Strong arguments, perhaps convincing to some. But floorstanding speakers have their drawbacks, too. It's much harder to…
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Following my review of two high-performance minimonitors last November (footnote 1), I received a letter asking why I recommended a stand-mounted speaker at all when it was possible to buy a floorstanding design with more bass for the same amount of money. Furthermore, the correspondent went on, when you consider that the minimonitor sitting on its stand occupies as much floorspace as the floorstander, it's hard to see why a market for minimonitors exists at all.
This is the most extended bass I've ever heard from a small speaker, beating out for low-frequency extension even the Platinum Solo that I reviewed last November. More important, the Mani-2 didn't achieve its awesome bass at the expense of definition. The speaker went deep, but it went deep clean! There was no puddingy loss of definition, no boom to drive you crazy. (Talking about boom, check out the laserdisc of Live Secret World, Real World 14381-3051-6—what did the producers do, wind up the mid-bass to make Home Theater owners think their inexpensive powered subwoofers had suddenly…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Two-way, reflex-loaded, magnetically shielded, stand-mounted loudspeaker. Drive-units: 1" (25mm) metal-dome tweeter, two 7" plastic-cone woofers. Crossover frequency: 4kHz. Frequency response: 29Hz-20kHz ±3dB. Sensitivity: 85dB/W/m (2.83V). Nominal impedance: 4 ohms. Maximum sound pressure level: 110dB before dynamic compression. Amplifier requirements: 40-200W (4 ohms).
Dimensions: 16.5" (420mm) H by 8.5" (212mm) W by 12" (305mm) D. Weight: 23 lbs (10.5kg) each.
Price: $3995/pair (matching Target R-2 stands cost $720/pair). Approximate number…
Sidebar 2: Review context
My relatively small room measures around 19' by 16.5' by 9'. Each of the loudspeakers was positioned for the best sound (with only one pair of loudspeakers in the listening room at a time), generally some 3' from the rear wall (which is faced with books and LPs) and approximately 5' from the side walls (which also have bookshelves covering some of their surfaces). Each pair of speakers sat on 24" Celestion Si stands, these filled with lead shot and spiked to the concrete floor beneath the rug/pad.
Amplifiers used were a Mark Levinson No.333 dual-mono (…
Sidebar 3: Measurements
Other than impedance, all acoustic measurements were made with the DRA Labs MLSSA system and a calibrated B&K 4006 microphone. To minimize reflections from the test setup, the measuring microphone is flush-mounted inside the end of a long tube. Reflections of the speaker's sound from the mike stand and its hardware will be sufficiently delayed not to affect the measurement.
The use of paralleled bass units means that the Mani-2's impedance (fig.1) falls to a very low value below the midrange, reaching a current-hungry 3 ohms at 200Hz, which will be…
Laterally (fig.6), the Totem offers almost-textbook dispersion, with the top octaves progressively rolling off with increasing off-axis angle. I have found this kind of horizontal radiation pattern always correlates with good imaging precision and the Mani-2 was no exception.
Fig.6 Totem Mani-2, horizontal response family at 50", normalized to response on tweeter axis, from back to front: differences in response 90 degrees-5 degrees off-axis; reference response; differences in response 5 degrees-90 degrees off-axis.
There were no surprises in the time domain, the speaker…
John Atkinson wrote a Followup in October 2001 (Vol.24 No.10):
When I reviewed the $3995/pair Totem Mani-2 in February 1996 (Vol.19 No.2), I was very impressed by this modest-sized but expensive two-way. In particular, the speaker produces an astonishing amount of low frequencies, this due to its compound woofer alignment, which features two 7" Dynaudio drive-units, one mounted magnet-to-magnet behind the other, with a volume of air trapped between the two cones.
For a given bass extension, the compound configuration (patented in the UK by Linn Products as "Isobarik" in the 1970s…
Measurements
Whereas the 1995 samples of the Mani-2 had a low sensitivity, the Y2K samples measured 84.5dB(B)/2.83V/m. While this is still below average, it is a more reasonable figure. Figs.1 and 2 show the impedance plots of the 2000 and 1995 samples, respectively. They overlay almost exactly, which reveals commendable production consistency. (The two Y2K samples were also very well pair-matched.) However, the use of paralleled bass units means that the impedance magnitude falls to 3 ohms at 200Hz, which will mandate a good high-current amplifier be used.
Whereas the 1995 samples of the Mani-2 had a low sensitivity, the Y2K samples measured 84.5dB(B)/2.83V/m. While this is still below average, it is a more reasonable figure. Figs.1 and 2 show the impedance plots of the 2000 and 1995 samples, respectively. They overlay almost exactly, which reveals commendable production consistency. (The two Y2K samples were also very well pair-matched.) However, the use of paralleled bass units means that the impedance magnitude falls to 3 ohms at 200Hz, which will mandate a good high-current amplifier be used.
Fig.1 Totem Mani…
John Atkinson reviewed the Totem Mani-2 Signature in October 2009 (Vol.32 No.10):
The loudspeakers Vince Bruzzese designs for Canadian manufacturer Totem Acoustic are intended for the long haul. His Model One has been in continuous production since its introduction at the end of the 1980s, and I recently gave a listen to its current iteration, the Signature, to see if the Model One was worth continued inclusion in our "Recommended Components" listing. Similarly, I first reviewed Totem's second loudspeaker model, the stand-mounted Mani-2, in February 1996, with a Follow-Up in October 2001…
Sidebar: Associated Equipment 2009
Digital Sources: Ayre C-5xeMP universal player; Meridian 808i.2 CD player; dCS Puccini SACD player; Benchmark DAC1, Ayre QB-9 D/A converters; Logitech (Slim Devices) Transporter WiFi music player with Apple Mac mini for media storage; dCS 972 D/D converter.
Preamplifier: Simaudio Moon Evolution P-8.
Power Amplifier Simaudio Moon Evolution W-7.
Loudspeakers: PSB Imagine B, Spendor SA1, Acoustic Energy AE1 Mk.3 Special Edition.
Cables: Digital: Kimber Illuminations Orchid AES/EBU, Stereovox CV2 electrical S/PDIF, AudioQuest OptiLink-5 S/PDIF.…