Focal Aria 926 Loudspeakers Review (Sunday 16 february 2014)
I went out yesterday with a friend who is interested to buy a set of floorstanding speakers to -say- a max of EUR 3000,- for a pair. So we went to a store in Eindhoven, The Audio TV Centrum, as they named themselves. Very polite and helpful: Just a call and we were invited by Roel for a listening session for as long as we wanted. In this price range they have about 14 speakers, switchable between 3 different amps. Among those speakers there were B&W 600-series, DynAudio, focus series, Tannoy Precision and Tannoy Revelution, a pair from Canton, Jamo and others. The three amplifiers were Denon, Rotel and Mucical Fidelity. (Date as of february 2014) After a cup of coffee we started listening.
First I have to tell that I am biased -in this respect- due to a loudspeaker kit that I have build myself some 20 years ago. It was based on the Focal TC120 TD5 tweeters and Audax Woofer/mid speakers. So -again- I am biased. The conclusion that I had to make is that I missed the openness and wideness from all the brands, except from…. Focal. Only the DynAudio was interesting to take in account, the rest -for me- was gone from the speaker selection switchboard within short time.
Is it due to the fact that I am used to the sound of the TC120 TD5? No, I don't think so. I played in a band in my young years, and I know how a drumkit is suppose to sound. I missed important details in the cymbals from all the others. You know, in that time I was the drummer. (Later I switched to Bass due to neighbour / noise problems ;-)
Another thing to mention is the Denon amplifier. This definately is something special, but not for me. It seems to boost the low frequency part. Further it warms the sound. Although not for me it may be brilliant combined together with a pair of agressive bookshelf speakers. The other amplifiers were Rotel and Musical Fidelity. They are very honest amps, not able to notice a difference between those two. Of course this can be due to the switchboard + extra cables and relays: All is not ideal, but workable. In our tests we switched between loudspeaker pairs and the 2 amps: Rotel and Musical Fidelity, but the latter two sounded equal, maybe the Musical Fidelity was a bit warmer, but hey, we came for loudspeakers, not for an amp.
So after a lot of switching between speakers we quickly concluded that there were 3 candidates left:
* DynAudio
* Focal Aria 926
* Focal Aria 948
The 926 and 948 sound enormous deep and wide in comparison with all other loudspeaker sets. Non experienced listeners easely can be overwhelmed with that, but it sounds as it should be. The Dynaudio was a bit more relaxed in a way, therefore interesting. The focusing of both brands was fine: Each instrument could be pinpointed where it was: Not only the location, but also from the deepness 'behind' or 'in front' of other instruments. Of course we played numerous CD's to test, for example "Maiden Voyage" with Leny Andrade. This song is on an audio test CD, very good recordings. Very good detail, for instance, the matal particles in the ride Cymbal. All is in there. The voice is a bit in the 'behind scene' (bit of reverb), placement is fine from all 3 speaker sets. Piano sounds fabulous! The highest frequencies from the cymbals are absolutely the best on the Focal speakers. We jump over to Pat Metheny's "Have you heard". This is instrumental with lots of guitar, lots of drums/cymbal work & percussion. From this song you hear that the 948 midrange is just a little too agressive, but the definitions are still fine. The guitar on the 948 sometimes is annoying, and that's a matter of taste. Switching to other speaker sets of the 14 candidates immediately lets you switch back to our 3 main choices anyway.
Pat Metheny is one of the musicians good for testing: The recordings are excellent. As soon as something in the system is bad, the fine guitar melody is sunk away in rubbish due to the dynamics of the drums, hence, generating undefinable noise and distortion. But our 3 candidates are absolutely fine: For this song the Focal 926 absolutely was the best. Midrange is present, but will not fatigue you. The detail is amazing, lots of dynamics and very precise. Normally I listen to quite progressive jazz-music, like Alan Holdsworth, Tony Williams, Charles Mingus, to name a few. This is "musicians music" (however, I would not dare to qualify myself as a good musician, no way!) This type of music is dense, detailed, lots of things are happening in 1 count. I did not dare to bring this music with me anyway: Most people walk away from that, leaving Roel without customers…
One perticular CD showed a remarkable difference. My friend brought along a CD from "Antony & The Johnsons". This is a live recording from 2012, absolutely of a great quality. Both Focal loudspeakers let you stand on the edge of the podium, exactly in the middle, where the musicians are all playing from far left to far right and in front of you, into the deepness of the space. The whole spectrum, wonderful. The DynAudio is different: It has a sound more as if you are near one of the (high quality) loudspeaker PA stacks that must help to fill the hall for the audience. Difficult to explain, but I hope you get my point here. The absolute winner is the Focal Aria 926, a fantastic speaker for the money, and to my humble opinion, better than the Aria 948.
Author: Marcus Simons, Electronics Engineer
