Nuance speakers

Wow Bent,

I almost feel bad now.

When I went and bought my receiver at Krazy Krazy (long story), the sales guy just had to demo me these awesome speakers. I do have to admit, they looked nice, and were piano black well before anything else was.

However, when he turned up the demo, and turned off the lights, I thought some inappropriate touching may take place (which thank God it did not).

Then when he told me the insane list price, reduced to the crazy manager special price, I actually laughed at him. His face kind of fell - maybe he thought he had a mark.

Well, at least I can thank George for two things:
- API was a hell of a company (until bought by Klipsch)
- It was the most amusing demo I've ever had

Sorry Bent,

Can't remember the guy's name, only that he was real young (say 22ish) back in '03.

I was never fond of KK either, but I knew someone there, so I could get buys at a good cost.

Funny. my first DD AVR was a Kenwood VR-407 bought at Visions. I have found their staff actually know something about audio than those at all of the big boxes, and they let you haggle (important for a Manitoban).

I heard that even with KK changing to AVE, that they will be closing in the very near future. Tough market to compete in. Plus, their selection has really deteriorated. Instead of Nuance they now have Ikon (same thing basically) in the dark room, and a few of the Energy C-line speakers. Tough to compete against even against a big box like BB who carries a variety of speaker qualities at different price points (PA, JBL, Infinity, Bo$e, and Klipsh).

Funny, I read an article that said Nuance would SUE any magazines that did performance reviews on their speakers. Not quite the self-endorsement, is it?

Well, well, well

The thread that WILL NEVER DIE!

So there is a guy locally looking to trade his Nuance SP-3 towers for some Athenas.

I'm almost tempted to do it, just because they are three way towers versus my two-way bookshelves.

I know we always say that the Nuance don't stack up well against other $2000 speakers - question is, how do they stack up against speakers like Athenas?

Fire away - good idea or bad idea?

Hey Tallyon,

Welcome here, to the thread that won't die!

Mind you, I wouldn't put an e-mail addy in the post. Let someone PM you on the forum board - otherwise you'll be getting 20 male enhancement spams a day.

Bad news for you - Nuance does not appear to exist anymore, and the founder is dead.

You obviously have a short somewhere in the amp section and you will continue to blow fuses until it is rectified.

My suggestions would be:
- If you are good with electonics and soldering, you could try to fix it yourself
- If you are not good with electronics, but good with a screwdriver, you could take the amp section to a local electronics repair store. At least they could give you a repair estimate. Check your yellow pages.
- If you are not good with a screwdriver, you could take the whole speaker in, but are now likely looking at at least a $40 estimate charge as they guy has to take it apart.
- If you are adventurous, you could buy another sub and use its amp section for your Nuance
- If you are smart, take the woofers out to build a sub box for your car, and go buy a good quality sub for just a little more $$$

I prefer the last option myself, but it never hurts to get an estimate if you can get a free one.

Based on a quick Google search of "Nuance N-200", this looks like a pretty common problem as the quality of these was crap, suggesting the design was suspect or some components were cheaped out on.

Funny story......

I had recently added a NAD 7125 receiver, and wanted to set up a 2 channel stereo nirvana in my basement. Therefore, I was looking to get rid of the speakers I was using in the basement, a very nice Dahlquist Orbit 5.1 system.

So I put the system up on Kijiji, and asked who would like to trade me a pair of towers for the Dahlquists.

And of course, I get offered a pair of the Nuances with the two 8" woofers, a powered 8" woofer and the tweeter. Seller lets me know they might have issues with the amp sections but he would check them out and let me know.

Of course, I now have a very morbid fascination with these. Although I wouldn't have dropped $2K on them, they seem much more attractive via trade.

Regardless, before I made the decision and the potential trade partner got a chance to check out the amp sections, I got offered a pair of Paradigm Monitor 7 v2. Narrowly saved from a pair of Nuance, but I wonder how they would have actually sounded in my basement. Guess I'll never know now.

And yes, this thread won't die!