Ultra High End Bookshelf Speakers
Focal's Utopia Micro Beryllium is the high end speaker from the French loudspeaker maker. These are some of the best speakers available, and they do not disappoint. These speakers are famous for their accuracy and extremely low resonance, distortion, or any disturbances. They're accuracy has become legendary, even comparing themselves to the electrostatics.
Review
The build quality on these are fantastic. It's like having a grand piano in your living room. Very stylish, and a great look that hints at whats in the sound.
I hope you agree. These speakers are awesome! And though I will be selling them, they will be missed. I always enjoy a new pair of speakers and all that goes into appreciating them.
Pro's
- Clarrity
- Accuracy
- Virtually No Case Resonence
Con's
- Tiny Bit Bright
- No Covers
- Expansive
- Needs Sub Wofer
Photos
Video Transcript
Hello guys and girls and everybody else,
Welcome to my channel. We're doing some more videos.
I might be doing a trade for a pair of my speakers and so I wanted to make the this video for us and we're talking about the review of and the opinions of the [Focal] Utopia Micros. These are Focals speakers, they are with the Beryllium or BE line.
We've got the manual right here. You might not be able to see it but it says Utopia Beryllium line. These are the smallest speakers I believe that they sell in the Utopia line. I mean these are their bookshelf speakers. Focal does recommend that this is paired with a subwoofer, and originally these sold for quite a bit of money. Around eight thousand to seven thousand dollars, I believe was the price. (Correction Five Thousand)
They're about eight to ten years old and they have this famous beryllium tweeter in them. Beryllium (Be) is a element. If you don't realize this.
I believe it's a metal, the largest group of elements, which is metal.
And Beryllium is a rare earth metal that's quite expensive.
In the manual they say it's twice as much as gold,
or more than gold, per gram and that's due to the fact that it's very hard to mine and there's not a lot of resources in it. And it explains a lot of this in this nice manual that i got with the with them.
I bought these on auction for around three grand
and I got a good deal on them so I was very happy with them.
They're extremely accurate.
One of the most accurate speakers I have not only that but this case does not resonate so when the music stops, or the sound stops. The sound stops.
There's no carry over, no little distortion, no little edge, to the end. It just abruptly ends and with the Beryllium tweeter I noticed the same type of great deal of accuracy is with it You know, the [fine details, like] vibrations of a string. When you're listening to it you can hear every little tiny detail of the string vibrating. And when it ends it ends when someone stops the noise stops the sound when the editor cuts it off or whatever it, it just ends
I mean and they're so extremely accurate I was telling the guy who who who's most likely going to trade me for them.
We're going to trade some other speakers for them. Possibly.
I told him that the experience of listening actively listening to focals. And I'm talking only about when you're sitting there paying attention to the music that you're listening to.
But when you're actively listening to these they can be a little exhausting due to that accuracy They don't… You gotta to focus just the amount of detail there it it comes in so much layers and it's overwhelming and it takes a lot to just pay attention to it and to try to consume it all. Actually whereas a lot of the other [lesser] speakers Their [details are] a little bit more rounded out the sound and a little less clear and a little less tiring. [Atleast] when you're actively listening.
When you're not actively listening,
you don't notice it.And so if I'm just sitting here playing cards, or playing a game with a girlfriend, I don't notice it. I don't notice the extreme accuracy. I don't notice the other things.
It's only when I'm actually sitting there [actively] listening do I start to notice how how good these actually are.
Which is generally the case for everything that I'm doing when i'm listening to speakers
The detail comes out at when you're when you're sitting there trying to listen to the music The Berylium cases are very nice.
The woofer is very nice.
They don't drop as low as I'd like.
Which is part of the reason I probably am gonna trade them.
My other complaint about it is this is a two thousand dollar tweeter, and it is exposed.
As you can see if someone brushes up against this, or it bumps into it, or one of my many animals bump into it…
It will get damaged.
The newer Focals have covers over them, but these do not
and it's very stressful having these speakers under those conditions.
I'm also worried about them tipping. I've got them on a Bowers and Wilkins (B&W)
stand here.…Or something else happening to them, and having animals.
[Ownership] Is just a little too stressful for me. As much as I would like.
And it's one of the main reasons I want to trade them, for a new speaker.
I'm getting another front speaker, made in france. [The replacement] is a powered speaker. I'll put the [new speaker in the] comments in the youtube channel, about what i'm potentially trading them for and these are 8-ohm speakers. They're about 100 watts. Focal, again, recommends a subwoofer. I'm not opposed against the subwoofer idea actually i think it's a great idea. Many of these other speakers have woofers on them and even subwoofers on them uh and they can dip down really low but the subwoofer and the tweeter are not in ideal locations and I would love to take this Bower And Wilkins 802 and take this mid-range and tweeter off of this and then replace my sup my woofers my subwoofers somewhere else in the room because they're not quite the same they don't work quite the same and they need to be in different positioning so having a bookshelf speaker handle the mids and the highs while having a subwoofer with it you can place around the room or pair of subwoofers sounds ideal to me. Also subwoofers are generally cheaper than many of the many of the bigger speakers and that's because they generally don't have the details that we hear we feel them so it's really we also can use different class amps class d amps with subwoofers that give us a lot of power very efficiently and do a very good job and because the frequency is so low that we're playing uh even if the d-class amp would be noticeable on the on the tweeter which i'm not claiming it would be because d-class amps have become incredibly good um you wouldn't hear it in the subwoofer so having a d-class panel amp or something like that just makes a lot of sense it's a lot more efficient a lot cheaper and you can really get a lot of power and put the money in the enclosure or the driver itself and so I do kind of support this philosophy they do make larger pairs of these and they get very expensive. They make one [in this product line] that's is as tall as my room with multiple mid-ranges and lower drivers and subwoofers that can handle the full range I've seen them up to eighteen thousand dollars even on the used market for these speakers They're incredibly high-end speakers and I
would love to own them but I don't think Iwould pay that amount new. I think I would buy this one and I would buy the subwoofer with it because unless I have a giant room this is going to do everything I need it to do
So, again the focal utopia be ease let's get around the side of this in the back of this so that
I'll turn it for you guys so you can see the back of it, in the light. In the ideal light.
That be very careful with everything But here is the [Focal] Micro Utopia's
They are just incredible speakers.
I got you know my pure oxygen copper going to them
speaker wire that's the best that I buy.
I don't have any speaker connects running right now
I ran out of them so I just kind of threw the cord in there. But the two connectors are very cool. This part here unwinds. They look like they're some type of metal or something they're not gold but they look very nice very heavy duty in everything the sides are wood this wood grain very beautiful speaker. I think I'm not complaining about the overall appearance i definitely like the phase lining and everything of the woofer pulling it forward a little bit overall in it one of the most accurate speakers I've ever played
I have to say they're comparative to the Martin Logan Ethos that I had. The electrostatics.
In their accuracy and how quick they resolve. I have to say they might even sound a little bit more clearer than the Logans.
They're definitely in the range of the Magnepans. The Beryllium is one heck of a material. Very hard.
It's like the third hardest material, element, on the planet and they just can make it very light and that allows the diaphragm of the tweeter to move very quickly which gives us that accuracy
so you know exotic materials galore are in these a very expensive speaker, but one of the best you could buy on the used markets and I can't discourage you at all from them. I just warn you that their tweeter is a little bit fragile and so if you do pick these up you want to deal with that and have an environment that's safe to them if you don't, I hear that tweeter is about two thousand dollars to repair which is a big hefty fee it's one of the most expensive things [parts].In the packaging they give you an envelope if the tweeter gets damaged they tell you to pick up the pieces of the beryllium with the tape put it in the envelope and send it to them apparently beryllium can be toxic to human health uh not in the state that these speakers have them in uh that's what focal claims not me but as soon as they break, there is a potential issue for it.
From what I understand, if it becomes airborne or if you would abrade them, if you know get little dust particles of Beryllium in your lungs you might have a problem so having them in a solid state like this is just fine but once they break apart you definitely want to take good care of them and make sure to follow the process of cleaning them up.
That's about everything I can think about these things.
Great speakers, Focal Utopia Beryllium line!
Great Speaker. Anyways, thank you very much for watching.
Please subscribe like our review, and more [comment]. Thank You
YouTube Video Transcribed
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Revisions
February 23rd, 2023—Added external links and revisions.
July 27th 2022—Added external links, and more.