Evolution Acoustics MMMicroOne

Robsker, Calloway,

I agree with Jonathan. Another way of saying it is that since the speaker is downstream of the electronics, if the setup with excellent upstream electronics sounds exceptional then that is testament to the transparency of the speaker just as much as the electronics themselves.

Therefore, one would expect that the same speaker with lesser electronics will mirror the sound of the electronics and not sound as good as with the better electronics, BUT that is not the fault of the speaker. In fact it is its strength. Also, I believe that the transparent speaker with lesser electrronics will still sound better than a less transparent speaker with those lesser electronics. The reason is that you will still hear the micro/macro dynamics, speed and transpareny of the speaker even though the electronics may be of a lower grsade.

Moreover, in my experience, most decent low-priced electronics are much better than you think. I believe, through experience, that speaker quality is much more critical than the the quality of the electronics.

At the end of the day, you want a speaker that sounds great with high priced electronics irrespective of the fact that you may use lower-priced electronics. My two cents.

Andrew

JTINN:

I in no way intimated that the speakers were mediocre. I said that I do not doubt that they are fine speakers. That said...

while it is true that a fine speaker will show forth the quality of the electronics feeding the speakers and that it is impressive that the system with 2K speakers and 80K of electronics sounds great... people need to realize that they are hearing an 82K system. Aoliviero states that speakers are far more important than the quality of electronics. Well... yes. But when ludicrous extremes are used, like 80k of signal to feed 2k speakers to endeavor to sell the 2k speakers... that is almost unethical.

JTinn... If you really thought your speakers were so great (and again, they may be) and that they sound great when driven by lesser electronics (as you state in your post) then by all means audition your speakers at shows with 8K of electronics, not 80K. Give a realistic audition to potential buyers. Certainly you should not fear such an audition.

Last salvo. I have not heard your speakers... but give me an 82K system... say with 50K speakers and 30K of electronics... I guarantee that the system will smoke the system with 2K speakers. That is, after all a very fair comparison --- same priced systems.

The point? It is crazy to push your speakers driven as they were at the show.

Robsker: I am sorry to tell you that IMO, you are just wrong. I say that knowing that you have not yet heard them. I would put our $2500 MMMicroOne's with stands against any bookshelf loudspeaker regardless of price.

As a matter of fact, I would put them up against just about any loudspeaker regardless of price. I understand that the last octave might not be it's strength, but it is a true reference loudspeaker that I would gladly use in my main system.

You stated: "JTinn... If you really thought your speakers were so great (and again, they may be) and that they sound great when driven by lesser electronics (as you state in your post) then by all means audition your speakers at shows with 8K of electronics, not 80K. Give a realistic audition to potential buyers. Certainly you should not fear such an audition."

You can say the same thing to any loudspeaker manufacturer who brings their product to a show and you would be wrong in doing so. Magico showed a $25k - $35k mini monitor that they used very expensive amplification to drive. Do they fall under the same criteria as you suggest we follow?

To make things clear, if someone called me and had a small room and was not looking for the last word in terms of the very deepest bass and had $100,000 amplifiers, I would not hesitate in suggesting that they use our MMMicroOne system.

You also say: "Last salvo. I have not heard your speakers... but give me an 82K system... say with 50K speakers and 30K of electronics... I guarantee that the system will smoke the system with 2K speakers. That is, after all a very fair comparison --- same priced systems.

The point? It is crazy to push your speakers driven as they were at the show."

Such a generalization is what is crazy and has no credibility. I will take that bet anytime as long as you do not choose any equipment that I represent and it is a system you can use in a small room. You are ultimately focusing too much on the price.

BTW: The last few shows we used the following electronics:

darTZeel CTH-8550 Integrated amp/preamp/phonostage - 20,300
Playback Designs MPS-3 - 8500

That comes to $28800, not 80k. Still pretty expensive, but quite a bit less than the 80k you mention.

Yikes, this is getting good!

JTinn, you may want to think about going ahead and bringing the $800 integrated to CES for grins. Cheers, Alan

Evolution Acoustics MMThree would be my dream speaker. But JTinn, I am on Robsker's side of argument. Take a look at my system. By your standards it is probably in class C/D/E.... But think - when I want to upgrade, I will always want to hear components in my range. I once was heard a PSB Silveri being driven by Krell mono blocks - this was about 12 years back - at a show. I was really mesmerized by the "ease of flow" of the music. Later when I wanted to put in a real system, I auditioned the same PSBs at a dealer. This time it was driven by a NAD power amp and later switched to Arcam integrated amp. Guess what - I was not that much impressed. I am not saying that the same will imply for the MMMicroOne.

But if you are targeting the MMMicroOne speakers for regulars like us, then the demo with real-life-electronic-partner will make more sense. (As of now) I cannot afford $20k+ electronics. If I could afford that, I would easily afford $20k+ speakers.

Andrew,
You are right. It is the speaker's strength to show the quality of electronics being used. But with a demo like that, I will always be frustrated knowing that my electronics will always be my weak link in the chain.