Focal Diva Utopia Active Speakers

He did, it was a Yamaha or Mackie one I think?
Sounded pretty decent tbh

It’s the gear used for live music events.

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  • So your traditional customers are ready to get rid of all their boxes?
  • That’s what I heard.

Coming from the CEO of the biggest box company in the world.

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Interesting comments from the personnel from Focal.

The CEO states that their customers are bored with black boxes and cables, want something easier to install. Want a plug and play product

Industry is alive because of Hi-Res streaming

Lifestyle products for a younger market.

He further states that they want to stick to the Naim / Focal DNA. But aiming for efficiency and convenience.

The Focal / Naim Product Group Manager states that separate boxes are not optimised for music.

Is this their way forward now for Focal, dumping Naim as a black box supplier, only to use them to supply electronic bits for their speakers.

DG…

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If naim/focal made a version of the speakers with just a single XLR input without the streamer they would sell like hot cakes.

Left and right amps packs on the back would be the same on each speaker with simple dip switches for bass roll off, bass gain, treble gain ( midwoofer would be fixed like how linn did it )
It could still be done with DSP but set up the old school way that most of us on this forum would be familiar with. The amps could be easily removed for sending back to naim for servicing and the speakers could come with veneered options as standard.

If Naim doesn’t consider it they are crazy because there’s so many posts on the forum now about the likes of ATC and PMC active speakers so there’s definitely a market for it.
As both speakers are the same ( so not master and slave ) the cost to make them would be less and the market they would be aiming for would be happy to run a cable to each one so they can drop the wireless modules too.

And finally the round logo on the front could be magnetic so you could swap it for a Naim logo in green or white or focal as the white light behind it would shine through lighting it up.

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There’s some truth here perhaps not expressed in the way I would present it. There’s definitely a trend towards less boxes (I wouldn’t interpret that as ‘no boxes’ personally) in some quarters, especially with the complexity of very large multi box systems. I’m personally running a large integrated with an internal DAC with a cheap streamer attached to it. Back in the day I had pre with monos, cd player, power supplies, phones stage, etc. Perhaps some of the Naim customer base is looking to simplify. The Diva Utopia is probably an oversimplification too far for most traditional Naim customers though, given the lack of redundancy and the complete abandonment of separate box. It’s surely a different customer for the Diva Utopia.

Something like a 500 level steaming pre (perhaps in a small tower format with two monos) with the ability to upgrade it in some way (ps architecture) would have some legs. Or if the Utopia product was ‘traditional’ active you could just have one fraim stack of source equipment.

I’m not sure I agree with the young guy in the video that separate boxes are not optimised for music. That’s the whole point of them surely. Perhaps he means the level of knowledge needed to set up means they are more difficult to get to the end experience, but I’d be more than willing to bet 30ks worth of seperate boxes and speakers will sound better than the Diva Utopia.

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We need to perhaps think a little about that £30k price. There are many systems at that price point and some considerably higher if you add in NPX300 as well. 333 plus 332 plus 250 is over £23k and you still need to add speakers. 222 plus 300 plus 250 is over £18k and if you add in say Kudos 606 then you are at £30k. Other non Naim systems can also cost a bit. My own one box Linn setup with Kudos 606s comes in at £30k.
For me the big issue is just their physical size - too big for your average UK room. Aware some folks have large listening rooms but I suspect most of us don’t or have to dual purpose the room eg lounge/listening room.

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Cool to see that some had the chance to spend some time with these speakers. As I mentioned in my introductory topic, Focal is an acquired taste. Not everyone is a fan of the sound signature even in combination with NAIM.

The Diva Utopia are designed to serve a niche which I would happily buy into when this is perfected and spilled over to us mere mortals. For example, when we bought the Aria 948 at launch for my father, we had to buy furniture as well to accommodate all the NAD gear and the Rega Turntable. When we got home and started assembling things, we got flooded with cables (pre-amp, amp, dac, cd-player, turntable, power supplies, etc).

In the new house, I had less space and just one slot in my TV furniture to install something. Therefore, I went for an all-in-one set-up which was the Uniti Nova and Kanta No 3. I fulfilled my dream with the space I had. Imagine this tech from the Diva in the Kanta, you’d have even more versatility.

I remain optimistic that those of us who do not have space for a rack with 6 devices, we will have options like this in the future. Of course, those who have the luxury of building a swamp of cables, I hope they will still have the chance :).

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My take/view on this kit is that it’s a wonderful development for a market space which many on here may not appreciate e.g. larger floor-plate rooms, where box-count and simplicity of delivery & operation are the key purchasing drivers. Sticking these 'speakers in to a smaller space will not enable them to breathe, and the bass output MAY over-power things, which would not render them to sound anything like ‘Utopia-range quality’.

Listening to the YT promotional vids, I didn’t hear anything approaching rock music played through them, more electronica (unless I missed something).

As to the question of whether Focal/Naim will produce ‘vanilla’ active 'speakers, I suspect not, as if you need a source box, having an amp alongside isn’t that much different(?).

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But I suspect the margin on separates is also much higher, while the volumes sold will be much lower.

The gihugous brick? I think the size and shape are more of a problem than the material with that one. And that’s from it coming with a Uniti of nowhere near 30k.

I use mine, mainly for volume and power. It is a bit cumbersome. I think it could have been an opportunity to do something different but all they did was swop the logos on the front.
It also feels like Focal are trying to suggest that the speakers are the star of the show, I’m sure many would agree getting the speakers to work right for you, in your room and for your ears, can be difficult to get right. Whilst shoving everything in the back of the speakers may be easy on the eye and look pretty, if it doesn’t make your ears happy you’d be left disappointed, and you aren’t able to change anything about the characteristics of the system beyond perhaps a different mains lead or fancy Ethernet cable.

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They look like a technical tour de force, but the grey felt finish means it’s a no from me. I agree with the comments that they are too big for most UK living rooms - will be interested to see if they launch a smaller pair.

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I think the Diva Utopias offer room correction. No idea how well that will work, but should give the opportunity to fiddle around with sound presentation through software. For the intended customer base that’s probably more appealing than playing with interconnects, speaker cables, switches etc that occupies so many here.

Roger

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Thankfully in my case it’s a £30k problem I don’t need to fix :smiling_face:
I’m sure those fortunate enough to fill their expansive living spaces with pairs of them can afford an on demand DSP consultant to pop in and tune it as needed.
More importantly, my ears spent a reasonable amount of time in front of a pair and left the room less than impressed (speakers and sales reps), ability or desire to purchase aside.

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I know a lot has been made of the price, but I think these are actually quite reasonable, no? If you consider what a pair of Sopra #2s, a new classic 222 and couple of new classic 3 series amps would cost, this is priced very well! Unfortunately, I’m not a fan of the felt looking material on the exterior. If they correct that, I think these will sell really well. Linn seem to be doing very well with a similar approach.

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On the video, they stated that different finishes will be available next year. However, it’s not DIY and the change had to be done by a dealer.

DG…

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Or use the room correction functionality in the app.

It’s quite a novel marketing approach for the Group Product Manager to state that the products which make up 40% of the turnover of one of the two companies in the group, around 13% of total group turnover, aren’t optimised for their function.

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Let’s face it, it’s a disaster of PR.

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