Original d'Atelier

[IanG-UK]

Out of interest does anyone know how well they've sold?  When it was first discussed I thought it was perhaps a bit of a hard sell if its an incremental step from an 800, as those owners could easily wait for the 'next incarnation' of Experts (assuming there will be one), or the drip down upgrades.  And it's a lot of money for a colour change… It seems like anyone that's posted about delivery, has quite a low serial number, so I was curious as to whether it just takes a while to arrive, or whether they are still in the low figures sales-wise…

When I first heard to Od'A at KJ West One in London in December, the two guys from Devialet said that 82 of the 97 (Devialet are keeping three) had already been spoken for in other parts of the world - and that eight were being allocated to the UK. 

Jon at Oxford Audio has sold three of four allocated to him and is hoping to keep the other one for himself - I understand that production of the Od'A is slow however as Jon has only received two of his four so far.

As for the sound, as Guillaume reported, there are gains in detail retrieval, in power/speed and in spacial recreation. There are conflicting unofficial reports from Devialet as to whether some or all of the technical changes will drip down, though clearly some of these can only drip down to the 800. For what it's worth, the back panel of the Od'A is marked DEV900 which might be a suggestion that the 800 will become a 900, perhaps by the time of the Munich show.

I doubt that, in the first five years, Devialet has sold more that 750 800s or its predecessors so they are probably thinking whether going to a 900, and/or dripping down a retrofit, is commercially sensible. Having said that, were there the option of buying an 800 or a more expensive "900" (excluding signature and gold finish) ...