Barefoot MM27 Active Speakers for Home Audio

Is for studio not for home

Keithr,

Good to read your comments, though I hope you're wrong about them not sounding optimal at 10-12 feet distance, because that's how I plan to use them! In any case, there's enough demand among professionals combined with a bottleneck in the supply, so they shouldn't be hard to pass on if I decide to stay with my AMS-12A. . .

Shadorne,

Good to hear from you. I'll definitely post some comments after I've had the MM27s for a while--from the point of view of someone who's used professional studio monitors for domestic listening for many years. . .

Happy listening all!

Regards,

Joel.

As we all know , buying a speaker is a subjective decision. There is also a difference between speakers designed for home use and those built for the studios that record what we listen to.

My son has a studio in Chicago and bought a pair of the Barefoot monitors. He had Adams before he bought the Barefoots, the Adams were 2/3 the price, but he is happy as a clam. I heard them and was impressed.

For $7,500 a pair they use great drivers, supplied by Madisound, and are self powered to boot. I was tempted to buy a pair, and I'm a DIY speaker builder.

FWIW, I heard a pair of Tannoy Series 1200 monitors at Sonicraft and am going to buy a pair. He had Subs on the bottom and the sound was fabulous! The Tannoy's are not nearfield monitors as are the Barefoots but they great for playback at a greater distance- 8 to 11 feet.

Visit WWW.Sonicraft.com for a treat. You'll see the finest array or RTR machines in the states. If you'd like to have a chat with my son about his Barefoot monitors, he is at Scott@strandedonaplanet.com.

As is typical with all studio guys, they keep vampire hours, work until 6 AM and sleep till 3 or so in the afternoon.

If I had a choice , I'd opt out of the Barefoots for home audio.

Ken

I demo'd a pair in my room and compared them directly to Dynaudio C1.

Overall, they are very good speakers---but I really feel they work better in more nearfield conditions. My pro audio friend completely agreed. We both preferred the C1s in my room---when sitting around 11-12' back.

They did not sound clinical to me at all btw. Probably because of the use of a soft dome tweeter.

KeithR

Hey Dr-joe - please let us know your thoughts when you get them. I suspect the negative responses here are merely due to differences in tastes. Being a pro speaker these will sound fairly clinical and very tight in the bass. A design that would not suite fans of Wilson type designs.

I've been impressed enough by comments from professional users that I've ordered a pair with the dedicated Sound Anchor stands. Don't know about other countries, but here in Canada it's a four-month waiting list, so I can expect take delivery in Feb. 2011.

My "reference" for many years is the Tannoy AMS-12A, an active monitor that uses a variant of the Tannoy 12" dual concentric driver with the onboard electronics designed by Hot House Audio in New York State. They were only made for a few years, circa 1998-2001 and retailed for around $9K/pr.

James63, I sent you a private email.

Jeff did you also post on the Martin Logan forum? If so are you leaning toward the MM27 over the spires?

I did find the bass to be powerful and arguably overpowering. But not muddy.

I am curious about the comment about phase issues, though. The vocals on the MM27 definitely project more than other speakers I have used. Could it be that the speakers accomplish this by the midrange being out of phase? What did you find in your measurements with respect to phase issues?

They were dull and lifeless. No emotion. They had phase issues as measured. Bass was overpowering and muddy. They had no soul.... We couldn't work with them.

Sorry not to be rude, but staments like "we did not care for them" are worthless! Why did you not like them?

We didn't care for them and instead, got the Focal Twin6/Solo6/Sub6 in a 5.1 config. It's the best we've heard in our room!