aerius
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- Oct 14, 2002
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I spent the last couple days checking out various speakers in the local shops, to see what's out there and also to recalibrate my hearing a bit. The first place I stopped by was a Totem dealer, and they had the entire line except the flagship Shaman setup in their 2 demo rooms. I started with the Forest and then worked my way up & down the line. Equipment was Bryston amps and Arcam CD players, along with Totem Sinew and Bi-Wire cables.
Standard disclaimer: All impressions are mine, made in show room conditions, limited time & music, etc.
First, read the Stereophile review of the Forest, it can be found here. About the only thing they got right was the description of the imaging and soundstaging. The bass which they claim to be surprisingly deep & impactful isn't. The strong bassline and kickdrum on SRV's "The Sky is Crying" is lean and has little impact to it. The nice room filling bass groove isn't there, it sounds like someone hit the Rumble Filter which is found on some older receivers and amps which rolls off everything under 100Hz. It's like listening to headphones but with speakers, you get all the sound & detail but no feel.
It also did bad things to SRV's electric guitar, notes which should ring out and scream with feedback don't. It sounds like they're being held back and muted, the dynamics just aren't there. The midrange in general just sounds confused, and tends to blend things together. And when the speaker's cranked up a bit to try and get more dynamics, it starts compressing and distorting the guitar tones as well as making the snare drums & cymbals harsh. Speaking of the treble, it's a bit on the bright side but usually stays under control until things start falling apart elsewhere, which unfortunately is all too often. Cymbals are nice & clean if a little too loud, and snare drums have a good whack & impact to them.
Playing something a little less demanding, in this case "Sweet the Sting" by Tori Amos, they sound pretty sweet except for a bit of sibilance. It got her voice pretty much right and managed to capture most of the subtle shifts & inflection, but again, the funky bass groove wasn't there. I played a couple more track but it was more of the same. Overall, I'm not a fan of it and wouldn't recommend it. Save a few more bucks and get the Mani-2 or B&W 804, both of which kick the crap out of it. Even the Fab Audio Brats at a bit over half the price of the Forests are far better.
Next I tried out the Hawk which is one model below the Forest. Take everything bad I said about the Forest and multiply it by 5. I listened to it for all of 5 minutes and that was all I could take. Blech.
So I went up the line to the Mani-2 super bookshelf speaker. Once again, read Stereophile's review here. Except this time they're dead on correct. This is one groovy musical speaker that makes you forget about all that audiophile crap and just bop along to the tunes. First thing I noticed? Bass, nice deep groovy room-filling bass. If I didn't know better I would've sworn that someone turned on a hidden subwoofer. Music sounded whole and complete again. And deep & powerful as the bass is it remains crisp & fast, even when faced with sorting out the drum & bass lines on SRV's "Wham". On many speakers & headphones, the electric bass gets buried by the drums & guitar and I end up loosing it several times. On the Mani-2 it only gets lost once, for a few seconds around the half minute mark.
Midrange, yeah, nice. Everything stays separate, no blending, compression, distortion, or any weird monkey business. I'd say it's a bit on the warm side, just the way I like it. Vocals, male & female sound the way they should, as do guitars, drums, and everything else. Natural. There is a minor weakness though, it's lacking the last bit of detail that the great speakers have. For instance the sound of Natalie MacMaster's violin isn't quite complete. It's missing a few of subtle resonances from the violin's body and the scrape of the bow against the strings is a bit soft. Still, the rest is good enough that I can easily live with it. No glaring flaws, really well balanced all-round speaker, I'd definitely recommend it.
To be continued, impressions of the Wind going up tomorrow...
Standard disclaimer: All impressions are mine, made in show room conditions, limited time & music, etc.
First, read the Stereophile review of the Forest, it can be found here. About the only thing they got right was the description of the imaging and soundstaging. The bass which they claim to be surprisingly deep & impactful isn't. The strong bassline and kickdrum on SRV's "The Sky is Crying" is lean and has little impact to it. The nice room filling bass groove isn't there, it sounds like someone hit the Rumble Filter which is found on some older receivers and amps which rolls off everything under 100Hz. It's like listening to headphones but with speakers, you get all the sound & detail but no feel.
It also did bad things to SRV's electric guitar, notes which should ring out and scream with feedback don't. It sounds like they're being held back and muted, the dynamics just aren't there. The midrange in general just sounds confused, and tends to blend things together. And when the speaker's cranked up a bit to try and get more dynamics, it starts compressing and distorting the guitar tones as well as making the snare drums & cymbals harsh. Speaking of the treble, it's a bit on the bright side but usually stays under control until things start falling apart elsewhere, which unfortunately is all too often. Cymbals are nice & clean if a little too loud, and snare drums have a good whack & impact to them.
Playing something a little less demanding, in this case "Sweet the Sting" by Tori Amos, they sound pretty sweet except for a bit of sibilance. It got her voice pretty much right and managed to capture most of the subtle shifts & inflection, but again, the funky bass groove wasn't there. I played a couple more track but it was more of the same. Overall, I'm not a fan of it and wouldn't recommend it. Save a few more bucks and get the Mani-2 or B&W 804, both of which kick the crap out of it. Even the Fab Audio Brats at a bit over half the price of the Forests are far better.
Next I tried out the Hawk which is one model below the Forest. Take everything bad I said about the Forest and multiply it by 5. I listened to it for all of 5 minutes and that was all I could take. Blech.
So I went up the line to the Mani-2 super bookshelf speaker. Once again, read Stereophile's review here. Except this time they're dead on correct. This is one groovy musical speaker that makes you forget about all that audiophile crap and just bop along to the tunes. First thing I noticed? Bass, nice deep groovy room-filling bass. If I didn't know better I would've sworn that someone turned on a hidden subwoofer. Music sounded whole and complete again. And deep & powerful as the bass is it remains crisp & fast, even when faced with sorting out the drum & bass lines on SRV's "Wham". On many speakers & headphones, the electric bass gets buried by the drums & guitar and I end up loosing it several times. On the Mani-2 it only gets lost once, for a few seconds around the half minute mark.
Midrange, yeah, nice. Everything stays separate, no blending, compression, distortion, or any weird monkey business. I'd say it's a bit on the warm side, just the way I like it. Vocals, male & female sound the way they should, as do guitars, drums, and everything else. Natural. There is a minor weakness though, it's lacking the last bit of detail that the great speakers have. For instance the sound of Natalie MacMaster's violin isn't quite complete. It's missing a few of subtle resonances from the violin's body and the scrape of the bow against the strings is a bit soft. Still, the rest is good enough that I can easily live with it. No glaring flaws, really well balanced all-round speaker, I'd definitely recommend it.
To be continued, impressions of the Wind going up tomorrow...
