Michael Green Rev 6 signature Speaker review

Over the last 5 years I have acquired my dream pair of speaker that I have been working hard saving my hard earn money for. It was Sonus Faber Guarneri Evolution which I got acquainted with at a demo show few years back. Realizing that I won't have the luxury of obtaining a large room, I was looking more towards bookshelf speakers. I still remembered the first time they appeared at my place, I took leave(called in sick lol!!) eagerly awaited for them to appear and got busy unpacking them. Once done I got them hooked up immidiately to my system, my heart was beating fast feeling excited and worried if they sounded less than what I heard previously. They initially sounded dark but threw a large soundstage and already quite an amazing bass. Over the next few months they sttled down and opened up beautifully, all that I have dreamt off and read on reviews was now there in my room. They had beautiful sweet highs, midrange to die for and bass that gave me a huge smile. Never once they had that boxy sounding bookshelf type that some speakers do tend to give. I knew the Guarneris is going to be with me forever. During this period while im trying to get the best out of my system I was searching for the right kind of racks for my tube equipments. Upon here I stumbled upon some articles about Justa Rack and Room Tune by a man known as Michael Green. I began to read his explanations about tuning and what vibrations can do to a system. This made me more curious on what he mentioned as I found his statements to be honest and logic(to me). So fast forward over the years I followed what Michael has to offer for my system and he guided me on tuning my system. He shared his knowledge and gave me deeper understanding on how does vibration affects a system and how to tap on all those good vibes in a room and use them to my advantage in a given space. Each and every purchase I made from him elevated my listening experience more than anything else that I have tried and beleive me I have tried a lot of stuff that many people will quickly dispose it as mumbo jumbo.

When Michael came up with his newer pair of speakers REV 6 I was initially baffled on his description about them being more of musical instrument rather than describing them as a pair of bookshelf speaker. Reading more on his descriptions about them and knowing the size of his speaker, I was not convinced of it's ability to throw a big soundstage like my Guarneris does in my audio room ( Over the years i managed to move my system up to a room that i re-did the room size is 12' x 21' x 9'). So after doing some talking with him, he said Rev 6 speakers will have no issues filling up my room with good tunes. It was still a tall order for me to take in but one thing I know over the years is Michael has never disappointed me in anyway with his suggestions.

Few months later a friend of mine was looking for his first pair of speaekrs for his small room I told him about Michael's Rev 6 and what it has to offer and its pricings was very reasonable which was within his budget. He contacted Michael and agreed to get a pair from him. That pair of speakrs got shipped and it landed at my place for few days before my friend took them back (he was not in town so I had to collect it for him so lucky me:). It was then I had a chance to try out Michael's Rev 6 in my room. Without doubt the speakers blew me off with a huge sound stage and amazing clarity but it was too short of a period for me to audition them. Base on how much of music was coming out from that small pair of bookshelf speakers and filling up my room it was no doubt I wanted a pair for myself too. Michael told me that it could give my Sonus a run for its money which was something that I was very doubtful lol.

Michael told me that he is able to make his signature version of Rev 6 so I decided to go with that. After 3 months the speaker was made, cured, voiced and shipped to me. It took about 10 days for them to reach. First of all I was very happy the boxes came in perfect condition and secondly Micahel did a fantastic job packaging them so well. Unboxing them was not an easy task !! The first thing I noticed once they were open was the smell, wow the smell of woodwork on the speaker was strong. Im not sure the smell is from the wood itself or from some special curing process that Michael did but I like the smell. Each part of the speaker and stand was carefully wrapped, it took me a while to unwrap them as I didn't want to cause any scratches on the speaker box or damage the drivers. The speakers had bolts attached to the sides which are connected using a bar. Once they were unboxed, I started installing the stand which was a breeze as Michael has already predrilled the post to place the top plate and base plate with its supplied screws given along with the package. On the plates (top and base) it had additional holes at 5 sides for base plate (3 back and 2 front) and 3 areas for top plate(2 front and 1 back). They are meant for spikes to be installed.

I placed the speakers and its matching stand initially in my computer room and let them run in for around 25 hours before I got them in to my main audio room. On my initial listening impression from my computer rig I noticed right out of the box the rev 6 sounded slightly tipped up and bright and harsh on highs and midrange. Listening to the bass in that small computer room of mine was very respectable (45hz range). I kept the bolts open and let them run in overnight on the first day. On the second day that bright sounding highs was much lesser and vocals sounded richer and stage grew slightly. I kept them running in using moderate volume for another few days, that made the highs sounding soo much more smoother and rounded but midrange sounded slightly shouty and scratchy also forward sounding. But the stage grew bigger and was filling up the room to an extend that I felt the Rev 6 needed to be placed in a bigger room. Bass was sounding deep and there was more extension (40hz). I could tell the Rev Signatures were starting their break in. Michael says the Revs start sounding nice to him after about 3 months of good play time. He doesn't believe in short term HEA break in times and lets you know how the speaker is doing as you describe to him the sound. He's more like talking to Steinway & Sons than a speaker designer.

After some discussion with Michael he said there's lots of room for improvements since its just barely brought up to life and once I start tweaking them there's going to be big changes, initially I was not sure on what he meant by tweaking them but that will be described more at later stage  

So before I started tweaking the speakers I proceeded to get the Rev 6 up to my main audio room and repositioned by placing them at the same site as my previous speakers were at using its supplied spikes. Now my room is significantly bigger than my computer room so the bass responce was not as great as it was in previously. Michael did mention to me about his MGA SW15 Sub looks like it is definately in need for my main room to get that lower octaves flowing. With some repositioning I managed to get them loading and activating those pressure zones this did help on the bass side but they are still bass shy as in comparison to the way I had them setup in my computer room. The room has been tuned to the Sonus Faber for a while now with the bass going low and you can hear the Rev 6 wanting something different acoustically. So I will have to revisit my room tuning and make them work for the Rev's at a later stage but for now I will keep them as it is.

Playing them in my main room was a real shocker as I was seriouly stomped on how big the stage is. I kid you not on the stage this is by far the biggest stage im hearing as of now in my room. The size of Rev 6 simply doesn't justify at all on how big it can produces a stage. It sounds more like a floorstander rather than a bookshelf minus the bass of a floorstander lol!. Now all this sounds amazing but upon my initial time with the Rev 6 I had some issues with them. Firstly as I increased the volume there was some scratchy and cracking sound that got me worried I might have pushed them too hard and blew the tweeters but luckily it turned out to be just the tuning bolts and bar inside the box that was vibrating against the side wall of the cabinet. So after I tightened them all those sound artifacts was gone. But by tightening them the stage size became slightly smaller than before. Something I must understand this is not a regular loudspeaker the Rev truly reacts more like a stringed instrument. Also I found that now size/girth of each instruments were slightly smaller and sounded shouty, etchy and hollow(reminds me of some horn setup that I have heard). However even though they shrunk and sounded as such each of those instrument notes were filling up my room more than my Guarneri did. But they were not at the same level of density, tone saturation that I did like it to be. Although bass response and extensions is there but they are lesser than my Guarneris that I have been accustomed to for a long time. Well maybe this might be me being bias towards my Guarneri's since I have been listening to them for around 5 years now but wish I could get more meat on the bones with the Rev 6. I must remind myself the Rev's are only 3 weeks old. What speaker breaks in in 3 weeks? My Sonus took several months to fully break in. Am I asking too much too soon out of the Rev.

Time to talk to Michael and see where I am at in the process. So after some discussions, he told me to remove those spikes that I initially installed on the top plate and let them vibrate freely drianing via the stands and on to my floor. So that's what I did by removing those spikes from the top plate. After giving a day of rest I then revisited them and wow what a big difference the sound is. Removing those spikes brought out that body and resolution in spades. Im hearing a completely different speaker now. Usually you will hear people describing more on improvements using spikes on a stand but here its a total opposite where the improvements are more of everything without spikes. I get it that it has got to do with resonance and letting them vibrate freely but the improvements removing those spikes was astounding. Knowing this I proceeded to remove the other set of spikes that was installed on the base plate. The main reason why I installed those spikes was to give them height so that it would present a good stage based on my experience with my Guarneri's but this turned out to be tottaly wrong with Rev 6. Not only the stage was at a perfect height but yet another level of improvement was heard especially on tonality with much more fleshed out body. I'm starting to get it, these really are musical instruments. With my Sonus I was thinking one way but with the Rev Signatures it's the reverse it's like I can go where ever I want with them. The Guarneri's are not light in any way so moving them is not an easy task im fixed towards few motions that I can make with them. With the Rev's being super light mass speaker im able to move them easily and make them work well with my room further as im able to tune them with the bolts which is truly and an amazing innovation. Its truly like a stringed musical instrument where you can tightened or loosened the strings to go accordingly as how you want them to sound. As for the Rev's I can tightned and loosen the bolts to give them an appropriate resonance on them to work well with the room.

With my Guarneris I kept them 7. 2 ft apart cause anything further apart i will loose that imaging and I start to hear holes on my stage also if farther apart they will be too near to my side walls which will now affect my imaging and bass will sound slightly wooley. The Rev 6 being smaller in size they are placed 9 ft apart yet they sound larger than my Guarneri's. How is this happening ? Im still figuring out till now how are they imaging so well when being farther apart and yet no holes on my stage in fact they are growing bigger and filling up more room space.

As of now it has been almost 4 weeks since I got them up and running, I was planning to post my initial impressions here but I didn't do so since they were breaking in my computer room which sounded way different than my actual room and also because they keep changing in sound that I felt it was better to let them settle down and have a more constant tune and signature sound before I start posting. For now Michael's Rev 6 speaker has totally transformed to a stage monster in my room with beautiful tone, instrumental separation/space and dynamics. It is still bass shy and theres still some bright sounding notes but it is not bothering me in any way and im in no hurry to go back to my Guarneri ;).

The big questions is can Michael's REV 6 Signature be a slayer to my beloved Guarneri's? Looks like it is happening by looking at its flexibility, soundstage, highs, dynamics and imaging the Rev 6 is the winner here hands down. For now the thing that is keeping my Guarneri's alive in me is its bass and that midrange with its slight dark yet involving musical signature sound that old Sonus Faber speakers are famous for. The Rev's bass is getting better now with more extensions after the 4th week but still its lacking that punch that im looking for.