Paradigm Persona 9H Loudspeakers

This is one of our reviews completed after long sessions in the Audiophilia “overflow room”, AKA Atlas Audio Video, Victoria. Thank you, Atlas for obliging my requests and on behalf of our appreciative readers. At USD 30,953/pair and massive in size and weight, the Paradigm Persona 9H Loudspeakers would overwhelm my listening room, wherever the placement. As such, no matter how sexy and gorgeous they are, and they are among the most beautifully made speakers I have seen, my smallish listening room would not do them or the readers justice.

Expensive, yes, and the most advanced and pricey Canadian company Paradigm has made in its 40-year history. To the $30,953/pair in standard finishes, you may add a premium for custom colours. Lenses, metalwork and grilles are also customizable.

The pricing of these speakers is all over the map on the internet, whether pounds, US or Canadian dollars—the USD price quoted per pair in this review is directly from the Paradigm office. Also, most sites quote “per speaker”! Let’s say we stop this recent habit. At these prices, a single speaker price is not going to alleviate sticker shock.

As Paradigm says, “Persona® 9H, the flagship of the Persona Series, is the most advanced, highest-performing loudspeaker we have ever designed.” The proprietary drivers, crossovers and cabinetry are custom crafted in Paradigm’s facility in Mississauga, ON.

The Persona 9H is a 6-driver, 3-1/2 way hybrid floor-standing loudspeaker with active bass acoustic suspension. The crossovers are 3rd order electro-acoustic at 2.4 kHz (tweeter/mid), 3rd order @ 400 Hz (mid/front bass), 2nd order @ 200 Hz (rear bass). Like many high-end loudspeakers these days, the Personas are a hybrid design with each woofer pair powered by a separate DSP-controlled 700-watt amplifier for a total of 1,400 watts (the speakers have an “H” designation for hybrid). So, your own amplifier powers only the beryllium mid and tweeter. The frequency response is an astounding 19 Hz—45 kHz. Basically, from gut feeling to perceived ambiance and every frequency heard in between.

Included with the speakers is Anthem Room Correction—ARC™, with an included calibrated microphone. The technology was not used as part of the review. The room was of appropriate size and well treated with acoustical panels. A very review-worthy room.

The tweeter is the Truextent® Beryllium dome, ferrofluid damped/cooled, “Perforated Phase-Aligning Tweeter Lens with Finite Element Analysis” with optimized pole piece assembly. The midrange is a (178mm) Truextent® Beryllium driver with “Inverse Differential Drive Neodymium” motor, “Perforated Phase-Aligning Lens, including the “SHOCK-MOUNT™ Isolation Mounting System” and 1.5" high-temp voice coil. Bass drivers include four 8-1/2" (215 mm) ultra-high-excursion “X-PAL” drivers with Differential Drive motor, overmolded “Active Ridge Technology” surrounds, SHOCK-MOUNT™ Isolation Mounting System and 1.5" high-temp dual voice coils.

Tech much?

See our introduction video of the Persona 9Hs here.

Other Specifications

Sensitivity: 93 dB

Amplifier power range: 15 - 500 watts

Impedance: 8 ohms

Dimensions: 132cm × 30 × 52cm

Weight: 86 kg

I streamed via the NAD M33 BLU OS Streaming Amplifier and amplification with a Hegel H390 Duo Mono Integrated Amplifier (Audiophilia video found here). The vinyl setup was a Thorens TD1600 Turntable with Goldring Ethos MC Cartridge. A Rega Aria served as the phono stage. Two well-balanced and fine-sounding sets of components. The cabling was full-on Audioquest Dragon, Thunderbird, Tornado and Diamond. Cabling doesn’t get much better or pricier!

The “standard” Persona finishes are ultra-luxurious (the review pair is in Aria Blue). Still, if your decor on these lifetime speakers demands a shade adjustment, you can order them in a wide range of colours (six-week lead time from order to delivery). The gorgeous “lenses” may be ordered in silver (below) or black. Cloth grilles, yes, but who would ever want to cover the sexiest driver lenses in history?

With fit & finish TDF, the Paradigm Persona 9H features both tweeter AND midrange beryllium drivers.

Sound

So here we go. First up was “The Vanishing of Peter Strong” from Point by Yello, streamed. What struck me was the incredibly low, controlled and effective bass. This type of bass is unheard in my reference room—generally, anything below 20 Hz is primarily a feeling, much like a 32’ organ pipe in a cathedral—and the 9Hs grabbed my attention with a brilliant recreation of the Yello’s sampled, synthesized, very low bass. The pristine sounds coming from the beryllium pair were terrific. Clear and concise with no blurring even at faster tempos. My BØRRESEN Acoustics 01 Silver Supreme Edition Loudspeakers ($55,000/pair) are among the finest speakers I’ve ever heard, and indeed the best stand-mounts, but physics and volume limitations are not fake news. And the Personas certainly give rise to the fact that a superbly-designed, large-scale speaker can deliver the bass goods many smaller speakers simply can’t.

For me, well-balanced is everything, and the Personas have that in spades; brilliantly conceived and executed. But, it’s the mids where much of the music and emotion happens. Treble and bass are the appetizer and dessert if you will.

The beryllium drivers covering much of the important musical information are very fine and do an admirable job relaying musicality, and coherence with their concomitant emotional effects. There are a lot of fancy technical names ascribed to both mid and tweeter; I disregarded the names and judged the sound. The sound was superb, among the very finest I’ve heard from a floor stander, yet repertoire-dependent. I’ve heard even more involving tweeters and midranges—for that experience, you’ll have to pay a lot more for your speakers, for example, my favourite floor standers, the Wilson Audio Alexia Series 2 Loudspeakers are now $57,900/pair. Even so, $30,953/pair is a lot of money for the swanky Paradigms, but in the rarefied audiophile world, double or even triple (Tidal Audio) is what is asked for the ultimate in relaying musical intent, which is far a more difficult proposition in my experience than laying down a perfect list of audiophiles’ needs. How do you relay an artist’s intent (interpretation, phrasing, the emotional value of each note, etc) through electrons? Without repeating myself, please read the sound section of my BØRRESEN review for what I experience daily with them as my reference. True, I’ve not been out of the house much over the past two and half years, but I’m not expecting anything to better them anytime soon (BØRRESEN has hinted to me a new version—update: the M1 debuted in Munich a few weeks ago—is coming and Audiophilia will get the first North American review sample, so stay tuned).

Back to the Persona’s spectacular bass; the speakers’ hybrid topology—passive treble/mid tied to powered bass drivers—was both effortless and seamless with the Hegel-powered drivers. Paradigm has cracked this difficult topology model. I’ve heard recent successful hybrids from Avantgarde Acoustic and others, but some manufacturers fail in the step-too-far of a powered bass and passive panel/drivers. In some of the streamed test sweeps I used to warm up my ears, the connection between all the octaves was timbrally and technically flawless.

Still, with the bass, the 9H also has two rear-firing woofers in addition to the standard front drivers. They operate in vibration-cancelling opposition (like my SONOS SUB) and they port through metal grilles in the rear/side of the cabinet.

This front/rear bass driver design makes placement extra important but not impossible. Our positioning was well-nigh perfect (see photo below).

As for the beryllium duo, the timbral accuracy of orchestral instruments was very good and using my go-to vinyl demo of Side 2 of Stravinsky's The Firebird of the Dorati/LSO/Mercury reissue, the Personas did an admirable job of replicating the unique sounds all the LSO star players such as Gervase de Peyer, clarinet, James Galway, flute Dennis Wick, trombone and Barry Tuckwell, horn. A well-nigh perfect test record. Imaging of these players was very good, too, from the Kingsway recording.

What I did find world-class and at least equal to much more expensive speakers was the soundstage experience from these recordings. It’s massive and reminiscent of the widest and grandest soundstage I’ve experienced from a speaker; Don Corby’s 30-year-old homebuilts in his Corby Audio store in Hamilton, ON. Stand mounts, no matter the tech, simply cannot convey a vast musical abyss like quality large floor standers. The Paradigm's width and depth mesmerized this listener. Along with bass performance and build quality, easily the most impressive aspect of the Persona 9H.

They could do gentle and delicate, too. Whether listening to my own recordings (solo flute) or the new Alma Quartet D2D vinyl of Korngold Quartets (review forthcoming), the imaging was very fine and the tweeter and mid accounted for superior timbral accuracy and added their tonal beauty to the wonderful soundstage.

Especially effective in musical effect and as technical fodder for down and dirty reviewing was Stay Tuned by Dominique Fils-Aimé, specifically “Constructive Interference”. This song was multitracked to the Nth degree and the Personas were able to decipher the inspirational source for this technique yet retain the focus and beauty of Fils-Aimé’s voice and the accompanying musicians.

Later, the jazzy inflections of Snarky Puppy on “Semenete” from their album Culcha Vulcha sounded exceptional—the close-miked flute lead doubling always sounds so cool when played with such virtuosity (Snarky Puppy, winner of four Grammy Awards, is yet another amazing group formed from University of North Texas grads from its world-famous jazz program). This type of music was a joy on these wonderful, full-range speakers.

Summary

The Paradigm Persona 9H Loudspeaker is one of the finest full-range loudspeakers available, and certainly the finest Canadian loudspeaker it’s been my pleasure to review. Yes, the $30,953/pair price is very expensive, but these are your big boy/girl speakers after a lifetime of work and audiophile craziness. That they play in big Wilson and Tidal pools at twice the price is a wonderful achievement. Bravo Paradigm.

Further information: Paradigm