Stereophile and Magico

[cannata]

wow! Harsh words for a good sounding speaker ... to each his own I guess

Not enough bass, too much bass, dark, bright, fast, slow, people just don't get it, these speakers are what you put in to them, nothing more nothing less. Can be boring to thrills seekers, pretending to be music lovers who need to be "emotionally" involved (see Ron Resnick latest posts from Munich).

 

[mcduman]

it is not about not enough bass / too much bass and all that. the treble and bass totally stick out, the speakers need to play loud to sound like music, not much flesh on the bones etc. typical attributes of jbl line of disco speakers. the v series it replaced were more humble perhaps but more balanced and refined too at 1/2 of the price. (i briefly used v3 too before the m5.) anyway, they are one of the shortest lived speakers in the magico line which I have been following closely since the mini.

 

[cannata]

it is not about not enough bass / too much bass and all that. the treble and bass totally stick out, the speakers need to play loud to sound like music, not much flesh on the bones etc. typical attributes of jbl line of disco speakers. the v series it replaced were more humble perhaps but more balanced and refined too at 1/2 of the price. (i briefly used v3 too before the m5.) anyway, they are one of the shortest lived speakers in the magico line which I have been following closely since the mini.

Come-on, I own these and this is the most ridicules things I have yet to hear about them. None of the subjective and objective coverage these speakers ever got support your comment. You sound like one of these guys who never got over the Magico wood period, that is too bad, you are missing out.

 

[mcduman]

You sound like one of these guys who never got over the Magico wood period,.

Precisely.

Have not heard the m-pro

 

[FrantzM]

it is not about not enough bass / too much bass and all that. the treble and bass totally stick out, the speakers need to play loud to sound like music, not much flesh on the bones etc. typical attributes of jbl line of disco speakers. the v series it replaced were more humble perhaps but more balanced and refined too at 1/2 of the price. (i briefly used v3 too before the m5.) anyway, they are one of the shortest lived speakers in the magico line which I have been following closely since the mini.

Hi

Always difficult to enter such a debate based entirely on opinion ... but I am jumping in... It is somewhat fun for a while. What JBL "disco" speakers are you referring to? Care to name some model #, names?
THis came as a new item to me that the S5 needs to be played loud .. I would grant you that for my personal taste I would go with the Q3 rather than the S5.. I am of the persuasion that subs plural are a must in almost all speakers however full range they could be by their lone selves... So the somewhat extra bass or perhaps slight mid-bass emphasis on the S5 is of not much importance to me but the way you describe it is the S5 as an entirely disarticulated speaker.. You may not like the S5 but from there to that? Seems it is mostly an emotional response to a brand rather rather than an honest (that is somewhat objective and sincere) assessment of the perceived sound of a component. Care to explain ?

 

[microstrip]

(...)
THis came as a new item to me that the S5 needs to be played loud .. ? (...)

I also had this feeling for the few times I listened to the S5. And some reviews suggest it if you read between the lines - the Hificritic refers that you only noticed how loud the speaker is sounding when someone talks to you, reviews tend to refer to its great sound at " thundering" levels.

BTW, we will know the flaws of the S5 when we read the review of the S5 mk2 - reviewers are much more explicit once the problems have been solved. I was rather reticent about the Q7 the few times I listened to them. Curiously most of the characteristics I disliked were addressed in the TAS review of the Q7 mk2. Unfortunately I have not listened to the Q7 mk2 time enough to have an opinion on them.

The old Magico Mini II is now playing in my living room. IMHO it needs to be played louder than the old Wilson Watt/Puppy system 7, that I owned for many years.

 

[FrantzM]

microstrip

This is something of interest and to me one of the reason I like Magico: They play clean. That tendency to want them to sound louder is that somehow ... They allow you to play louder and perhaps loud enough for the way the recording was mastered... They are in that sense very accurate (I know I am opening a Pandora box here but WTH! ). If you were to measure with an SPL, something I have not done, it would seem that at similar level they seem to play softer than competing design.. Does the level of distortion produced at elevated SPL have to do with that? I am almost certain. Competing design will start sounding louder before because of the distortion produced IMO. A trait they share with some products I have heard: Vivid B1 and several horns: the famed Avantgarde and some others.. The better horns play loud enough to deafen you before you realize how loud they play, I did find the Goldmund Epilogue to belong to this category of being able to play very loud before you realize how loud they're playing and clean and it is one of those speakers that have been under the radar strangely. OTOH speakers I truly like, e.g the older Magnepan , the 3.6, 1.6 and MG 20.1 had to be played loud to become .. for the lack of a better word, alive, not familiar enough with the new generation 1.7, 3.7 , 20.7 to opine. Not so with the Magico they play soft well and loud as well. The Q3, Q5, Q7 and S5 which are those I care about , the Q1, S1 are not my cup of tea. I have not heard the M Pro, the M3 Pro, The S3 and the S5 MKII so can't comment but I would think they are more of the same. For the record I prefer the Q to the S and consider the Q3 as the sweet spot in term of price to performance ratio.. Perhaps the Q7 has that last ounce of refinement. I believe the Q5 would have been my favorite speaker in all their lineup if it weren't for the low sensitivity.. Low sensitivity, a subject I would like to approach in WBF and other sites.

 

[mcduman]

hi frantz

i am not a professional reviewer, dealer or anything of the sort. so i guess it is ok to show some "emotional response to a brand" if i. i have experience with it and ii. it does not offend anybody. after all, this is just another data point in a forum. but i try to be honest as well when i say that i was hugely disappointed with the s5 as a successor to the v & m series from day one. heard them for the first time in Munich 2012 driven by devialet and i thought the amps were broken. i heard them many times after that with other equipment and always had that sour taste.meanwhile, the hi-fi press seemed to like them a lot and i know there are many happy owners. but they all seem very eager to abandon ship with the announcement of the mk ii that came faster than a typical refresh cycle of 4-5 years. relevant or not here is a post i made some 2 years ago and i am totally in the same position today



http://www.whatsbestforum.com/showthread.php?14885-Hint-of-new-Magico-products&p=285615#post285615

 

[microstrip]

microstrip

This is something of interest and to me one of the reason I like Magico: They play clean. That tendency to want them to sound louder is that somehow ... They allow you to play louder and perhaps loud enough for the way the recording was mastered... They are in that sense very accurate (I know I am opening a Pandora box here but WTH! ). If you were to measure with an SPL, something I have not done, it would seem that at similar level they seem to play softer than competing design.. Does the level of distortion produced at elevated SPL have to do with that? I am almost certain. Competing design will start sounding louder before because of the distortion produced IMO. A trait they share with some products I have heard: Vivid B1 and several horns: the famed Avantgarde and some others.. The better horns play loud enough to deafen you before you realize how loud they play, I did find the Goldmund Epilogue to belong to this category of being able to play very loud before you realize how loud they're playing and clean and it is one of those speakers that have been under the radar strangely. OTOH speakers I truly like, e.g the older Magnepan , the 3.6, 1.6 and MG 20.1 had to be played loud to become .. for the lack of a better word, alive, not familiar enough with the new generation 1.7, 3.7 , 20.7 to opine. Not so with the Magico they play soft well and loud as well. The Q3, Q5, Q7 and S5 which are those I care about , the Q1, S1 are not my cup of tea. I have not heard the M Pro, the M3 Pro, The S3 and the S5 MKII so can't comment but I would think they are more of the same. For the record I prefer the Q to the S and consider the Q3 as the sweet spot in term of price to performance ratio.. Perhaps the Q7 has that last ounce of refinement. I believe the Q5 would have been my favorite speaker in all their lineup if it weren't for the low sensitivity.. Low sensitivity, a subject I would like to approach in WBF and other sites.

Frantz,

Yes, you are opening the Pandora box ... Master engineers are known to listen very loud, and loudness levels in control rooms are not typical consumer levels.

Curiously electrostatic speakers are considered very clean and most of them can play at low levels. And although for sometime I shared your opinion about Avantgarde, I now feel that if they are properly amplified at set up they can play at low levels.

My reference is this aspect is still the the Wilson XLF - I have found it scales independently of sound level once properly positioned. IMHO our perception of loudness in speakers is also correlated with scale. If they do not fit each other the playback feels artificial. I always felt sorry that the Quad ESL63 did not achieve the sound levels I needed for symphonic music - it one of the inexpensive speakers where the scale was given by the recording, not by the speaker.

BTW, I hope you start the thread on sensitivity - it is really a challenging subject. Most people will tell you that it is just a question of electronic gain, nothing else ...

 

[FrantzM]

Frantz,

Yes, you are opening the Pandora box ... Master engineers are known to listen very loud, and loudness levels in control rooms are not typical consumer levels.

Curiously electrostatic speakers are considered very clean and most of them can play at low levels. And although for sometime I shared your opinion about Avantgarde, I now feel that if they are properly amplified at set up they can play at low levels.

My reference is this aspect is still the the Wilson XLF - I have found it scales independently of sound level once properly positioned. IMHO our perception of loudness in speakers is also correlated with scale. If they do not fit each other the playback feels artificial. I always felt sorry that the Quad ESL63 did not achieve the sound levels I needed for symphonic music - it one of the inexpensive speakers where the scale was given by the recording, not by the speaker.

BTW, I hope you start the thread on sensitivity - it is really a challenging subject. Most people will tell you that it is just a question of electronic gain, nothing else ...

microstrip

I may have not phrased my points properly .. I believe Avantguard speakers to scale well with the music, from soft to stupidly loud ... I find them good but have heard (Warning! ..Opinion! Here aka "WOH!" )better and much less expensive horns. Their Basshorns doesn't appeal to me BTW. If I need to go there I would have preferred the Danley Tapered Horns.. Not well known by the audiophile community but serious subwoofers nonetheless.
I did find the X-2 to scale well, the first Wilson speaker I could own and be happy with, not heard the XLF so can't opine. I am with you on the ESL 63. I had it but it could not play all the music genre I liked with similar aplomb.. Soft they are good , Loud they die , realistic bass they don't do however some would like to debate this point. ESL 63 aren't rich in bass...
I will start that thread on sensitivity later or perhaps find one similar I started a few years ago in WBF.

 

[microstrip]

microstrip

I may have not phrased my points properly .. I believe Avantguard speakers to scale well with the music, from soft to stupidly loud ... I find them good but have heard (Warning! ..Opinion! Here aka "WOH!" )better and much less expensive horns. (...)

You already opened the Pandora box and now are opening the curiosity box - which horns are in your opinion better and less expensive?

 

[BlueFox]

microstrip

This is something of interest and to me one of the reason I like Magico: They play clean. That tendency to want them to sound louder is that somehow ... They allow you to play louder and perhaps loud enough for the way the recording was mastered.

I used to regularly play my S5s in the 100-110db range for certain songs on a Friday/Saturday night. One Friday, after a few too many beers, I thought I would find out just how loud they could play. I was going to use distortion/clipping as the stop point. So, I am slowly increasing the volume and am sitting there just amazed at how loud they are playing. I am literally being pounded by the sound, yet it is clear as a bell. Finally, I said this is just too loud, and was about to turn it down when I blew the right mid and tweeter. It also weakened the left mid so that it went shortly after getting the right fixed. Now I never exceed the low 90s when playing. However I am still impressed at the capability of the S5, not to mention just how great they sound.

 

[mcduman]

"Makes you deaf before you realize it". i am so impressed I will look for this next time I am in the market for speakers. Why did not I think of this before.

 

[Al M.]

I used to regularly play my S5s in the 100-110db range for certain songs on a Friday/Saturday night.

Not good for your ears.

I follow NIOSH recommendations:

http://www.gcaudio.com/resources/howtos/loudness.html

(dBa is obviously not the same as dB, but anyhow. My dB meter is A-weighted (dBa).)

 

[Al M.]

"Makes you deaf before you realize it". i am so impressed I will look for this next time I am in the market for speakers. Why did not I think of this before.

Precisely.

 

[Steve williams]

Very interesting chart Al. It should make all of us stand up and take note

 

[Al M.]

Very interesting chart Al. It should make all of us stand up and take note

I wish I would have paid attention to this stuff sooner. My high-frequency hearing is not that bad as it relates to my age, but it could be better.

At least I wore ear plugs in the disco when I was younger.

 

[FrantzM]

Hi

I wanted to post this a while back since we're talking about loudness now.

Very interesting I must say

The Seductive (Yet Destructive) Appeal of Loud Music

 

[Steve williams]

That was interesting as well with a conclusion to consider.......

Like every drug, loud music can be very destructive in high doses. But unlike ordinary drugs, it takes years of abuse before the damage is noticeable. That may be the primary explanation for why loudness is ignored. Like a mother who tells her children to brush their teeth to avoid mouth problems as an adult, for most people, the future is too hypothetical and remote to be taken seriously. Immediate gratification can thus produce deafness with a corresponding disruption in social and emotional well-being.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

Hi

I wanted to post this a while back since we're talking about loudness now.

Very interesting I must say

The Seductive (Yet Destructive) Appeal of Loud Music

there is more to emotional music involvement than loudness/high SPL's. how 'physical' can an amp/speaker get without being painfully loud? an amp/speaker with authority, 'jump factor', and ease can sound real and involving at moderate levels. and just a little more can really get things moving. I think in many ways we get back around to that 'first watt' question and how synergistic amp/speakers are in that way.