I’ve already set up my Wharfedale Diamond 10.7, 10 CS and 10.SR. So here are my impressions:
I. Aesthetics
The Diamond 10 is a good-looking series, no doubt about it. The Diamond 10 cabinet is curved like the Diamond 9s, but the 10s have a composite front baffle in piano black finish that looks pretty sleek. The gold-plated binding posts and bridge connectors of the 9 series were also retained on the 10s. But the most eye-catching aesthetic feature is the aluminum speaker flanges that are as shiny as polished chrome. The contrast between the piano black front baffle and the shiny silver flanges looks striking.
The grille frame looks like it’s made of wood, unlike the flimsy plastic grille frame of the 9s. The problem with the grilles on the 10s is that the pegs are not placed on the outer edges and corners of the frame, but on the inner portions where they’re supposed to attach to the hexagonal holes of the Allen screw heads on the speaker flanges. The idea behind the peg placement is to make a front baffle that has no noticeable peg holes when the grilles are off.
As a result, the pegs are now just little stubs that need rubber covers to hold the pegs inside the Allen screw head holes. Upon inspection at the retailer, my sealed-box 10.7 pair had 5 missing rubber peg covers, believe it or not. Without the rubber covers, the peg will not snap onto the Allen screw head hole, so the retailer took 5 rubber covers from the display models and attached them to my set. When I got home, I tested the grilles and found that every time the grilles are removed, those 5 surplus rubber covers detach from the pegs and remain stuck inside the Allen screw head holes. So I had to glue the rubbers onto the pegs myself.
The 10.7’s grilles are fine now, but it’s annoying to have to go through all that trouble just because the designers wanted a silly “invisible” peg-hole look. As a side note, my 10 CS and 10.SRs have no problems with the grille pegs and rubbers, maybe because the grille frames on those two models are much shorter, making them less problem-prone.
It looks like the Diamond 10s are designed to be used with grilles off. So if you like the no-grilles look, then this is a handsome set that looks better without grilles. But if, like me, you prefer to have the grilles on, then you’ll notice that this series was not designed with your preference in mind.
II. Specs
The Diamond 10s have black woven Kevlar woofers and black soft dome mids and tweeters. The 2-inch mids and 1-inch tweets have a metal dome diffuser that make the mids and tweets seem bigger than they really are.
The Diamond 10.SR is a small monopole surround speaker with a 4-inch bass/mid driver and a 1-inch tweeter, designed for wall-mounting. Unlike the front-ported Diamond 9.SR, the 10.SR is now rear-ported. Sensitivity is 88 dB, with a frequency range of 70 Hz to 24 kHz. This is a two-way, two-speaker design with crossover at 2.2 kHz.
The Diamond 10 CS is the medium-sized center speaker of the line, with two 5-inch bass/mid drivers and one 1-inch tweeter. It’s rear-ported, like the 9 CS. Sensitivity is 89 dB, with a frequency range of 70 Hz to 24 kHz. This is a two-way, three-speaker design with crossover at 2.8 kHz.
The Diamond 10.7 is the flagship of the mid-end Diamond 10 series. It’s rear-ported, with two 6.5-inch bass drivers, one 2-inch mid driver, and one 1-inch tweeter. Sensitivity is 90 dB, with a frequency range of 30 Hz to 24 kHz. For sure, the extra sensitivity is provided by the 2-inch midrange driver. This is a three-way, four-speaker design with crossovers at 150 Hz, 850 Hz, and 4.5 kHz.
Note that the 10.7 is is not a 4-way speaker, even if it has 3 crossover points that are commonly assumed to automatically mean that the frequency range is divided into 4 ways. This is in fact a 3-way speaker, since the Wharfedale website clearly says so.
But strictly speaking, this is really a 3.5-way speaker, with frequency ranges divided as follows:
1) 4.5 kHz to 24 kHz = Tweeter
2) 850 Hz to 4.5 kHz. = Midrange
3) 30 Hz to 850 Hz = Bass
3.5) 30 Hz to 150 Hz = Low Bass
The main bass driver has a sealed enclosure, while the low bass driver has a ported enclosure. So the two speakers should sound very different even if they are both 6.5 inchers. The main bass driver covers 850 Hz and below. But from 150 Hz down, both the main bass driver and the low bass driver will run simultaneously in parallel, with the low bass driver merely providing the function of "BSC" ("Baffle Step Compensation").
So the low bass driver only helps the main bass driver by providing reinforcement for the 150 Hz-and-below range. The low bass does not have a frequency range dedicated to it; hence, it’s referred to as the “.5” in the 3.5-way system of this design.
III. Sound
I once had a big 3-way speaker system, but I felt the midrange was overpowering the bass. After that, I tried a 2-way system, liked it better, and never looked back.
I’ve long preferred a two-way system because it gives me the clear mid and stronger bass that I like. Due to the simpler design, it’s easier to build a good 2-way than a good 3-way. So if both types are equally well-made, chances are that the 2-way will sound better because speaker integration will be easier to achieve. That’s why high-end professional near-field monitors are 2-way systems, because the 2-way is the configuration that will give the most accurate sound.
But the environment for near-field monitors has one characteristic not found on the HT environment --- the near-field placement of about 2 to 3 feet from the listener. It's not going to be as easy to provide the same accuracy when the listener is positioned about 10 feet away from the speaker. That’s why I previously had a Diamond 9.5, a 2.5-way floorstander. With the 9.5, I had the 2-way that I preferred, plus the .5-way provided by the low bass to fill the 10-foot listening distance better.
But this time, I wanted to try the 3.5-way Diamond 10.7 and see if the new low-cost 3-ways have improved. I was a bit skeptical, since a 2-way system designer has only one crossover to dial in right, but a 3-way system designer would have to get two crossovers right, making it more likely that the 3-way will have more integration and transition problems.
But hey, designers have the benefit of computer software these days to help them design their speakers, so why not give those 3-ways a try and find out for myself if the supposedly greater clarity and detail on the 10.7 they’re talking about is going to work for me.
My receiver is Yamaha 767, a 2010 mid-end model that has PEQ (Parametric Equalization) in its YPAO feature. The receiver was YPAO-calibrated while partnered with my previous Diamond 9s, and I connected my new 10 set without re-calibrating, to find out what differences I would observe.
Using my old Diamond 9 YPAO settings on my new Diamond 10s, I noticed that the midrange changed from full and aggressive to thin and mild. The difference was slight, and will only be noticeable to someone who’s had the 9s for a long time, which in my case was 6+ years. The bass also weakened very slightly. But the bass reduction was so slight that I had to listen very closely to notice anything. Tweeters: still good, typical of soft-dome types; sound is the same as the old 9.5s.
Now, on to YPAO calibration. Running the Diamond 10s with their own YPAO settings, the midrange is much better --- clearer, fuller and more forward, plus much more natural. So it seems that the auto calibration PEQ really does work. As for the bass, I can hardly notice any difference at all, not even after a long listening session. Maybe it’s the subwoofer that’s making it nearly impossible to notice the difference. I’m going to have to listen to 2-channel CD on pure direct mode (no sub, no PEQ, no bass management, no processing) later and observe. Highs are also pretty much the same, still has good detail without sibilance.
Compared with my old 9.5, the new 10.7 clearly sounds different, but I’m not prepared to say that the 10.7 is definitely better. What I noticed about the 9.5 is that midrange was louder and more forward than the midrange on the 10.7. Not in terms of SPL at the same volume level on the receiver, but in terms of forwardness in relation to the lower and higher frequencies.
It’s going to be a matter of preference. Someone who prefers the mid on the 9.5 would say that the 9.5s have more aggressive mids. But someone who prefers the mids on the 10.7 would say that the 10.7s have more controlled and balanced mids. As for me, I haven’t quite decided yet.
Testing 2.0 music CD tracks on the Yammy’s pure direct mode, the singer’s vocals on the 10.7s sounded very good --- clean, clear, detailed, airy and not so forward-sounding. Well, vocals on pure direct also sounded clean, clear, detailed and airy on the 9.5s too, but more forward and aggressive.
So I don’t agree that detail and clarity are better on the 10.7 vs. the 9.5, because to my ears, detail and clarity sound the same on both speakers. The only difference I hear is a less forward-sounding mid on the 10.7s. This is surprising to me, since I was expecting the 10.7’s dedicated midrange driver to produce more in-your-face vocals, yet I’m getting the opposite.
The bass is tight and has a huge sound, the kind you can expect from a floorstander of this size. I was expecting the bass on this 10.7 to be slightly weaker, but I still can't detect any bass difference between the 10.7 and the 9.5. Maybe because I'm just basing my comparison on what I remember from the 9.5s, without the benefit of an actual side-by-side comparo. As for the highs --- still zero difference, just the same as my old 9.5s.
300 Hz to 3 khz is the usual frequency range considered to be “midrange.” On this range, the Diamond 10.7 has only one crossover point (850 Hz) which was probably a good design choice. Looks like they intentionally raised tweeter crossover to a high 4.5 kHz, to avoid having two crossover points in the critical 300 Hz to 3 kHz range.
I don't hear any problems as regards crossover design choices on this Diamond 10.7. That’s expected, since Wharfedale is the second-oldest existing speaker company in the world, and a company as venerable as that shouldn’t be having problems on something as basic as crossover point choices.
The way I see it, if auto-calibration were so great, both setups should have sounded so similar to each other that they would have been indistinguishable. Yet I’m hearing differences even if both setups were auto-calibrated with parametric equalization.
This only shows that auto-calibration has its limitations, and should not be expected to render receiver-speaker matching issues irrelevant. Yes, auto calibration is a very useful tool, but it’s still not a magic pill.
IV. Conclusion
To the Wharfedale fans who presently have the Diamond 9s, don’t worry about losing the Wharfedale sonic signature if you upgrade to the Diamond 10s, because the warm characteristic is still there.
Midrange quality improvement --- that’s the sound characteristic the Diamond 10s emphasized in this series. But for me, this is just a change, not necessarily an improvement.
If you already have a 2.5-way Diamond 9, an upgrade to a 3-way or 3.5-way Diamond 10 will not give you a midrange that is louder and more forward, or even clearer and more detailed, although it will give you a midrange that is more relaxed, balanced and controlled.
