OK, so I thought I might start with my experience so far.
I bought DS-3000’s from Hifido in Japan about six weeks ago and had them shipped to my home in Australia. This cost a small fortune, as you would expect at 52kg each, but Hifido did as they always do and the Diatones arrived in perfect condition. During that 6 weeks I have been away from home for 3 weeks, so only now starting to get a real feel for them.
From the start I was surprised at a general lack of bass response. Given the specs say that they go right down to 25hz, this caught me a little off guard. I don’t need thundering, wall shaking bass, but I do like a nice full, warm sound. Initially, they sounded rather thin. I know these and other Diatone speakers are well known for the surrounds of the woofers hardening as they age. The Hifido listing stated that the surrounds had been treated to soften them. When they arrived, the surrounds seemed mostly soft, but with some harder areas. Perhaps further treatment is needed? I also noticed that the surrounds on the upper bass driver seem to be very hard. I’m not certain if these surrounds are made from the same material as the woofer, but they do feel like they could do with the same treatment.
Not sure if it‘s my aging ears, but when there is even the slightest harshness in high frequencies, it’s really quite uncomfortable for my ears. My early testing with the Diatones certainly had this issue.
I’m well aware that with any speakers, they rarely show their best in the first position you place them in the room. So I started playing with the placement. My listening room is small/medium size, carpeted floor. I don’t as yet have dedicated stands for these speakers as I wanted to try different positions first. I initially placed them on the floor, either side of the cabinet housing the rest of my gear, front baffles in line with the front of the cabinet. This left approx 20cm gap to the wall behind. The result was as described above. Thin on bass and harsh highs. The imaging was pretty flat too. From there I moved them forward and back, including right out into the room about a meter from the wall. With all this there was some variation, but broadly results weren’t much different. I then tried them with the stands from my Wharfedale Linton Heritage speakers which the diatones are replacing. These certainly aren’t the right dimensions for the Diatones but were an opportunity to elevate them on quite a solid and heavy stand. To be honest, the results were much the same again.
After a bit of thought, I remembered that when I was in my teens, my father bought a pair of AR speakers. They were a sealed box design as are these Diatones. I recalled that when he bought them, the salesman told him they were designed to be placed against the wall, in fact the user manual stated exactly that. I then placed the DS-3000’s on the floor as close to the back wall as I could.
WOW! All of a sudden they came alive! There was significantly more bass, the highs were smooth as silk and the imagining expanded massively!
I would love to know if anyone has seen any official information about how these speakers have been designed to be placed? Perhaps in a user manual? Has anyone else had a similar experience? Would be great to know if they have been designed to be against a wall or if its just the specific acoustics of my room and my other gear.
Whilst I’m much happier now with my speakers performance, I do think there is more to squeeze out of them. Common wisdom around the net is to treat the woofer surrounds with brake fluid. I must say that I am somewhat reluctant to go down that path. I worry that it may do long term harm.
I would also, be really interested in whether anyone has had success in treating their upper bass surrounds.
Lastly, has anyone has had their crossovers tested and/or recapped. Are they standing up still or have they started to deteriorate?
Looking forward to hearing other owners experiences.
