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The development of a method of notating music in a sophisticated manner—one that could measure time and rhythm—at the end of the 13th century was nothing short of revolutionary. It allowed a religious ceremony to be treated as…

"Your point being?"

"Dynaudio speakers are a lot like the people who make them. They don't look all that fancy, but they tell the truth and they get the job done. To a lot of audiophiles, that's boring. But there are a lot of people who have been looking for those qualities in a loudspeaker, and for them, boring can be cause for excitement."

Al had a point. When I…

Thread-on spikes are provided for leveling the cabinets. These are cleverly designed: one end is pointed, the other rounded. The pointy end is perfect for penetrating carpet and coupling the speaker to the subfloor, while the rounded end is perfect for those with nicely finished wood floors or those, like myself, with brittle ceramic tile flooring. Considerate.

The…

Some might find the Dynaudio's bass quite lean, and it was somewhat. But it was also absolutely free from bloat and overhang—so much so that some listeners might miss just how deep and solid the bass response truly was. I side with Goldilocks: I do not favor a sound either too lean or too loose and flabby. If the Contour 3.3 wasn't just…

Description: Three-way, floorstanding dynamic loudspeaker. Drive-units: 1.1" cloth-dome tweeter; one MSP-cone 5.25" midrange unit driven by a 38mm aluminum voice-coil and a dual-magnet system; two 8" MSP-cone woofers driven by a 4" aluminum-wire voice-coil in conjunction with dual magnets. Crossover: first-order, 6dB/octave. Crossover frequencies: 350Hz, 2.3kHz. Frequency response: 26Hz-24kHz, ±3dB. Sensitivity: 89dB/W/m. Impedance: 4 ohms nominal, 3.2 ohms minimum.
Finishes: wood veneer.
Dimensions: 46.7" H by 8.7" W by 14.4" D. Weight: 80 lbs each.
…

Dynaudio was founded in Denmark in 1977 by Wilfried Ehrenholz and a partner. In 1994 Mr. Ehrenholz became Dynaudio's sole proprietor. Initially, the firm constructed speakers from OEM drivers, using its own crossover designs, but it quickly became apparent that, in order to build speakers to the quality level it desired, the firm would have to design and build its own drivers.

Within three years of its founding, the company's entire line of loudspeakers was constructed from drivers developed and built in-house. Dynaudio decided to offer its…

LP Playback: Linn LP12 with Naim Armageddon power supply, Naim ARO tonearm, van den Hul Frog phono cartridge.
CD Playback: Mark Levinson No.39.
Preamplifier: Conrad-Johnson ART.
Power Amplifiers: Krell FPB 600, Mark Levinson No.33H monoblocks.
Interconnects: Kimber KCAG.
Speaker Cables: Kimber Black Pearl.
Accessories: Audio Power Industries Power Wedge 112, Magro Stereo Display Stand.
Sound Treatment: ASC Tube Traps, Studio Traps, Bass Traps; RPG Abffusors; Oscitant feline rug.—Wes Phillips

The Dynaudio Contour 3.3 was measured with DRA Labs MLSSA system in the Stereophile listening room, mounted on an Italian Outline speaker turntable (footnote 1). I calculated its B-weighted sensitivity as a lowish 84.5dB/2.83V/m. However, its impedance (fig.1) only dropped below 4 ohms briefly in the upper bass. Note the absence of any wrinkles in the impedance traces, implying a corresponding freedom from cabinet resonances. This graph was plotted without the foam in the ports. The tuning of the ports is indicated by the "saddle" in the magnitude trace at 32Hz.…

Fig.4 Dynaudio Contour 3.3, vertical response family at 50", normalized to response on tweeter axis, from back to front: differences in…