Focal Sopra N°3 High-End Speakers. JMLab. Wonderful!

JMLab Focal Sopra N°3 3-Way High-End Loudspeakers pair that sound amazing. Comes with all grills and original boxes. These have been refinished in custom flat black. The fronts of the speakers are the original factory flat black and they are excellent as are all the drivers. The glass tops and bottoms are great as well. The sides were painted and have some flaws but from my seated position, I do not see any of the flaws. These speakers sound so real and natural!
These are well balanced speakers that have tight bass and extended clean highs, and great tonality (which some Focal speakers lack). They are very dynamic and make the music come alive. These may be the overall best value in the entire Focal line. Super high end, without the super high price. Perfect for medium sized rooms. These speakers have a nominal impedance of 8 ohms and an efficiency of 91.5db so they are an easy load for most amplifiers.

Trades considered. Please use Check or Wire Transfer or Paypal friends transfer. Thank you!

Please note that there are two boxes so shipping quote will not be accurate. It would be best to use a shipping service like Uship.com which I can help with.

Midwest Audio
 574 329-1850

ABOUT:

3-WAY HIGH-END LOUDSPEAKER – 2 WOOFERS 8¼” (21CM)

The longest standing loudspeaker of the line, Sopra N°3 perfectly combines dynamics, space optimization and harmonic richness.

With its two 8¼" (21cm) woofers, this loudspeaker offers solid, rich and perfectly defined bass for music lovers looking for optimum performance. Despite its reasonable size, it will reveal its full potential in rooms measuring up to 860 ft2 (80 m2).

Sopra clearly inaugurates a new era for the “Premium High End” by taking into account new performance criteria. Compact, modern, a pure design, character... all these are essential factors to ensure perfect integration into your interior.

Equipped with best midrange drivers ever developed by Focal, with the NIC and TMD technologies, Sopra pushes back the limits of sound reproduction in terms of transparency in a very compact enclosure. Indeed, unlike Utopia, which is extravagant by essence and where size is by no means a constraint, Sopra aims for maximal compactness to ensure easy integration into reasonably sized rooms.

INFINITE HORN LOADING
Our Beryllium tweeter features an incredibly light and extremely rigid dome, that deliver a transparent and dynamic sound. Its main limitation comes from the compression of air in the cavity behind it. But the requirement for Sopra to be compact meant that as much of the cabinet as possible had to be used for the bass. We had to explore other options for loading the tweeter, which led us to come up with the IHL system. The "IHL" system enables to load the Beryllium tweeter respecting the compactness demand of the speaker. The rear wave of the tweeter is delicately and gradually absorbed to avoid any distortion. The treble definition is pushed to the maximum

NEUTRAL INDUCTANCE CIRCUIT
Since the beginning, we have always had a great interest in the magnetic circuit, an essential aspect of a speaker drive unit. The precision and detail of audio reproduction depends on the stability of the magnetic field. NIC technology (Neutral Inductance Circuit) permits to control the magnetic field and finally enables to master it in order to limit distortion. It decreases the effects of distortion and give the sound a very high-definition and an unprecedented dynamic.

TUNED MASS DAMPER
Our teams have revealed resonances which alter definition in the suspension which connects the cone to the basket. The solutions already known for increasing the damping properties of the suspension all result in an increase of the mass which consequently alters definition. The answer came from a technology used in earthquake-resistant skyscrapers and which is also used for the suspension on racing cars. "TMD" technology consists of optimizing the suspension profile which controls the resonance in order to drastically reduce distortion and increase the definition of bass and midrange.

NO SACRIFICE OF PERFORMANCE TO AESTHETICS
The design agency Pineau & Le Porcher designed Sopra with one rule: no sacrifice of performance to aesthetics. The Sopra line is destined for the most passionate sound enthusiasts. Its design favours performance, whilst exceptional materials associated with different lacquered finishes or wood finishes in oak (Light Oak and Black Oak) with High Gloss varnish for a radiant shine bringing even more elegance and warmth to your home décor.

Substantial efforts were made to give the front a tidy appearance to iron out any aspects which could afflict the acoustics or the appearance. Sopra’s very structure is articulated around the intermediate section. This injected polyurethane component allows for the upper and lower cabinets to be inclined for the "Focus Time" (acoustic convergence of the channels).

DETAILS
The main theme of Sopra is deliberately uncluttered, though it still offers connoisseurs the opportunity to enjoy all the small details. The grille with an incremental meshing motif protects the Beryllium tweeter and gives it a strong identity. This motif is repeated for sealing the curved back panel of the middle section. The terminal board, the thumb nuts and the adjustable spikes have all been specially designed for Sopra, as have the few visible screws, all of which were manufactured by watchmaking experts.

MASTERING THE CABINET AND CHOICE OF MATERIALS
Made in France Sopra’s cabinet was designed in our cabinet-making facility in Bourbon-Lancy (Burgundy, France) using the same manufacturing process as for Utopia The 69mm sandwich-machined front panel uses the same principle as ‘Gamma Structure’ to provide inertia and damping. Its density gives it the inertia necessary to provide a stable mechanical reference for optimal definition. The inside of the cabinet has no parallel side panels, and small Helmholtz resonators have been added to the lower section to prevent vertical standing waves. We chose glass as the material for the base of the loudspeaker to provide floor coupling, using spikes, which enabled the fastest propagation time possible, thus eliminating all halo effects in the bass.

SPECIFICATIONS:

Type: Three-way bass-reflexfloor standing loudspeaker
Speakers:
2 x 81/4" (21cm) “W” cone woofers with NIC
61/2" (16.5cm) “W” cone midrange with NIC and TMD suspension
11/16" (27mm) pure Beryllium IHL inverted dome tweeter
Frequency response (+/- 3dB): 33Hz - 40kHz
Low frequency point -6dB: 26Hz
Sensitivity: (2.83V/1m) 91.5dB
Nominal impedance: 8 Ohms
Minimum impedance: 3.1 Ohms
Crossover frequency: 250Hz / 2200Hz
Recommended amplifier power: 40 - 400W
Dimensions: (HxWxD) 4949/64x1553/64x2327/64"
Weight: (unit) 154.32lbs (70kg)