Vivid Audio Oval K1 Loudspeaker

John Marks has posted a review of the Vivid Audio’s Oval K1 loudspeakers ($/pair) in his The Fifth Element column at Stereophile. His conclusions:

“The Vivid Oval K1 is one of my absolute favorite loudspeakers ever, joining the very short list of Harbeth’s P3ESR, Wilson Benesch’s A.C.T. (ca 1997), and the Shahinian’s original Obelisk and Diapason. But does that immanentize the eschaton for everyone else? Um, not quite.

One area in which others might decide that other speakers better suit their rooms and tastes for similar money is the bass. In that respect, Vivid’s line of speakers strikes me as philosophically similar to Wilson Benesch’s: At each step up the price ladder, neither manufacturer offers the bass extension, heft, and slam of its US competitors at that price, the chiefest of which is Wilson Audio Specialties. Comparing the published specs, and at roughly the same cost, Wilson’s Sasha W/P offers bass extension to 20Hz, –3dB, vs the Vivid Oval K1′s 30Hz, –6dB. That’s a major difference. Although I haven’t had the Sashas here, I spent a very full day and evening with a very well set-up pair at Fidelis A/V in New Hampshire and was extremely impressed…

Don’t get the wrong impression: Vivid’s Oval K1—like the B1, but more so—could play crazily loud and go plenty deep with such “guilty pleasure” tracks as Alannah Myles’s “Black Velvet,” Al Stewart’s “The Year of the Cat,” and Jamshied Sharifi’s “Tariqat.” (All as JA heard here through the B1s; Sixpence None the Richer’s “I’ve Been Waiting” rocked him back in his chair.) It’s just that Wilson Audio’s $15,000/pair Duette produces about the same amount of bass as the $25,000/pair Oval K1—and in the K1′s own price range, Wilson’s Sasha outputs a lot more. ”

You can read the full review here.