Pioneer Premier TS-C720PRS

coffee_junkee · 12-11-2006

After waiting for a couple of weeks for them to arrive, these bad boys are finally here! I will do my best to keep the review into two separate portions: First all the objective facts about these and secondly, the subjective listening test.

Box, Packaging and Manual: The box looks like ordinary Pioneer, only the gold foil printing of the model number hints of the goodness that await inside. Everything is packaged individually and the set includes the speakers themselves, brackets for 5x7's, uni mount brackets for just about any 6.5" hole, tweeter

wedge mount, tweeter hidden mount, crossovers and a gaggle of hardware. Folks, the Pioneer guys were very thorough in making sure they arrive in one piece and with everything you would need to have them playing in reasonable time. The manual is a series of practically inconprehensible pictograms, but does sport a very complete list of the Thiele-Small parameters for the woofer and crossover

specs for running them active. The inside box lid also features a series of cut-outs for all the included mounting componetry.

Price and Availability: As many of you well know, I'm a bargain hunter and shop carefully for the best bang for the buck. These carry a suggested retail of $550 from Pioneer and can be had (or could hopefully be had again) for the tidy sum of $217 shipped, off eBay. Shiza, that's %50 off RRP! I purchased mine from "hificaraudioonline". I'll reserve judgement on my buying experience for now, but the 720's arrived in one piece and the box was factory sealed with all the serial numbers still there. Ebay is fresh out, but our friends at woofersetc.com, have plenty and the $50 price penalty over eBay is neglegable.

Meat and Potatos I lugged these heavy guys out of the styrofoam to be greeted by the most elegant looking woofers these eyes have seen in some time. They feel damn near indestructable at a less than svelte 6 pounds each! The basket and solid aluminum phase plug were carefully painted and appear to have been spit shined by the Chinese assembly folks before being boxed up. The 3 layer cone is thin, very rigid and terminates to a firm, microfiber surround

. The voice coil

appears to be just shy of 2" in diameter and all the glue work was performed without any slop. The screw down wire clasps are of a high quality and the tinsle leads are glued appropriately to the cone to prevent slap while you are showing off to friends! Guys, the woofers are worth $200 alone, they're that nice.

The tweeter is a soft dome made from treated Tetron fabric. The housing itself is sealed, damped and made from machined aluminum. The dome is protected by three thin resin bars and no other grilles are provided. Bummer on the grilles because these sound so good, you wouldn't want anything untoward to happen to them!

The mounting options are flush, reverse flush and two-angle surface. The speaker leads are already soldered to the tweeter and that's fine with me.

Listening I carefully placed the set into my 2 cube test enclosures, rearranged my livingroom and placed them on 18", lead filled, spiked stands.

I first placed them off axis as that is how they would typically be installed in your car. Pioneer really did their homework with the off axis response as they sound great like this. The image was stable, wide and had very good depth in my smallish room. A real sense of space was represented on Fiona Apple's track Slow like honey and her voice was simply haunting. With my eyes closed, it really felt like a much bigger room and the detail in Fiona's voice was fantastic. Her voice has such delicate changes in pitch that are very hard to reproduce with realism and the Premiers really shine in this aspect. So delicate and airy these Premiers, it seems shameful to put them into my S2000 where I will miss all of their goodness.

Next up was Becker Brothers cd from 1990, Return of the Brecker Brothers. What a great disc for drums, upright bass and let's not forget the horns! Some of the tracks from this disc were on a great compliation cd from Boston Acoustics in the early 90's. Anyway, the 720's have hardcore bass extention for their size. The upright came over uncolored and each note was rendered with ease even as he played briskly on track 4. Impressive too was the midrange detail where my ears tire after a bit of cheap speaker torture. There was no audible dips or distortion at the 2k crossover point that I could hear. Just smooth all over with my only real complaint being that the tweeter had a touch more sparkle when I turned them on axis. Nothing a touch of eq couldn't bring back for sure.

Right now I'm doing a hodge podge of cd's from Dave Matthews to Dr. Dre. They don't really like rap too much. It could be the piss poor recording quality of most hip-hop, but they just don't sound natural like that. The rendering of rap seemed almost fake. I dunno. They were punchy and the bass is clean, I just think they really are accurate enough to reveal all sorts of flaws. Initially I thought the rap sounded bad because my ears were fatigued, but damn did Dave sound as good as ever! Dave's Matthew's solo album Some Devil has a great track entitled Gravedigger. His voice is raw here and the Premiers remained faithful, centering his voice just above the guitar with the drums just behind and to the right. Amazing stability here. I went back to the rap and it still sounded somewhat bad. Mabye I'm just not in a hip hop mood tonight.

Overall, these things are a steal and they don't really need tons of power to get loud. 100w a side would be plenty for the average listener and 200 for headroom junkies like myself!

I like the gains a minimum..

Feel free to ask any questions and I will post better pics when my GF brings the good camera back.

zfactor · 12-11-2006

iyo how was the lower end?? in car as i listened they were fantastic.. wondering maybe if the enclosure you were using was to large you did say 2 cube correct?? ill add that the tweeters never seemed to bright to my ears and they get crossed over low enough that they just had awsome midrange response. almost undetectable at the x-over point to me

i can add i didnt think they were as good on a good metal album though they seemd to not like to be played as "fast" as some others ive played with..

zfactor · 12-11-2006

coffee what other sets have you had listening tests with that you could say?? and where do these stand in that mix??

reason ive been asking so many opinion questions is im doing a bit of research for a certain company i can not name.. they are looking at other speakers to model from.. wondering what other people want to hear and what type of sound they are looking for...

matdotcom2000 · 12-11-2006

What other speakers have you listened to, in order to compair to these?

bassfromspace · 12-11-2006

Quote:

Originally Posted by coffee_junkee

After waiting for a couple of weeks for them to arrive, these bad boys are finally here! I will do my best to keep the review into two separate portions: First all the objective facts about these and secondly, the subjective listening test.

Box, Packaging and Manual: The box looks like ordinary Pioneer, only the gold foil printing of the model number hints of the goodness that await inside. Everything is packaged individually and the set includes the speakers themselves, brackets for 5x7's, uni mount brackets for just about any 6.5" hole, tweeter wedge mount, tweeter hidden mount, crossovers and a gaggle of hardware. Folks, the Pioneer guys were very thorough in making sure they arrive in one piece and with everything you would need to have them playing in reasonable time. The manual is a series of practically inconprehensible pictograms, but does sport a very complete list of the Thiele-Small parameters for the woofer and crossover specs for running them active. The inside box lid also features a series of cut-outs for all the included mounting componetry.

Price and Availability: As many of you well know, I'm a bargain hunter and shop carefully for the best bang for the buck. These carry a suggested retail of $550 from Pioneer and can be had (or could hopefully be had again) for the tidy sum of $217 shipped, off eBay. Shiza, that's %50 off RRP! I purchased mine from "hificaraudioonline". I'll reserve judgement on my buying experience for now, but the 720's arrived in one piece and the box was factory sealed with all the serial numbers still there. Ebay is fresh out, but our friends at woofersetc.com, have plenty and the $50 price penalty over eBay is neglegable.

Meat and Potatos I lugged these heavy guys out of the styrofoam to be greeted by the most elegant looking woofers these eyes have seen in some time. They feel damn near indestructable at a less than svelte 6 pounds each! The basket and solid aluminum phase plug were carefully painted and appear to have been spit shined by the Chinese assembly folks before being boxed up. The 3 layer cone is thin, very rigid and terminates to a firm, microfiber surround. The voice coil appears to be just shy of 2" in diameter and all the glue work was performed without any slop. The screw down wire clasps are of a high quality and the tinsle leads are glued appropriately to the cone to prevent slap while you are showing off to friends! Guys, the woofers are worth $200 alone, they're that nice.

The tweeter is a soft dome made from treated Tetron fabric. The housing itself is sealed, damped and made from machined aluminum. The dome is protected by three thin resin bars and no other grilles are provided. Bummer on the grilles because these sound so good, you wouldn't want anything untoward to happen to them!

The mounting options are flush, reverse flush and two-angle surface. The speaker leads are already soldered to the tweeter and that's fine with me.

Listening I carefully placed the set into my 2 cube test enclosures, rearranged my livingroom and placed them on 18", lead filled, spiked stands.

I first placed them off axis as that is how they would typically be installed in your car. Pioneer really did their homework with the off axis response as they sound great like this. The image was stable, wide and had very good depth in my smallish room. A real sense of space was represented on Fiona Apple's track Slow like honey and her voice was simply haunting. With my eyes closed, it really felt like a much bigger room and the detail in Fiona's voice was fantastic. Her voice has such delicate changes in pitch that are very hard to reproduce with realism and the Premiers really shine in this aspect. So delicate and airy these Premiers, it seems shameful to put them into my S2000 where I will miss all of their goodness.

Next up was Becker Brothers cd from 1990, Return of the Brecker Brothers. What a great disc for drums, upright bass and let's not forget the horns! Some of the tracks from this disc were on a great compliation cd from Boston Acoustics in the early 90's. Anyway, the 720's have hardcore bass extention for their size. The upright came over uncolored and each note was rendered with ease even as he played briskly on track 4. Impressive too was the midrange detail where my ears tire after a bit of cheap speaker torture. There was no audible dips or distortion at the 2k crossover point that I could hear. Just smooth all over with my only real complaint being that the tweeter had a touch more sparkle when I turned them on axis. Nothing a touch of eq couldn't bring back for sure.

Right now I'm doing a hodge podge of cd's from Dave Matthews to Dr. Dre. They don't really like rap too much. It could be the piss poor recording quality of most hip-hop, but they just don't sound natural like that. The rendering of rap seemed almost fake. I dunno. They were punchy and the bass is clean, I just think they really are accurate enough to reveal all sorts of flaws. Initially I thought the rap sounded bad because my ears were fatigued, but damn did Dave sound as good as ever! Dave's Matthew's solo album Some Devil has a great track entitled Gravedigger. His voice is raw here and the Premiers remained faithful, centering his voice just above the guitar with the drums just behind and to the right. Amazing stability here. I went back to the rap and it still sounded somewhat bad. Mabye I'm just not in a hip hop mood tonight.

Overall, these things are a steal and they don't really need tons of power to get loud. 100w a side would be plenty for the average listener and 200 for headroom junkies like myself!

I like the gains a minimum..

Feel free to ask any questions and I will post better pics when my GF brings the good camera back.

Throw some Roots in. Dr. Dre tends to have cd's that are mastered pretty well. Nice review.

coffee_junkee · 12-12-2006

Quote:

Originally Posted by zfactor

coffee what other sets have you had listening tests with that you could say?? and where do these stand in that mix??

reason ive been asking so many opinion questions is im doing a bit of research for a certain company i can not name.. they are looking at other speakers to model from.. wondering what other people want to hear and what type of sound they are looking for...

Geez, where to start on prior comps...

Rainbow, O/S MB Quart, Morel, Alpine F#1, Diamond Hex, Diamond D9, JL ZR, Boston Pro, PG RSd, Ti Elite... So many over the years!

I would probably liken their sound most to the Morel Elate's, but the midrange and lower extention are far better here. Just real smooth and airy on the top end with exqusite midrange detail. After sleeping on it, for albeit only 6 hours, I'm left feeling that the set shines for someone that likes their music at 7/10ths volume with copious amounts of clarity and detail.

If at all possible, I would like to reserve final judgement on the rap/hip-hop issue until I can get a listen to some better material. I do have Tripping Point, by the Roots and Eminem's Marshall Mathers LP which I feel is well mastered. They will be played all day for more break in time so we shall see tonight if my ears like them more, or less!

Oh, as far as the enclosure size; I think they might have been big, but my doors are approximately 2 cubes, and sealed very well. Since that is where they will be installed, I wanted to see how they would sound in that amount of space. I will plug the specs into WinISD, see what it says and post the results here.

Keep the questions up if you have any and I will post the T/S parameters if anyone is interested in plotting their own graphs!

Gotta go, my coffee is getting cold, yeech

zfactor · 12-12-2006

what is your opinion with metal or harder rock stuff?? you may not be a fan but that stuff sure gives most speakers a heck of a work out..

coffee_junkee · 12-12-2006

Quote:

Originally Posted by zfactor

what is your opinion with metal or harder rock stuff?? you may not be a fan but that stuff sure gives most speakers a heck of a work out..

During the hodge podge session, I did listen to a couple of Smashing Pumpkins tracks. One of my favorites, "Galapogos" from the Dusk to Dawn disc of Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness was mostly, effortlessly rendered. Things got a little iffy about three minutes in where the guitar overdub (Iha and Corgan play no less than 5 different guitars in this track) changes pitch. I did rewind and play that point in the track several times and I think it was a resonance from the terminal cups. The drums in this track have great impact, even at moderate volumes and the Premiers kicked pretty good.

A bit of a departure from the typical layered guitar-like Pumpkin's sound, Eye, a collaborative effort from the Lost Highway soundtrack, really got the woofers moving. The electric bass in this song is killer. The woofers seem to have the ability to play well down to about 60-70hz and then start to sound compressed at real high volumes. This likely won't be a problem since most of you will use a subwoofer and your car will boost the output in this range anyway. The tweeter maintained it's composure at high volumes during the heavy bridges. There was a touch of harshness on axis that seemed quite a bit less audible when I spun them off axis.

Sorry, I don't have anything harder than the Pumpkins.

zfactor · 12-12-2006

good info.. i found them to not be as "fast" i guess as i tend to like. i only got a short while with them but on real heavy stuff they did kinda "give out" a bit.. but then most speakers do with this type of material. i think the only set ive heard in the past that didnt were the qsd's.. but then with those tweeters on the screaming solo's could burn right through your ears at times... lol... these are very distinct and have great tonal character imo.. things sound very "Real" i dont think they are as detailed as some you listed but hold thier own .. especially if you got them at the 200+ price tag ...i dont think there is much out there even at over thier retail that would sound as good,

did you notice a bit of sibliance from the tweeter?? it may have been the setup i listened to but i noticed they were a bit hot at times. which was suprising from a soft dome and a decent size one at that...

zfactor · 12-12-2006

also are you thinking run active these could fare even better than they do with the passives?? the passives dont use the best of components.. not at all bad but they could be better.. the reason i ask...

coffee_junkee · 12-12-2006

Well, the crossovers leave a bit to be desired, but they're not awful Audiobahn rejects.

I made my amp rack to accomidate them, so they are going in for now. I may switch out the APA100ix for an APA460ix and run them active.

As far as the QSD's, I don't care for them much above 5/10th's power. North of that, they just burn my ears and I have to turn them off. They're fast and accurate, but I don't typically listen to hard material where that's a huge factor. Like I said, Smashing is about as hard as I like.

zfactor · 12-12-2006

lol ... last time i used the qsd's i used the tweeter down in the kicks and there they were okay but still a bit bright...

coffee_junkee · 12-12-2006

I don't know what it is about Quart tweeters, but when I get done listening to them it feels like someone had put a Dremel in my ear with the sanding disc on. Bad.

zfactor · 12-12-2006

but how would you think they fare used active compared to others you mentioned??

coffee_junkee · 12-12-2006

Hard to say, I have only head two of the ones mentioned running active.

They will have been playing for about 15 hours by the time I get home. I would like another descent session before giving them my formal stamp of approval.

At RRP, there would be a good fight between a couple I mentioned, but at street prices it's going to be tough to beat these.

rekd0514 · 12-12-2006

Ya they are definately some heavy drivers, can't imagine why, they comprise of mostly metal. haha I was talking to Marv about some baffles he is making right now for these midbass drivers and we noticed something. He needed the diameter measurments for them, so I got out the ruler. I measured the diameter without the tabs and it was only 6 1/16" and only 6 1/2" with them. Obviously a lot smaller than the 6 3/4" that they advertise on the box. I don't know where the hell the got that. For fun I also measured the cone and cone (with surround) diameters. I came up with 4 13/16" for the cone and 5 9/16" with the surround. Just something to notice, since you are getting a lot less than you think.

From your review, they seem like a very awesome set especially for the money. Pretty much everyone else that has heard them has gave the great reviews. I should be very happy with them feeding them 100RMS. I can't wait to hear them!

coffee_junkee · 12-13-2006

Quote:

Originally Posted by rekd0514

From your review, they seem like a very awesome set especially for the money. Pretty much everyone else that has heard them has gave the great reviews. I should be very happy with them feeding them 100RMS. I can't wait to hear them!

After another good session last night, I took them out of the test enclosures and started to install the woofers into the S. I haven't decided on tweeter placement so I'm going to do some experimenting before building anything permanent.

To sum up the review, I really like these speakers. Are they the best? No. Are they the best for $220? Hands down hell yeah. I don't think that the PG's, Diamond Hex, or lower end Quart could hold a candle to these. The Morel Elates have better tweeter extention and a touch more detail, but less midbass. The Premiers don't like to be played real hard or they lose composure on the top end and its exaggerated if they're on axis. Basically, don't buy these thinking they will like hour upon hour sessions of Judas Priest and you'll be fine.

Hopefully they will surface on the cheap again real soon.

zfactor · 12-13-2006

not so good with metal then... damn and i bought a set... oh well

zfactor · 12-13-2006

coffee have you heard these in comparison to the polk sr set or the spx set from alpine?? im curious about the thoughts?? looking for the wife's car for just a good mid priced 2 way set?? i dont have enough seat time with the spx's.. and the polk set was semi impressive after we set it up right.. thanks

z_accoustics · 12-22-2006

I'm still considering getting these but am puzzled by the bad RAP reproduction (or faithful crappy reproduction).

Can someone compare the dynamics in the midbass and highs of these to that of other 2-ways such as the morel supremo 2-way and dyn system 262. I will mostly be listening to rock, trance and a touch of rap.

coffee_junkee · 12-23-2006

I'll tell you, the passive suck.

I installed them active with the DCX and most of the issues I experienced with them either went away altogether, or were easily dialed out with some light EQ-ing. Much of the roughness at the crossover point went away when used active. Staging was good with the tweeter 30 degrees on axis, mounted on the surface of the A pillar. Distance from mid to tweeter was just shy of 16" and with some careful T/A, the drivers blended together very nicely.

The in door bass response is nothing short of freaking stellar. Vast improvement over my sealed test enclosures. They are very articulate and really get loud without really making the delicate midrange suffer.

My issue with the heavy metal might just be my aversion to that type of music. A good friend stopped by who loves the stuff and came away very impressed with their performance. He has the PG Xenons and is thinking about switching if that is any indication.

As far as a comparison to the Dyns or Morels; I like the Dyn midbass better, but they need lots more power and the price differential is ugly at best. The Dyn tweeter would likely need little help with the EQ on harder material than either the Pioneers or Morel.

Nass027 · 12-23-2006

Thanks for the review.I have just received mine and gutted my Kef Q1's and installed the drivers in there to let them warm up for a little while.In your listening sessions so far have you thought about using the woofer as a midrange only and adding a 7" or 8" midbass?How do you think it would work in that position or are we losing out on the strong bottom end ?Just curious

tophatjimmy · 12-23-2006

Between you and CA&E my interest is very peaked with these. Right now I'm running the 2 ohm Infinity Kappa's and overall I think they're pretty OK (that should indicate how discriminating my tastes are), but my tweets are starting to have problems with breaking up on certain notes.

These sound like a pretty heavy-weight set to try out. I wonder how well they would do running off of a bridged Arc 4150?? Think 320+ watts to each set is a bit too much (properly adjusted, of course)?

Now, I work for a Focal dealer, so I can get that stuff at cost so here's another question. At this price point, how do you think these would compare to say the 6.5" K2 Power set (same amp/power to both)?

Thanks again for the stellar review.

zfactor · 12-23-2006

only thing i never liked were focals tweeters they always seemed a bit harsh but then i listen to a lot of hard rock metal.. this stuff sounds pretty nasty on many tweets... so far im liking these. a bit "dull" for me they dont have the liveliness i normally like. these remind me more of morel or dyn as mentioned. i would prefer more of the rainbow seas stuff i think ive heard rainbow and loved them. never ended up with them due to me always wanting the top line stuff and thier top shelf stuff is way to expensive for me... but these are doing good. i dont know about 300+ on them though, my set has 150 to each speaker active and the mids are crying it seems at times.. they can get loud but as someone else said they dont like to be overpushed.. they sound really great till that point though... i can say after using them in my own car for 2 days they are a hell of a bargin and much better than anything imo out there in thier price range, now cost on other stuff is not really fair though....

tophatjimmy · 12-23-2006

just trying to do apples to apples as far as my wallet is concerned.

I just cannot find a set of speakers that sounds how I want and I'm too cheap and lazy to get all complicated-like and enter the DSP/Active arena.

So if I can snag a set of these, I probably will. If I don't really like them all that well, I'll let you guys have first dibs at 'em.

Too bad I can't bi-amp them. I got this nice 4 channel amp and I'm not really using all of it....