Hi,
For some time now I have been searching for an "easier" alternative to building a HT system and have been avoiding the "separates" route.
I had read about Violet 3D- India's first wireless HT system and had left my contact number on their web site.
The company was very prompt in responding and agreed to schedule a demo within 2- 3 days of my response on their website.
I was quite impressed by the interest & the eagerness to schedule a demo at home- though I had provided the option to visit their office/ show room to look at the product.
After reading the posts on this forum, I was eager to like their system- given that these speakers dont need wires running across the room.
Just to ensure that there was no bias in my judgement, I had invited our old forum member Reju to join me at home.
Inspite of the heavy rainfall yesterday, the company engineer and a technician landed up at home with the necessary equipment (including a DVD player).
Hardware:
The speakers look very impressive at first glance with their unique shape and design. The active sub is a very small affair - and left us wondering if it would be sufficient for a living room (the room dimensions being 24X12) of this size.
The control console is pretty light weight and looks more like a small media player.
The calibration mike is more like an antenna with 3 blades.
Set up:
Setting the speakers was a relatively easy chore. Since the positions for these were not fixed in advance, we decided to do keep these on tables/ shelves/ cabinets. One of the USPs of Violet is the flexibility in placing the speakers without impacting sound.
Each speaker has a stand for keeping it on a table/ shelf.
However the sub, the console and each speaker needs a separate power outlet. So in all you need 5 +1 +1 power sockets to accomodate the set up.
After the equipment was switched on, the engineer connected the calibration mike which sends signals to all satellites so as to calibrate the sound.
In terms of positioning the left front, right front and center along with the sub were placed at the other end of the room from where we were seated. So the distance between us and the LF, RF , Center and sub was about 22 feet. The engineer confirmed that this was not a problem since the system could cater to a room as large as 800 sq ft as well.
While calibrating the system, for some reason the engineer preferred to keep the mike in the middle of the room though we felt that the mike should have been kept at or near the seating area. The reason the engineer gave us was that the system generates a "3D cloud" which takes care of such issues.
The rear left and right speakers were kept to our left and right respectively (close to where we were seated)
Connections:
Though I had planned to connect the system to my Pana BDT 220 and then on to the PJ (Epson 6100) we realized that the Violet system did not have an HDMI in/ out nor did it have a SPDIF in. The HDMI limitation was known but the digital connections are limited as well (though it provides for optical- coax)
Thankfully the Violet team was carrying a DVD player of their own which had analogue outs which could be connected to the console and my TV.
Demo:
As mentioned earlier, the mike was placed in the center of the room and we observed silecen for 3-4 minutes. Once done we were excited and ready for the first demo.
The first demo was the scene from the blue room (they were carrying a demo disc). The sound at first seemed quite good for speakers of their size but the rears started dominating the scene (being closer to us).
To overcome this we moved our seating position to the middle of the room which improved the situation. Impressive but we were expecting more.
The next demo clip was of the Eagles live concert (a standard in most demo rooms). The sound was quite good, but the sub was clearly underpowered for a room of this size. When we asked the team to increase the volume level, we realised that the volume was already at its peak (for all speakers).
Also while it felt that there was sound all around us, what was overwhelming was only the noise level rather than the separation, stage or effects.
Next we requested them to play something with dialogues so that the center channel could be tested.
The only thing that came close to this was an action scene from Kill Bill which had a few sentences of dialogue.
Again the sound was loud but disppointing on the effects front. The thuds (low freq) seemed to have improved a bit but the movement of sound was found lacking. It felt that the speakers were belting out the same sound (sans Dolby Digital/ DTS). I had to move very close to the center speaker to figure out if it was working.
The next in line was a song from Jodha Akbar which we requested them to stop before it could run its full course (the sound was very harsh and started hurting the ears).
Though Reju was done with the demo I insisted on playing a few audio CDs through the DVD player. The first song was Chupke Chupke from Ghulam Ali which is a good test of vocal clarity for most systems (IMHO).
Quite surprisingly the system sounded much better in reproduction of music than movies. The vocals were clear, the instruments sounded good and the system envelopes you in music.
However as a purist if you want to switch to stereo - there is no option.
Listening to the Beatles was again a pleasant experience with a balanced focus on all aspects of the tracks. However the sub was again found missing in action.
All in all its a system that comes close to HTiBs but will find it very difficult to crack a AVR based system.
Pros:
- good on the eyes
- easy to set up
- calibration has to be done only once
- good for music compared to HTiBs
Cons:
- no HDMI (being included in a new model)
- no SPDIF
- slight metallic tinge to vocals/ spoken word (Reju's observation)
- no individual volume control for speakers- for eg if you want to lower the volume of the rear speakers- theres no option
- stiff price given the options
- wiring not eliminated- given that you need to do wiring for 6 points in the room
- no stereo option
Conclusion:
- a great system to take on Philips, Sony, LG and Samsung but a difficult match for the Onkyos and Denons. You could argue that it will be unfair to compare this with a Denon/ Onkyo but given its price (65-67k) its very difficult to avoid the comparisons. You can ultimately buy a Denon 1713 + Wharfedale system for around 29k plus 35 k.
While the system has its own positives, the nagging question that it leaves you with is- can I build a better system with separates in the same price and the answer always seems to be yes.
For some time now I have been searching for an "easier" alternative to building a HT system and have been avoiding the "separates" route.
I had read about Violet 3D- India's first wireless HT system and had left my contact number on their web site.
The company was very prompt in responding and agreed to schedule a demo within 2- 3 days of my response on their website.
I was quite impressed by the interest & the eagerness to schedule a demo at home- though I had provided the option to visit their office/ show room to look at the product.
After reading the posts on this forum, I was eager to like their system- given that these speakers dont need wires running across the room.
Just to ensure that there was no bias in my judgement, I had invited our old forum member Reju to join me at home.
Inspite of the heavy rainfall yesterday, the company engineer and a technician landed up at home with the necessary equipment (including a DVD player).
Hardware:
The speakers look very impressive at first glance with their unique shape and design. The active sub is a very small affair - and left us wondering if it would be sufficient for a living room (the room dimensions being 24X12) of this size.
The control console is pretty light weight and looks more like a small media player.
The calibration mike is more like an antenna with 3 blades.
Set up:
Setting the speakers was a relatively easy chore. Since the positions for these were not fixed in advance, we decided to do keep these on tables/ shelves/ cabinets. One of the USPs of Violet is the flexibility in placing the speakers without impacting sound.
Each speaker has a stand for keeping it on a table/ shelf.
However the sub, the console and each speaker needs a separate power outlet. So in all you need 5 +1 +1 power sockets to accomodate the set up.
After the equipment was switched on, the engineer connected the calibration mike which sends signals to all satellites so as to calibrate the sound.
In terms of positioning the left front, right front and center along with the sub were placed at the other end of the room from where we were seated. So the distance between us and the LF, RF , Center and sub was about 22 feet. The engineer confirmed that this was not a problem since the system could cater to a room as large as 800 sq ft as well.
While calibrating the system, for some reason the engineer preferred to keep the mike in the middle of the room though we felt that the mike should have been kept at or near the seating area. The reason the engineer gave us was that the system generates a "3D cloud" which takes care of such issues.
The rear left and right speakers were kept to our left and right respectively (close to where we were seated)
Connections:
Though I had planned to connect the system to my Pana BDT 220 and then on to the PJ (Epson 6100) we realized that the Violet system did not have an HDMI in/ out nor did it have a SPDIF in. The HDMI limitation was known but the digital connections are limited as well (though it provides for optical- coax)
Thankfully the Violet team was carrying a DVD player of their own which had analogue outs which could be connected to the console and my TV.
Demo:
As mentioned earlier, the mike was placed in the center of the room and we observed silecen for 3-4 minutes. Once done we were excited and ready for the first demo.
The first demo was the scene from the blue room (they were carrying a demo disc). The sound at first seemed quite good for speakers of their size but the rears started dominating the scene (being closer to us).
To overcome this we moved our seating position to the middle of the room which improved the situation. Impressive but we were expecting more.
The next demo clip was of the Eagles live concert (a standard in most demo rooms). The sound was quite good, but the sub was clearly underpowered for a room of this size. When we asked the team to increase the volume level, we realised that the volume was already at its peak (for all speakers).
Also while it felt that there was sound all around us, what was overwhelming was only the noise level rather than the separation, stage or effects.
Next we requested them to play something with dialogues so that the center channel could be tested.
The only thing that came close to this was an action scene from Kill Bill which had a few sentences of dialogue.
Again the sound was loud but disppointing on the effects front. The thuds (low freq) seemed to have improved a bit but the movement of sound was found lacking. It felt that the speakers were belting out the same sound (sans Dolby Digital/ DTS). I had to move very close to the center speaker to figure out if it was working.
The next in line was a song from Jodha Akbar which we requested them to stop before it could run its full course (the sound was very harsh and started hurting the ears).
Though Reju was done with the demo I insisted on playing a few audio CDs through the DVD player. The first song was Chupke Chupke from Ghulam Ali which is a good test of vocal clarity for most systems (IMHO).
Quite surprisingly the system sounded much better in reproduction of music than movies. The vocals were clear, the instruments sounded good and the system envelopes you in music.
However as a purist if you want to switch to stereo - there is no option.
Listening to the Beatles was again a pleasant experience with a balanced focus on all aspects of the tracks. However the sub was again found missing in action.
All in all its a system that comes close to HTiBs but will find it very difficult to crack a AVR based system.
Pros:
- good on the eyes
- easy to set up
- calibration has to be done only once
- good for music compared to HTiBs
Cons:
- no HDMI (being included in a new model)
- no SPDIF
- slight metallic tinge to vocals/ spoken word (Reju's observation)
- no individual volume control for speakers- for eg if you want to lower the volume of the rear speakers- theres no option
- stiff price given the options
- wiring not eliminated- given that you need to do wiring for 6 points in the room
- no stereo option
Conclusion:
- a great system to take on Philips, Sony, LG and Samsung but a difficult match for the Onkyos and Denons. You could argue that it will be unfair to compare this with a Denon/ Onkyo but given its price (65-67k) its very difficult to avoid the comparisons. You can ultimately buy a Denon 1713 + Wharfedale system for around 29k plus 35 k.
While the system has its own positives, the nagging question that it leaves you with is- can I build a better system with separates in the same price and the answer always seems to be yes.
