The S7t Black Edition loudspeakers are the 4th pair of Perlisten speakers to have graced the Barn with their sound presence.
I reviewed the original S7t back in 2021 (review), the R7t in 2022 (review), and the S5t in 2023 (review). Here’s part of what I wrote about the S7t coming up on five years ago:
The Perlisten S7t speakers release music into the room, into the Barn in this case, in a manner that belies their size and complexity yet they do not sound like horns or single driver speakers. Rather they sound like ghosts, shape shifting apparitions that take on the form of the music in play, dissolving into pure energy, free from source and boundary. Poof!
Pure energy sources that disappear into pure music energy is something I would also say about the S7t Black Edition speakers as they became part of the architecture of the Barn so to speak, locking into the A-Side’s space and beyond with a wonderfully precise yet rich voice that morphed into whatever music I asked them to play seemingly coming from a rock solid sound image made whole again here and spread out as far and wide as the recording called for. Ghosts.
As you can well imagine, this kind of disappearing act draws one’s attention right into the music, do not pass go do not think about crossovers, Textreme drivers, or specs. When this kind of pure music connection occurs consistently and without fail over time, I am one happy listener.
If you’ve read about the Perlisten S7t Black Edition in my In Barn post or elsewhere, you know they differ from the standard S7t in meaningful ways well beyond cosmetics.
For example those aluminum cheeks you see on either side of the speakers weren’t done with cosmetic surgery, a quick puff up, but are in fact an integral aspect of the cabinet design as they attach directly to the core aluminum structure adding improved damping with more mass as well as good looks. The DPC Array for the Black Edition is machined from a 40mm billet of aluminum serving two functions—as a rigid housing for the array and a “massive thermal heatsink for all three dome tweeters in the array conjoining the existing aluminum heatsinks that each tweeter assembly already employs.”
And the updates keep on coming with a larger internal cabinet volume as compared to the standard S7t, upgraded crossover components, new Textreme TPCD (Thin Ply Carbon Diaphragm) woofers using a re-designed voice coil and magnetic circuit providing “20% more linear excursion” while reducing overall inductance, as well as a new Perlisten-designed isolation/damping system only available (for now) in the Black Edition. While many of the specs remain more or less the same as the S7t including frequency response, sensitivity, (92.2dB for the S7t, 91.4dB for the Black Edition), and impedance, there is one difference and I bet you can guess what that is—the standard S7t weigh 122.5 lbs. a piece while the Black Edition tip the scales at 240 lbs. each.
Stepping back for a more general view, the S7t Black Edition are a 4-way design with a down-firing ports that can be run as a bass-reflex or acoustic suspension design by either leaving these ports open (bass reflex) or plugging them up (acoustic suspension) which changes low frequency output from 22Hz in bass reflex mode to 32Hz (-10dB) when plugged. I ran them wide open as more bass is more better. The driver complement consists of four 180mm Textreme TPCD woofers paired up over and under the DPC Array which houses two 28mm Textreme TPCD midrange drivers sitting over and under the 28mm Beryllium tweeter, MTM style.
I’ll let Perlisten talk about their DPC (Directivity Pattern Control) Array:
The DPC Array Is Machined From a 40mm Billet of Aluminum
Each part is precisely cut to 0.1mm tolerances, heat treated and then ultimately anodized to the final cosmetic. The real benefit is not just cosmetic and mechanical. Here, the aluminum DPC doubles as a massive thermal heatsink for all three dome tweeters in the array conjoining the existing aluminum heatsinks that each tweeter assembly already employs. Unique to the S7t Limited, they are now thermally coupled to the aluminum DPC. This not only increases power handling and reduces thermal compression of the individual units, but also maintains the same temperature across all drive units. This ensures the complete DPC array tracks as a single unit, effectively avoiding thermal runaway of any one tweeter or any non-linear compression from one unit to the next. This technique is often applied in audio amplifier design, this is a first for multiple loudspeaker transducers.
You’ll find dual binding posts mounted on a matching black aluminum panel with an engraved model name. The Black Edition stand 52.5” tall and measure 14.4” wide and 18.7” deep but once again due to their sleek sculpted appearance they do not look big or bulky at least here in the Barn. The cabinet, as its name states, is finished in a Satin Black Anodized Aluminum and to my eyes the Black Edition have a sleek and stealthy look and I like the way that satin finish captures light.
I will note that I spent real time, as I always do, placing the Perlisten Black Edition speakers on the Barn’s A-Side because even minor moves brought real sonic gains (or losses) and ideal placement becomes even more critical when a speaker puts out real full range energy. This is a process I work on over a number of days and into the night because I find working in the near dark allows for my most productive fine tuning due to the lack of visual interference. Once I had the Black Edition locked in, a final series of measurements using both tape and laser were done to ensure perfect symmetry in terms of distance to room boundaries, the Florence Knoll knockoff listening couch, and driver level. Once done and locked, you can easily hear how the speakers and room act as one with both disappearing into the sounds and space of music.
I used two integrated amplifiers to drive the Black Edition speakers—the 870 Watts into 4 Ohm Musical Fidelity M8xi (more info), and the 300W into 4 Ohm Devialet Astra Opéra de Paris Edition (more info). The Barn resident Grimm MU1 (review) was paired with the recently reviewed Imersiv D-1 DAC (review) while everything was tied together with cables from AudioQuest including ThunderBird XLRs and Thunderbird ZERO speaker cables (see full Barn and system details).
One more blast from the past to further set the Black Edition listening stage, this time from my review of the Perlisten S5t:
What I can say for certain is this system with the Perlisten S5t paired with the BAT VK-80i made music in Barn that consistently transcended the mechanics of reproduction to a shocking degree. The kind of sound quality that obliterates the perception of transformation from recording to sound by placing the things responsible for their making right there in front of you, fully formed and in full voice, from the tiniest spectral haze to the grandest sweeping orchestral gesture. Seamless, effortless, magical.
I’ve yet to tire of placing Holy Fohr as Circuit des Yeux’s Halo On The Inside, released on Matador Records last year, in Barn and the S7t Black Edition speakers laid out a very convincing and badass version that exploded in space on the A-Side and beyond. While many a speaker can disappear, not many in my experience leave behind a very full range and physically imposing version as if all the wild sounds on Halo On The Inside are coming from all over the place, well away from the confines of the speakers as if they’ve exploded into as many pieces as make up this powerful music.
If you enjoy putting your hifi to the test, give “Skeleton Key” a whirl with a generous turn of the volume knob and see how well all those layers of abandon play out in your space. If I was a teacher, the Perlisten Black Edition would get an A+, especially when driven by the Devialet Astra that offers more resolution and nuance than the very powerful sounding Musical Fidelity M8xi integrated. At the 3:20 mark, just after a brief acoustic guitar respite, things go off the rails with everything cranked past 11 with layer over layer of electric guitar shredding, operatic vocals, manic percussive attacks, and more pushed past loud, the Barn was alight with the pulsing energy of Circuit des Yeux as if transformed to the point where I felt like I was very nearly inside the music-making. Striking.
When sitting amidst this sonic deluge, there’s no doubt that the S7t Black Edition speakers offer very controlled dispersion from tippy top to basement deep low end because there was no sense of room-related interference even with 90dB+ peaks. Impressive.
A recent Album of the Week pick, in filth your mystery is kingdom / far smile peasant in yellow music by Dagmar Zuniga, offers a largely acoustic charm and quiet with some very unexpected bits sprinkled in. Here, I zoomed in timbre, timing, and resolution and once again the Black Edition scored very high marks by lending a believable voice to every element from micro to macro capturing the quirky homemade sounds of Dagmar Zuniga recoded to tape over the course of five years.
Backing away to a more general observation, I find the notion that a ‘good’ hifi makes poorly recorded music nearly unlistenable due to its “accuracy” one of the silliest ideas floating around hifi which has more than its fair share of silly ideas. In my experience, a well balanced and properly set up system that’s appropriate for the room it’s in makes any music engaging no matter the recorded quality because we, all of us, have the ability to listen past things like tape hiss or surface noise to get to the heart of the matter. I would venture to suggest that this ability is innate, something we humans have learned to do to stay alive. We can find a more insidious kind of noise buried in digital replay where noise has become part of the signal, a kind of camouflaged distortion that erases low level detail while messing with timing all willy-nilly with no way for our brains to filter out these adverse effects. Ick.
All to say, this system with the Black Edition speakers, Devialet Astra or the Musical Fidelity M8xi, and Grimm MU1/Imersiv D-1 DAC let me hear past the noise and deep, deep, into this music, its moods, and meanings. A short hand way of saying something similar is the Black Edition speakers are in no way surgically amusical or sterile.
I recently happened upon Mount Shrine’s 2018 stunner Winter Restlessness, which is “Recommended for lovers of subtle field recordings and sleep ambient” according to the album notes. To my mind, this music is best listened to in the dark allowing its slowly shifting sounds to take complete control of one’s senses, painting a vast and timeless sonic world to explore. Once again the Black Edition speakers took control of the Barn and the physical presence of what is for me deeply moving music energy.
This music moves like ocean swells where even the subtlest shifts are the result of very deep waters and the Black Edition speakers highly resolving tightly focused and full range energy communicated this mystery and power perfectly.
The S7T Black Edition at $29,995/pair places them in some very good company. A look at my Favorite Speakers finds the DeVore Fidelity O/Bronze ($30,000/pair), Gauder Akustik Capello 100 ($26,975/pair), and Magnepan 20.7x ($30,000/pair) in this neighborhood and if you know anything about these speakers you know we’re talking about different approaches to design and performance and if you know anything about the way I approach hifi and difference you already know I’m not here to pick a winner.
What I can say is the Black Edition speakers offer the most physical presentation of this bunch with the ability to make music feel powerfully present while at the same time calling attention to the music and not themselves. All pluses in my book. The Gauder Capello 100 struck me as being exceptionally well balanced with stunning speed and delicacy, the Magnepans offer a very different kind of presentation that’s more of an invitation into music, and the DeVore O/Bronze, as you might expect seeing as I own the DeVore O/96, hit all my most cherished hot spots with their amazing grace, richness, and presence that makes reproduced music feel like it’s really right there for the taking. All to point out the obvious fact that speakers are designed for people and we are, thankfully, not all the same.
The Perlisten Black Edition speakers arrived in Barn on February 21st and they went straight to work on the A-Side where they’ve played and played and played. Hours, days, and weeks-worth of music and there was never a moment where I called their performance into question, not a single aspect of their presentation that gave me pause due to being distracted from the music. As I mentioned the Devialet Astra showed me that the Black Edition offer a very nicely nuanced sound that digs deep into the recording along with the grip and power that the Musical Fidelity highlighted. One thing worth noting is I tended to listen louder than usual, turning music up and up again in part because it never pushed beyond the limits of the room and the level of physical engagement became addicting.
I hit many a ‘test track’ all the way back to early entries including “Since I’ve Been Loving You” from Led Zeppelin III, the Lounge Lizards “Voice of Chunk”, “Siren” from John McLaughlin’s Devotion, and even some “Mississippi Queen”. Barn burners all (more cowbell) and the energy in all this music in the Barn and in me were perfectly in sync. I love when that happens.
Perlisten set out to make a better S7t with the Black Edition and I have no doubt they succeeded. Everything I heard from the S7t Black Edition during their 2 month+ Barn stay spoke to a speaker that sounded out as pure music energy source with a powerful yet delicate voice capable of moving me physically and emotionally no matter what I asked them to play all wrapped in a sleek and very well made package.
There’s a speaker for every kind of listener and if you enjoy a pair that disappears while leaving you in the presence of music that can kick and caress, the S7t Black Edition will not disappoint. They are, in my experience, a lot of speaker for the money.
Perlisten S7t Black Edition Loudspeakers
Price: $29,995/pair
Company Website: Perlisten
US Distributor Website: Fidelity Imports
Technical Specifications
Enclosure Alignment: 4-way bass reflex / acoustic suspension
Sensitivity:91.4dB / 2.83v / 1.0m
Impedance: 4Ω nominal / 3.2Ω min
Response Linearity: 80 – 20kHz +/-1.5dB window
Frequency Response (-10dB): bass reflex: 22 – 37kHz | acoustic suspension: 32 – 37kHz
Typical In Room bass extension bass reflex: 16Hz | acoustic suspension: 23Hz
Dimensions (HxWxD): 1332.5 x 365.0 x 475.8mm | 52.5 x 14.4 x 18.7″
Weight:112.3kg (247lbs)
Recommended Amplifier Power:100-600W RMS
SPL Capability (100-20kHz): 119.4dB peak | 117dB peak <2% – 2nd, 3rd Harmonics
Available Finishes: Satin Black Anodized Aluminum