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Speaker Asylum General speaker questions for audio and home theater. |
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Speaker Asylum General speaker questions for audio and home theater. |
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In Reply to: RE: thoughts on upgrading my Totem M1S posted by el34eh@yahoo.com on August 27, 2014 at 10:09:57:
My long-time readers often roll their eyes, when I repeatedly refer back to the original Totem Model 1. Though I had seen ads and read about the Model 1, I didn’t actually see it in person, until the March 1993 Stereophile show in San Francisco.
When I got to hear the Model 1, it was one of the first and few speakers, which, despite or because of its sonics, translated the music well. Three albums really set the Model 1 apart from other speakers I had auditioned. The first was Led Zeppelin’s Zoso. The Model 1 really made me feel as though I were back in college, sitting in front of UC Santa Cruz’s redwood trees, hearing the sweet sounds emanate from the dorms.
The second album was Dream Theater’s Awake. Yeah, it was like a scaled-down model train set. But girl, the songs on Awake came alive.
The third album was The Police’s Synchronicity. Here, the Model 1 proved that PRAT is not about BASS or speed. Rather, getting PRAT right begins and ends with getting the snap and pop of the snare drum right.
Here’s my take. If a person has the Model 1, and, because of room or stands, absolutely positively needs a speaker of the same size, then get the 20th anniversary The One. These periodically show up on the used market. It only came in “root brown,” so you don’t have to worry about color choice.
Yes, I did have the AudioPrism Debut II and Conrad Johnson MV-55 driving the Model 1 Signature. The M1S had more than enough resolution, to tell me that the Debut II was more open, with less of a sonic personality. The MV-55 was “chewier.” So if you listen predominantly to electric guitar, and do not like clean tones, you’d love the MV-55.
Over the years, my audio friends and I threw dozens of preamps and amps, of all technologies, at the M1S. The M1S isn’t all that biased. What matters most (and this applies to ALL systems) is that you use the highest-quality sources you can find.
Although I, as a reviewer, have expensive speaker cables, no, the Totems do not *need* them. I’ve seen several friends get a bi-wire set of Kimber 4TC, and be done with it. Yes, you should have seen how upset some audiophiles got, when I stuck the car-priced Nordost Odin on The One. But you know what? This experiment showed that The One had enough resolution, to tell us just how fast and clean the Odin was. Yes, you can be perfectly happy with an affordable but good speaker cable. And if that's not good enough for you, be my guest, go for the car-priced cables. The Totems will keep up with and love those $$$$ cables.
But here’s something I’ve always struggled to write and convey. Because the Totem M1S, The One, and Element Fire are not voiced to appeal to Stereotypical Audiophiles, you could, in a pinch, start off with a mass market A/V receiver. And these Totems, by not heaping further sonic insult, won’t sound half bad with a receiver. That buys you time. You can then skip the intermediate steps, and go directly to your dream, big-ticket, high-priced amplification spread.
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Follow Ups
- RE: thoughts on upgrading my Totem M1S - Luminator 11:18:16 08/27/14 (2)
- RE: thoughts on upgrading my Totem M1S - el34eh@yahoo.com 11:46:03 08/27/14 (1)
- Sigh, 1993... - Luminator 12:42:25 08/27/14 (0)
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