“At the suggestion of Lenbrook Industries Consumer Product Marketing Manager, Denise Babin, I agreed to do a complete review of this one-company/two-brand home theatre system. Maybe I should have thought about it a little longer; it was a pretty big project, as it turned out: an upper echelon NAD Blu-ray player, a powerful and very versatile HT receiver, and 6 channels of PSB Image reproduction. I brooded about this while I spent the better part of a day or two unboxing and measuring all the speakers…”

“If you want a compact subwoofer, the Fathom f113 looks like a fine choice, if you’ve got a weightlifter friend: it weighs in at 115 pounds. If not self carrying (my limit is my Yamaha 9.9 outboard motor at 85 pounds), it is self calibrating, and comes with a microphone that you put at the listening position. We’ll show before and after measurements for our room below. This process is called Automatic Room Optimization, or A.R.O. More on all this later. The f113 is roughly 16.5 inches high and wide, and 19.25 inches deep…”

“Last reviewed in Winter 92, this small speaker has since set a kind of standard for its size, as well as being the progenitor of a line
of compact speakers notable for their bass extension. Hallmarks of the Totem Model One are veneer on both inside and outside of
the cabinet (to equalize interior stresses in the wood; see the Linn review), “multilayer borosilicate damping” inside the enclosure, “lock mitre cabinet joints”, a “full plane crossbrace for extreme rigidity and increased damping”, and WBT 5-way terminals…”

“Here we have a pair of very attractive, very small speakers, our samples finished in Black High Gloss, but also available in Mocha and Cherry veneer. A bass reflex design that’s rear-ported, the BS–243 employs ELAC’s own Jet tweeter, and a new bass/midrange with a “crystal” diaphragm. Here’s what the manufacturer has to say about this new technology…”

“The Niro Spherical Surround System, or SSS for short, is a complete surround system that supports Dolby Digital, DTS, and Dolby Pro logic II. It provides 6 channels of 30 watts rms, and complete surround reproduction from a 3-piece front-mounted minimal speaker/subwoofer array and an amplifier/controller with analog and digital inputs. It’s plug-and-play all the way, and offers a level of convenience that’s hard to resist…”

“When I last visited Axiom Audio in Dwight, Ontario just east of Huntsville and west of Algonquin Park, the talk turned to product reviews (as it somehow always does), the suggestion was made that I follow the process developed by their resident artist, Joe Vassallo, who has in a long design career done posters for such movies as Flashdance, and dream car sketches for the now-struggling US automakers. He is an accomplished airbrush artist, as well as designer/photographer for the Axiom web site, having retired (sort of) to Muskoka after a 30-year career in the US….”

“Here we have a compact combination of four identical satellites, a centre channel, and a subwoofer, all compact and stylish, the sub remarkably small for its bass extension. According to the manual, “With their versatile design, the satellite speakers can be placed virtually anywhere on shelves or stands, or mounted on a wall using the supplied base…”

“This system from a relatively new Canadian manufacturer combines value and performance in a very special way. Stylish in a contoured cabinet, the four satellites (6 1/2″H x 5″D x 4″W) are very small and attractive in silver or black, and the centre channel is almost identical except for its 10″ width to accommodate an additional 3 1/2″ woofer/midrange. The tweeter is a 3/4″ soft dome that is slightly recessed with an anti-diffraction plate around it to optimize imaging. Mind you, there wouldn’t be all that much diffraction off a baffle this small…”

“Sinclair is a relatively new name in speakers, developed in Canada by Erikson Consumer, who also distribute Harman/Kardon, AKG, and several other brands, including Sirius satellite radio receivers and accessories and numerous iPod-related items. The speakers are designed in Canada, and manufactured in China to Sinclair’s exacting specifications…”

“The new v2 versions of the Reference Signature flagship models from Paradigm appear to push the limits of enclosure technology and construction, with just about everything die-cast in aluminum. The Seismic subwoofers (a small matching Signature is not yet available) also use this expensive fabrication technique…”

“After a long history of Stratus top-of-the-line loudspeakers, through the Gold and Platinum series, PSB has recently renewed its flagship line with a new name: Synchrony. I think the intention is to bring together all the elements of acoustic design and mechanics in enclosures that employ completely new approaches to the physical and aesthetic aspects of dynamic speaker construction…”

“The 8 inch long throw driver faces downward, with quite large feet setting the optimum distance for effective radiation from a sealed cabinet using floor loading. The fourth side contains the control panel and inputs and outputs. There are a pair of RCA ins, plus a single XLR connector which none of my available males would fit into; it is the combined type that also accepts 1/4″ stereo phone jacks…”

“Canadian loudspeaker manufacturer Axiom is the latest company to wade into the desktop audio fray, joining a few other established, high end audio players in the burgeoning computer audio market (see my recent review of the Dynaudio MC-15 desktop speakers). Like the recently reviewed Audioengine A2’s, the Audiobytes are very, very small (6.5 x 5.5 x 4 inches), appealing to those with limited desk space to cede to speakers…”

“This speaker system from Klipsch puts together several models from their Reference Series with similar or identical drivers, and makes for a floorstanding front pair, with compact surrounds and a matching centre channel, along with a quite compact subwoofer. They’re designed to match the new generation of flat screen video displays, including, plasma, DLP and LCD rear projection, and other variants of compact, less deep monitors…”

“Omnidirectional loudspeakers have been a mainstay of Mirage over the years, and have evolved under their design team from large panel designs to compact towers like the Omni 250. With a tweeter mounted under a dispersive lens and over a slant- mounted woofer/midrange, this design is intended to disperse sound much like a musical instrument. An additional front-mounted woofer is used, with a port below…”

“When the folks at Audioengine offered to send me their new A2 powered speaker system for review I have to admit that I hesitated for a couple of days in saying yes. In photos the A2’s looked very similar to the company’s larger, more expensive speaker system, the A5, which I had already reviewed (and ended up buying). How different were they going to be?”

“The new Seismic Series of subwoofers from Paradigm is the result of years of research into high excursion driver technology and a host of other related concerns. It used to be that a sub had to be big to go deep, but that’s been less and less the case in recent years, as Sunfire has shown in leading the way in compact models. The Seismic 12 has “tremendous peak-to-peak cone excursion (over 2 inches in our SeismicTM 12)”, producing “incredibly deep bass response with equally incredible speed and power.”

“Once known best for its cabinetry, Monitor Audio has come quite a distance in recent years to become notable for the audio quality and manufacturing consistency of its loudspeakers of all sorts, without losing that leading edge in furniture fashioning. The beefing up of their engineering in recent years has resulted in some speakers that both look and measure very well…”

“You may recall the recent review of the quite expensive Adam Compact loudspeaker which uses an ART tweeter, designed by Oskar Heil, and here we see another variant from ELAC in this beautifully clad speaker design. This time it’s called the JET tweeter, “developed to perfection on the basis of the famous ‘Air Motion Transformer’ by loudspeaker pioneer Dr. Oskar Heil. Its principle: a concertinaed foil membrane is driven by a strong magnet system of neodymium rods.”

“Gosh, I can remember when the Reference Series was new and hot, but I guess that was back when we were recording the Chuck Israels Quartet out in Bellingham with a pair of Studio 20s as monitors. They were awfully good then, and the v.4 successors aim to be better. Here’s how: “1[inch] (25mm) G-PALTM Gold-Anodized Pure Aluminum Domes (also developed for our award-winning Signature Series) chosen for their exceptional rigidity and improved internal damping. The reduced radius of curvature on the tweeter diaphragm has also brought about significant improvements in sound dispersion. Ferro-fluid cooled and damped…”