From MRK7421@aol.com Fri Oct 14 09:54:47 2011
Subject:Re: Numa with Harbinger APS 15 speakers


Yep... the tweeter is very much " backed off" on the Harbingers, but the woofer is excellent.

And yes ,on some of the powered speakers, there is definitely too much bite. And no way to back it off in a lot of cases.

The Harbinger does have the 5 band EQ, with adjustment at 2K, 6K and 12 K for the highs. The 2K softens the 3rd harmonic slow decay nicely when it gets really loud.

On the Numa, slow decay third harmonic is actually a bit louder than fast decay third harmonic, which is unlike my B-3.

I like to use the slow decay, kind of going back to what I consider to be THE classic Jimmy Smith sound of the mid 60's. The Numa does that well but bright speakers kind of emphasize it is the upper registers and it starts to sound kind of unauthentic if you aren't careful.

The 3rd harmonic in the upper register seems to be an achilles heel in clones. A lot of people want loud percussion in the low and mid range but when it gets into into the upper harmonics it can become a deal breaker as well as an ear breaker.

I thought Numa did a good job in tapering the shrillness in the upper registers by the way.

I am hoping the Harbingers work out because they have nice tone. I am still on the trial period.

By the way, I did notice at NAMM that there were a lot of speakers similar to this that are coming out of China, where I assume the Harbingers were made. The prices were very reasonable. The trouble is in finding them.