Phantom Premier vs Phantom I

[st33f]

I am having my old gold upgraded to new one

Is that by Devialet's recommendation?

Nope, I want black matte and will be eventually getting a second one.

[streamy]

Anyone tried both the old Phantom Premiers and the new ones? Do they sound different? I understand there are some hardware differences but also some software changes that are exclusive to the new models, so it would be interesting to see if this has a noticeable impact on the sound!

I have been trying to get info online but there is none given it is has been only a month or 2 since release! I am considering buying an old gold at discount while they exist but wondering if the differences are noticeable!

I do much prefer the old glossy white rather than the new matt version, so that would be a plus to the old one! Thanks everyone, have really enjoyed the discussion so far!

I have also taken the opportunity to replace my 6 year old Silver Phantom with a new Phantom I 108dB (Gold). I have still 2 Gold Phantoms running DOS1 and updated the Silver Phantom to DOS2. With the UMIK2 from @struts I made a number of recordings of the Silver using DOS1 and DOS2 and the Golds using DOS1. Also run them from Spark, Roon, Optical Direct and normal optical inputs. After I will receive the new ‘Gold’ I will also measure them, hopefully over Easter holidays. Then I will process the recordings and report here in the forum. Stay tuned

[ragwo]

Anyone tried both the old Phantom Premiers and the new ones? Do they sound different? I understand there are some hardware differences but also some software changes that are exclusive to the new models, so it would be interesting to see if this has a noticeable impact on the sound!

I have been trying to get info online but there is none given it is has been only a month or 2 since release! I am considering buying an old gold at discount while they exist but wondering if the differences are noticeable!

I do much prefer the old glossy white rather than the new matt version, so that would be a plus to the old one! Thanks everyone, have really enjoyed the discussion so far!

I have also taken the opportunity to replace my 6 year old Silver Phantom with a new Phantom I 108dB (Gold). I have still 2 Gold Phantoms running DOS1 and updated the Silver Phantom to DOS2. With the UMIK2 from @struts I made a number of recordings of the Silver using DOS1 and DOS2 and the Golds using DOS1. Also run them from Spark, Roon, Optical Direct and normal optical inputs. After I will receive the new ‘Gold’ I will also measure them, hopefully over Easter holidays. Then I will process the recordings and report here in the forum. Stay tuned

Looking forward to your measurements!

[howcho]

Anyone tried both the old Phantom Premiers and the new ones? Do they sound different? I understand there are some hardware differences but also some software changes that are exclusive to the new models, so it would be interesting to see if this has a noticeable impact on the sound!

I have been trying to get info online but there is none given it is has been only a month or 2 since release! I am considering buying an old gold at discount while they exist but wondering if the differences are noticeable!

I do much prefer the old glossy white rather than the new matt version, so that would be a plus to the old one! Thanks everyone, have really enjoyed the discussion so far!

I have also taken the opportunity to replace my 6 year old Silver Phantom with a new Phantom I 108dB (Gold). I have still 2 Gold Phantoms running DOS1 and updated the Silver Phantom to DOS2. With the UMIK2 from @struts I made a number of recordings of the Silver using DOS1 and DOS2 and the Golds using DOS1. Also run them from Spark, Roon, Optical Direct and normal optical inputs. After I will receive the new ‘Gold’ I will also measure them, hopefully over Easter holidays. Then I will process the recordings and report here in the forum. Stay tuned

Looking forward to your measurements!

Mee too! Great work

[Razza1974]

Well i had a 3 year old phantom gold and decided to upgrade to 2 new phantom I's (gold version). The hifi shop (great shop, nice owner, was knowledgeable and up to date on the devialets and talked a bit about things that might be coming in the future) and offered me a good deal for the trade in
Before i set them up, I compared the old gold to the new one. And just as he told me there is a subtle difference. I found the new golds not only looking a bit better (I like the matte colour) but also sounding a bit better. To my ears they were more lively, brighter sounding (not too bright). The oldie sounded a bit "muted" like he was a bit tired. Still sounding great and i think you would only notice when directly comparing them in the same room side by side.

Apparently there seems to have been a downgrade in sound quality if i am reading all the recent posts and this is indeed true. To my ears sound qualiy improved a bit. At the same time I have to say that to be able to "equalize" sound output would be very nice. Sometimes they have a "boom tskkk" profile (copied that from an old review on the gold i believe which described the exact same issue for the reviewer) and by this i mean sometimes the sound will get better by just downplaying the high tones a bit and also lessening the bass a bit. Its not with a lot of songs like this but often enough that being able to manipulate output would be great. Still like them a lot

[hydr]

Maybe I misunderstood this whole thing, but I thought Devialet promised AirPlay 2 a long time ago? Now we need to replace the hardware to get it?

[streamy]

Well i had a 3 year old phantom gold and decided to upgrade to 2 new phantom I's (gold version). The hifi shop (great shop, nice owner, was knowledgeable and up to date on the devialets and talked a bit about things that might be coming in the future) and offered me a good deal for the trade in
Before i set them up, I compared the old gold to the new one. And just as he told me there is a subtle difference. I found the new golds not only looking a bit better (I like the matte colour) but also sounding a bit better. To my ears they were more lively, brighter sounding (not too bright). The oldie sounded a bit "muted" like he was a bit tired. Still sounding great and i think you would only notice when directly comparing them in the same room side by side.

Apparently there seems to have been a downgrade in sound quality if i am reading all the recent posts and this is indeed true. To my ears sound qualiy improved a bit. At the same time I have to say that to be able to "equalize" sound output would be very nice. Sometimes they have a "boom tskkk" profile (copied that from an old review on the gold i believe which described the exact same issue for the reviewer) and by this i mean sometimes the sound will get better by just downplaying the high tones a bit and also lessening the bass a bit. Its not with a lot of songs like this but often enough that being able to manipulate output would be great. Still like them a lot

I think I can understand what you mean with saying ‘seems to have been a downgrade in sound quality’, but from all the discussions here in which I participated it is not about a deterioration of sound quality, but rather a deterioration of hires signal throughput to the Phantom drivers. The SQ in the for us adult humans (probably 20+Hz to 16kHz- ) is perfectly preserved according to all measurements I recently did. Even better from 16Hz to 22kHz my measurements on old Gold Phantoms and on a Silver Phantom both in DOS1 and DOS2 using any of the lossless paths (all except Bluetooth) are great. Low distortion, way more room influences than speaker or source differences. I did repeated sweep measurements from 10Hz-30kHz with almost identical frequency response, from Silver as well as on Gold Phantoms. The Gold Phantoms have in the very low frequencies 10-90Hz a higher volume (about +4dB @20Hz decaying to asymptotically meet the Silver curve @90Hz) than the Silver, but else look very similar. The room characteristics is much more influencing the frequency response than the speakers or the signal path (optical, Spark, Roon, optical direct). In the high frequency I have not yet have sufficient time to identify differences. Both speakers go to 22 kHz almost in identical curves when the input is anything else than optical direct. In optical direct mode the frequency curves attenuate later and reach around 26kHz before being buried in the background noise in my recordings with the UMIK2. Surprisingly, very much the same on Silver as on Gold Phantoms. But besides that I had made blind tests with my wive and my parents five years ago and all including me could blindly identify the better performance/sound of the Gold Phantom compared to the Silver Phantom at same loudness. So, I fully acknowledge that our ears are more refined in hearing than great microphone technology as the UMIK2. Probably because our hearing can discern room influences much better that SPL recordings with microphones that are very precise, but do not tell us what really matters. Therefore, in conclusion I have no doubts that the latest Phantoms perform well, I just ordered a latest version of the Phantom I 108dB, as the Golds are now called and will compare them to my previous measurements.

[Jann]

I am very close to buying my first Phantom.
It is a very tough choice, as Devialet is still offering the “old” Phantom Gold as part of their “Last Chance” program:
2590€ for Phantom Gold
vs
2990€ for Phantom 1 108db

As of my understanding the only difference seems to be the included remote, the newer processor and the matte finish or am I missing something?
The choice is so hard as I don’t think I’ll be needing the remote, the sound quality is roughly the same, and 400€ is quite a bit, especially considering stereo which would result in 800€ of saving.
Any tips on this decision?

[Johnnydev]

The phantom 1 saving energie and sounds better than the premier

[struts]

I am very close to buying my first Phantom.
It is a very tough choice, as Devialet is still offering the “old” Phantom Gold as part of their “Last Chance” program:
2590€ for Phantom Gold
vs
2990€ for Phantom 1 108db

As of my understanding the only difference seems to be the included remote, the newer processor and the matte finish or am I missing something?
The choice is so hard as I don’t think I’ll be needing the remote, the sound quality is roughly the same, and 400€ is quite a bit, especially considering stereo which would result in 800€ of saving.
Any tips on this decision?

There are other hardware differences, for instance iirc the 108dsB support 802.11ac Wi-Fi, the Golds only 802.11n. There may be other digital hardware differences such as HomePlug version, Bluetooth version etc.

I would probably still go for the new version if buying today, although I have held off upgrading my Golds which although five years old are still working well and doing what I want them to do. If it ain’t broke..!


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