Free Primus speakers with purchase

[Rob Babcock]

Sound City has a pretty nice deal right now- buy any Infinity speakers totalling $398 or more and get a free pair of Primus 150s. Those are pretty nifty looking 2-way bookshelfs, and they'd probably make nice surrounds (they've been reviewed well in the rags). Looks like a good break if you're thinking of getting Infinity's.

I'm not affiliated with Sound City, but I've made many purchases from them and have always found their service to be top-notch.

 

[Leprkon]

good speakers, but..

The primus 150's are a good buy, even at normal prices. The only issues are size and weight. The speaker is very deep, making for a big box and correspondingly low WAF.. It is, after all, a true bookshelf, rather than a surround. The package also weighs over 8 pounds, so don't expect to be using the $ 10 Walmart mounts. Even with a good mount rated at 11 pounds, you better be drilling into wood, not sheetrock, or you're going to be cleaning up a bunch of plaster and a broken speaker in the morning...

Don;t get me wrong, the sound is great and it's a killer value. Just be prepared to hang a solid chunk of speaker and maybe have to hide it.

BTW, Ultimate Electronics and Crutchfield are honoring the sale as well. Crutchfield will even give you the speakers if you spend $ 398 on their clear-out alphas (including the excellent $250 Alpha 37C center, originally a $ 399 retail and also a solid chunk at 33 pounds) or their scratch & dents.

 

[Rob Babcock]

Hmmm, didn't realize they're all in on that deal. Crutchfield is a really honest company, too, in my experience. I've bought a couple DVD players there, and actually had to return one that was defective; they couldn't have been any nicer or better about getting me an RA. I have a local Ultimate Electronics, and those guys are the best! They don't sell a lot of super high end stuff, but they have great prices on what they do have, and offer unbelievable support (at least at my store).

Some may call the budget Infinity's "flat" or "uninvolving," but I think they're pretty neutral and musical, almost as good as you'll find at the price point where transparency is concerned. A very good deal for someone building a music/HT rig on a budget.

 

[WmAx]

Stereophile gave those a 'rave' review earlier in the year. The measurements were very good, excepting a resonance due to the enclosure.

After reading the review, I was so curious(the price vs. those measurment - what a bargain!) that I headed on down to my local Circuit City and took an hour or so and set them up in the middle of the soundrom on stands in nearfield configuration and compared them to my Sony MDR-7506 reference headphones. Subjectively, the sound is okay(excellent for the price) and seemed to be *somewhat* accurate cmopared to the MDR-7506(which I have expanded on in other threads of how I classify this is accurate), but the PRimus 150 sounded slightly warm(warm meaning the lower midrange was emphasized). The main problem seemed to be that darn cabinet! If one was to cut open the back and add some bracing and damping sheets to the walls, then place additional stuffing/fillilng in the volume, I feel this may drastically improve the sound quality of this speaker and it would become an excellent bargain when bi-amped with active crossovers to stereo subwoofers. Unfortunately, the percieved severity of coloration from the cabinet seemed to make it difficult to compare with the reference headphone. I would look forward to comparing again with a modified Primus 150 speaker set.

Please note that I offer only the most basic descriptions of sound, since these seemed obvious in comparision listening to my usual reference(MDR-7506). Subjective observations are subject to unreliability and delusions, so please take them for what they are: testimony(not worth much).

-Chris

Hmmm, didn't realize they're all in on that deal. Crutchfield is a really honest company, too, in my experience. I've bought a couple DVD players there, and actually had to return one that was defective; they couldn't have been any nicer or better about getting me an RA. I have a local Ultimate Electronics, and those guys are the best! They don't sell a lot of super high end stuff, but they have great prices on what they do have, and offer unbelievable support (at least at my store).

Some may call the budget Infinity's "flat" or "uninvolving," but I think they're pretty neutral and musical, almost as good as you'll find at the price point where transparency is concerned. A very good deal for someone building a music/HT rig on a budget.

 

[Rob Babcock]

Yeah, even some very expensive models can benefit from some additional bracing- not long ago Brian Cheney (owner/designer of VMPS) endorsed some mods to brace the cabs of the $5,000 RM40s. He also suggests using glue to vitrify the passives of the '40s and the RM/X Elixers, and they cost $9,000! Dowls cut & glued in are often effective, and easier to retrofit than windowpane braces.

I don't mean to imply the cheapo Infinity is world class, but I think the midrange gets the "essence" of music right to a greater degree than most budget speakers. If you can afford to spend more, by all means do so, but for the money I feel they're a pretty good value. Perhaps not one of my all time favorite brands, but good for intro models.