Speaker Asylum: REVIEW: Spendor S5e Speakers by Guth

Model:	S5e
Category:	Speakers
Suggested Retail Price:	$1650
Description:	Small 2.5-way Floorstander
Manufacturer URL:	Spendor
Model Picture:	View

Review by Guth on July 15, 2004 at 15:30:37
IP Address: 66.80.42.30

Add Your Review
for the S5e

This is my first attempt at a product review so I apologize for any shortcomings in my offerings here, however I felt that this product deserved some publicity as I am quite impressed with its price/performance ratio.
After moving to a new city/new (to us) home I found myself in audio purgatory. The house is an old bungalow built in the early 1900's with suspended wooden floors and smallish rooms. As the stereo is set up in our living room (at least it doesn't have to share space with the TV) I am not able to apply much in the way of room treatments, etc. The living area is approximately 13' x 18' x 9' with a large opening on the left-hand side (short wall) into the dining room of similar dimensions. Forced by the room layout, the stereo is set up along the long wall. My system which was built around a pair of Dynaudio Contour 1.3 mkII speakers now sounded both boomy and overly bright in it's new environment - very fatiguing. I finally decided to set out in search of some new speakers.
During my quest I encountered the Spendor S5e floorstanders paired with Naim electronics (Nait 5i integrated amp along with the Nait CD5i). I simply could not believe what I was hearing/feeling from this system. The music coming out was full of life and of astonoshing proportions. I almost instantly decided that a home audition was in order and I was not disappointed. I ended up replacing the Arcam A85 I had been using with the Nait 5i to match up with the Spendors. I liked the way the S5es sounded with the Arcam, but I really liked the way they sounded with the Nait.
I've owned these for about 2 months now. After the home audition I was convinced and placed my order. Once the new gear came in, I hooked everything up and I was less than impressed. The "boom" was back with a vengeance, the treble had dropped off noticeably. I felt confused and frustrated to say the least. This music coming from this setup simply did not sound like that coming the gear that I had just auditioned. After playing around with speaker placement, making foam plugs for the speakers' vent ports and even swapping out the speakers with other models I simply gave up on the whole process.
Finally I remembered that when I had originally brought the Spendors home for audition, my dealer had included some small metal footers for placing the speaker spikes on to protect the wood floors. I didn't think much of it at the time. I had been using some small nylon-like footers as it made moving the speakers around quite easy. At my last visit to my dealer I picked up a set of Lovan footers and when I replaced the nylon footers with the Lovan's I was amazed. All of the qualities that I had been seeking were back in force - at last!
So that is how I have come to the point where I feel that I can add some words regarding the Spendor S5e to the Reviews section of this site. Sometimes it truly is the little things (in the case metal footers) that matter.
On to the Spendors. Simply put, these speakers offer a tremendous amount of performance for the money. Through my frustration mentioned above I ended up auditioning a few speakers that were far more than I had budgeted for (the Spendor SP 1/2e and the Harbeth Compact 7es). This really helped me understand the strengths and shortcomings of the S5es. The S5e is a small 2.5 way floorstanding design (I'm still not sure how a 2.5 way differs from a 3 way design). I believe this reveiw format includes a link to Spendor's site where you can view more details if you like. The design includes a small, rectangular vented "flow port" in the rear of the cabinet at the bottom of the speaker where the cabinet meets the attached plinth.
One of the difficulties that I faced in selecting a new pair of speakers is that I enjoy a lot of different types of music: Jazz, Blues (electric and acoustic), Rock, and an eclectic mix of a lot of acoustic-based/folk/bluegrass music. I don't listen to much classical and nothing in the way of rap or commercial country. I think that the S5e's weakness is also it's strong point - while it doesn't exactly excel in any particular genre of music mentioned above, they are quite capable of doing justice to any of them.
I've often found reviews helpful that included references to specific albums, so I'll attempt a bit of the same. My intent is really more to provide a glimpse of the mix of music that I've been enjoying through the Spendors.
Joe Jackson has been around for quite some time, his first few albums really had some punch and drive in the best of the pop/rock tradition. His live album "Afterlife" issued this year features the same lineup that played together all those years ago. The recording was made over four nights in Califoria at various venues throughout the state. The S5es are able to pull off the reproduction of this music in convincing fashion. The rhythmic, driving basslines (the track Fools In Love is a great example) are strong and authoritive, the guitar has plenty of rip to it and the sonic ambiance of the venue is captured taking on the effect of placing you square in the building. These little speakers can flat out rock. Rock music is where the SP 1/2e and to a lesser degree the Compact 7 fell short in the overall scheme of things compared to the S5es. This was a really bass-heavy album, and while I could crank the S5es to fairly extreme levels, I'm guessing things would start to break up quite a bit if I really tried to take it to stupid levels (they aren't call stupid levels for nothing, right?) Not sure if this is a reflection of the Spendors or the Nait however.
Jacky Terrasson and Jessica Williams are two current Jazz artists that I enjoy greatly. The S5e does a great job rendering the timbre of their respective pianos on JT's "A Paris..." and JW's "This Side Up". While the timbre sounds right to me, there is a bit of weight and air missing in the presentation of the instrument - this is something that the SP 1/2e and the Compact 7 both did really well. And while the SP 1/2e and the Compact 7 did a better job creating a sense of size and space of the music coming from the piano (the SP 1/2e was spectacular in the regard), I thought the S5e did a better job with the timbre of the instrument than the Harbeths. What the Harbeths did excel at was the inner details contained within the tracks on these albums. You got a better sense everything coming out of the double bass in particular on either album. In my system however, I could only enjoy the Compact 7s for a short period of time before listener fatigue set in. While the S5e did not offer up the last word in detail or presence compared to the more expensive offerings, it did provide a great sense of overall balance (that whole sins of omissions thing).
The S5es also brought even greater listening pleasure from some of my older jazz recordings - which I have mostly on CD, as the vinyl versions have become too collectible (i.e. expensive). Cannonball Adderley's "Somethin' Else" is one of my favorites and has never sounded better in my home (keep in mind that I'm planted firmly in the low-end of hi-fi from a price perspective). Miles Davis' trumpet and Adderley's sax are full of life with the right amont of ring (that timbre thing again). Sam Jones' bass is reproduced with the right amount of weight and is easy to follow throughout the song. Art Blakey's cymbals ring true without being harsh making the music highly enjoyable - once again no listener fatigue here. And while the treble reproduction of the S5e is sweet and is certainly not edgy, there is still a lot of detail on tap.
One of my favorite Lyle Lovett albums is his 1998 release "Step Inside This House" which features tunes penned by some of Lovett's favorite songmiths. The songs are enjoyable and Lovett's albums are a great test of a speaker dynamic capabilites and bass response. On the track "Memphis Midnight/Memphis Morning" bursts of percussion explode from the S5es in dramatic fashion belying their small size. Throughout the album Lyle's vocals are crisp with detail and the little Spendors are up to the challenge of the "heavy" balance of the album.
Female vocals are also portrayed quite convincingly. Aimee Mann on "Lost In Space", Shawn Colvin on "Fat City" and Shirley Horn on "I Remember Miles" all sounded beautiful. When I listened to Horn in particular I wonder why I don't read more mention of her here. I think that same slight lack of weight in the midrange works to the advantage of female vocals.
All in all, these are highly enjoyable speakers. As best I can tell, imaging is good as is the soundstaging (the soundstage sounds good to me from a height and width perspective but perhaps a bit lacking in the area of depth compared to other designs). But I must admit that this really isn't my cup of tea these days and it's probably a good thing - without a dedicated listening room it would more than likely drive myself nuts trying to re-arrange everything in the room to maximize these effects. The Spendors perform well with a large variety of music, and more importanty with a wide range of recordings of varying quality. I enjoy a lot of "audiophile" recordings, but the reality is that a good chunk of my music collection is of less than stellar production quality. The Spendors allow me to enjoy my entire music collection, which is really important to me. These speakers are not without compromise, and I have no idea how they would work with tubes or on classical music, but if your tastes run anywhere near mine, I believe that they are worth a listen.

Product Weakness: Not the last word in detail and I wouldn't mind a bit more "weight" in the midrange. But these are compromises that I am more than willing to make.
Product Strengths: Good balance with sweet highs, accurate midrange and strong, tight, articulate bass. The small size works well for those without a lot of space and they are not overly-critical of room placement.

Associated Equipment for this Review:
Amplifier:	Naim Nait 5i (50W/ch)
Preamplifier (or None if Integrated):	None
Sources (CDP/Turntable):	Linn LP12/Lingo/Akito/Adikt
Speakers:	Spendor S5e rated at 87dB for 1W @ 1m, 8 ohm (4.4 ohm minimum)
Cables/Interconnects:	Naim NAC A5 speaker cables, interconnects by Chord (Cobra 2) and Kimber (Hero)
Music Used (Genre/Selections):	Rock, Jazz, Blues, Folk, etc.
Room Size (LxWxH):	18' x 13' x 9'
Room Comments/Treatments:	Sadly few - an area rug, chairs, couch and curtains.
Time Period/Length of Audition:	2+ months
Type of Audition/Review:	Product Owner

Product Weakness:	Not the last word in detail and I wouldn't mind a bit more "weight" in the midrange. But these are compromises that I am more than willing to make.
Product Strengths:	Good balance with sweet highs, accurate midrange and strong, tight, articulate bass. The small size works well for those without a lot of space and they are not overly-critical of room placement.