Floor Loudspeaker Reviews

There's an audiophile trope that says that when you've found the best position for a pair of speakers, you know it because everything snaps into place: No other position will do, even if it's just a half-inch away. That has never been my experience, and it wasn't here. To me, it's as though loudspeakers in a room occupy a potential well, like a marble on a hilly surface that rolls around until it settles in a low point—the low point being, in the analogy, the spot where the sound is locally optimal. Typically, that optimal position is approached in steps, and the closer you get, the smaller the changes become with each adjustment. What's more, in a particular room, there can be more than one position that's optimal locally, which is to say, where you end up may depend on where you start. Often, then, it makes sense during setup to make big changes as well as small changes. You don't want to get stuck, as scientists say, in a local minimum.

Once I had the XB Diamonds positioned in spots that felt and sounded right—once the speakers were no longer complaining—I removed the wheels and spiked the speakers to the floor. In addition to anchoring the Estelons firmly in place, this allowed me to tilt them slightly forward so that the drivers were aimed directly at my ears as I sat in my lower-than-average listening chair.

From the start of the setup process to the finish, the sound of the Estelon XB Diamonds was transformed, from night to day. When positioned where the Wilsons had been, they sounded clotted, claustrophobic, a little bright. Now the sound was relaxed and expansive with even, articulate bass.

Listening
The Estelons' sonic transformation didn't end when I spiked them to the floor. They continued to change, or my perception of them did, throughout the period of the audition, right up till the end. Maybe it was both things at once: the speakers' various parts relaxing into synergy with all the other parts and my ear/brain relaxing into synergy with the new speakers.

Not to wax too philosophical, but I think this is a key point. When you change out speakers—it's true of other components, too, though usually not as much as for speakers—the sonic effects of the change can be overwhelming. Over time, though, much of what you hear at first ceases to be important: You forget it, or, if you don't forget it completely, it ceases to matter. Some differences, though, persist and continue to be consequential to your experience of music through the system. Those are the differences that matter (footnote 5).

The first difference I noticed upon introducing the XBs into the system and getting their positions right was that the presentation was balanced more toward the treble than other speakers of my recent experience, including their immediate predecessors, the Wilson Alexx Vs. They didn't sound bright—not in their final positions—except with music that was recorded that way, but there was a clear, if subtle, upward tilt compared to the Wilsons. One consequence that persisted was on solo piano, on the top third or so of the keyboard, more metal string sound in the note and less woolly wood hammer, which made single notes on a Steinway D sound a touch more harpsichord-like than it does in real life.

On one unfamiliar track I listened to, courtesy of Roon Radio, I thought, "This piano sounds a lot like a harpsichord." When I looked at the details, I learned it was not a piano at all but a fortepiano (Haydn: Late Piano Works, by Gary Cooper, 24/192 FLAC, Channel Classics/Qobuz), which, in case you're not familiar, sounds like a hybrid of piano and a harpsichord. The coloration I heard, if it was a coloration, was much more subtle than that.

As a check, I put on a very familiar recording: John Atkinson's recording of Robert Silverman playing Liszt (Sonata: Piano Works by Franz Liszt, 16/44.1 FLAC rip from CD, Stereophile STPH008-2). I listen to this recording during every review (whether or not I mention it) because it presents a reliably natural portrayal of a Steinway D grand piano. I followed the Liszt with Silverman's Chopin album (Four Scherzi and Polonaise-Fantaisie, 24/96 FLAC, Marquis/Qobuz), engineered by Don Harder, which I'm less familiar with and which sounds rather different: To my ear, the piano tone is vaguer, more generalized, than on the Liszt album, but it's still a very enjoyable listen, musically and sonically strong.

If I tried, I could hear that trebly character, and I could (maybe, marginally) hear that enhancement of that metallic character on some individual notes, but overall, Silverman's Steinways (I'm assuming, though I don't know, that he was playing different instruments on the two albums—hence the plural) did not sound metallic. In direct comparison with other speakers, I heard a subtly different tonal balance, a different balance of lows, mids, and highs in runs and especially chords. But I often hear such differences even at live performances, listening to different Steinway Ds, in different venues, or to the same Steinway D in the same venue from different seats. This is, in other words, a legitimate difference of musical perspective.

In any case, we don't listen to music comparatively, not if the objective is to enjoy music. What matters is how the music sounds to us now, in the moment, through the system we're listening to.

A moment came, as I was listening to jazz, when the character of the XB Diamonds revealed itself distinctly. I put on WomanChild by Cécile McLorin Salvant (24/96 WAV download, Mack Avenue). First up, the first track, "St. Louis Gal." On any good system, Salvant's vocals on this album are remarkably present. Now, though, they were more so—off the charts, spooky real. Note the word "present." Is this, then, a presence-region lift? Could be, and yet there was no trace of exaggerated sibilance. The sibilance region overlaps with the top part of the presence region, suggesting that if so, only the lower part of the presence region is elevated. Which seems right to me. I feel like I'm hearing a slight rise in the low-to-mid treble, in the range of high-note fundamentals, perhaps through the top of the piano keyboard (around 4kHz).

Often, colorations, even those that sound good, have a downside, a way in which, in different music, they sound worse instead of better. Yet, careful tailoring is a big part of the art of musical production/engineering and perhaps also of loudspeaker engineering. In any case, here, I could hear no downside. Nothing about Cécile's vocals was worse; this was pure enhancement, extraordinarily vivid, captivating sound.

What's more, the accompanying acoustic guitar on the first track (played by James Chirillo)—metal strings—also sounded natural, very present, with no trace of added metallic flavor. This is among my most listened-to albums. I know its sound very well, and this was special.

Well-recorded jazz albums old and new sounded pristine. Songs for My Father by Horace Silver (24/192 FLAC, Blue Note/Qobuz). 12 Stars by Melissa Aldana (16/44.1 WAV, Blue Note). Crisp. A natural-sized soundstage, the size of the stage at, say, the Village Vanguard from good seats, say, 20' back. That slight, trebly character I've described was still present, somehow carving a coherent, pristine soundstage out of the surrounding space, lit up and yet lending stillness to the space between sonic images, increasing spatial contrast. Good depth. Faultless presentation.

But it wasn't only in jazz. On a new recording, Recuerdos, with Augustin Hadelich and the WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln (24/96 FLAC, Warner Classics/Qobuz), imaging was precise, with good depth, even as I listened at low volume late at night. I heard only a slight shrinkage in the size of soundstage at lower volume. At all volumes, the soundstage was liberated from the speakers.

The XB Diamond Mk IIs were talking to me again, explaining their character, but now I'm struggling to express in words what the speakers told me. I was hearing a presentation of great purity—suggesting, I think, the absence of distortion—with cleaner, blacker space between the individual, spot-lit sounds on a stage carved out from the surrounding space, as I have said, by that subtle lift.

More observations about imaging: Reviews of various components often mention how far back or far forward the soundstage starts, but with the XB Diamond Mk IIs, it varied with the recording, starting (with the most forward recordings) just behind the speaker-baffle plane. With some recordings, the stage started several feet farther back. This is not an uncommon thing, but it speaks to the precision with which specific recordings are rendered.

Assuming it's legitimate to generalize about a "house sound" across different speakers from the same brand, I can confirm Michael Fremer's conjecture, in his Forza review, that Estelons are capable of a big soundstage in rooms larger than his. On recordings that contain such information, a big soundstage was what I heard, with considerable depth. (Limited soundstage depth is, I think, a weakness of my listening space. Except for some speakers I've heard here with rear-mounted drivers—Alta Audio Titanium Hestias; Audiovector R 8s—which do interesting, unusual things with space, the XBs mapped out as much soundstage depth as any speaker I've heard in my home. I suspect that more depth is possible with some adjustments to room acoustics.)

How's the maximum volume? More than ample for my needs—I never came close to running out of power—though I'm not sure I'd choose speakers with ceramic membranes as party speakers. These are too good for that anyway.

And the bass? Ample quantity, approaching full-range depth while perhaps not quite plumbing the lowest reaches. Certainly, the bass was present at full volume down to the bottom note on acoustic or electric bass (41.2Hz), and it comes very close to full volume down to the lowest notes on a standard grand piano (27.5Hz). Acoustic (double) bass was lively and articulate. On tracks with lots of bass—I'm thinking of EDM tracks like Cristoph's "Reachin'," from Consequence of Society Vol.1 (16/44.1 FLAC, Noir Music/Tidal), the bass is fun, although the XB Diamond Mk IIs don't quite provide the bass massage of the big-sister Forzas. In a room smaller than mine, perhaps they would.

Summing up
The Estelon XB Diamond Mk IIs possess a voice that's distinctive while remaining in that desirable middle space in terms of the key sonic virtues—realism, tonal balance, timbre, etc—occupied by all speakers that reproduce music naturally, including acoustic music. Plus, subjectively, they sound low-distortion. A pristine instrument capable of (re)producing compelling music in any genre. Highly recommended.

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Footnote 5: This is, to me, the strongest possible argument in favor of the long-term reviewing methodology Stereophile employs.