Hi, I'm Scott newnam CEO of audio advice
This video is an overview in comparison of MartinLogan's
Masterpiece speaker series which in my mind is one of the coolest and best
Sounding line of speakers that exists to give you a sense of how much I believe in these speakers
I'm standing right now in my own home office with Martin Logan ESL
13a speakers as you might imagine
I'd test lots of speakers and have tried many different ones and I can tell you these are just
Amazing and have lit up my own office in a way
No other speaker has at any price point
I've tried if
You want to read our full review on the masterpiece series head over to audioadvice.com by clicking on our link in the description
Along with this review. You'll find hundreds of other reviews comparisons
Buyers guides and much more now Let's get started
For those of you who may not be familiar with electrostatic speakers
They've actually been around for over 65 years when the quad electrostatic was introduced
unlike conventional speakers in simple terms
Electrostatics use a super thin diaphragm that sits in between charged panels that cause the diaphragm to move
The advantages are the diaphragm is far lighter than any other type of speaker material and you have a whole lot more surface
area to work with
the disadvantage historically were that electrostatic panels could not really produce deep bass in
Most designs had limited dispersion which historically made these speakers better for
Dedicated listening rooms where you can sit right in the sweet spot
Also, all of the early electrostatics were very limited in the volume output they could produce
For decades though audiophiles have loved the sound of electrostatic speakers as they have this sense of pure
Effortless sound with zero coloration from a speaker cabinet or the speaker driver itself to me
It's most pronounced listening to acoustic music hearing guitar strings and vocals on these
Electrostatics is like sitting in a private live concert with the artist
Over the years MartinLogan has become the clear leader in electrostatics speaker technology
with constant innovations in their speaker technology to overcome the inherent limitations or disadvantages of
electrostatic speakers
Their new masterpiece lineup can produce deep bass
Plays the concert levels and no longer has that one sweet spot where you must sit for great sound
They truly are an audio
Masterpiece I thought it would be fun to go over the bestsellers in their masterpiece series today
I will go over the Renaissance ESL 15a the expression ESL 13a the impression ESL
11a and the classic ESL 9
first I'm going to discuss the technology they all share and then get into the differences between the models and give you some insight as
To which might work best for your system as I said earlier
Electrostatics have large panel. So if you are looking for a small bookshelf or desktop speaker, you can probably stop watching
however, if you want to learn about some of the best sound on the planet sit back and enjoy the
Magic of these electrostatic speakers is that there is a super thin transparent film
suspended between two charged
Perforated metal stators an amplifier signal when applied to the stators creates a strong
Electrostatic field that moves the diaphragm back and forth exciting the air and transmitting the sound
you can imagine that this gives them an incredible advantage in speed and accuracy of
starting and stopping versus large cone drivers with the transducer changing direction more than
40,000 times per second
However, there are two inherent challenges that MartinLogan had to solve in electrostatics to achieve the greatness these speakers have today
the first was that
Electrostatic speakers don't naturally produce low bass and the second is that they were not as forgiving when you were off
axis and not in the sweet spot
When Gail Sanders and Ron Sutherland of MartinLogan were doing their early experiments on electrostatic panels
They discovered a way to produce deeper bass and more output than any previous
Electrostatics the MartinLogan team also figured out how to integrate bass drivers into the speaker's with very precise
crossovers that blend the advantages of
electrostatics in the mid to high frequencies with the advantages of
traditional subwoofer drivers this combination of taking the best of each technology is
One thing that sets the masterpiece speakers apart from their competition
It was late one night that Gail and Ron came up with the idea of how to address the off-axis issue of electrostatics
Which was to produce a horizontally curved panel
there are a host of advantages to this but most importantly it allows a broader sweet spot and
reduces the natural blurring effect of the room on the listening experience
MartinLogan's curvilinear lines source electricity panel is
gently curved providing both a sonic and aesthetic advantage
micro perf stator technology has been developed over time which allows the new
CLS Xstat panels to have almost twice the exposed
electrostatic surface producing sound as other
electrostatic panels of this same size
MartinLogan developed what they call clear spar spacers that keep a perfect level of tension on the diaphragm
Not only does this design yield great results. It also makes the MartinLogan panel see-through which adds to their lure
designing a great curved panel in the lab with ideal characteristics
Does you no good if you cannot mount it in such a way that the mounting does not interfere with the sound
the first MartinLogan's had pretty large frames around the panel's but as time and engineering moved on they've developed a way to
Hold the panel that is almost invisible
Called their airframe blade construction
The frame itself is made from an aerospace grade extruded aluminum
alloy on all of the masterpiece models
You'll notice the frame is very narrow in the front while the sides taper to almost a triangular point on the rear
The airframe blade design enables better
imaging more low-level details in
Increased efficiency of the panel as it has held much more rigidly by this new frame design
This blade design also contributes to the unique and beautiful look of these speakers
Powered force forward based technology uses two separate woofer enclosures to produce substantial bass energy
By using advanced crossover techniques with phase time aligned woofers you get super accurate and articulate bass
from their woofer system
The hidden gem in any speaker is the crossover
This is the group of electronic components that direct signal flow inside a speaker to its different drivers
When you get the crossover
right, the blend between drivers in a speaker is seamless and you get a great sense of effortlessness and
Transparency from the speaker one huge advantage these speakers is that they only have one
Crossover used to separate only the woofer for low bass from the electrostatic which can produce both the mids and highs
This eliminates the need for an additional crossover between mids and highs
Required by most traditional speakers which provides for more seamless sound from the one electrostatic transducer
Now, let's have a look at each of the models starting with the classic ESL 9
The smallest model in the masterpiece lineup still stands at five feet tall
And a little over two feet deep which will fill up most small to medium sized rooms with amazingly fast sound
the ESL 9 uses a 44 inch by 9.2 inch panel producing
405 square inches of radiating surface area the bottom of the cabinet houses two eight inch cast basket laser designed
Aluminum cone woofers using their powered force forward bass technology
The two woofers are capable of producing bass down to 34 Hertz
Which is very respectable for dual 8-inch design and is also super fast
we find they sound the best with the front of the speaker roughly three feet off the back wall and
slightly angled in towards your listening position
Since they are fairly sensitive at 90 dB we suggest you think about better power in an amplifier over more power
MartinLogan's are all very revealing and will easily show off the advantages of a better amplifier
They can also run quite well on better home theater receivers. If you are thinking about a complete MartinLogan home theater system
So I jumped over here into our Raleigh showroom just to show you in our own
Experience center where we've got multiple speakers set up. These are the
ESL
11A's which is a step up from the classic nines so you can see they're just gorgeous speakers
And so now I'm just going to walk you through a little bit about what happens when you step up from the nines
To the 11A's, but again a gorgeous speaker
When you take the jump to the impression ESL 11a you now get an onboard high performance sub
Amplification so you run speaker cable from your amplifier to the speaker
But the crossover will pull out the bass and play it through the woofers with its own onboard
Amplification this means you do need to provide power to each speaker
So if you have a room where you simply cannot get power to your speakers
These high-performance speakers are not going to be the right solution for you
however
If you can get power to them this gets you something in addition to the match amplifier itself
You get what I feel is a great technology
developed by MartinLogan's sister company anthem
Anthem room correction is one of the best methods we have ever encountered for fixing issues caused by the room
Starting with the ESL 11a and up
all of the masterpiece models have anthem room correction or Arc on board for the woofers this advantage of having Arc
Integrated into these speakers should not be underestimated
No room is perfect and having this advanced technology to calibrate the speaker to the room
Dramatically improves the final experience for example in my home office here
I have a bass mode at around 60 Hertz that Arc was able to adjust for so that it does not
Overpower the rest of the frequencies in this office
If you decide to purchase these speakers
we've produced a full speaker setup video for these speakers and an arc
Calibration video that we send to all audio advice customers that should make the process super straightforward for you
Just remember you do need to purchase the PBK mic kit to do the arc
calibration if you don't know where to get it, or you got any questions go over to audioadvice.com
We have the pbk kits happy to sell to you and also answer any questions that you've got
With the ESL 11a you also get a larger panel that is 44 inches by 11 inches with about 20%
More surface area than the ESL nine at four hundred and eighty four square inches
The speaker itself is only about one inch taller than the ESL nine
But about two inches deeper
With the onboard amp and slightly bigger cabinet to match with the larger panel bass drops down deeper in the ESL
11a to twenty nine Hertz
And you get a sensitivity bump up to 91 DB which is pretty amazing for an electrostatic speaker, which are notoriously inefficient
Moving to the rear of the speaker starting with the ESL 11a you get some legendary
WBT binding posts, this is a specialty company known for their incredible connectors
You'll be able to use even the most stout speaker wire connection with the WBT plugs as well
You can see in my own setup that I have really high performance reference cables securely connected to these binding posts
the rear of the speaker also has a bass level control knob and a mid bass level switch to allow you to fine tune to
Your room I cover this in more detail in the audio advice setup video
with its built-in amp the ESL 11a can fill up just about any size room except for a very
large one with big sound voices will float seamlessly right in front of you while you feel
superfast impactful bass
They're over 5 foot size also means the musical soundstage in front of you is almost lifelike in size
The ESL 11a gives you all of the best the masterpiece series has to offer in their most
Affordable and compact package and for most music lovers will be the best price performance for the money in the entire line
If you take all of the tech in the ESL 11a and make it bigger that sums up to the ESL
13a which is what I've got here in my office
You move up to a larger panel that is 13 inches wide by 44 inches tall producing
572 square inches of radiating area the woofers in their cabinet get bigger to match up to the larger panel with two
10-inch cast basket drivers and a larger amplifier to drive them in each speaker
They're physically about two inches wider about an inch taller than the ESL 11 A's
for me, these are the perfect size for
ultra-high performance
Listening without requiring an additional sub if you take a look at my setup
You'll see I'm using my Mac to stream music through a chord hugo 2
Which is an incredible little desktop DAC that also serves as a preamp in my system allowing me to toggle
between headphones and the MartinLogan's this then runs to a
300 watt per channel amp and into the speakers because the 13a's have four
Ten inch subs reaching down to 24 Hertz
I don't need extra subs for this setup and the panels are just the right size to give me the great
Imaging but also easily fill my room at 91 DB efficiency
You'll notice in my setup that I've got them pretty far off the front wall and from the sides in theory
you'll want to place the MartinLogans at least as far off the front wall as the size of the sub and the speaker so
In this case 10 inches 8 inches for the 11a and 9s in 12 inches for the 15s
However, you can pull them out even further like I have in this room to get a more near field listening experience
That is just amazing
You'll also want them at least two to two-and-a-half feet off the sidewalls in my case
I've got them over three feet off the sidewalls by way of perspective
this room is a little over 20 feet deep and I've got about 15 feet wide and
Just under 10 feet high to just give you a perspective and these things
rock this room
If you want to learn more about setup and placement for these speakers
Reach out to us at audiadvice.com to get a copy of the video
I've made on how to best set up and place the masterpiece series that goes to all purchasers from audio advice
when you think of most
Masterpieces from the art world you think of the Renaissance time period I love the name MartinLogan chose for their top of the line
masterpiece series speaker the Renaissance ESL
15 stands at an impressive almost 6 feet tall and with the larger bass enclosures are about 30 inches deep the
Panel goes to 46 inches by 15 inches producing
690 square inches of radiating surface area to match the 15-inch wide panel MartinLogan uses two
12-inch aluminum cone woofers with an amp capable of 1000 watts peak for each independent bass driver
Sensitivity jumps up to 92 dB and you get deep bass down to 22 Hertz. That is spectacular the
Renaissance makes you feel like performers are literally standing in front of you. While it's not quite as big a sound as their
$100,000 Neolith speaker. It is pretty darn close and a quarter of the price is pretty amazing
the larger panel is even more effortless than the 13a which lets you hear even more micro details of the music these
140 pound large panels will need to be at least about 12 inches off the back wall and slightly towed in towards your listening area
This is an electrostatic that can give you the full dynamic impact of a symphony orchestra
yet reveal the slight draw of breath as a singer pauses or the subtle brushstrokes of a cymbal with a
Realism that makes you think the concert is in your room. Are they expensive?
Yes
And do they deliver unbelievable sound you betcha for those with essentially?
unlimited budgets Martin Logan also makes the CLX art which sells for
$30,000 and the Neolith which is a
$100,000 pair
These are obviously state-of-the-art speakers that were built to be the best speakers possible with no budget constraints
We've demoed these speakers at audio advice during our music matters events with lines of people coming to hear them
The pure clean sound of electrostatic speakers has been the dream of music lovers for decades
the MartinLogan masterpiece series represents the pinnacle of this type of speaker system the
combination of all of their three decades of Audio Engineering
results in a line of products whose performance is even better than the sum of all their high tech
They certainly achieved MartinLogan's goal of truth in sound
martinlogan speakers are owned by many of the experts here at audio advice giving our team the hands-on experience to help you find the
best match for your system room and budget
while
The larger models in the line do need a pretty good-size room to perform their best
We can work with you to see which model will fit best in your room in your situation. If
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