Amphion Argon 3LS Tower Speakers: $3500 (White or Black, $4300 Walnut)

(38 1/8h, 7 5/8w, 12d, 8 ohms, 50 lbs, 85 dB SPL)

Suppose you would like a beautiful sounding diminutive tower. That… would be the Amphion Argon 3LS. It is made in Finland in Amphion’s factory. It isn’t a generic badged effort from Asia. If you’re after a very serious loudspeaker in a small tower form factor, do not pass up Argon 3LS!

At about 38” tall and 7 ½ wide, this Amphion doesn’t have a big footprint. Yet it casts a massive soundstage, with impressive width and depth. Its cosmetic finish {black, white or walnut- an upcharge} is more stylish than regular speakers and gorgeous! Why don’t Amphions have traditional cloth grills? It’s because those socks slightly muffle the sound. That won’t fly with Amphion.

Amphion’s “magic” starts with its Wave Guide tweeter design. Using a 1” Titanium tweeter within this gibbous saucer baffle, Amphion’s image is broad and immersive. The Wave Guide also provides a much larger sweet spot than traditional tweeter designs. When listening to Amphions you simply can’t miss the spacious soundstage they purvey. The size of the image coming from these diminutive speakers is nothing short of surprisingly spectacular.

We recently sold a set of Argon 7LS in a less than ideal audiophile setting. The speakers are about 14 feet apart and near the side and back walls, on either side of a custom wall unit. The couch is about ten feet away. Yet when you listen in this gorgeous, yet non audiophile prescribed living room, the sound is wonderfully expansive and clear. I can’t imagine any speaker, at any price, being a better fit for this family’s living room than Amphion.

You’ll find that Amphions are forgiving of where they are placed. Further, you don’t have to sit at X marks the spot, as you do with many audiophile speakers. They’re made to work well in normal living rooms. Amphion is quite proud of this different approach from “the other guys.”

The 3LS features one 6.5” front firing Aluminum Bass mid driver. It also features a rear firing 6.5” aluminum ABR. Amphion contends that traditional ports are out of tune, and pollute the midrange as well as bass in their attempts to deliver more bass to your listening experience.

As audiophiles we all make the judgment of, how much bass is useful? We want strong bass, but we don’t want it to intrude on the timbre of the music. Specifically, I don’t want so much bass from my speakers that it makes a grand piano or drum kit mushy.

Amphion cabinets are created with CNC design and rigid construction. Even the Wave Guide mechanism itself is threaded into the cabinet baffle- not just screwed in like everyone else. The cabinet rigidity is well beyond your mainstream MDF enclosure.

Amphion uses high end components in the crossover. They cross the tweeter over at 1.6K, which is lower than everyone else. Most companies cross at 2.5-5K which invariably ends up sounding harsher because it’s at a frequency we’re very sensitive too. We are much less sensitive to the 1600Hz setting.

Amphion uses high purity silver plated copper wire. It doesn’t sound brighter. It elucidates superior definition to standard copper cable. Transients and overtones are more clearly delineated and natural.

While there are many fine speakers on the market, it’s really tough to get a small tower with cosmetic panache and GREAT sound. Amphion’s 3LS delivers all of this with lovely aesthetics and surprising bass extension without becoming muddy!

Amphion Argon One $1400 Per Pair: Black or White ($1500 Walnut)

(12 3/8h, 6 3/8w, 10 3/8d, 8 ohms, 18 lbs, 86 dB SPL)

Argon 1 is the little brother to the formidable Argon 3S stand mount. Argon 1 uses a 5 1/4” Aluminum bass/mid and 1” Titanium tweeter. It is rear ported, yet tuned to be in pitch. Argon 3S is significantly larger and uses an ABR.

Clearly Argon 1 will most likely be used when your real estate is tight. Yet it has considerable weight to its sound and maintains all the beauty of what Amphion is noted for. As you read about the Argon 3LS above, Argon 1 uses the same quality tweeter, wave guide, crossover network and cabinet quality. It’s a modestly sized speaker that produces a massive soundstage and respectable muscle.

Argon Zero $1000 Per Pair: Black or White ($1100 Walnut)

(10.2h, 5.2w, 8.66d, 8 ohms, 9 lbs, 86dB SPL)

Argon Zero uses a 4.5” Aluminum bass/mid and a 1” Titanium tweeter. It is rear ported as Argon 1 above. Argon Zero is ideal in the near field for use as a highly resolving transducer when you don’t need Herculean bass.

David Crosby Made Mattresses

Singer David Crosby “brags” that he made some of the worst mattresses in history while he was in prison for a year in Texas. A judge determined this was the only way to save him from himself and keep him from his addictions.

KLH Model 5 $2000 Per Pair: Price Includes Risers

Walnut or Mahogany Finishes

(34.25h on riser, 13.73w, 13d, 52 lbs, 6 ohms, 90.5 dB)

A new KLH-5 has just been introduced to the market. What is different about KLH-5 vs a zillion other speakers?

First of all, it uses a SEALED cabinet- there’s no port. This helps tighten the bass. It doesn’t have the FAT sound most speakers have. If you prefer bass definition to thud, consider Model 5.

A sealed speaker has “air spring” within the cabinet. The drivers have to be solid to behave properly under this pressure wave. Of course KLH has paid attention to this detail with cast drivers.

It isn’t coupled to your floor. It comes with riser stands (5% tilt). The acoustic suspension design and inclined risers create well delineated bass. Both techniques are employed to achieve taut, vs sloppy bass.

It is a legit 10” 3-way. You have a dedicated midrange driver to help purvey clear vocals.

The tweet is a 1” aluminum dome. The 4” mid (housed in its own enclosure) and 10’ woof (with 6 pound magnet!) are comprised of pulp fiber. The cabinet is internally braced just above the woofer within the enclosure. Most are not! There is a 3 position acoustic balance control to allow you to tune the timbre to your room.

The crossover is sophisticated with Mylar caps.

The warranty is a generous ten years!

The grill that comes with the walnut version is an off white linen design. The mahogany finish comes with wheat colored grills. You can buy linen grills a la carte for the mahogany finish, but it’s an upcharge of $200. The grills are magnetically attached and affix easily.

The essence of this new speaker is to present sound with plenty of presence and taut

bass. While KLH-5 is efficient enough to be driven by any amp, it will reward you for using something special. How about Hegel for example?

Hegel H-390 Integrated Amp $6000

(250×2, 5.71h, 16.93w, 17.32d, 44 lbs)

Hegel’s H-390 integrated amp is among the smartest purchases in high end audio!

First of all, it is a great integrated amp by any measure. It has enough power to drive any speakers quite well. Beyond having a lot of power, more importantly, Hegel has prodigious damping factor. To compete with H-390, you’d need to buy a stack of separates that will run you about $12-15k from anyone else.

H-390 delivers a damping factor of over 4000. You’ll find most 250×2 amps have a damping factor of about 250-500. What does this mean? Damping factor is like torque. A VW Beetle with go 70. So will a truck. Which will pull your boat? H-390 will control your speakers as a lesser amp cannot.

Hegel has a patented technology called the SoundEngine 2. Why?

Amplifiers have output transistors. They are not exactly alike. In fact, with mass production of thousands being built, the dozen or so transistors that end up in YOUR amplifier, are likely to be quite varied in performance.

Think of 6 transistors for the R channel, and 6 for the L channel. All 12 are essentially tuning forks- that don’t play the same frequency. Instead of having 12 identical “tuning forks” you have 12 different ones. The frequency they’re playing is slightly blurry as they work as a group. The more you have, the louder, and more fuzzy the response.

Old guy audiophiles (guilty!) remember that when a company made a monster power amp, the same company’s smaller power amps sounded more detailed and less gritty. This was primarily because the less expensive amp only had a plus and minus transistor per channel. The big boy amps might have used a dozen per channel. Sure, they played louder. But they also sounded more harsh.

Back to the point… SoundEngine2 is Hegel’s patented control system to ensure that the output transistors WILL work in precise harmony. Your tuning forks will play the pure frequency desired. They won’t be smeared.

H-390 uses a DISCRETE preamp. The preamp section of H-390 is comprised of hand matched components in Norway. Hegel insists this is vital to attain its pristine clarity and vivid colors of sound. Op amps simply can’t perform as musically. By the way, all the Hegel integrateds, even entry level H-95, have these matched parts in the preamp.

H-390 has a SyncroDAC on board that is as good as you can get. Hegel shakes hands with the native digital signal and does not upscale or bugger with it. Hegel feels SyncroDAC sounds better than trying to process the sound. Traditional asynchronous DACs upscale or PROCESS the sound. In so doing, the result is typically the same as the output transistor discussion above. Or, another analogy would be… back when TVs had relatively few lines, you could see the lines in the picture. If you employed a line doubler to soften the lines, the device tried to fill in information between the lines. Of course it was somewhat artificial. While the line intensity was softened- so was the picture.

You’ll love the SynchroDAC’s high resolution.

Hegel H-190 Integrated Amp $4000

(150×2, 4.75h, 16.93w, 16.45d, 42 lbs)

Fortunately, everything you read above this for H-390, holds true for H-190 as well! H-190 is a less powerful little brother. It uses a bit smaller transformer, caps and fewer transistors. It has the same sound, sans a bit of the weight that big brother has!

Hegel H-95 Integrated Amp $2000

(60×2, 4h, 17w, 13d, 25 lbs)

We just got another batch of H-95s in! This is the entry level Hegel integrated, yet it still has SoundEngine 2 and the SynchroDAC. H-95 has a more immediate and dynamic sound than main stream brands like Yamaha, Denon etc. Buy it before the price hike!

Steve Moore “The Mad Drummer”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=blbM6dwtC1Y

Wipeout!