A brutal review of the Wilson Maxx

I respect, but I don't particularly like Wilson speakers. That said, the "review" was unusually biased. Hardesty clearly has preconceived notions of what constitutes a good speaker and he slams Wilson for not following his lead. His main points are that the MAXX is not tonally/phase accurate and that they represent a poor dollar value. I agree with his first point, but I don't see it as a fatal flaw since there are many truly great speakers out there that are not phase coherent and have a tailored frequency response (BBC monitors, Sonus Faber, Proac, Monitor Audio Studio Series, etc.) As far as value goes, unless you can afford them, you're really not in any position to judge whether the MAXX is a good value or not. His comments about Wilson catering to the carriage trade misses the mark. Personally I can't think of any speaker or electronic component over $10,000 that isn't aimed at that market.

I don't find it clearly stated in the "review", but how many people think Hardesty actually listened to the speakers as opposed to simply reading the other publications' reviews?

I don't mind if people don't like Wilson speakers, but I wonder how many of the people who bash them have heard them in their own room??? People who make claims about, or denegrate a product based on how they sounded in a SHOWroom or at RMAF or CES really don't have enough information about a product to make intelligent comments.

I have only heard Wilson products in those environments, so I have no opinion about them. I will reserve judgement until I can get a proper level of experience.

"unless you can afford them, you're really not in any position to judge whether the MAXX is a good value or not"

I can afford them. I have heard them. They're not good value. If I couldn't afford them, it still wouldn't make my relative value judgement less valid when there are several competitive products that provide higher quality on several attributes for less money.

Components over $10,000 that aren't aimed squarely at the Carriage Trade:

- Audio Research Reference series
- VPI HRX
- Totem Shaman
- Lamm
- Higher-end Avalon speakers
- The list goes on...

He is not the only reviewer that gave a luke warm review of the Maxx 2's. Martin Collom's from hi fi news gave them a luke warm review back in late 2003. This coming from a guy that had Wilson watt puppy speakers as his reference for over 10 years.
He owns Avalon now.

Perhaps he was turned down when he approached Wilson about advertising in his mag? Vitrolic? absolutely. Axe to grind? Perhaps.

In either case I have also not been overly impressed with wilson speakers on the few occasions I've heard them. Certainly not for the coin. They did have fine detail and pretty impressive soundstaging with the right equipment, but I didn't find them involving at all. They didn't captivate me, and for that money I would expect a speaker to have me bound and gagged on the sofa.

Enjoy,
Bob