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Re: The pro's and cons of Magnepan??? [Longish]

Posted by David Spear on July 28, 2002 at 03:55:25

In Reply to: The pro's and cons of Magnepan??? posted by RGA on July 28, 2002 at 00:48:13:

I would guess that Magneplanars are by far the most popular planar speakers made. The company has been around for many years and has an excellent reputation among audiophiles. (The high-end magazine "Absolute Sound" absolutely adores them.) You might want to click on the "Planar Speaker Asylum" link at the top of the page for TONS of information on Magneplanar speakers.
I owned several pairs of "Maggies" years ago, and they really got me hooked on planar and line-source speakers. Your description of Magneplanars as "the poor man's electrostat" has some truth to it, but the planar magnetic design has some major practical advantages over electrostatics:

1. A purely resistive load, making them easier for the amp to drive(even though they do require a fair amount of power)
2. You don't have to plug them into the wall
3. No risk of arcing
4. Relatively unaffected by dust, smoke, and humidity
5. Extremely reliable
6. Very thin and light, since they do not need a transformer, so you can easily move them to the optimal position for listening, and move them out of the way when they are not in use
7. Outstanding price/performance ratio, good trade-up policies

Compared with box speakers, the main advantage of planars (both planar magnetics and electostatics) is their dipolar planar/line source radiation pattern, resulting in a HUGE soundstage, amazing depth, and room-filling sound. (This is what got me hooked on the planar sound.) They also suffer from no box resonances or colorations, since there is no box. Finally, they are (IMO) very cool looking!

The disadvantages of Maggies are:

1. Despite their thinness, they are very large and visually imposing, meaning that spouse-acceptance factor can be a problem
2. They need a lot of power (IME, at least 150 WPC)
3. Their transparency means that they can really show up deficiencies in upstream components
4. Room placement is critical, and can takes months of exacting effort to get right
5. Need a lot a distance from the front wall (i.e., behind them) -- say, 4-5 feet
6. A narrow sweet spot, the "vertical venetian blind" effect
7. Limited vertical dispersion
8. Clean (but rather polite) low end; definitely NOT for fans of gut-thumping bass (OTOH, they mate well with good subs like RELs.)

All in all, I think the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages. When I bought my first pair of Maggies 25 years ago, I was totally blown away, and I've never been able to listen to box speakers since. You should definitely listen to a pair -- you may also become a convert!

PS. You might also want to check out some of the planar magnetic and ribbon hybrids that are out there (e.g., Eminent Technology, Newform Research [not a dipole design], VMPS [ditto], and Soundline Audio). They enjoy many of the advantages of planar speakers but also have a fuller, more visceral bass response. IMO, the better hybrid designs successfully avoid the problems associated with integrating a fast planar/line source with a conventional woofer.

Good listening!

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