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General speaker questions for audio and home theater.

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RE: Marten Speakers

Posted by RGA on January 16, 2017 at 16:04:02:
I disagree - a loudspeaker isn't just designed for your room and your room isn't automatically better than a dealer room just because it's a dealer room. I have had plenty of speakers in plenty of rooms and the speakers themselves have not been hugely impacted - Magnepans have sounded more or less the same in every room that I've tried - you don't mistake a Magnepan for a B&W for example. Rooms shift some frequency response - but so long as it's a "fair" room with "appropriate" equipment then you are hearing the speaker.

It also doesn't take 6 months to figure out if something is good or not - it takes me one or two tracks to figure out if the speaker has it or not. From that point - out of the speakers that have it - then it takes awhile to determine which is going to be something more long lasting.

People move - the speaker that works in a 14 X 10 room in South Central made of wood will work in a 13 X 9 in a wooden north Central home and a 15 X 11 wooden home in the East or a 14 X 10 wooden dealer room too. The speaker designed for that space and construction will work in that space anywhere. It may not sound good in a 7 X 8 room or a 25 X 17 room however.

But at Soundhounds I auditioned the AN E/Spe for an hour using a wide array of music - then in the same constructed building I auditioned the Magnepan 20.1 with the exact same music in a larger room more appropriate for the Maggies - the Maggies indeed, were better set-up than the AN E - had much more space to breathe and had 1000 watt highly regarded SS amps connected to them. I put on first a well recorded Jackson Browne Acoustic Vol 2 CD which has excellent piano rendition and this is basically music that panels are SUPPOSED to be good at re-producing.

This is not a disc that is going to create a bunch of room related issues nor do I play this stuff particularly loud - also should not recreate room issues. From the first few bars I knew it wasn't going to cut it. I listened and then looked over at the salesman with a kind of WTF look. And guess what - he just looked back at me and said "we know." (as in We know they sound mediocre).

You can blame rooms all you like and claim you need 6 months with them but the fact is you really don't. So long as you do what the manufacturer recommends and run the speakers with what the manufacturer tells you to run them with - in AN's case you bring them home and you run them with a SET amplifier - not SS not class D or Class T and you put them in an appropriate room size and construction (solid walls) not up against wood frames and doors - you will get "their sound" and according to Magnepan's recommendations - they were set up properly with the proper amplification to put the sound in their best light.

Sure at a given show something might sound bad. But I have tried Magnepan probably 25 times. And even then I'd still try another one at home - I had lower end Maggies in my home for a weekend back in the day. But did nothing for me - although I didn't own a tube amp back then.