Budget Component Reviews

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Stand Loudspeaker ReviewsBudget Component Reviews
Definitive Technology StudioMonitor 45 loudspeaker
Stephen Mejias  |  Sep 19, 2012  |  First Published: Aug 01, 2012  |  1 comments
The Definitive Technology StudioMonitor 45 measures a very room- and back-friendly 11 11/16" (297mm) high by 6¾" (172mm) wide by 11 11/16" (297mm) deep, but these dimensions are attractive for reasons other than simple, efficient transport and placement. I noticed right away that something about the speaker just looked right. Paul DiComo, DefTech's senior vice president of marketing and product development, explained that while the number and size of drivers used in any DefTech design will largely dictate that speaker's height and width, the company nevertheless aims for Fibonacci, or golden-ratio, dimensions. According to DiComo, these efforts help minimize standing-wave and "organ-pipe" resonances inside the speaker's cabinet.
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Stand Loudspeaker ReviewsBudget Component Reviews
Definitive Technology StudioMonitor 55 loudspeaker
Robert J. Reina  |  Nov 09, 2012  |  0 comments
Recently, I thought about all the audio shows I've attended over the last 27 years, looking for any pattern that all of them might have shared. I came up with a handful of audio manufacturers that have earned at shows a reputation for getting, year after year, consistently good sound—rooms in which I could reliably depend on being able to chill out and enjoy music in good, involving sound. Those companies include Audio Research, Music Hall (distributor of Creek and Epos), Vandersteen Audio—and Definitive Technology. Since their founding, in 1990, Maryland-based DefTech has been a major presence at shows, displaying an increasingly wide range of high-value speakers for two-channel and surround-sound systems. But I'd never reviewed one of their models. I thought it was about time.
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Stand Loudspeaker ReviewsBudget Component Reviews
Denon SC-CX303 loudspeaker
John Marks  |  Jan 05, 2010  |  First Published: Dec 05, 2009  |  0 comments
The companion loudspeaker to Denon's RCD-CX1 SACD/CD receiver is the SC-CX303 ($1200/pair). The SC-CX303 is a ported two-way with a 1" soft-dome tweeter and a 5" carbon-fiber–cone woofer. Denon claims a sensitivity of 86dB and an impedance of 6 ohms. Instead of a formal frequency response, Denon instead gives an unreferenced figure for frequency extension that, at 35Hz–60kHz, is neither helpful nor credible.
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Budget Component ReviewsComputer Audio Reviews
Digital Audio Labs CardDeluxe PC soundcard
John Atkinson  |  Sep 22, 2000  |  0 comments
Convergence. There, I've said it. I swore I wasn't going to use the "C" word, but when you're faced with writing about a product that smashes the boundaries between component categories as completely as the CardDeluxe does, you have little choice.
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Floor Loudspeaker ReviewsBudget Component Reviews
Direct Acoustics Silent Speaker II
John Marks  |  Jul 05, 2011  |  First Published: Jun 30, 2011  |  0 comments
Direct Acoustics is a loudspeaker company in Weston, Massachusetts, that sells, by mail-order only, just one product: the two-way, floorstanding Silent Speaker II ($748/pair).

Its seemingly paradoxical name refers not to any inability of the Silent to create sound, but rather is intended by its maker to indicate two aspects of its performance. First is the ability of the loudspeaker boxes to "disappear" in the sense of not being readily apparent as sound sources. Well, okay, everyone wants that. The other intended sense of Silent is that the woofer and its loading arrangement were designed to minimize stray noises created by the woofer's excursion, or by the movements of air within, or in and out of, its vent or port.

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Stand Loudspeaker ReviewsBudget Component Reviews
Dunlavy Audio Labs SC-I loudspeaker
John Atkinson  |  Dec 10, 2006  |  First Published: Dec 10, 1994  |  0 comments
The SC-I ($995/pair) is the smallest model in the "Signature Collection" to come from Dunlavy Audio Labs, the company founded by John Dunlavy after he left Duntech. The largest model in this series used to be the $4995/pair SC-IV that Robert Deutsch so enthusiastically reviewed last April, and that this month was voted Stereophile's 1994 "Product of the Year." There is now also a huge SC-VI available.
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Budget Component ReviewsJ. Gordon HoltStand Loudspeaker Reviews
Dynaco A-25 loudspeaker
J. Gordon Holt  |  Apr 13, 2017  |  First Published: Dec 01, 1969  |  8 comments
Everyone knows that a lot of serious music listeners—that is, those who listen to music instead of using it as a conversational background—have neither the space nor the money for a pair of typical floor-standing speakers, and must make do with bookshelf-type systems that are actually small enough to put in a bookshelf. But while the typical audio perfectionist will freely admit that there is a place in the audio sun for these dinky little speakers, he cannot really take them seriously, particularly when they're priced significantly under $100 each.
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Stand Loudspeaker ReviewsBudget Component Reviews
Dynaudio Excite X12 loudspeaker
Robert J. Reina  |  Mar 22, 2010  |  2 comments
I miss the High End Shows. Not the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas—no thanks. I can do without the overpriced hotels, the 45-minute taxi lines, the frantic racing from venue to venue. No, it's the Stereophile shows I miss, with the centralized location, the rubbing shoulders with readers ("Hey, you're the cheap-speaker guy! Check out room 206!"), the listening to live music, and maybe even playing a little of it.
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Budget Component ReviewsPhono Preamp Reviews
EAR 834P phono preamplifier
Michael Fremer, Robert J. Reina  |  Jul 10, 2005  |  First Published: Jul 10, 1997  |  0 comments
No, folks, vinyl is not dead. And even though my colleague Mikey Fremer is beginning to sound like a broken record, the little guy is right: when it comes to the sound on offer, CD still doesn't come close. There are more turntables, phono cartridges, and tonearms on the market today than ever before. Moreover, with companies like Classic Records, Analogue Productions, and Mosaic offering a steady stream of ultra-high-quality reissues, there seems to be an increasing supply of quality vinyl at reasonable prices.
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Budget Component ReviewsComputer Audio Reviews
Echo Indigo IO CardBus soundcard
John Atkinson  |  Nov 08, 2004  |  First Published: Nov 01, 2004  |  0 comments
The integration of computers into high-end audio is contentious. A reader poll last spring on our website indicated that a significant proportion of audiophiles—a quarter—is dead set against the idea, yet both Microsoft, with Windows Media Player 9, and Apple, with iTunes, seem convinced that the future of domestic music reproduction involves computers. To support that idea, both Apple- and Windows-based computers (the latter with Intel's about-to-be-launched HD Audio technology) are promoting hi-rez audio playback.
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Budget Component ReviewsStand Loudspeaker Reviews
Elac Debut B6 loudspeaker
Herb Reichert  |  Mar 31, 2016  |  21 comments
The first I heard about Elac's new Debut line of speakers was from two 12-year-olds at T.H.E. Show Newport Beach 2015. "Elac's room is making the best sound at the show," they said.

Elac? I thought. I have an Elac Miracord 40A turntable. Hmmmm...

So I walked to Elac's room and listened to the Debut B5 bookshelf speakers ($229.99/pair). I was impressed—but maybe not as impressed as everyone else in the room seemed to be. In the halls, people were raving: "Did you hear Andrew Jones's new speaker?" Show bloggers went crazy. People kept asking me, "Herb—what'd you think of the Elacs?" My polite response was always, "I'm glad I'm not in the business of making $1000/pair speakers."

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Stand Loudspeaker ReviewsBudget Component Reviews
Eminent Technology LFT-16 loudspeaker
John Marks  |  Dec 31, 2008  |  First Published: Oct 01, 2008  |  0 comments
There is much to admire and to enjoy in this idiosyncratically charming hybrid loudspeaker. Eminent Technology has been around for about 25 years. Founder Bruce Thigpen was a pioneer in air-bearing technology, and ET's first product was a well-regarded air-bearing tonearm. The company later developed and was awarded patents for its Linear Field Transducers (LFTs): push-pull loudspeaker panels that operate on the magnetic rather than the electrostatic principle. Arraying magnets both front and rear of the plastic-membrane diaphragm eliminates a problem inherent in many planar-magnetic designs: as excursion increases, the magnetic restorative force diminishes. As can be expected, this technology is not efficient at reproducing bass, so most such speakers have been hybrids.
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Floor Loudspeaker ReviewsBudget Component Reviews
Eminent Technology LFT-VIII loudspeaker
Corey Greenberg  |  Mar 30, 2008  |  First Published: Feb 02, 1993  |  0 comments
"And I say panel speakers can't rock'n'roll—"
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Budget Component ReviewsFloor Loudspeaker Reviews
Emotiva Audio Airmotiv T2 loudspeaker
Thomas J. Norton  |  Apr 23, 2019  |  13 comments
Visit any consumer audio show these days and you'll see rooms full of systems costing from six to seven figures. Manufacturers like to put their best foot forward, and demoing systems with loudspeakers designed to sell for $50,000/pair and up (often up) seems an obvious way to go.

It's also common for an audio company to launch its flagship models first, and only later release more affordable products, for a wider range of buyers. The hope is that the promotional shine of the dream products will be reflected onto the budget models.

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Budget Component ReviewsStand Loudspeaker Reviews
Emotiva Audio Pro Airmotiv 4s powered loudspeaker
Robert J. Reina  |  Mar 24, 2015  |  7 comments
"I'm intrigued how Emotiva can offer an active speaker for so little."

This was John Atkinson's response to my request to review Emotiva's Pro Airmotiv 4s ($299/pair). My colleague Steve Guttenberg had been discussing this speaker with me at a recent industry event, and I'd realized that it had been some time since I'd reviewed an entry-level loudspeaker. I'd reviewed Emotiva's X-Ref XRT-5.2 floorstanding speaker in the August 2012 issue and had been impressed with its combination of sound quality and price. I requested samples for review.

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