Olive and Thiel team up for a high end, high priced audio server
By Joseph L. Flatley 
posted January 6th 2010 5:02AM
posted January 6th 2010 5:02AM
Call us crazy, but we think this is an idea that just might work. Olive, known for high-end music servers, and Thiel, who we've seen in this space purveying high-end speakers and IP-based audio solutions, have joined forces to rock your condo, trendy loft space, or dentist's office. Built around the Olive 4HD (with its 2TB storage, 24-bit / 192kHz sound, gigabit Ethernet, 802.11n WiFi, and an iPhone / iPod touch remote control app), the Olive+Thiel can rock up to four pairs of Thiel's SCS4D IP-based self-powered speakers with 6.5 Inch Coaxial/Coincident driver and 200W Class D Power Amp. In addition to the server functionality, this bad boy can rock you out via its analog and USB digital audio inputs -- trust us, Butterfly by Crazy Town has never sounded this sweet! (OK, maybe its never sounded that sweet to begin with.) Available this month for $7,900. PR after the break.
Olive+Thiel Networked HD Music System
Olive+THIEL unifies the convenience of a consolidated music library, superb sound quality and IP-based multi-room HD music streaming in a plug-and-play solution
The Olive+THIEL project combines the expertise of two companies devoted to high-end audio by creating an elegant integrated system, combining source, amplification, and loudspeakers in a complete high performance package that eliminates set-up confusion for consumers. The Olive+THIEL system is all-digital, streaming music over Ethernet in HD quality and with perfect synchronization, directly into THIEL's IP-based SCS4D high-performance speakers. For a multi-room music experience, users can very easily add an additional pair of SCS4D speakers per room.
Based on Olive's flagship 4HD music server, the unique Olive 4HD server can store 6,000 CDs or 20,000 24-bit HD music tracks in lossless quality. A built-in touch-screen LCD allows users to find and play their music with ease, and an iPhone™ app that allows an iPhone™ or iPod® touch to act as a remote is available at no charge. Music can be easily copied to the hard drive via the built-in CDRW drive (which can in turn burn playlists for the car), or from a networked computer (either PC or Mac). There is also an HDMI interface allowing for connection to a TV.
"Olive and THIEL share a mutual passion for audio perfection at the best possible value," said Dr. Oliver Bergmann, founder and CEO of Olive. "Joining forces on the Olive+THIEL HD Music System allows us to offer a complete HD audio experience at home that maintains the golden-master standard of 24-bit/192 kHz-the same quality used in the studio by high-end recording engineers. Combining source, amplifier and speakers in one system allows us to offer an unprecedented complete sound solution from start to finish."
The new Olive 4HD has been specially modified for digital HD multi-room music streaming via proprietary IP technology and a 4-port gigabit Ethernet switch. This delivers perfectly synchronized sound from the Olive 4HD to up to four pairs of THIEL's SCS4D IP-based self-powered speakers. Additionally, the Olive 4HD has analog and USB digital audio inputs to allow streaming from additional music sources such as television, satellite radio or computer. The Olive 4HD connects to each SCS4D speaker via simple Ethernet cables, enabling easy connectivity anywhere within a home network. No additional equipment or expensive audio cables are required.
With the Olive 4HD, it's a breeze to rip, play and burn music CDs - or import a digital music collection from any networked PC or Mac. Olive also offers a time saving preload service, ripping the user's CD collection onto the Olive 4HD at the factory. The first 100 CD conversions are free.
"THIEL views the Olive+THIEL HD Music System as an important step forward in our quest to give consumers uncompromised sound quality in a complete package that is effortless to set up and operate," commented THIEL president Kathy Gornik. "We wanted to eliminate all of the confusion and techno-babble and just let our customers enjoy listening to their music," Gornik added.
The SCS4D speakers are based on the award-winning SCS4, a time and phase coherent bookshelf-sized two-way speaker that can be placed either upright or sideways with no detrimental effect on sound quality. The SCS4D features a die-cast aluminum baffle and robust cabinet construction with ample internal bracing to reduce enclosure resonances. For the Olive+THIEL HD Music System, THIEL modified the SCS4 to include THIEL zöet proprietary IP-technology which eliminates latency issues that typically plague network-connected systems. Additionally, there is an ultra-high performance DAC and a 200-watt class D amplifier.
THIEL SCS4D IP-based Coherent Source® Loudspeaker
* 6.5-inch coaxial/coincident driver
* 200W Class D Power Amp
* Burr-Brown 1792A 24-bit/192kHz DAC in mono mode
* IP-connectivity with 32-bit DSP
* 48Hz-20kHz (+/- 2dB) frequency response
* IR Receiver Input
* 1-inch thick cabinet walls
* 8.37 x 17.62 x 11 inches
Olive 4HD HD Server
* 2TB ultra-quiet hard drive
* TEAC CDRW mechanism
* Network technology: 4-port Gigabit Ethernet (wired) 802.11n (wireless)
* Analog and USB Audio Inputs
* IR Receiver Input
* Navigation: 4.3-inch (480 by 272 pixel) color touch-screen LCD
* 1 HDMI output
* 17.13 x 3.35 x 11.42 inches
* 13.2 pounds
Pricing and availability
The Olive+THIEL HD Music System will be available in the US in January for a retail price of $7,900 and will be sold through a selected number of resellers.
Olive+THIEL unifies the convenience of a consolidated music library, superb sound quality and IP-based multi-room HD music streaming in a plug-and-play solution
The Olive+THIEL project combines the expertise of two companies devoted to high-end audio by creating an elegant integrated system, combining source, amplification, and loudspeakers in a complete high performance package that eliminates set-up confusion for consumers. The Olive+THIEL system is all-digital, streaming music over Ethernet in HD quality and with perfect synchronization, directly into THIEL's IP-based SCS4D high-performance speakers. For a multi-room music experience, users can very easily add an additional pair of SCS4D speakers per room.
Based on Olive's flagship 4HD music server, the unique Olive 4HD server can store 6,000 CDs or 20,000 24-bit HD music tracks in lossless quality. A built-in touch-screen LCD allows users to find and play their music with ease, and an iPhone™ app that allows an iPhone™ or iPod® touch to act as a remote is available at no charge. Music can be easily copied to the hard drive via the built-in CDRW drive (which can in turn burn playlists for the car), or from a networked computer (either PC or Mac). There is also an HDMI interface allowing for connection to a TV.
"Olive and THIEL share a mutual passion for audio perfection at the best possible value," said Dr. Oliver Bergmann, founder and CEO of Olive. "Joining forces on the Olive+THIEL HD Music System allows us to offer a complete HD audio experience at home that maintains the golden-master standard of 24-bit/192 kHz-the same quality used in the studio by high-end recording engineers. Combining source, amplifier and speakers in one system allows us to offer an unprecedented complete sound solution from start to finish."
The new Olive 4HD has been specially modified for digital HD multi-room music streaming via proprietary IP technology and a 4-port gigabit Ethernet switch. This delivers perfectly synchronized sound from the Olive 4HD to up to four pairs of THIEL's SCS4D IP-based self-powered speakers. Additionally, the Olive 4HD has analog and USB digital audio inputs to allow streaming from additional music sources such as television, satellite radio or computer. The Olive 4HD connects to each SCS4D speaker via simple Ethernet cables, enabling easy connectivity anywhere within a home network. No additional equipment or expensive audio cables are required.
With the Olive 4HD, it's a breeze to rip, play and burn music CDs - or import a digital music collection from any networked PC or Mac. Olive also offers a time saving preload service, ripping the user's CD collection onto the Olive 4HD at the factory. The first 100 CD conversions are free.
"THIEL views the Olive+THIEL HD Music System as an important step forward in our quest to give consumers uncompromised sound quality in a complete package that is effortless to set up and operate," commented THIEL president Kathy Gornik. "We wanted to eliminate all of the confusion and techno-babble and just let our customers enjoy listening to their music," Gornik added.
The SCS4D speakers are based on the award-winning SCS4, a time and phase coherent bookshelf-sized two-way speaker that can be placed either upright or sideways with no detrimental effect on sound quality. The SCS4D features a die-cast aluminum baffle and robust cabinet construction with ample internal bracing to reduce enclosure resonances. For the Olive+THIEL HD Music System, THIEL modified the SCS4 to include THIEL zöet proprietary IP-technology which eliminates latency issues that typically plague network-connected systems. Additionally, there is an ultra-high performance DAC and a 200-watt class D amplifier.
THIEL SCS4D IP-based Coherent Source® Loudspeaker
* 6.5-inch coaxial/coincident driver
* 200W Class D Power Amp
* Burr-Brown 1792A 24-bit/192kHz DAC in mono mode
* IP-connectivity with 32-bit DSP
* 48Hz-20kHz (+/- 2dB) frequency response
* IR Receiver Input
* 1-inch thick cabinet walls
* 8.37 x 17.62 x 11 inches
Olive 4HD HD Server
* 2TB ultra-quiet hard drive
* TEAC CDRW mechanism
* Network technology: 4-port Gigabit Ethernet (wired) 802.11n (wireless)
* Analog and USB Audio Inputs
* IR Receiver Input
* Navigation: 4.3-inch (480 by 272 pixel) color touch-screen LCD
* 1 HDMI output
* 17.13 x 3.35 x 11.42 inches
* 13.2 pounds
Pricing and availability
The Olive+THIEL HD Music System will be available in the US in January for a retail price of $7,900 and will be sold through a selected number of resellers.
And just where are you going to get 192kHz music?
@revoltracers There are some Blu-ray audio discs that are 24/192, but this doesn't seem to support Blu-rays. So yeah, I'm stumped too as to what the 24/192 would actually be used for.
@revoltracers
I'm one of the chief designers of the IP enabling and audio processing components of this product and wanted to note that when the source media is not 192kHz native, there is a high end sample rate converter that upconverts the audio to 192kHz. So in other words, if your source is a ripped CD - 16 bit 44.1kHz, then the system will upsample this to 192kHz (lowering the noise floor a bit and increasing the fidelity to 24 bits) - then we transmit this losslessly through your existing Ethernet network (home, office or connected directly to the switch on the back of the system).
@EKiN BICOM
Plus, for example, I could make 24/192 recordings of my LPs and upload them to the server.
And by they way ignore the "it's too expensive" comments. Engadget readers are mostly a tin-eared lot, content knowing that the Logitech Z-2300 / Creative X-Fi is the ultimate in sound reproduction, bless their little hearts.
@EKiN BICOM
"increasing the fidelity to 24 bits"
I'm not sure, but it looks like you're implying that such upconverting would improve the sound quality.. which would only make sense if you're either trolling or selling stuff to audiophiles. ;)
But let me just explain something, for those who are not so familiar with audio technology: you can't improve the CD quality sound by "up-converting" it to 24bit and 192kHz.
In fact 192kHz is pretty much useless for the end listener altogether. Not only because humans can't hear such high frequencies, but also because there's virtually no music being made with such frequencies and because virtually no speakers or audio equipment in general can reproduce them.
192kHz potentially makes sense for audio production (when using effects during mixing/mastering) but that's it.
@Endadget
Well, yeah, that's pretty much what I was pointing out.
People at television studios master video with HDCAM SR @ 440 Mbps, but they don't sell it or broadcast it that way, do they?
And isn't "upconverting" just making the edges sharper, so to speak? I don't see how any detail would be added.
But then, I am no audio engineer. Just my two cents.
@Endadget
The guy is half right. You can improve fidelity by lowering the noise floor. a 16-bit resolution has 65,536 possible amplitude values per sample, yielding approximately 96.7dB dynamic range. A 24-bit resolution opens it up to 16.78 million amplitude values per quantization interval/sample. This radically increases the dynamic range to 140dB, effectively decreasing the noise floor. This is true.
However, it's also true that the signal quality of the source itself cannot be improved. Garbage in, garbage out. If the noise was captured in the recording itself, and not merely the result of artifaction from signal reconstruction (e.g. frequency aliasing, roll-off, etc.), the noise is going to get reproduced.
I'm as anti-audiophile as they come, but the guy is half-right... even if only accidentally.
@Endadget
wow! - do you really think that because something is sampled at 192 khz that the signal it carries must also be at 192 khz.
furthermore, everyone should take a look at a 20KHz sin wave sampled at 44khz to get some idea of the possible benefits of upsampling.
the gaps between the samples are always going to be filled in - they might as well be filled in intelligently by a known algorithm.
whether or not you can hear a difference is another story - you can certainly see it the difference with real musical content on a oscilloscope.
@Rubin Safaya
You didn't read what I wrote. I know perfectly well that 24bit audio [from 24bit or higher source] has its benefits. But 24bit audio made from 16bit audio sounds exactly like 16bit audio. The guy I was replying to seems to imply that it's not so, that you can benefit by converting 16bit audio to 24bit.
@Okapi
OK, upsampling can have its benefits in theory. But eventually it's all just a DAC process, which should include specific components to work properly and some form of "intelligent upsampling" is just an optional part of it, which can lead to a better sound IF implemented properly. What got me started was more the fact that they pack it with "up-bitting" to 24bit, which can't have any benefits even in theory.
FWIW tho, I'm still willing to bet with anyone that they won't hear the benefits of upsampling. At least not without a mastering studio environment and unless they can hear frequencies above, let's say, 18kHz (which excludes most adults).
@Endadget
Hi just chiming in again after reading the feedback on my initial reply.
I think Rubin nailed it, garbage in garbage out. A great quality 16-bit recording will audibly outperform a decent 24-bit recording.
As far as upsampling you really need to hear to believe because I also used to think there wouldn't be a perceivable quality difference, however when we did an A/B listening test it was clearly superior when upsampled. There was more presence a larger soundstange, and the simple explanation for this the reduced noise floor.
If you are at CES, stop by the Venetian in the High Performance Audio Area, we're in room 2601 and we can show you the difference.
7,900 Dollars! That's more than 7800 Dollars!
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha...................................NO SALE
beautiful! Me likes! A lot! Probably is a bit overpriced, but who cares!
Reminds me of my Roland MT-32
$7900?! That could buy my current system 3 times over.
......And my current system freaking ROCKS!!
@(Unverified)
and that could buy my current system 50 times, ... and my system rules (a couple of Polar Bear speakers :-P )
$7900 !!! this is crazy !!!