Description: Two-way, sealed-box, floor-standing loudspeaker. Drive-units: 1" (25mm) metal-dome tweeter, two 165mm polypropylene-cone bass/midrange drivers. Crossover frequency: 4.2kHz. Frequency response: 45Hz–20kHz ±3dB. Sensitivity: 89dB/W/m. Nominal impedance: 8 ohms. Amplifier requirements: 15–180W.
Dimensions: 31.5" (800mm) H by 8.9" (225mm) W by 12.6" (320mm) D. Weight: 44 lbs each.
Finish: walnut/black ash/Kenya black/oak standard, rosewood/teak/mahogany available at extra cost.
Price: $1349/pair (1988); no longer available (2008). Approximate…
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Sidebar 4: Specifications
John Atkinson wrote again about the R952MD in February 1988 (Vol.11 No.2):
I reviewed this modest-looking, two-way (but three-driver), floorstanding loudspeaker last month. I concluded that the combination of high sensitivity, superb transparency, excellent imaging and, for me, optimally aligned bass, made them well worth the $1349/pair asking price, offsetting the rather forward mid-treble which is due, I am sure, to the intrinsically rising response of the twin woofers in this region. Prolonged listening has not changed my opinion of the speakers' sound quality. However, the overall…
Sam Tellig wrote about the R952MD in May 1988 (Vol.11 No.5):
I was in my local mid-fi store the other day to look at the used equipment shelf (you never know when you might see some old Marantz tube gear). A customer—I'd say he was in his early 30s and very much a burn-out case—was grooving on a Grateful Dead tape.
The speakers were by the man in the white coat—you know . . . the genius.
"Great sound, huh?" the customer asked.
I nodded, trying to hide the fact my eyeballs had rolled into the back of my head.
The sound was all bass. And lots of it.
…
In January, I reported on my experiences with the Integra DTC-9.8 preamplifier-processor, which I found to be outstanding with digital sources. That assessment was due, in no small part, to the performance of the Audyssey MultEQ XT room-correction system, which is included in the DTC-9.8. With only a little serious effort, MultEQ opened up the entire soundstage, making possible a better appreciation of the hi-rez sources now available on all sorts of discs. I have no doubt that any careful user can achieve similar satisfaction.
Nonetheless, part of the buzz about the DTC-9.8 was…
Sidebar: Recordings in the Round
Multichannel recordings have been most successful, in my experience, for three categories of music: 1) expansive and dynamic music for large ensembles sounds less constrained through 5.1 channels than through two; 2) the typically small ensembles of chamber music can be almost completely encompassed with high-resolution multichannel; and 3) complex polyphonic music whose intricacies demand as much transparency and detail as possible. Here are three fine examples of the third category.
ROMA TRIUMPHANS
Christopher Jackson, Studio de musique…
The Oakland fluker said, "You mean we should lug our Connie Companion layout all that way? It's too heavy and something might happen to it."
"No, just to discuss rules and stakes," Norman said.
Dubiously, the Oakland fluker said, "Well, I guess we could do that. But you better understand—we take our Connie Companion doll pretty damn seriously."
—Philip K. Dick, "The Days of Perky Pat" (1963)For days I've found myself walking back and forth past my vintage Thorens TD 124 turntable, the platter of which is temporarily unbolted from its main bearing. Thus, the thing I've been…
First, some encouraging words for the budget-minded hobbyist or the DIY audiophile of any means: The Thorens TD 124 Mk.II that I purchased last year for about $700 (including a TP-14 tonearm that isn't quite usable) required only $120 in parts to achieve mere functionality—all manufactured in Switzerland by Schopper A.G. and sold in the US by Audioarts. And of the improvements I've put in place since that time, the most effective by far was the cheapest.
The things my turntable required to get up and running were a new drive belt ($35), new rubber "mushrooms" for isolating the player from…
THE COMMITMENTS: Original Soundtrack
MCA MCAD-10286 (CD only). Paul Bushnell, Kevin Killen, Alan Parker, prods.; Kevin Killen, eng. AAD. TT: 46:54.
MCA MCAD-10286 (CD only). Paul Bushnell, Kevin Killen, Alan Parker, prods.; Kevin Killen, eng. AAD. TT: 46:54.
1991 was the Year Of The Soul: James Brown's epic Star Time! box set, the monumental nine-CD Stax/Volt singles box, Rhino's Didn't I Blow Your Mind This Time? series of super-bad '70s blaxploration, Atlantic's CD reissues of complete Stax/Volt albums, and finally the release of the movie/soundtrack, The Commitments (footnote 1). If you haven't seen the movie yet, SEE IT! It's loud, ballsy, and probably the truest film about the…
When David Hafler sold his Hafler and Acoustat companies to in-car audio manufacturer Rockford-Fosgate a year or so back, things went quiet for a while as the new owners made arrangements to transfer production of both brands to their Arizona facility and took stock of where their new acquisitions stood in the marketplace. Then, at the 1989 CES in Las Vegas, the company made a reasonably sized splash with the first in a new range of Hafler products intended to lift the brand out of the hobbyist-oriented identity it had, perhaps inadvertently, adopted in the last few years.
The Iris…
Following this mechanical switch array, we get to the heart of the Iris, what Hafler has cutely (and somewhat annoyingly) termed the "Cyber-Optic" volume control. One problem with relatively inexpensive preamplifiers is that the lower financial resources available to the designer forces him (or her) to choose an inexpensive, logarithmic-taper, volume-control potentiometer. As well as having a limited lifetime, these often feature variable tracking between the two channels, particularly at low levels, which leads to drastic changes in channel balance dependent on the listening level chosen.…