The Opus’s once — looking back — little bit cheesy music has recently been stuck in my head. After receiving the TakeT LIVE supertweeter, sent for testing from Ceres and wiring it up, this immediately came to mind and I can't get rid of it. Of course, there’s something joyful about this song, and when I add that in our childhood, at the plage, it was played 3-4 times a day, it somehow reminds me of those happy, mischievous years. The sun is shining, carefree times, joy, happiness, summer, a grin. That’s the feeling I got immediately after connecting the LIVE. Christian (the europian distributor) told me that I should be listen to it for about a week, and then form an opinion. For me only two seconds were enough to know, that I won’t send it him back :)

But what is this? Supertweeter. OK... We’ve seen a lot of these. What makes this different? Well, like the Batpure, it has an extremely high impedance, so it virtually doesn’t affect the amplifier’s damping; it detects the speaker just as well without it. As Chris said, the amplifier doesn’t feel it’s there. The principle is completely different, but anyone following the Batpure story has probably already seen that this tweeter’s construction has nothing to do with other speakers. It features some wavy, folded membrane that the passing current “moving,” moving the air accordingly. Whatever I heard from it, is just that — different, and that’s it. When I asked what the difference was compared to other TakeT models, Chris said the principle of the speaker is the same, just bigger, more loadable, and of course, the bigger ones are somewhat better. Although the supply is gradually starting to limit itself to the Batpure and the LIVE, the intermediate products seem to be disappearing from the palette. What’s certain is that Kürthy Tomi’s bigFAL (very-very BIG Furuyama C90 spekaers) has two pairs of Batmaster units installed, which was their previous top tweeter, replaced by the LIVE. Online, I saw that anyone who has both told that the Batmaster is also very good, but the LIVE is slightly better. And if I add that the Batmaster was priced around 1.2 million forints (3000EUR) in Hungary, and the LIVE costs less than half a million (1148 EUR), you can’t complain, not to mention any other supertweeter that costs this much or more, and not so good.

But what's different about this? With classic supertweeters, I always feel like I get something, but I also lose something. The silly situation is that the music opens up, but in a strange way, it also closes a little. It opens here, closes there, but I can’t define exactly where. It opens in the atmosphere but closes in realism and rawness. Well, the LIVE only opens, in every sense. Maybe it’s helped by the fact that it radiates 360°, I don’t know, but it’s probably no coincidence that they omitted the directed radiation in the top model. Although I was most worried about this, since supertweeters are very directional, this one doesn’t need to be aimed around, which is great....

...

I set up it with ToMPi (business owner of TMP Audio). I intentionally waited so I’d have help if I couldn’t decide whether it was better or not. The turntable was running beforehand, Tompi was a bit late, so — I was too lazy to swap records — I just put it back to the start when it finished. That was good because this way I got to know the Yello/Flag album inside out, every nuance

Unboxing the LIVEs... Very beautiful. They are finished in walnut color, though I think a black one would suit my room better, but I think they only make it in walnut color

The small label at the bottom shows which position the rear potmeter is in and how many dB it presses, so it’s quite easy to set. The pot isn’t “clicky,” so you can very finely tune the value that best matches the speaker — totally analog. The minimum adjustable sensitivity is 50dB, and the one clicking increases the efficiency by 5 and 10dB. (but the sensitivity also varies between two values, just not scaled).

TakeT highlights three settings:

Low efficiency, but noticeable presence (50dB)

Medium, standard efficiency (70dB)

High efficiency (i remember 90dB)

...

I intentionally chose 70dB and connected it with the same cheeper cable to the amplifier output (using banana plugs and bare wires), just like the Batpure, so I was sure I’d only hear the difference between the two tweeters (the Batpure is 70dB). And yes, there is a difference — quite a big one. I haven’t complained much before, but now the system has entered a new dimension, and elevated the listening experience not only in proportion with the costs. It definitely leaned towards Kürthy Tomi’s sound style (hungarian TakeT and Kondo ex-distributor), but it’s hard to put into words. The previous sound seemed more mechanical. ToMPi and I tried to describe it, but we couldn’t defined exactly what happened. Everything became even more alive, and the system conveyed the musical events even better. In live recordings, like "Bizottság/Kalandra fel" (hungarian punk band live album), we felt even more like we were stepping out of the room and found ourselves at an outdoor concert — a real time-travel. Every tiny detail that previously went unnoticed, now made sense, and we realized how much extra information is still on the record. It’s silly and somewhat cliché to pay attention to such things, but for example, in Yello/Race, the “race track” used to go from left to right with a roaring motor, straight to the spinal cord, but now it moved from left to right, and when it turned left again in the corner, and I see, turned back on the race track — NASCAR-like experience.

...

ToMPi suggested that we should try stepping backward in the chain, so I reconnected the Batpure. Even then, the sound was noticeably more mechanical, less open and little bit less lively compared to the new sound with the LIVE (but it was good). When every supertweeters were disconnected, it got even worse. We agreed that if we’d never heard the system with tweeters, that sound would be very good, but we have heard it. So, it’s only worth trying this if you’ve already set aside the money for it, because once you connect it, you can’t give it back. I did the same. I wouldn’t even dare connect it to my small system because I’m satisfied with the Batpure’s contribution, but I know I would be shocked if I tried it and then I would have to buy another pair of LIVEs. (and it’s bedroom hifi just a secondary system, turned on once or twice a month)....

 

Conclusion?

Let’s start with the disadvantages:

- No black finish

- The potmeter’s scale is on a black background, only difficult to see, so for a "blind" like me, it’s quite hard to see (especially in dim light), but we found it with a flashlight :)

- At the beginning, when the TakeT logo is illuminated by the lamp, it shines in many colors, and if it’s at the right angle, it even shines into your eyes (just turn it away).

 

And now the main part:

I’ve heard many systems with supertweeters, which cost is low or high. But this is a different animal altogether. Every such specialized system can deliver impressive openness, but compared to that, they are all a bit stiff, tense, or mechanical, while this one brings out the raw, natural realism. It’s hard to describe — you have to hear it, because it’s a phenomenon you can’t achieve with other modifications or equipment. I believe it’s a must-have in higher-budget systems, but it will also significantly upgrade smaller setups. Christmas is coming, so think about what you want under the tree — but this is a guaranteed hit, this is the real LIVE :)

 

I found the photos on the internet. I'm too lazy to take LIVE out of the system and take photos for the sake of the post :)

 

test system:

amp: Kondo Overture

spkr: Avanatgarde Acoustuc UNO (Classic version)

TT: TW Acustic Raven 2 Special, Artemis Labs TA1, ZYX R50 Bloom

phono: 47Lab Phono Cube Silver

cables: Kondo KSL SPz, LPz, ACz