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REL Explained, Top-to-Bottom
Every Line Given Meaning and Context
The below text is a transcription of the video.
So we get questions about our different ranges of product, right? We have the T/x, the S, the reference, the HTs. If you’re trying to figure out how to navigate the REL universe, how does that work? I think the easiest thing for you to understand is to recognize that the sort of the core of the line, where we started was with really Serie S. The S gives you all the virtues of REL, and it does it in qualitative senses that are beginning to get into like near Reference kinds of performance levels. It’s an amazing product. It’s beautiful, it’s extremely well made. What S’s do is they deliver incredibly fast sound. They go extremely deep. They connect up by your choice of high level, low level, or 0.1. You can mix 0.1 and either the other two, but what’s most traditionally done is high level where you’re literally feeding our REL the same sonic signal that you’re feeding your speaker.
Don’t worry, there’s massive amplifiers inside of the S’s that do all the amplifying. We don’t take anything from you. It’s really important the customers understand that we have to be fed exactly the same signal that you’re feeding your speakers, or we can’t possibly sound exactly like your speakers do. They’re dynamic characteristics that your speakers receive from your amp. They’re tonal characteristics. We build that forward into our high level. And then if you’re doing theatre on top of that, you have a 0.1 LFE, 0.1 is that sixth channel and a 5.1 system, it is the special effects low frequency channel. It produces the really bombastic big stuff in the theatre. So with S’s, we start with 500 watts amplifiers. We move up into our 1000 watts amplifiers, but we sleeve them down, we limit them for the application. So in the 510, for example, you’ve got 500 watts in the S/812, you have 800 watts.
We have larger elements within the Serie S family that have a full 1000 watts. So these are very powerful pieces that are very quick. Now let’s talk about just quickly the difference between T/x and S to give you a context. The smallest S, the S/510 absolutely decimate one of our best sellers called the T/9x. It’s stronger, it’s faster, it’s bigger, it’s just more. What kind of speakers are we talking about? Well, if you look at most speaker lines, not subwoofer lines, but speaker lines, they’ll typically have a reference line, right? And Bowers and Wilkins, for example, it’s an 800, kef starts at 10,000 in their reference line and goes right on up to $20,000. And then they have super luxury pieces that are over $30,000 a piece. The S is designed to take the upper end of their medium line and well into their reference line.
That gives you a feel for it in dollars and cents. It’s probably things like S/510s and S/812s are designed to work with and complement and even exceed the performance of things in sort of the six to $10,000 per pair price range of speakers. What we’ve done with T/x is taken and drawn as much of Serie S virtues and characteristics as we could possibly get into a lineup that is really attainable in its pricing. What we’re able to do is capture the basic voicing, right, the same quick rhythm. We use similar filters. They’re both eight millisecond filters. Where we change is that the S’s have very big expensive die cast chassis that are very stiff, very quiet and immense amounts of throw. The travel of the driver itself is a couple of inches. On the T/9x’s, you’re gonna lose about an inch of full, a full inch of travel.
Doesn’t mean it doesn’t play loud. A T/9x is somewhere in the range of 105, 106 db. It’s an extremely powerful piece, and the S’s are more powerful yet again by another five or six dB above that. So these are the greater gradation differences. The T/x’s also have the high level filter. They also can connect up simultaneously to the 0.1 LFE. So all the basic ingredients of the S that we could, we distilled and brought them into the T/x’s. They’re also beautifully built and finished. This is stuff that is built better than most people’s top end subwoofers. So even though these are not wildly expensive, they have a fit, a finish and attention to detail. The industrial design is exquisite. All of these things transfer over. We don’t build subwoofers where we have to apologize for the way they look, nor do you, let’s go up a little bit.
The carbon special, which is about, oh, 30% more yet again than an 812, it’s a little larger. It’s an all carbon fiber driver. What does that mean? It means the cone weighs next to nothing and is as stiff as can be. That’s why it’s used in race cars. It’s why it’s used in self-bombers. This material is unique. The use of it in a product, in this price category with this power, I believe we call for 900 watts, but we’ve used this amplifier continuously at about 1,020 watts just continuous for half a minute at a time. And when you hear it next to an 812, it is faster. It’s more incisive, it’s more delicate. It’s quieter in the background, it’s more explosive when things call for that. It’s just taken all of those things and expanded them. And when we talk about that, it’s not in the bass.
It of course its in the bass, but it informs everything up and down the line. So it makes your system better. Why do I need that? You may not. You may not. It depends on your speakers. And if you are at that level, you’ll begin to understand. You’re gonna start hearing about the carbon special. Dealers are going to be saying, well, if you’re using those speakers, you should really consider a pair of carbon specials or a six pack. These are for systems that are really remarkable. We have them paired with speakers in the 40 to $50,000 pair range. When we’re doing six packs. They often start off with just a simple stereo pair. They comment on what an unbelievable transformation that was and they gradually start asking questions about what would it take to do a six pack? Can I do it, you know, in stages?
Own four of them for a year and then finally add the six a couple of years later. The answer is yes. It’s one of the beauties of six packs. If you start with a pair, it just makes it so easy to start moving up, and that is a whole another experience, not a base. We make a lot of bass for a little money. It is the most three dimensional oral reality I’ve ever heard, period. I don’t care how good your speakers are, we have a six pack that can make a huge improvement on your listening experience. We have one special model called a 212/sx. Again, it’s often sold in stereo pairs. It is the badass be all end all for somebody who says, listen, I’ve only got room for two. I like to do everything. I don’t want any constraints. I want it to play loud.
I want to do big theatre. I want it to be able to do the most bombastic music I can think of, and I’ve got a big room. So what do you have? And the 212/sx is literally as the name applies, it is a relatively tall narrow cabinet. It has a pair of active 12 inch drivers. It has a down firing passive, and it has a rear firing passive. It’s mounted quite high up in the cabinet. The down firing passive gives you extremely deep bass, the kind of low bass that just ripples and rumbles across the floor. The upper one does something very much like a six pack for about half the price in that. It releases the high frequency harmonics back and into a corner. It goes up the corner, travels up to the ceiling, comes back down, and you just get this beautiful, delicate filigree of high frequency components that you’re just scratching your head going, how did I get that out of subwoofers?
When you get up to Naples Ultra speakers, when we’re talking about large Wilsons, when we’re talking about the larger rock ports and things, we created the reference models, the No.31 and 32 to be identical in quality, but for different sized rooms. The 32 is when you have an enormous room, hopefully given overt largely to the expression of music. And if you can afford a six pack of those, you’re a very fortunate person in life. You should really thank your lucky stars. It’s an amazing experience. In most 32 owners’ lives, they can afford a vast array of toys, and we get the feedback from them that they’ve never gotten this much joy out of any single purchase, but for their six packs, it completes very large systems. Understand these are systems. It could be anywhere from a hundred thousand dollars right on up to a million dollars.
And then at the very bottom end of the range, this little bitty little thing called a Tzero, it’s the cutest little thing you’ve ever seen sells for under $500 US. It is something that someone who is just out of college, living in a small apartment or flat or not, or just living in a small apartment or flat, there are plenty of us who maybe are downsizing from having a big stereo system. You’re, you know, beginning to enter retirement. You go, I don’t need this. Boom, cute little guy. And that sort of completes it except I said, I come back to the HTs and the HT is a very special range of ours for high performance theatre. They’re incredible. They have more output than things two and three times their price in our own range, and it’s expressly dynamic and explosive just for big theatre.
These are relatively inexpensive pieces. They started about $700 US and go on up to a couple of thousand dollars at the moment, and they hit and play louder and make extremely deep base. It’s needed for people who really value theatre. Hence the name HT. They’re incredible values. They’re beautifully finished. They’re beautifully built. They actually work really well with the T/x’s and the S’s in systems. It’s a very lengthy explanation, but we wanted you to understand our universe, how we conceive of these things. We really believe in having horses for courses. Each one of our pieces really meets real world needs that system owners have.