26-Dec-2015, 20:01
Hi Theovip2 and welcome to the world of Phantom ownership - pleasure mixed with pain sometimes!
I have considered the new Play5 against the Phantom with the option of the Sonos sub. Whilst I doubt it'll give that wow factor the Phantoms can with the right material, it may well be good enough given the savings. I heard the Play5 in John Lewis before xmas, whilst that's hardly a critical listening environment, you could tell the unit is no slouch.
The software without a doubt is the Phantom's letdown, however as things go on it will mature and develop. The upcoming Spotify integration will be a big bonus as it will avoid Spark, in my experience of owning 2 Phantoms the less I have to do with Spark, the better.
With my Phantoms I've so far used my trusty Sonos Connect unit via optical into the Phantoms, as you might a Chromecast Audio, flipping back to Spark for volume control which isn't the end of the world. Having an additional £270 odd investment for the Sonos is less than ideal with over £3k worth of Phantoms but it does fix the Software/UI issues and bugs with Spark.
I get the distinct impression that down the line, say a year or so, the Phantoms will have evolved significantly with new features and more robust implementation of features currently in the software. Additional functionality such as home cinema (that I can't see happening without a new Dialog that has HDMI ports so audio and video can be synced) and up&p functionality to allow the Phantoms to play from a NAS drive I'm sure will arrive, but it'll take time to arrive and then more time to fix the bugs.
Being sold through Apple stores will pile some pressure on Devialet - I can't imagine Apple tolerate angry customers in their stores because there are loads of firmware glitches in their expensive speakers, rather they want happy customers buying more iDevices
The question I find Phantom ownership currently boils down to is: are you willing to put up with the lows (functionality, sometimes reliability and cost) to get the highs (SQ, range, detail)?
Also watch out if you want other Chromecast Audio's or Sonos units in the house, the Phantoms will be out of sync with the other units as there's a delay in the Phantoms playing music due to DSP, other non dsp speakers will be infront of the Phantoms when grouped if that makes sense. This Christmas it wasn't the same not having music playing all over the house as we are used to with Sonos, we could have it in the lounge and nowhere else or everywhere else and not the lounge as the Phantoms were out of sync - just one of those things that can't be helped when DSP is involved unfortunately.
I still have dilemma's about my Phantoms - sound and look the business Vs some glitches and UI immaturity.
Hope this helps, not really on thread of Spark 1.4.1 though sorry!
I have considered the new Play5 against the Phantom with the option of the Sonos sub. Whilst I doubt it'll give that wow factor the Phantoms can with the right material, it may well be good enough given the savings. I heard the Play5 in John Lewis before xmas, whilst that's hardly a critical listening environment, you could tell the unit is no slouch.
The software without a doubt is the Phantom's letdown, however as things go on it will mature and develop. The upcoming Spotify integration will be a big bonus as it will avoid Spark, in my experience of owning 2 Phantoms the less I have to do with Spark, the better.
With my Phantoms I've so far used my trusty Sonos Connect unit via optical into the Phantoms, as you might a Chromecast Audio, flipping back to Spark for volume control which isn't the end of the world. Having an additional £270 odd investment for the Sonos is less than ideal with over £3k worth of Phantoms but it does fix the Software/UI issues and bugs with Spark.
I get the distinct impression that down the line, say a year or so, the Phantoms will have evolved significantly with new features and more robust implementation of features currently in the software. Additional functionality such as home cinema (that I can't see happening without a new Dialog that has HDMI ports so audio and video can be synced) and up&p functionality to allow the Phantoms to play from a NAS drive I'm sure will arrive, but it'll take time to arrive and then more time to fix the bugs.
Being sold through Apple stores will pile some pressure on Devialet - I can't imagine Apple tolerate angry customers in their stores because there are loads of firmware glitches in their expensive speakers, rather they want happy customers buying more iDevices
The question I find Phantom ownership currently boils down to is: are you willing to put up with the lows (functionality, sometimes reliability and cost) to get the highs (SQ, range, detail)?
Also watch out if you want other Chromecast Audio's or Sonos units in the house, the Phantoms will be out of sync with the other units as there's a delay in the Phantoms playing music due to DSP, other non dsp speakers will be infront of the Phantoms when grouped if that makes sense. This Christmas it wasn't the same not having music playing all over the house as we are used to with Sonos, we could have it in the lounge and nowhere else or everywhere else and not the lounge as the Phantoms were out of sync - just one of those things that can't be helped when DSP is involved unfortunately.
I still have dilemma's about my Phantoms - sound and look the business Vs some glitches and UI immaturity.
Hope this helps, not really on thread of Spark 1.4.1 though sorry!
