Vivid Audio G1 Giya

Where Art plus Science equals Music

Stereophile July 2010 -"Is Vivid Audio's G1 Giya the best loudspeaker I've ever heard? Yes."

"We listened. At the end of a jazz piece, the first row of listeners broke into applause and shouted praise. The sound of the Giya was immediate and detailed. Louis Armstrong's voice was full of grit and lungs and throat, and seemed enormous." - Stereophile

Vivid Audio is not a familiar name in loudspeakers, but the South African loudspeaker company has its roots in on of the most iconic loudspeaker companies of all times, B&W. Robert Trunz, former co-owner of Bowers & Wilkins, and Laurence Dickie, former R&D engineer for B&W, partnered with Philip Guttentag and Bruce and Dee Gessner to form the Company around 2001.

The name Giya is derived from a classic form of Zulu dance. The shape of the Vivid Audio Giya loudspeaker captures the spirit of music. The swirling, cochlear shape and materials of the G1 Giya's vacuum-infused, composite fiber cabinet are not so much a matter of style as of function. The woofer chamber is curved to prevent standing waves, and to save space. The teardrop shape of the Giya's front baffle reduces cabinet reflections, and the enclosure's downward taper (noticeable when viewed from the side) allows the tapered tubes of the midbass, midrange and tweeter to be solidly anchored to the rear of the enclosure with a single locking screw and O-ring.

Four-way design
The Vivid Giya is a four way design with five drivers. Two 11" anodized aluminum bass drivers are mounted near the bottom of the enclosure on opposite sides of the cabinet and directly coupled to one another. The vents behind each woofer are tuned to 23 Hz.

Located on the front baffle are the 1" caternary dome tweeter, the 3" caternary dome midrange, and the 4.9" aluminum cone midbass. You can read more about the caternary dome drivers in the white paper section below.

All of the vivid Audio loudspeaker drivers Utilize the cylindrical, super flux ring magnet structure and are coupled to the tapered tubes, but decoupled from the enclosure by means of rubber O-rings and the single mounting screw and O-ring on the rear of the enclosure.

Wrapped within the Giya's distinctive shell (some say plant) like appearance lies an exceptional level of engineering detail and acoustic design sophistication that have become the hallmark of all Vivid Audio Loudspeakers. The shape of the Giya is defined by proven acoustic principles unhindered by the conventional loudspeaker enclosure norms of building trapezoids out of MDF. The enclosure of the G1 Giya represents the state-of-the-art in enclosure design and materials science.

The sound
Of course, all of this technology is meaningless if the speakers don't sound good. Wes Philips, in his July 2010 Stereophile review of the Giya loudspeaker writes:

"I was consistently impressed with the G1 Giya's dynamic range and jump factor...Even at extremely high volume levels, the Giyas retained all their clarity and focus - and produced deep bass that immediately set off car alarms in front of my house...I've never heard such a loudspeaker return such a feeling of limitlessnaturalism. Even at levels that had to be overloading my listening room, there was no sensne of imminent-or any-dynamic compression."

and

"Is Vivid Audio's G1 Giya the best loudspeaker I've ever heard? Yes. And it will be my yardstick from now on. Whether or not you can afford a pair, you should listen to them so that you know exactly what is possible in a high end loudspeaker."

Press

• Stereophile
• Sonic Flare
• Tevami.com
• The Audio Beat (Marc Mickelson's Blog)
• High Quality Speakers

Vivid Audio White Papers

• Catenary Dome Drivers
• Tapered Tube Loading
• Highly Aligned Driver Chassis
• Super Flux Magnets
• Reaction Cancelling Compliant Mount
• Highly Vented Voice Coil Former

Manufacturer Web site