Any Vivid Giya owners here?
 

I've been doing a lot of listening as of late for new speakers and these were not even on my list. I've had the last 3 versions of b&w 802s (with plenty of others before them) but it had been a pleasure for the past 10 or 11 years with b&w. I had watt puppies before the first 802's (n-line back then) and given the accolades of the sasha, I went to demo those today thinking it could be fun to return to that sound for a while. Obviously some fantastic dynamics but after an hour of listening, I had the same concerns that I had with them 10+ years ago which for *my ears* involved listener fatigue. They do a wonderful job disappearing and presenting the live sound in all of its glory but I'm not 25 anymore and listen a little more politely throwing dominoes with my better half over a bottle of wine in the evening.

To make a long story short, the dealer suggested I give the Giya G2's a listen which I did for the past few hours. Wow, any adjective I have would be an understatement and I demoed them on the same system I heard the sashas (which consisted of a dcs purcell front end with an ayre pre and 300w monos with transparent cabling). Price wise it's not a fair comparison as the Giyas are about double the retail but I've simply never heard music played back that way. It's a unique soundstage seemingly more deep than wide though to be fair the room plays a large role that I'm not used to.

I still want to hear the rockport avior (something I need to get on a plane to do) but this is going to be a tough one to overcome. Unfortunately, the local dealer does not have a the giya G1 and I'm curious if anyone here has had the pleasure of listening to both the G1 & 2 could give me your feedback? At first blush I thought the look of the speaker was on the feminine side for my tastes but after listening to those for a couple hours, I don't care what they look like and feel deep down that this is going to be nearly impossible for me to top. Last question for any owners of the G1 or 2 being how are your impressions of the speaker months or years later? IE anything that you're missing compared with previous speakers you owned but from the couple hours I just had with them, they had no weakness other than price tag but then so does most of this pursuit. Thanks in advance

I think Bart has a pair....he loves them by memory. Certainly very impressive.

Andy is right Bart owns them and loves them . He is a real nice guy and will let you know all about them.:thumbsup:

And BTW welcome Lee

Thanks fellas, nice site. I've been reading what little I can find online and seems the appearance is polarizing (which comes as no surprise) at the various sites while the handful of print reviews seem quite positive. I believe/know I went on about them for far too long with my better half last night at dinner. If I'm reading things correctly the G1&2 are differentiated by a pair of 11 or 9 inch bass drivers, overall dimensions and ~$15k retail.

Bart, if you read this I'm interested in your thoughts and if you've endured any problems with them over the months or years that you've owned them, thx.

Hi Lee3!
Just back from London, where we spent the Easter weekend with my brother who's living there.

I have my Vivid G2Giya's now since November 1st.
I can refer to my thread:
http://www.audioaficionado.org/mbl-d...vid-audio.html
There is also information here:
http://www.audioaficionado.org/mbl-d...rs-choice.html

I could compare the G1's and the G2's in the presence of Mr Laurence "Dic" Dickie himself.
It was or England or the Netherlands for me to audition them. And that was an easy choice, because this way I could combine it with a visit to my brother.
I have to admit that I didn't listen to music that goes really deep, let's say in the lower regions of a church organ. I'll come back to that later.
What we did hear was all kinds of music, going from The Beatles, over Massive Attack (a very bass heavy piece by the way), Madredeus ('Ainda', which has a continuous deep tone of 25-26 Hz which is quite difficult to get rightly transduced) to the exigent sound of a viola da gamba (to test the naturalness of an acoustic instrument) and some vocal jazz (to test the soundstage and the quality of the reproduction of voices).
The G1 and the G2 sounded the same.
For Dic, the G2 is maybe his favourite, because "you get 95% or more of the performance of the G1 in only 50% of its volume". Also, the tweeter and and mid are more at ear height in most of the listening rooms.
For my wife the G1 was too big, and I think she might be right. Even if our living room is not that small (6 by 10 meters or 18 by 30 feet).
The G1 goes 3-4 dB lower, and costs 7000€ more (or 15000$ in the US). So if your listening room is really big and you can stretch to the G1, it might be the good choice for you, but we are very happy where we are now!
To come back to our own experiences with bass reproduction: I like the organ very much and I have to say, in our room, the G2 goes really low.
The Organ Concerto from Francis Poulenc contains some subsonic tones that go on for minutes.
Before, with my B&W PV1 sub, these were inaudible, with the G2's they came through very nicely and accurately.

The Vivids are still improving.
Sounding good right out of the crates, they evolved the most in the first 200 hours, developing an even wider soundstage.

I hope this helps!

Good luck with your quest!

Thanks Bart, I appreciate your input. My room is fairly large but I believe the G2 would be the way to go regardless. I've got powerful monos too that will help fill the space. Interesting that you mention a church organ as I brought a stack of music with me to demo including jimmy smith. I had picked out the obvious stuff to let let the sasha's strut their stuff like Stevie Ray Vaughn but found myself revisiting it with the G2's and all around prefering the sound.

I threw everything at them that I could including your massive attack, polite acoustic guitar, some hawaiian slack key, beatles, phish, thievery corp, filla brazilla and a tons of jazz. I'm not one for classical but that's just me. What I found most amazing 3+ hours in was that mentally I had said to myself that if there is a weakness with these speakers it has to be low bass. So, I put in some Marley and a few other reggae tracks and the resolution and decay was something I've personally never been treated to in my life. That bass is there, it's just round, tight and punchy as opposed to earth shattering and I prefer the former anyway. Said differently, I've never heard the music I associate with lots of low frequency presented like that and I need that in my home. I thought I had heard every bit of minutia on many of those recordings and Saturday I learned otherwise in frightening fashion but that's the fun part of this pursuit. Still in awe and have to convince my wife that these are worth a small fortune but I think she'll agree. I'm envious of your system, enjoy.

Lee3, you're right about the bass performance.
When I did my first comparison of Vivid Audio with other speakers, it was the B1 with the B&W 802D.
It was amazing that the tiny B1 almost equalled the big 802D in this aspect. And the much better soundstage and clearer midrange and highs made it the obvious winner.
In the Giya's, the bass authority is of course even much more there, and the midrange and treble become even more refined and transparent.

Thanks for posting those links above Bart, as i tried searching this forum over the weekend for giya (i'm new here so definitely my error) and didn't see that thread. Great read and like you I think I'm leaning towards piano black. Congrats again

Most welcome Lee3!
And let us know what you decide!
Cheers,
Bart