MY StudioMonitor 65 Story
Ok so I was wondering around Best Buy for no good reason other than to kill time while my wife and kids were shopping at Target next door (pretty typical of me) and as usual I found myself in the "Magnolia Demo Room" playing with the toys, again pretty standard practice. I’m a huge music fan and love hearing quality music on quality equipment but when I get dragged to Target “Magnolia” will have to do.
So like clockwork my Magnolia guy comes in and we start chatting about this and that and we get on the open box topic and he mentioned that he had a Marantz 6006 demo for sale and instantly my ears perk up like my Bull Mastiff Aja's do when i mumble "want to go bye bye in the car?" I took a breath to keep my composure as we walked over to the table where it was stacked on some other really cherry receivers like useless Betamax players in a storage unit. I instantly noticed the big red sale tag showing the original price of $1199 cut to $899 slashed to $639 open box. I made him price every other item before reaching my target...sr6006. After some hard nose negotiating and 3 closes… HE finally agreed to $300 bucks! As my rush started to fade I realized two things first my wife.... second and more importantly I need speakers! So as any happily married man knows purchases like these need to be done in steps.
Right, so I handle the little lady and off to the computer to start my research for the best bookshelf speakers I can purchase on a father of four's middleclass budget, sigh- this is gonna be rough. I begin searching the usual trusted sources; audio advisor, home theater etc. and one name kept popping up, the New Bookshelf series from Def Tech. I read at least 10 glowing reviews and then I ran and auditioned the studiomonitor 55 at, once again good ole BB. After being blown away by those little gems I went searching online for the best price. Well, I should've bought them there because everybody's price was exactly the same $598.00 for the pair and I could have gotten them there and then. But instead I bought them from Vann's online and had to wait a few days! Being a typical impatient New Yorker this is up there with waterboarding (legal torture)! 4 days later my delivery arrives and like a kid on Christmas I proceed to tear into them. I also got nice looking stands.
So I get it all hooked up bi-amped and on the stands, lookin good and ready to rock! I played some Steely Dan- Black cow and I had to pick my jaw up off the floor. The highs were crisp and clean without brightness just a wonderful reproduction so realistic my son literally looked around for my daughter playing her cymbals. midrange was just as perfect (so I thought) and the real show stealer was the incredible lows these little guys were driving out ,seriously low and firm bass not at all boomy just really musical and LOW. So I sat back on my couch like the King of the world as far as I knew and just took it all in. I couldn't help thinking what a superb system I got for a fraction of cost of what a snobby so called "audiophile" would pay. In fact I was so thrilled I decided to write an email to Paul DiComo thanking him and the rest of the Def Tech guys for a job well done.
Not expecting an actual response more than some boilerplate canned reply, but sure enough the very next morning I get an email response back from Paul! He wrote how glad he was that I was pleased with my purchase and referred me to his Head Tech Chet to go over whether or not a subwoofer was needed or worth the money due to; again the remarkable range the 55's had on their own (responding to a direct question of mine from the email). So about an hour later I got a call from Chet. We went over my system and my listening habits and so on. During the conversation I asked about the Sm-65’s. I wanted to know how much better they can really be compared to the 55’s. He went on to tell me how much more midrange they pump out and that there is a huge difference between the two because of the additional driver. He also said the low end is also noticeably better due to the larger racetrack passive subwoofer on the top of the 65 as compared to the 55. At that point I heard enough “I’m getting the 65’s” I told him that’s it, place my order. He said he couldn’t sell it to me and said he wasn’t trying to sell me on them and I told him that I knew it wasn’t his intention but I NEEDED to get them based on his description. So we left off that I would go out and exchange the 55’s for the 65’s and after listening to the 65’s I will decide whether or not to add a subwoofer.
So I received the new speakers 1.5 weeks after sending the old ones back, ugh. But there I was finally hooking up what I knew would be some extraordinary sounding speakers. I had my banana plugs laid out and ready to go so setting the new ones up was super quick. I sat down on the couch and slid down my music selection on my android gizmo app till I decided to stop at The Police live cd Certifiable and keyed in King of Pain and I swear I instantly felt goose bumps shoot up both arms. The sound these brand new non broken in marvels produced practically took my breath away. The mid-range he spoke of was room filling and filled in where I thought nothing was missing. The only way I can describe how incredible these $900 a pair speakers sound is by comparing them to my buddy’s $1,800 a piece Focal floor standing speakers that are connected to a sweet NAD rack and I got to say if he shuts down the huge top of the line JL sub you really couldn’t tell the difference between mine and his! I have to say these speakers really do sound like $4k+ speakers! The next day Hurricane Sandy decided to come and ravage Long Island and black out the region for weeks, my treasured SM-65’s sat idle for a week and a half! I knew I had to write a review about these spectacular little beauts so all can know just how happy they’ll be when they purchase these beautifully engineered masterpieces. But my planned review was further delayed for the sheer fact that after the power was restored I couldn’t help but to just sit and re-listen to a good portion of my music library with the 65’s being simply stunned by how they seemed to magnify little nuances and detail I haven’t heard in them in some cases 33 yrs. of listening to these songs.
By the way, I decided I’m getting a Supercube for sure, not because it needs it (it really doesn’t) but because it will make the hair on the back of my neck stand up every time I play my music. This purchase put my system and my listening in a whole new category, Thanks to The StudioMonitor 65’s I am officially an audiophile! Without the snobbery and the debt!
Thank you Def Tech for nothing less than enhancing my life. BRAVO!
