Orpheus Apollos

[buddyev]

Just taken delivery of some beautiful Orpheus Apollos courtesy of Mr Rantan. Thanks very much, it was a very great pleasure to deal with you, sir.

I hadn’t considered the Apollos before and knew nothing about them. I saw and scored these by sheer chance, instinct and, I realise now, very good luck.

Here’s the result of a preliminary listen—a couple of hours only—but I’ll resist the temptation to write something considered and thoughtful and just shoot from the hip.

I have 2 systems, both fed by Imac, iTunes, Airport Express, Rega dac.

Lounge: Arcam Delta 290 running Celestion A2. It was fine before we enlarged and renovated the room. The standmounts are a bit lost in such a big space and I’ve been intermittently looking for some floorstanders to replace them. This will probably where the Apollos end up.

Study: Arcam A90 & Arcam P90 bi-amping B&W CDM7s. I work at home so spend all day every day with this playing so I know the sound pretty well. Arcam makes a lot of people groan. They probably are boring and middle-of-the-road but they are my only experience of reasonable quality gear—you don’t miss what you don’t know. I added the P90 last year and it made a massive difference to the speed, space and detail—a dull system came alive. I didn’t discover this difference from careful critical and comparative listening but from suddenly having to get up and bop around the room or listen more closely. Background music was no longer background but commanded my attention—bad for my work, but a real ear-opener. This is all very unfortunate because now I’m getting picky.

Anyway, I thought I’d check out the Apollos in the study first so I moved out the B&Ws. The Apollos have only one set of posts so I connected them to the Arcam A90 only. As you’d expect, it was immediately apparent that I didn’t have the staging and detail I’m used to, but they do sound pretty nice.

First up: Coltrane’s Africa Brass. This is a deal-breaker for me. Coltrane’s sax can be rendered unlistenable with an aggressive tweeter or overly bright system. He is singlehandedly responsible for me dumping the DacMagic in favour of the Rega dac. The top end is strong and true, no grating metallic edges or sssibilance. Nice. Also very taken with the double bass in the opening bars—really tight and well defined, no woolliness at all. Impressive.

Samuel Yirga’s Habasha Sessions: great piano playing. The piano doesn’t have the excitement or immediacy it has with the bi-amped B&Ws. The left hand doesn’t have quite the beautiful liquid waterfall feel and the right hand isn’t as quick, clean and percussive. Not bad though.

Tom Waits. Misery is the river of the world, everybody row. Yes, he’s had 25 or is that 26 fags before breakfast today. The voice is terrific. Prefer over the B&Ws

Dylan: I am a lonesome hobo. The voice is quite a bit richer and much less thin and nasally than in the B&Ws. Definitely prefer the Apollos.

Purcell, Dido and Aeneas: A spine-tingler for me when done well. Strings are nice, no edginess. Voices and instruments are not as distinct, but tone is great. Not as detailed. The soprano goes veryU loud without any stress—pure and clear. Great.

I never really understood what people meant by musical speakers, but I think I’d call these musical. The Apollos—with the single Arcam A90—dont have the openness and spaciousness of the bi-amped B&Ws which I am used to, and they are not as quick. But there is a kind of coherence about the music that I really like. Space isn’t necessarily a good thing. Voices are great across the board, from throaty Waits to soprano.

I was planning to put them in their new home in the lounge this evening but I think I might keep these and put the B&Ws in there. Anyway, some first thoughts.

Edited August 30, 2012 by buddyev

[Luc]

Nice summation of your thoughts and yes I think you got an absolute bargain from L and it's great to hear someone really enjoying their new speakers(like me if truth be told) and also quite happy to detail what you think other people think about gear that is sometimes considered a bit pedestrian: It's all subjective of course and thank god it is otherwise we'd all be listening to earbuds and our smartphones or ...

SNA is very catholic in it's broad base of members; JohnA and Victor and Tax and many others with their stratospheric systems dipped and gilded in unobtania for most of us but also just as willing and helpful to come to the aid of others or just come and comment on the systems that you have put together and that I have put together, it's what I love about SNA.

Thanks for letting us into your head and home for a brief sojourn with your music+system.

[buddyev]

Thanks Luc, looks like you have some nice new toys to play with also—they look to be a very elegant speaker.

Just moved the Apollos into the lounge and will spend a few hours of close listening. But was surprised when I put the B&Ws back in the study. I don't have enough matching speaker cable to bi-amp them so I've had to use some old Cabletalk speaker cables—quite surprising difference from the QED silver anniversary—much nicer cleaner treble. I think the QED wasn't a good match at all. So many variables.

[Luc]

So many variables.

Indeed!

[Guest hilux]

yes you are right buddyev. I too have a pair of Orpheus Apollo. I find the Apollo very musical and involves you in the music. I suppose that is the difference between digital and analogue sound. Digitally sound are very clean but you are not there. I have recently hooked the Apollo speakers up to a valve amplifier and I was blown away. The detail and warmth is most impressive. Orpheus tells me that the Apollo was designed to be easy to drive and having a valve amp drive it, is confirmation of that. I find the vocal and piano extremely neutral, which means "life like", nothing more nothing less. Playing back some violin music, well for once I find listening to a violin painless.

[buddyev]

They are very easy to listen to and have turned out to be ideal for the space I have. I don't know much about valves, I always thought my B&Ws needed quite a bit of power so never considered them. I was toying with the idea for the Apollos. What are you using?

[Guest hilux]

Yes you are right. They are very easy to listen to, even a reasonably loud volume. I believe this means the speakers are not compressing the sound into an irritable noise. You are also right that the B&W requires a lot of power, hence unsuitable for valves unless ........

I am currently using a set of valve amps made by CYMER. Rated at 100 watts and it drives the Apollo easily, .......stressfree......pure bliss.....

[DAMO 1147]

hey - contrats on the apollo's - they are great BFB and i am sure they will be great for a number of years. :thumb:

[Guest hilux]

Mate, WTF does BFB mean. I check wikipedia and it says...."Beautiful from behind""..... my goodness....

[buddyev]

Bfb was a new one on me as well. Beautiful from behind- i must have set them up wrong- i thought you had to sit in front of them!

[DAMO 1147]

HA HA -I cant say what sites you guys are into - i will leave that for your interests.

'Bang for Buck' common term from Motor mag used to describe performance for cash i thought it would be a good cross over here.

Edited September 4, 2012 by DAMO 1147

[buddyev]

Bang for buck.

Obviously! And yes they are.