YG ACOUSTICS Summit
Floorstanding loudspeakers
YG Acoustics was founded in 2002 and the launch of their first speakers was accompanied by an aggressive print campaign that claimed they were the best loudspeakers worldwide. That certainly was a clear overstatement back then. Yet over years and through endless reiterations of their models, the YG have got darn close to perfection. One of the last extensions of their catalogue surprisingly arrives at quite a compact format, measured by YG standards. And what a debut it is!
Function and form
I would say that, for its asking price, the Summit undoubtedly represents one of the best buys in the entire YG catalog. You can hear that the development team has put a lot of work into it, and if I'm being completely honest, maybe too much compared to the same price level competition. In the YG hierarchy, the Peaks series, at the top of which the Summit stands, is basically the entry level and above the Summit model you will find twelve(!) other models that should be (and are) better performing. This disqualifies the Summit from appearing on the lists of audiophiles that are hunting for nothing but the best, as these people only look at the top 2-3 lines of the catalogues. And that's the paradox, because what is entry level for YG is often where other big brands end up with their portfolio, judged by sound performance. If I was starting a loudspeaker company, the Summit-like model would be my flagship, and I’d ask more money for it.
Bass management
Take Sam Fribush Organ Trio and their jazz piece called Riverboat. The sound of the Summit is superbly controlled and no way you can guess where the cabinets are in the room with your eyes closed, nor how big they are. Talking about the cabinets, the Summit uses closed one with no bass-reflex port. This usually means better control (tighter bass) as well as perceived deficiency of it because of the absence of phase-induced smear. However, if the speaker is competently voiced, the negatives go away. YG Acoustics optimize crossovers with their own modelling software, and they do so in several dimensions at once: phase alignment at ±5° across an octave around each crossover point, phase slope and transient response. The crossovers use components such a copper-manganin foil resistors, pure aluminum foil capacitors and OFC ribbon inductors. YG also puts a lot of effort into the area that is as critical as the selection of crossover components – how to optimize the layout of the crossover boards to minimize component interactions. This area is often overlooked by speaker manufacturers; my own TAD Revolution One project showed how important is to get the layout right and that it can make or break a loudspeaker.
When I go back to the Riverboat track, the YG Summit’s bass is full, impactful, textured, and can be heavy as hell when the recording asks for it. At the same time, the sound is wonderfully transparent and clean and leaves the drivers with effortless and weightless motion without the cabinets or drivers leaving their fingerprint on it.
Clarity & delicacy
The YG Acoustics Summit is a 3 way speaker, 114 cm tall and 72kg heavy. Although the aluminum cabinets gave way to veneered 2.5cm MDF, the thick front is full aluminum, as is the midrange 18.5cm BilletCore driver and the 26cm BilletCore woofer. The tweeter is a silk dome, recessed in a shallow waveguide. I believe it is the latter that lends the agility, openness and speed to the Summit’s treble. Interestingly, the cabinets are said to be outsourced from Europe, as they need specialized presses. It is a funny fact that non-metal components are outsourced, but when you think about that, the YG’s own workshop has been specialized on aluminum milling from the very beginning, thus no wood allowed.
The sensitivity is above average, 90dB. The nominal impedance is 4 ohms with a minimum of 2.4 ohms, so the Summit will need a stable amplifier. Specs say that the speaker has “a useful output” between 24Hz and 40kHz, which realistically can be -6dB at 24Hz vs the reference level. Still, these are impressive specs.
The Summits are available in three veneers – ebony, rosewood, and oak, all executed flawlessly as we are used from YG. I miss bi-wiring option, although I like how close to the floor the speaker terminals are. Sometimes manufacturers place them high on cabinets and – especially with bulky and heavy speaker cables – it represents a problem and can get expensive too, as an extra meter is needed.
Tonal accuracy
The electric guitar is truly electrifying through the YG; when it jams, it's as if it shoots out of the speakers, with a tremendous dynamic slam. Similarly, the drums - I have a beautifully rendered kit in front of me in the room, where the Summit accentuates the pace and timing. No single note lingers longer than necessary, everything is superbly clean, precise and pitch is just right. All of this is elevated even further with really well-recorded dynamic material (Michael Ruff and his Wishing Well on the Sheffield Labs label) where you can feel the stomp of the kick drum deep inside your body, the saxes have the right bite and the overall magic of the recording is like air after a storm, charged with ozone.
The timing is one of the strengths of the Summit. Where rhythmic parts reign supreme, such as in Nightwish's roaring A Cracking Sphere from Imaginaerum Score, the speakers tend to rip the floorboards out of the floor with their energy. Similarly, the cinematic Sundown is big and monumental, denying the size of the Summits. I wish this album had better dynamics, but it's amazing what large-scale drama the Summit can built.
Spatial resolution
In fact, these friendly-sized YGs filled the room with almost the same authority as the much chunkier YG Sonja 2.3i, that occupied the very same spots before the Summits. The Summit is a living proof that loudspeakers must always be selected in the context of the room and that bigger does not automatically translate into better. Cramming two two-metre columns into a relatively small space just because I can afford them can be counterproductive. Of course, the Sonja bested the Summit in everything, and it could create bigger sound pressure with much more slam. However, if the room is not spacious and/or if you sit not far way from the speakers, you may experience problems with driver integration in the listening spot, and you may overpressurize the room with too much energy in lows. Then, a baby dinosaur like the YG Summit will, with careful placement, give you 80% of what the reference YG models can do, but at 15% of their price. It's still not a completely cheap investment, but for the yet affordable money one can really buy one of the ultimate solutions.
Unless YG Acoustics change their policy, the owner of the Summit can be sure that any future upgrades to the model (drivers, crossover) will be retrofittable. This is definitely one of the compelling reasons to own a YG speaker. For me, the Summit is among the very best speakers I have auditioned in past 12 months.
Recommended resellers
Dreamaudio, Bratislava, +421 907 838 806
Manufacturer's website: http://www.yg-acoustics.com
Associated components
- Sources: Taiko Extreme Server, Router and Switch, Lampizator Horizon DAC (modified with Takatsuki TA-274B rectifier valve)
- Amplifiers: Ypsilon PST 100MkII Silver Edition premplifier, Ypsilon Hyperion monoblocks
- Loudspeakers: YG Acoustics Summit, YG Acoustics Sonja 3.2, Wilson Benesch Omnium
- Interconnects and speaker cables: Stage III Concepts Cerberus, Stage III Xphynx USB, Taiko XDMI
- Power conditioning: Telos Power Station Tai Chi Yin and Yang, Telos Grounding Station, Stage III Concepts Leviathan, Proteus, and Kraken
Gallery
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