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REVIEW: Philharmonic Audio Philharmonic 2 Speakers

Model: Philharmonic 2
Category: Speakers
Suggested Retail Price: $2,000
Description: A 3 way speaker with a open baffle midrange and a transmission line woofer
Manufacturer URL: Philharmonic Audio
Model Picture: View

Review by F Robert Simms on January 13, 2012 at 08:08:20
IP Address: 98.196.251.146
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for the Philharmonic 2


The best $2k speakers are the Philharmonic Twos which are made by Dennis Murphy who is retired. Dennis has always been searching for a speaker that would produce what he heard on the concert stage when he plays his Viola with the Washington Philharmonic Orchestra. I think he pretty much nailed it with his new Philharmonic Two! Dennis buys cabinets which are custom built to his specs. By himself, he builds speakers for his customers. He donates $50 of his meager profit to the Washington Philharmonic Orchestra. Paul Kittenger designed the transmission line woofer section.

I have Salk SoundScape 10s that were also voiced by Dennis Murphy. One of my best friends had serious speaker envy. My friend said that my SS10s were the first speakers that played music that moved him emotionally. He didn’t know music could do that. When I found out that Dennis Murphy had a similar design at a much reduced price I told my friend and he immediately told me that he wanted to buy a pair. I told him that they wouldn’t have my SS10’s museum grade finish nor their very deep bass response, but that didn’t make any difference to him. He said that he was mainly interested in the midrange. I was a little bit surprised as he is very big on style. This review is of his pair.

I was pleasantly surprised by the nice build and satin black finish of the cabinet on the Two. It looks better than the pictures that were posted and seems to be built solidly. It passes the knock test even though it is not a particularly heavy. My friend was very pleasantly surprised by how nice the cabinet was.

The Twos are a pseudo open baffle speaker. In a live performance some of the sound radiates from the performer to the surroundings and bounces back to listener. The upper chamber of the Twos has an open back to allow the sound to hit the front wall and surroundings like a live performance. This adds a natural bloom or ambiance to the performance. Open baffle and panel speakers usually have an overly large image. The Twos have fairly deep walls or wings on the upper chamber which allows the image to be of a more lifelike size. The back ambiance wave goes directly back to the wall and bounces directly to the listener just like a live performance. If the speaker is too close to the wall then the reflected wave can interfere with the sound coming from the front of the speaker. This creates an uneven frequency response that is called comb filtering. To minimize that effect, the front of the speaker needs to be at least 4 feet from the back wall. This is true for all open baffle and panel speakers. Since the speaker is 2 feet deep the back of the speaker needs to be at least a couple of feet from the wall for best results. Absorbing or diffusing the front wall’s direct reflection can make closer placement feasible if absolutely necessary.

I loosely filled the top chamber full of poly-fil and I had pinpoint imaging. I could almost see the singers in front of me. The image was totally realistic. I removed about half of the poly-fil and I lost the pinpoint imaging, but I gained a glorious bloom. The music became much livelier. There was still enough stuffing for a soft natural image. In a live setting, you rarely get a pinpoint image. Only in a heavily treated studio do you get that. My friend still said that he felt like he could reach out and touch the singers. I left the top module half full the remainder of the review as the music was so much more exciting.

The Twos are very forgiving and musical. With ambiance reflections old 40’s and 50’s mono recordings are very full and musical. With good modern recordings, the illusion of a live performance is palpable. Somehow the Twos get the timber of instruments correct and do it with a sense of finesse. The pianos are woody, full and sparkling. The brass sounds like brass with all the brashness they should have. The strings are woody, full and sweet. The drums are full and you can hear the round tones of the taught drum heads. The cymbals and bells are metallic and are clean and clear. Both male and female vocals are among the finest that I have heard. The Twos seem to be able to make singers sound like real people and not musical instruments. Playing an orchestra can give a strong illusion that you are right there. Most of my limited classical CD collection is dated, but listening to the Classical Music channels on Cable, many of the pieces sound fabulous. I don’t think I have ever heard a speaker that has nailed the tone of so many different instruments. I have heard speakers that have gotten one or two individual instruments a bit better but not so many of the instruments.

I played Louis Armstrong on It’s a Wonderful World and Louis was recessed. I pushed the phase button of my preamp and Louis stepped forward nicely. My receiver didn’t have a phase button so I rotated the banana plugs on both my speaker cables to reverse the phase.

Jennifer Warnes Way Down Deep was amazing. The drums and Jennifer Warnes were up front. The drums vibrated the room and were tight. Jennifer was intoxicating. The backup vocal was behind her and the guitar was further on back. The violin was off in the distance.

The Twos have a very large sweet spot. In my setup it is about 3 or 4 feet wide and falls off very slowly from there. The speakers have such a wide dispersion that most of the room has the same tonal response. The image is free from grain, wide, deep and completely detached from the speakers. It is not an open window to the performance. It is an open porch.

Madisound sells these RAAL tweeters for $389 apiece and at that price they are worth every penny. They are arguably the finest tweeters that you can buy for any price. The RAAL, on the Twos, completely disappear. But, maybe it is just because I am 65 years old.

The midrange and treble match seamlessly as you might hope from them both being ribbons. This is the first midrange driver that I have heard that can come close to keeping up with the RAAL in clarity.

The Twos are among the most transparent speakers that I have heard. They do this and still manage to sound very musical without being warm. They remind me most of the way an electrostatic speaker can sound transparent and still remain very musical. Like an electrostatic speaker, they play well at lower volumes too.

The Twos sound great with my cheap digital XR70 Panasonic receiver. Maybe that is because of the musicality, efficiency and the easy load on the digital amps by the Twos. The clarity of the Panasonic is put to good use. Still, my Calypso and McCormack are more engaging.

I tried the Twos with my 30 watt Fisher 500C tube receiver. As Dennis suggested, I moved the jumpers to their 4 ohm taps. I ran my Aesthetix Calypso preamp directly into the amp section of the Fisher. I can tell it is an antique but the 30 tube watts drove the speakers well. I loved the total lack of compression that the tube amp had. The bass was even tight.
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For music, you might be able to get by without a sub. The Twos go down to 32 Hz and that is low enough for most music. The bass sounds clear clean and tight. The double bass on Splanky by Christian McBride sounds deep and clean with a lot of character.

The sound effects on TV shows like The Mentalist can have a lot of shock power and the Twos soften the percussion a bit. Adding a sub crossed over at 80 Hz pretty much fixes the problem though. Movies would also improve with a sub.

I know people want me to compare the Twos with my SoundScapes. With the huge price/quality differential it would be unfair to make a detailed comparison however; I will make a few observations. As might be expected by a similar design by one of the same designers, they have similarities in sound. Still, the more expensive SoundScapes are better in all areas except for two. I like the transparency and musicality of the Two’s midrange driver better than the Accuton in the SoundScape. The Accuton has its charms too, so it may not be a clear call. I also prefer the higher efficiency of the Twos. There is no free lunch as the Twos trade almost 10 Hz of bass extension for their higher efficiency. Dennis has a more expensive model Three that has more bass extension at the cost of lower efficiency.

Who shouldn’t buy these speakers? The only people that I can think of are people who like to play rock at ear damaging levels. They will play at realistic levels (i.e. loud) but not comfortably at 90+ db levels at 12 feet. Crossing the Twos over to a sub at 80 Hz allows a few more decibels. Of course, to get the maximum from this speaker you need to experiment with position and stuffing. Still, if you didn’t want to bother with that, you could just loosely stuff the midrange chamber and just treat them as normal speakers.

I have attended three RMAF shows and have heard most of what is out there. In comparison to the best speakers, the Twos give a taste of the highest levels of performance. Of course I am not talking about the bass extension or the ability to drive a large ballroom. For a $2k speaker that is absolutely incredible performance.


Product Weakness: None at it's price level
Product Strengths: As transparent a speaker as I have heard


Associated Equipment for this Review:

Amplifier: McCormack DN225
Preamplifier (or None if Integrated): Aesthetix Calypso
Sources (CDP/Turntable): Panasonic DVD S97
Speakers: Philharmonic 2 - 87.5 Db
Cables/Interconnects: Modest
Music Used (Genre/Selections): Classical, Standards, Jazz and Rock
Room Size (LxWxH): 24 x 15 x 9
Room Comments/Treatments: Realtraps Diffusers
Time Period/Length of Audition: 2 weeks
Other (Power Conditioner etc.): None
Type of Audition/Review: Home Audition




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Topic - REVIEW: Philharmonic Audio Philharmonic 2 Speakers - F Robert Simms 08:08:20 01/13/12 (7)

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