Hi Mike.
I will see what I can sort out. Are you saying that the Neat are musical
Never owned any but all my dealers have sold them over the years and every time I’ve listened to them I’ve always found them to be musical and fun as opposed to analytical and detailed. They can do detailed but never without losing the fun. I’ve also found that if I’m at a show and working my way through room after room of predictable music and clinical, hollow sounding kit then it’s always the rooms with the Neat speakers (or indeed Rega turntables) where you walk in and within a few seconds you’re thinking “Ah music. I remember that.”
People will give you a list of “usual culprits” with Naim boxes and to some extent they will all work but I’ve always found they major on a kind of evenness of tone which may well be “accurate” in some way but is just a tad like every other speaker that people mention. You’ll get detail; solid bass; decent imaging blah blah blah but something is always missing, like actually toe tapping rolling your eyes back in your head wanting to stand up and dance “fun”. Thus I ended up with the Zu. Exactly the same reason why we possibly both ended up with a CDX2 perhaps?
I worked my way through 3 years of auditioning and several shops and all the usual culprits. The only ones where I felt a loss when a dealer pulled them out was Neat and Zu.
To some extent dealers disrespect them. They all like them; they all enjoy them but they all have something which in their heads sounds better and which they want to sell you ahead of Neats. They may well be right to some extent but in my humble opinion not as often as they think 
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Agreed, they would be very right with the OP’s set. Not boring though.
I think you have your ‘facts’ mixed up there! Bob Surgeoner was the founder of Neat in 1989, Paul Stephenson was naim’s MD before retiring a few years ago.
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Deleted by D41
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I wonder who Mr Bennet might be. Trevor Wilson took over when Paul let go of the reins. The technician’s grasp of Naim management seems tenuous at best.
Hi HH, O dear–I shall remonstrate with my source re the facts as relayed sorry for the confusion-- I’d better delete the posts rather than cause more confusion,
Thank you gents!
D41
I recently went from Focal 1008be II to SBL. I then had a new set of drivers fitted and had a copy of the XO made using uprated components. By the time I finished it cost me about £3k, and I am VERY happy.
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Hi I had SBL’s before the Focal. Couldn’t get them to work in my room no matter what I tried. Again always on the bright side with gery little lie frequency.
Trevor
That pesky room/speaker interface!
M
Better than big lies in the frequency!
Sorry low frequencies
Hello, did you end up having your speaker demo? Curious about your opinion on the Neats…if you indeed listened to them.
Brgds.
Hi David
Yes they are totally different speaker to the Focal 1008BE. Shockingly different in fact. The Focal are a fantastic speaker they don’t work in my system and room to my liking.
With The sound of The Focal in my head initially I thought the Neat were a bit tame and laid back.
But after 15 minutes and playing vary music I began to realise they were showing me exactly what the problem was with the Focal. In your face shouting look at me with loads of high frequency sound. This initially makes them seem very fast and impressive.
The sound of the Neat was very natural and realistic. Not at all hifiish. Nothing was making me notice the speaker.
Bass is taught and sufficient the mid range is controlled and the top end very detailed. There was also a very wide soundstage. I have to say the room I was in was larger than the average room with a very high ceiling. After 90 minutes of listening I decided I liked them enough to take them home for a trial. I have them for a week so I have been bashing loads of music through them from Ozzie Osbornes new album through to Tracy Chapman and Susan Vega.
My dealer said they would sound fuller in my room with the lower ceiling etc.
The sound in my room is much fuller but still open and detailed but above all they seem to make music and encourage you to keep playing music. The bass is well controlled and this was pushed hard by the Cold Play Ghost stories album. They just sort of seem right not drawing your attention to anything particular with one possible exception which I think is down to the recordings or possible my cable. That is on some female vocals the sound can be spitty or sibilant. I will play these albums on my second system and compare. No wear near as bad as the Focals but just a observation. The sound however is not bright but the upper registers are very detailed and this could be a consequence of that. I have been in touch with Neat about the top end and am waiting a response from them.
Positioning wise they are about 2.2 meters apart 150mm away from the wall toed in slightly towards the listener. Tomorrow I am going to pull them out another 25mm and move them apart another 50mm and slightly increase the toe in. I think this will open them up more and tighten them up even more. Neat recommend 200mm from the wall but I don’t want them out that far unless I have to.
I was told ribbon tweeters are difficult to get a good image with. I didn’t even try just plonked them where I wanted them and looked right and they imaged straight away.
Build quality appears to be very good but you do need to handle them carefully because of the cone in the base. Instructions on how to unbox and assemble are provided. Simple 5 minute job,
Appearance is subject. But the wife likes them although the walnut supplied wont be our colour choice.
A mate of mine called in to listen he is a Cyrus / Monitor Audio user and after 5 minutes was unimpressed but by the time he left 2 hours later he loved them. The pace and drive of the Ozzie Osborne album being the clincher.
To date I have only tried the CDX2 as its quick and easy to flip between albums. Tomorrow I will give the LP12 a run.
Even the wife has sat and listened which she refused to do before with the Focal.
To summarise a quick listen will leave you unimpressed because there is nothing that stands out to grab your attention. But stop listen and you began to realise what they are about.
Unless the turntable throws up an issue I will be ordering a pair a next week.
Trevor
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Ah synergy , it seems that Neat do (pun intended) focus on the synergy with Naim and to be blunt, with Naim (I think) being the largest premium HiFI brand in the UK it makes sense .
I am sure there will be howls of protests from people if I am wrong in my belief that Naim is the largest premium brand in the UK
Largest perhaps. The best probably not. Bang for bucks possibly.
That’s politics.
Who makes what I like and want at the right price governs me. Dont care about brand ss such within reason.
Music rules
That sounds very positive. What you want - what I want anyway - is speakers that simply disappear and let the music speak for itself. Speakers that do this are not impressive in a hifi way, but the fact they can do it is hugely impressive. As I said above, the Ekstras sounded really good when I heard them briefly at my local dealer. They are pretty little things too.
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Hi Just need to understand the spitty/vigilance.
I think from my experience you need to trial at home especially if you dknt want them out in the room.
The Cold Play album Ghost Stories seems perfect for this.
Susan Vega live at the Barbican shows the spitty side in my system
Hello Trevor,
Thanks for the excellent report that will surely interest a few others as well. Sounds like the speakers indeed have potential to satisfy. Would be nice to hear how you feel about them after a week’s time.
Is it correct that there are no speaker grills supplied with the Ekstras? Did you find them sturdy/solid enough as they stand on only three points? Was your fear of the rear port alleviated as 150mm is quite close to the wall? Enjoy your time with them during the trial period!
Brgds.
David
In response to your post. They do now come with grills as supplied with the new small bookshelf/standmount model. I have asked about this with Neat. Although the pair I have on demo don’t have.
Ref the 150mm at sensible volumes the 150mm seems ok as you wind the volume it the affect of distance becomes noticeable. However at sensible realistic volumes to date not a problem.
Ref stability yes I think there is a design issue here which I will talk with George at neat about. They are fine in normal use but a large dog or a child could I think destabilise them. I think this could easily be overcome by mounting a stud on each corner that does nothing in normal use but if tipped comes into contact with the floor to prevent them tipping. I have experimented by just putting a couple of Lego bricks under the rear corners. These don’t touch the speaker but as soon as the speaker it comes into contact the brick and stops it going any further. A piece of wood or anything like that removes the problem. However this should be dealt with by design.
I will add additional comments next week.
Trevor
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