picked these up for $420 US. At that price there are only strengths and few if any weaknesses. Coherent from top to bottom. Neutral and revealing. If it's on the recording these speakers will show it. It will not smooth out a shrill top end, or unduly emphasize any frequency. These play all genres of music equally well - from reggae to bluegrass to jazz to classical to modern pop and everything in between. My Dunlavy Alethas led me to the purchase of the SCIIIs. If you see them on sale and can audition them with your favourite tunes, you will most likely, if you can compare them to other similarly priced speakers, you'll probably buy them and not regret your purchase.

Obviously they only lack in the very low bass. Add a sub or two and you'll have full range bliss.

Sound Stage, Presence in the room, Clarity, Looks, Sound reproduction. These are very impressive speakers that I have enjoyed since 2000. They are paired with a NAD C372 Integrated Amplifier and I could not be more pleased. Many who stop in for a listen, leave impressed with what they heard. I can not say enough good things about these Dunlavy III speakers. I have DAL speaker cable also. I listen to Vinyl, CD's, DVR's and run the TV through them.....

None that I have found

It has been about 5 years since I got my SC3's and I still love them. But like I said years back that you'll find yourself replacing your system around them and that is what happened. The PS audio amp was replaced by LLANO design amp (available on line only)incredibly good amp do yourself a favor and listen to one. The micromega stage 5 was replaced by a classe cd player. The pre amp is linn Kairn now. And last but not least an REL subwoofer that just itegrates beautifuly with these speakers. Sad to know that dunlavy went belly up and they are no longer in business. Mine are here to stay till the budget will allow a pait of PBN MONTANAS !!!

Good imaging.

Bright and with weak bass.

This speaker was a major disappointment after all the hype Dunlavy has received from the audio magazines. The highs are bright and unrefined. Ear fatigue begins after less then 1 hour of listening. The bottom octaves are non-existent. The only thing this speaker does right is in the imageing department. I don't recommend this speaker to anyone who values a pleasant musical experience.

Similar Products Used:

B&W 802III, Thiel, Vandersteen

very airy,accuraty,fast,neutral

little shy bass.i want little more bass extended.i hope dunlavy work new model future,same i say model 2

very airy,neutrality,works fine velodyne subwoofers, i think dunlavy`s dealers can more recommends velodyne subwoofers with them.i get very good gomments thats sound. it`s work fine cheap creek amps.that`s compinations is best what i have hear for price.

Similar Products Used:

nothing not gome mind,because dunlavy is so accurate,perhaps some planar speakers

scale; coherence; neutrality; lack of boom; detail

lack of very deep bass; they "float" on thick carpet; lots of space needed for setup

Ya gotta follow directions, Jerry. Of course they'll sound bad at only six(!) feet away. You need to be about 10 feet away from them. And the angle subtended by the speakers should be greater than 60 degrees, so if you were sitting 12 feet away from the plane of the speakers, they would need to be about 14 feet apart for a good soundstage. The manual has very explicit recommendations for getting the best out of these speakers.

They did sound a little bright at first. Some sonex on my bare walls helped that. Neutral speakers + bright untreated room = bright sound. Note that Dunlavy is big treating the back wall with thick foam.

Their imaging is very good (expected at this price level), but seems a little diffuse. This may be because of my much less than ideal listening room, but I wouldn't expect pinpoint imaging from a speaker this size, either. However their soundstaging, i.e. the feeling of listening to real instruments in a hall, is wonderful on recordings that have this information. And the sense of natural scale, particulary image height, is something you're not going to get from mini-monitors or compact floor-standers.

The sealed box means you don't get that boomy, fat, slow, ported speaker bass, but fast and detailed bass. Double bass runs and individual bass drum taps that were a blur before are clearly audible. This means that _The Rite of Spring_ is more rhythmically brutal sounding even without that last bass octave.

One downside is that their is no provision (like spikes) for leveling and securing the stands on thick carpet. I wonder if this may be part of the "soundstage breakup" problem noted by other reviewers.

Equipment:

Bryston B-60 integrated (60W into 8 Ohms; 100W into 4 Ohms)
Arcam Alpha 9 CD player

Room: 16'10" x 12'8" with an adjoining dining room (about 10'x10'). Speakers are along the long wall. I sit with my head about 1' from the back wall and a little less than 10' from each speaker, and the speakers are about 11' apart. The left speaker is actually sticking out in front of a hallway! Luckily the speakers are easy to slide around on carpet.

Similar Products Used:

Ariel; Soliloquy (not really similar IMO)

I have owned the Dunlvy SC-III's for almost two years now and have not yet found their limits. True, they do nothave powerful deep bass, but I do get tight tunefull bass down to about 28 Hz in my listening room. Imaging
and soundstaging are superb. They aren't as dymanic as WATT/Puppies but then again what is? It is hard to
break down their performance because they don't do anything wrong and they don't exaggerate any part of
the frequency spectrum. I agree that they do require a fairly large room where you can sit at least 9 feet away
and have them spread laterally an even greater distance. These speakers are a tool, feed them good stuff
and the result is good, feed them crap and that is what you get. I have heard everything, Wilson's, ProAc's,
Martin-Logan, Thiel, Ariel, Linn, PSB, NHT, JM Lab, Snell, Hales, and more. Can your do better? Mabye, but
for the price the Dunlavy's are damm hard to beat. Right now the only thing I would consider getting are
Dunlavy V's (which give you 90% of the VI's), or Wilson X-1's if I could afford them! Try them for yourself.

As with all speakers, synergy with components, listening room, and individual tastes will apply. Rather than say the SC-IIIs are the greatest speaker in the world, let me try to describe the sound.
The Dunlavys are tonally accurate, phase and time coherent, and as neutral as I have heard. They do not have alot of bass (45-20KHz +-2db). They do require a large listening enviroment. Ideally, the listening position from the plane of the speakers should be at least 10 feet away. This is required for the drivers to integrate and acheive an accurate on-axis frequency response. They also sound better when the speakers are spread at least 10 feet apart, to achieve the 60 degree listening angle.

Because the Dunlavys act as a point source, the sweet spot is narrow. However, although it is narrow, it is at least as accurate in terms of soundstaging and imaging as a audiphile pair of headphones. The bonus of course is the visceral slam you get in addition. The SC-IIIs are also as quick of a pair of speakers as I have heard.

When friends come over and listen to the speakers for the first time, their initial reaction is, "wow, they are so detailed."

Some people may not like the Dunlavys because they are so neutral. It's all a matter of choice. Someone (I can't remember who, where, or when) described the Dunlavy line of speaker as the world's largest near field monitors. That, in a lot of ways is true. You could think of them as a giant set of headphones, and that is what I desire in speakers, total accuracy in terms of frequency response, phase, imaging, detail, and soundstage.

It all boils down to what kind of sound rocks your world. The Dunlavys do just that for my wife and I.

I have owned the SCIII's for a few months now. Before I even go on about how HAPPY I am listening to them daily, I want to mention that I called to speak with a technician at Dunlavy Labs to ask a question. I was informed that the person that handles such calls was out for a few days, but if I wanted to, she'd let me talk to John (Dunlavy). Can you imagine?... Mr Dunlavy spoke to me for a good while and even followed up our chat with a call to me on a Saturday to continue to addess my questions. It is service like this that gets my dollar. It happened again, when I was in the market for a power line conditioner. Mike Vans Evers talked to me several times about his product (Cleanlines power conditionewrs)... I ended up buying the 900.00 reference 85. Not just because he came to the phone, but because it is an excellent product with excellent customer service. Try calling Pioneer or Sony or almost any other manufacturer and you'll get someone in customer service reading to you from a print out.
As for the SC-III's.... I listen to mostly reference quality cd's... chesky stuff.... Rebecca Pidgeon, Ana Caram... 96/24.... blah blah blah.... I am so pleased with the mating of the Dunlavy's with my Audio Research tubed gear, that I don't want to listen to any other speakers.... cuz, right now, in my own mind... I have found the promised land... don't burst my bubble... :)

Listen to these speakers and go home.... them try not to dream about them... I dare you....

Sound stage, life sized scale, detail, transparency, neutraility, coherence

Lacks bass, limited dynamics

I recently auditioned the SC-IIIs and came away with a very positive impression. Within the SC-IIIs LIMITS this speaker sounds better then any other I have listened to in this price range. The soundstage is wide, deep, and has a scale very close to real life. Nothing was over emphasized, the tonal balance was even top to bottom with excellent integration of the drive units. It impressed me as sounding like the real thing. The slim and tall cabinets were also pleasing, and dissapeared easily.

The downside of the SC-III is a lack of extended bass. There is enough bass present to create a foundation, but this isn't the SC-III's strength. The other downside is that the SC-III compresses very quickly. Densely scored music with low frequency content quickly dissolves the SC-III's excellent soundstage.

I listened breifly to DAL's Athena, and at 2k more solves any issue with compression and bass extension, but the Athena didn't produce as lifelike a soundstage and image either. I haven't listened to the SC-IV/A yet, but then this is twice the price of the SC-III and opens up a lot of other possibilities within this price range.

If you listen primarily to chamber music, or other acoustic music that isn't densely scored, or contains lots of low frequency content, then I'd give the SC-IIIs a 5 rating. But for an all around speaker a 3.5.

Similar Products Used:

DAL SM-1, Athena, Theil CS2.3