is out. Big operatic scene with large chorus and ensembles is not so great either.
I am still trying to locate Sonus Faber Cremona M and Wilson Sophia to audition.
The speakers will be used with an older pair of Jadis JA200 amplifiers.
Thanks for your opinion and input.
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Chris Martens is the resident expert on the big Usher speakers, so I'll let him add to this. But I would say that your room definitely qualifies as large. So, the BE-20 could work. But I think the feeling here is that the BE-10 works well in a variety of rooms, whereas with for the BE-20 to be worth it you really must have a larger room. And even then it isn't clear that it will work better. Many of us would save the price difference and apply it to upgrades in source or amplification or room treatment.
CEO and Editorial Director, Nextscreen LLC
Given that you currently have a pair of Monoliths, I think you'd be well advised to check out ML's current top speaker, the CLX. In a room the size of yours, you might want a pair of Descent i subs, but try the CLX without the subs first.
Hi Suteetat, you pose an excellent question and one on which I think I can shed some light. Your room definitely qualifies as a large space, but that does not necessarily mean you need to go with the Usher Be-20. Here's my take on the Be-10 vs. Be-20:
1) The Be-10 works well both in small and large rooms, with the only practical limitation being that--at some point--you might conceivably reach the excursion limits of the Be-10's single Eton woofer on loud, low-bass passages.
2) Because the Be-10 is shorter than the Be-10, it places the midrange/tweeter drivers more nearly at ear level for a seated listener, which I count as a plus. The Be-20, on the other hand, places the midrange/tweeter drivers above ear level, which isn't a problem in larger rooms where listeners sit well back from the speaker, but can be tricky for listeners who prefer to listen to the speaker from up close.
3) The Be-20 is really optimized for larger rooms, and doesn't work well in smaller spaces because its dual Eton woofers can easily overload rooms with more bass output that they can handle.
As a side note, I should mention that I once had an opportunity to discuss the Be-10 and Be-20 designs with a gifted speaker designer who had analyzed both models with an eye toward seeing whether it might be possible to offer upgrade kits (an open-ended question, as it turns out, since the speakers are awfully good to begin with). But what particularly interested me were the designer's comments on the Be-20's dual woofer design. The designer told me he felt the Be-20's dual woofers were "not working very hard most of the time" and therefore represented "overkill in most rooms and on most music." The designer felt the output capabilities of the Eton woofer were sufficiently high that "one is really all you need."
The point, I think, is that the Be-10 might be the better balanced and more versatile model overall.
Chris Martens
Editor, Playback
Cannot agree with you more. Very nice input!
Cannot agree with you more. Very nice input!
Dear Mr Martens and other members of this forum,
I have the rare opportunity to get my hands on a BE-20 for an exceptional nice price. But I'm worried that my listening room might be too small for it (ft 23 x 16 x 6.8, well damped with carped, bookshelfs and sofa, only small windows). Unfortunately, I have no chance to find out if the BE-20's dual woofers overload my room before I buy them. If this is the case, would a solution to my problem be to simply disconnect one of the two woofers of the BE-20? Would that downgrade the BE-20 to a BE-10 without any disadvantages?
Best Regards - Chris
Dear Mr Martens and other members of this forum,
I have the rare opportunity to get my hands on a BE-20 for an exceptional nice price. But I'm worried that my listening room might be too small for it (ft 23 x 16 x 6.8, well damped with carped, bookshelfs and sofa, only small windows). Unfortunately, I have no chance to find out if the BE-20's dual woofers overload my room before I buy them. If this is the case, would a solution to my problem be to simply disconnect one of the two woofers of the BE-20? Would that downgrade the BE-20 to a BE-10 without any disadvantages?
Best Regards - Chris
Dear Mr Martens and other members of this forum,
I have the rare opportunity to get my hands on a BE-20 for an exceptional nice price. But I'm worried that my listening room might be too small (ft 23 x 16 x 6.8, well damped with carped, bookshelfs and sofa, only small windows). Unfortunately, I have no chance to find out if the BE-20's dual woofers overload my room before I buy them. If this is the case, would a solution to my problem be to simply disconnect one of the two woofers of the BE-20? Would that downgrade the BE-20 to a BE-10 without any disadvantages?
Best Regards - Chris
Thank you for all your comments. I was a bit disappointed with ML Summit as I did not think it was a significant improvement over my Monolith. CLX would be very interesting but way beyond what I could afford currently. US audio product cost about 30-50% more than US retail price here in Thailand whereas European can be anywhere from 20%less to 20% more than the US. Usher on the other hand is quite a bit less expensive than in the US so it seems like a great bargain. The difference in prices between BE10 and 20 is not that huge, certainly not $4000 spread like it is in the US. The dealer here also seems to prefer BE-10 over BE-20 quite a bit.
My room, as I said is 22x24ft. One side wall is really only a half wall wiith large opening into kitchen/dining area and hallway into bed room. With my current set up, I sit about 11 ft away from each speaker with the Monolith about 5 ft from the back wall with some absorptive panels behind the speakers. Most likely I will start with similar location and will start moving things around. For BE-20, what would be the minimum distance between the speaker and listener, considering the height of the tweeter, in your opinio?. I don't always listen to the music very loud but once in awhile, I love a little goose bump experience when I listen to either Birgitt Nilsson or Eva Marton's in Richard Strauss' Elektra or some other big symphonic works.
Suteetat
A quick update, I arranged to have the BE-20 auditioned in my room. I found the bass to be just about right balance in my room.
However, as mentioned earlier, the speakers are quite tall and at my usual listening position about 9ft away, I am sitting too low
for the speakers. My ears are at about the midrange driver height and the sound improved quite a bit if I sit up another 4-6 inches
which is rather surprising since at my usual height works very well with ML Monolith.
Anyhow, I moved the speakers around quite a bit yet and have not install the spike feet yet which will add even more height to the
speakers. When on spikes, is it a good idea to tilt the speaker forward a little bit to aim the tweeter more at my ear level? Is that
going to be the problem with the time coherent design?.
Thanks for any comment.
Hi, Suteetat, I'm currently auditioning the Dancer 8571 and waiting for a pair of BE-10's to arrive in the UK. I've experienced a similar performance feature to you - if I sit up higher than the mid-range driver, the bass response is much fuller. Part of it is a room issue, I'm sure but I'm wondering if it is also a design aspect of the Dancer series. Tilting the speakers made no difference. I think you need to experiment more with positioning.
"Break the rules" and push the BE-20's near to the rear wall. You'll get bass reinforcement, the image depth will disappear and the midrange will become muddy. Then put them wide apart - say 20% of the width of the room in from the side walls, so about 4'6" in your room. If you can hear them iindividually, bring them closer together a little at a time. Then, start to ease them out from the wall, a little at a time, more to begin with, less as you start to fine tune. I think you'll find a point around 36 to 40 inches out where you get the mid range and iimage depth back and you'll have the frequency extension when seated, too. Then, you can fine tune things with your listening position. (Of course, it might just be easier to buy a higher seat...)
Steve
Steve, thanks for your comment. My set up is a bit irregular as the stereo is in the living room. Right now, both speakers are
about 5ft from rear wall, one speaker is about 3ft from side wall with bass trap and absorptive panels behind it, the speakers are 9ft apart so one speaker is quite far from the side wall but there is a grand piano between it and the side wall. I am sitting 12ft away from the speakers. So far I find the bass to be very tight and well balanced.. The treble does not yet have the kind of smoothness that I heard on a BE10 in the dealer showroom but that is because the speakers only have about 20 hours breaking in period so far.
Currently a couple of big cushions on my couch seemed to be the best solution until I can get taller seat. Now that the height is taken care off, I will need to try to pull the speakers away from the back wall a bit more and see if that will improve anything more.
Suteetat
Khun Suteetat, I've just purchased the BE-10 from audiocom in Thailand, I think it's the same one that you had auditioned earlier. I don’t know if it’s my room or set up that the speaker is sounding kind of strange.
The midrange and the lower bass don’t seem to blend. The music doesn’t flow smoothly from mid to bottom. The mid sounds kind of thin. The dealer suggested that it’s because that I’m driving my amp direct using the wadia 581se, and I should try a good preamp between them.
How is your current setup? I’m glad if you could share. Here is my number 0819012363.
Well, after serious listening, I think the problem is with my wadia 581 se. I have the wadia for about 3 months and with only about 50 hrs play time. I switched to my older Marantz and wow, the singer’s voice just gush out of the BE-10. So it’s not the Usher fault after all.
The wadia has more details in the instrumental and strings, but falls badly on the singer’s voice. The voice sounds so thin, laid back and sterilize compared to my U$500 Marantz.
Do you think I need more time to burn my Wadia before it can really drive the BE-10. I’m always out of town and only have a chance to listen to my system a couple of time a month. And I don’t feel comfortable leaving the cd on when I’m away.
Khun Lek, I would not give up on the Wadia just yet. I think it should be very safe to leave the Wadia on all the time at least for now. I leave my Esoteric D-05 on pretty all the time except when I am away for a week or longer. However I am glad to hear that BE-10 works very well with your old CD player. I do find that some CD players sound better with a good preamp though. I certainly prefer my Esoteric D-05 hooked through Audio Research Ref-3 than going directly to my amplifier. I tried to call you around 7.30pm local time here but no answer. Anyhow, you should have my cell number now on your phone so please feel free to call whenever.
During the last weekend, I did arrange for an audition of a Wadia 581 SE at my home. The Wadia is a demo player at my local dealer which has more than 600 hrs of burn-in period. Compared to mine, it is more refine, focus and has more warmth in the upper midrange. But I still prefer to have more warmth in the vocal. Can anyone suggest what kind of interconnect to use? The music coming out of the BE-10 is still kind of dry and not involving. Right now I’m using a Wireworld Gold Eclipse 3, it is an old version.
During the last weekend, I did arrange for an audition of a Wadia 581 SE at my home. The Wadia is a demo player at my local dealer which has more than 600 hrs of burn-in period. Compared to mine, it is more refine, focus and has more warmth in the upper midrange. But I still prefer to have more warmth in the vocal. Can anyone suggest what kind of interconnect to use? The music coming out of the BE-10 is still kind of dry and not involving. Right now I’m using a Wireworld Gold Eclipse 3, it is an old version.
I have a pair of brand new Usher BE-10's on evaluation. They've been in place for a week and from around day 3 started to open out so that the mid and top end softened and the bass both extended and became fuller. That process is ongoing and I've heard of BE-10's which are improving after 1,000 hours.
I have to say, they have already impressed me hugely. With Dancer 8571's in my room, I had some integration problems that I felt were room related. The BE-10's have answered that. The room definitely has a bearing but it seems to me now that the 8571's could not load the room adequately. The BE-10's provide delicacy and, very importantly to me, clarity with spoken voice and Lieder that equals my Sonus faber Guarneri Homage, which have been my standard setters in this dimension. Top to bottom integration is seamless to my ears and the bass is very tuneful - they really do show nuance in bass tones. They are extremely quick and, with the bass extension and mid/top clarity, make sense of music that I've found difficult before. An example is David Bowie's Black Tie, White Noise album.
I have a dCS transport and DAC driving MacIntosh MC501 amplifiers. I don't have any analogue sources and don't use a preamp. Whilst I've never heard a Wadia component, I wouldn't rush to change anything - new speakers and a new front end is enough already. Why not put the Wadia on repeat for a week? Turn it down over night but let it play continuoulsly. With 200 to 300 hours under it, I'm sure it will be nicer and will then be a better platform for decisions on interconnects and cables.
I think the BE-10's are slightly on the warm side; feed them a high quality signal of clarity and detail and they'll make stunning music of it. I'm pretty sure that mine will be staying.
Hi, this is atul kanagat, President and CEO of MusikMatters, exclusive US importers and distributors of Usher Audio and JPS Wire products. I enjoyed reading this thread, especially the part about how great the Ushers sound.
I have been a committed (sic) audiophile for thirty years, and an Usher Distributor for less than three. I personall;y prefer the Be-10 in most applications. The woofer is more than enough and the presentation feels tighter and more dynamic in most rooms. Also, we have received consistent feedback from highly qualified listeners tthat the cabinet and the drivers in the Be 10s and 20s are without peer at these price points. We have improved the internal components on all speakers, and independent designers are offering upgrade kits to take advantage of this opportunity.
One of the features of the Be 10 and 20 that some people have difficulty with is the sheer size of these sapeakers. The Be 10 is obviosly a bit better than the Be 20s. At CES, Usher introduces two new "mini" dancers, the mini 1 and the mini 2. The mini 2 is a three way MTKM design and the 1s are two way floorstanders. They are priced at 3800 and 4800 a pair. Their footprint is about half the footprint of the big Dancers and may fit some lifestyles (and wallets) a bit better.
Hi, Atul. Interesting comments, especially about the upgrade kits. How will such upgrades affect the manufacturers warranty?
During this week I've decided to buy the BE-10's I've been evaluating. I guess that my comments have to be taken in that light - that I'm blinded to flaws and shortcomings to reinforce my buying decision! Actually, I don't feel like that at all! I've spent 18 months listening to speakers at various price points from around GBP6k to GBP15k. The BE-10's are the best I've heard in that period.
About their size (BE-10's as I've never seen BE-20's): They are large but their proportion and profile makes them much more room friendly. They are 43" at the front (without spikes) rising about 3" to the rear. That, with the curved side walls makes them easy to look at. The more difficult thing is their weight. My listening room is upstairs and they need two strong people to move around. On carpet, they can be moved easily for fine tuning. Spikes should definitely be left to "the last act".
What impresses me most is the amount of space they create for individual instruments and voices and then the musical detail they fill that space with. I'm having more fun with my collection than for a long time.
I also would like to find out a bit more information regarding upgrade kit etc.
Now that my BE-20 has a bit more time to break in, I continue to impress by the level of their improvement
and may be I should stop thinking about tweaking my system for awhile and just enjoy the
music but curious mind would like to know.
Unfortunately I never get to hear BE-10 in my living room. The dealer did offer that if BE-20
overloaded my room, he would bring in the Be-10 for me to try. After a few days of living
with BE-20, I was not going to let them leave my place.
BE-20s are quite large but after living with ML Monolith for 12 years, BE-20s are no problem!
The height is really the only problem I ended up raising my sofa another 20 cm to get proper sitting height.
I also find BE-20 matches incredibly well with Synergistic Research cables. I use the Accelerator interconnects
for quite awhile now but recently replaced my old pair of Wireworld Gold Eclipse speaker cables with
biwire SR Accelerator speaker cables and I could not be happier.
Usher is not offering an upgrade kit at present. Loyd Walker, designer of the Walker Prosceneum Black Diamond Turntable, has developed an upgrade for the Be 20's that is nothing short of sensational. You may want to look into that. I have heard it with his mod (point to point silver wire, high grade resistors and caps, and his pixie dust,) and they sound excellent. I suspect it will be a very expensive mod, knowing Loyd.
I don't know if he will entertain modding a pair of Be 10s.
John Tucker did demonstrate a modded Be 10 at RMAF. You might want to explore that too. I am told it was very good, but was not able to develop a personal point of view.
A bit more on my last point above. John Tucker, Exemplar Audio, is offering modified Be 10s for $ 21,500. Or you can get an upgrade kit from them for $ 3,000.
This is worth looking into.
Hey Atul,
I'm running a pair of BE-718 and am upgrading soon (hopefully) to the Mini-dancer 1 for the slightly better bass extension, which I consider the only weakness in the smaller speakers. For the month or so I had them they were extremely pleasing to listen to, even with my very basic source, cabling and amplification (E-mu1212m, Buffalo DAC, homemade cables and a LM3886 chipamp with exotic parts).
Would you think it would be worthwhile to perform some homemade upgrades - silver wire, new resistors and Mundorf caps etc, or is there little room for improving the design? I do know that you had a hand in its conception and design - and I'm really hoping to be treated to a great experience. The India distributor could only get hold of two pairs, so I'm getting the maple finish (assume the same as the BE-10/20) while he keeps the Pioneer in the showroom. His initial reports seem to indicate excellent extension and output in the lower registers, along with improved imaging (!) and a more open midrange from the BE-718, I assume this might have got to do with the low-diffraction setup of the tweeter which is closer to the bigger Ushers.
As a side note, apartments in Mumbai, India, are usually very small so the bigger dancers aren't going to have much room to dance ;)
Well, the Mini-Dancer 1s are in the house and I have the following to say:
For:
Against:
Overall, I'm actually debating keeping them or switching back to the Tiny Dancers. The improved extension comes at the price of some midrange harshness. Diana Krall's whiskey and honey voice has much less honey, for example. The sound is more 'dry', for lack of a better word. It seems they either got something wrong when redesigning the XO for the larger baffle, or dumped the BE-718 XO into this without a single change (which would result in some loss of lower midrange due to the larger baffle). Or, the midwoofer needs a lot of running in to settle down.
Once I get a comparison from my dealer (who's running AB against the BE-718 today) and these have run in properly, I'll be making a decision on these. For now, I remain hopeful.
S
Further observations: The Usher Mini-Dancers have settled down, I now have over two hundred hours on them. The sound is a lot more tamed than it was to start with, and the bass is deeper than it was out of the box.
My frustration with the binding posts on the Usher mini-Dancers remains though. These ones don't grip spades well at all (I'm using the Cardas CCMS-C1 milled spades) and generally inspire no confidence, and the wiring used is generic Taiwanese OFC speaker wire, not the JPS wiring used on the smaller speakers.
Caveat Emptor.
Sangram
I am happy to hear you like the sound and sorry that the construcftion is causing some problems. The product we are evaluating for the US has no such issues. Since I don't distribute to India, I can't help you directly. I will send your entry on to Usher to see what they say.
Frankly, I thnk the Be 718's are perfect for apartments in Mumbai or New York. The front port allows flexibility with placement relative to the rear wall. Their excellent off-axis response makes room interactions a bit easier to deal with. We are working on a powered pedestal for the Be 718's; ETA uncertain given the economy, to extend the bass.
As you know, the US version of the Be 718's is different from versions elsewhere. The crossover network and internal wiring and damping are made to our specs for the US. Please be sure to ask for the US version to receive the extraordinary performance the 718's can provide.
We are putting the Minis through their paces and evaluating the wisdom of updating its internals. Usher has incorporated much of our feedback from the US into their stock models, so it is not clear if we need to add the American pixie dust or not. we will know within a month or two. Stay tuned.
-atul
Atul -
Any updates on the Minis? Will you be changing any of the internals? Any comments on the performance relative to the Be 718's? Any idea on availability? Thanks!
The Usher Mini Dancer 2's have been tested and approved for release in the US. They are very good indeed. Compared to the Be 718s (aka Tiny Dancers) they are more efficient at over 90dB at 1 meter compared to 86 for the tiny's; thus they are easier to drive opening up a broader range of amplifiers theat can drive them effectively.
They should be available for purchase by the end of April at a bit under $ 5,000 MSRP.
Hi Atul, thanks for the reply, sorry it took me so long to put in mine. I understand that the product for the US is quite different in the case of the BE-718. It is not possible to get that version in other parts of the world, as I am led to believe. I don't know what they've done with the final runs of the Mini-Dancer, as I was told got one of the two pre-production pieces for India, not a production version. I guess I was expecting more from a $4000 product myself, but I guess I'll live.
I am in the process of upgrading the wiring on my speakers to a mix of Cardas litz, Wonder Wire and solid silver, which has resulted in a slight softening of the previously crisp midrange and upper end for a bit more sophistication and air, and a more solid bass foundation, the stock wire was of pretty low quality and only 18AWG, I like internals to be a little more substantial. I am particularly happy with the quality of the drivers and the woodwork, a three-part front baffle and three separate crossover boards really inspires confidence, though the 'Rapport' capacitors used in the tweeter crossover will probably have to be changed out for something better, I'd be happy to hear a suggestion of a suitable type. I am planning on using Cardas bare copper binding posts as the next change along with the capacitors.
I have now moved back to Calcutta, another Indian city, where the room is a healthy 18x22ft, which is around the right size for the Minis, and the bottom end has opened up very nicely indeed. I did hear about the bass module for the BE-718, and I guess it would be a good additon to the BE-718. I did feel the reach was not *that* deep though the quality of the bass that was there was first-rate. The Minis sounded nice enough and a little better over the BE-718 in that tiny flat , but in the new location they absolutely shine, with reach all the way down to the early 30s, which is more than enough for me.
Do the US models have the same binding posts as the CP line (mine do) or have they used the Dancer posts? And are they using upgraded wire and crossovers, or is it the same all over the world?