I had a breakfast appointment down the street near the local mall and saw a Tweeter store in the same parking lot. I decided I would take a look at what they had to offer for home theater.
I have always read great reviews of ML speakers so I thought I would give them a go. I had just auditioned some Revels so my test cds were still in the car. The salesman got straight to business and he had a pair of the electrostatic Aeon I (US$2,600\pair) and the center Cinema i (US$1,800), supported by the Depth subwoofer (US$1,800) ready to go. No ML rears were setup so he ran some Polks(LSI Effects? @ US$1,000\pair) for the rears. We used a Denon 3806 to as closely match what I have along with a 3910 Denon DVD Player.
I have not heard electrostatic speakers in a VERY long time and so I was not particularly impressed with the suggestion to listen to them at first. We walked into the second showroom and I handed him a Sting cd "Nothing Like the Sun". The sound immediately struck me as a sonic twin of the Revel's I had just heard the week before. The only real difference was that the bass was more powerful and sounded much more capable of filling a larger space with the Martin Logans. This really surprised me because all that was in the bottom of the towers were a singe 8" driver in each! Now the sub did pick up a lot of the slack and I will get to that later, but the transition was impressive.
I quickly switched to the Eagles "Hotel California" from the Hell Freezes Over cd. The bass kick drum and guitar work were spot on. Tight, clean, articulate bass from the subwoofer that with a little tweaking, would surely have blended perfectly with the front towers. The guitar sounded so natural and well placed to the left as the song begins. I do not know what impressed me more, the servo driven subwoofer that exhibited no distortion and never seemed stressed at any point, or the sense of power I was getting from the front and center electrostatics. Not something I remember from this design. One thing I think the Revel's excelled at was off axis frequency response. They just seemed to sound more consistent as I walked across the room than the MLs. This also surprised me.
I also played the soundtrack from the Fifth Element and Mission Impossible and this further reinforced my feeling that this package could keep up with my own Klipsch Reference System when it came to home theater use.
The center speaker is the Cinema i and it is a very large speaker by width. Like the Revel, the electrostatic design provided a very accurate and unadulterated sound that seems to just sound right. Once again, the MLs exibited a more powerful sound that seemed to reach a lot deeper than the Revel Concertas and F12s. What did surprise me was how directional it was, even compared to my own horn loaded speakers.
The subwoofer really is a great sounding unit. It uses position feedback via a servo controller to basically readjust the input signal to compensate for distortion. It drives three, 8" drivers, I think. One may be a passive radiator but no statement to this effect is made on their site although I could find no porting on the unit either. This sub sounded MUCH bigger than it looked and in my short time listening to it, convinced me that it outclassed my RSW15 with less distortion and equal power and depth. I think they make an even larger sub than the Depth but I could not imaging needing such a beast. I would much rather have two of the Depths. I have listened to SVS and Velodyne and others and the MLs really caught me flat footed. The last thing I expected to hear today was such a capable piece of equipment.
Aesthetics are more important to some more than others, especially if you have to share your home theater with the family room like me. The Martin Logans were by no means ugly, but their unconventional design and lack of a furniture look could raise red flags with you or significant others. They do have a wood accent along the edges of the towers but the rest is a flat black. The sub looks like molded plastic and that cost it points too. On the plus side of the looks and size, the towers take up about a square foot each and the sub also small for its abilities. Definately a more contemporary designed speaker but for an electrostatic, very user friendly and remarkably streamlined.
Although a complete 5.1 system from ML would have cost slightly more than I paid for my system, it was not that much more considering the reputation of Martin Logan to be only a dream to own for some of us because of the prohibitively high prices associated with their products.
If you have a large space and are looking for a Home Theater system that will also handle your light work (two channel audio), you should consider the Martin Logans. I am a believer.
