Sheep,
There are no no-nos here (oddly enough that seems to read OK ;^).
Just enthusiasts. People sometimes forget that while we put bread on the table with SVS it's NOT "just a hobby" for us. We have to USE this stuff. And of course we're reasonably confident that if they or our subs are NOT as good as can be, or as good as we say (which is the same thing for us) then the "putting bread on the table" AND the bit about us using our own gear starts to become a bit painful.
We hate pain.
But I digress.
So far the MTS-01's are shapping up to be mid-high end "mid tower speakers" (ergo the name) though final product selection from a host of options (large free standers, or large bookshelfs that require a stand, etc etc) have not been winnowed down.
The latest back and forth I've seen had to do with picking apart (literally and figuratively) all the top drivers available on the market today, including some rather exotic things that usually you would never see in the $2,500-$3,500 price point on 5.1 systems. Tweeters are the most famous example of techno exotica (some of it quite exciting, some just plain snake oil) but even more or less established technology like mid-woofers include some genuinely facinating developments. Crossovers will get even more serious attention as we're nearly certainly driven to a 3 way design for the MTS-01 lines, center in particular. Not that we're out to complicate any product needlessly. We keep to elegant design principles wherever possible.
There of course is a LOT of BS in the mains world, just as there is in the subwoofer world, and we hope to inject some additional and always needed reality into discussions about what really is exclusive high-performance stuff and what's merely warmed over marketing hype. We're not totally alone in this as an OEM, but "reality-based" product design, pricing and marketing is still much too rare in our view in this market, and one of the reasons we felt we had to finally go into this product realm.
I won't add to our own hype though here WRT the question above. Rest assured that when there is something significant, and more or less solid (price, form factor, availability date, etc etc) the Audioholics crowd will be among the first to know. We can't come over as much as we'd like but we won't hold back either. And it's not like we're hard to find:
techsupport@svsound.com or
sales@svsound.com is about all you need to get our attention. Or call of course.
Actually the more we move ahead with R/D the more apparent it is that with the right supplier partnerships and with enough time/budget and research we'll still remain with or even a bit above the price/performance ratios of the best OEMs selling at any given price point. Again, as all know here, there are a lot of VERY good speakers for the money, there are quite a few vastly overpriced baubles, and some outright junk. Prices only sometimes correlate to these categories. Our goal is to price things rationally for the product niche, and to always base the product on sound science and verifiable performace.
Back to my original premise, we have to use this gear ourselves, and we rely on it to grow the company here and overseas. Anything less than products which will stand up to the best of the best is just counter-productive. Due to our direct to customer sales model however it's rarely a big issue to reach into the level of parts quality and performance (or design it from scratch) so we can achieve just that. If some objective criterion like "sensitivity" isn't class leading, it will be a conscious decision that's made with the understanding it will have little or no effect on the end-user likely to consider buying the product (as was the case with the SBS-01 package).
Not a particularly substansive answer to your question Sheep, but I figured I'd frame the background and out views on things as we do provide more here and on our News page in the near to mid-term. Quite a bit of product planning is expected to move ahead between now and the end of January so you should start to get a bit more info early next year.
Ron
SVS
