Phantoms and Dialog in limbo

[daibaron]

Yes, audio volume over DLNA suddenly rise over 75 %(in my case) because the value of the controller was set to 75%.
I now have an hearing loss because of them... and i am now extremely careful with it

[steve_denney]

It will be interesting to see how they implement Bluetooth into Experts. At the show I asked out of curiosity whether it would be APT-X but was told it wouldn’t because it will be based on the Phantom implementation.
That suggests security vulnerability will still be present in Experts too.

I agree that some of the known bugs are frustrating and even embarrassing.
Imagine my position a few weeks ago. I was trying to justify the vast expenses of a pair of Gold Phantoms to some friends who have Sonos Play.
I was demonstrating the fantastic sound from my Unitiserve connected to Dialog using Optical. All great for a few minutes and a lot of smiles. Then the first audio dropout which I tried to ignore. Then another dropout a few minutes later. At that point I had to admit it was a known bug and been around for many months that Devialet seem incapable of resolving!
A few pats on my back and comments that “Sonos doesn’t do that” so happy with their cheap system.
Difficult to argue against really.



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[Bobbybina]

With regards to Phantom, the surrounding technology and software is evolving. For example, Apple’s AirPlay 2 will be able to send music to multiple speakers using a single iOS device. Spark may need to evolve to a setup, maintenance and update app. The music player may not be needed. With that said, the Phantom line of speakers may need to be streamlined into two markets- high end and lower end. By lower end, I do not mean low end. The Silver and White Phantoms should be phased out. The Gold should remain. In place of the Silver and White Phantoms, there should be a physically smaller version of the Phantom (mini Phantom) in the sub $1,000 range. This mini Phantom can be added to other mini Phantoms or the Gold Phantom. The mini Phantoms may also be used in home theater settings in addition to the Golds. Now, in order for the home theater sound to be reliably synced, an updated dialog with HDMI connected to the television will help keep all in sync. The video Dialog can sync video and audio more reliably. These are the changes that may help better define and defend the use case for Phantoms, mini Phantoms, and video dialog for all purpose use for a household that is reliable and captures both ends of this higher end market.


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[Axel]

With regards to Phantom, the surrounding technology and software is evolving. For example, Apple’s AirPlay 2 will be able to send music to multiple speakers using a single iOS device.  Spark may need to evolve to a setup, maintenance and update app.  The music player may not be needed. With that said, the Phantom line of speakers may need to be streamlined into two markets- high end and lower end. By lower end, I do not mean low end. The Silver and White Phantoms should be phased out. The Gold should remain. In place of the Silver and White Phantoms, there should be a physically smaller version of the Phantom (mini Phantom) in the sub $1,000 range. This mini Phantom can be added to other mini Phantoms or the Gold Phantom. The mini Phantoms may also be used in home theater settings in addition to the Golds. Now, in order for the home theater sound to be reliably synced, an updated dialog with HDMI connected to the television will help keep all in sync. The video Dialog can sync video and audio more reliably.  These are the changes that may help better define and defend the use case for Phantoms, mini Phantoms, and video dialog for all purpose use for a household that is reliable and captures both ends of this higher end market.


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Pardon me poking my nose in.
There is a new, lower powered and lower priced Phantom available, but physically, it’s the same size:
https://www.devialet.com/en-gb/phantom-speaker/

[Hifi_swlon]

The reason they aren’t making any other shapes/sizes/redesigned dialogues - is because it’s far more expensive to do that than keep rehashing the electronics in existing shells.

When you read historical articles on how much r&d they did to create phantom, they probably underestimated how long it would take to recoup the money in sales (they probably overestimated how much of a market there is for strange looking expensive Bluetooth speakers - which is kind of how they market them).

New sizes mean, new design and manufacture, new testing, new packaging, etc etc. All expensive.

Probably better they try and make them work properly so they don’t go down in history as a company that had groundbreaking products but went out of business because of hyperbole and poor performance (not in sound terms)

[Bobbybina]

The importance of miniaturization of the Phantom or similar technology is for use in other markets such as automotive and consumer audio. The reduced priced Phantom at the same size does not achieve these goals. Additionally, the trend to include voice assistants in speakers is to sell more speakers. I would think that if you sell some of the best speakers you would leave the voice assistant market to the leaders in that field ( Apple, Amazon, Google, etc.). However, I would recommend to embrace and extend these voice assistants. That is, to allow the customer to choose which voice assistant to use using an inexpensive add on device (may even be built into an updated Devialet remote). This way customers can choose to use whichever voice assistant they want via their cell phones, etc. Using an external add in device merely as a conduit of the audio to the customers existing device (iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, Android, Alexa) via Bluetooth or WiFi may help add this functionality with less investment. And giving the customer choice is a win.


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[Bobbybina]

Well there you are:

https://www.devialet.com/en-us/phantom-reactor-speaker

They don’t pay me the big bucks for nothing...

Ha!


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[streamy]

Well there you are:

https://www.devialet.com/en-us/phantom-reactor-speaker

They don’t pay me the big bucks for nothing...

Ha!


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Good nose, congrats!