Everyone whose Merlins...


have just passed the break-in period, could you please post your thoughts on the speaker and SuperBAM. A friend is using my pair till my room is finished(Sometime next year).
128x128tabl10s

Showing 2 responses by oneprof

Well, the bottom line is that the MX is a dramatic improvement over the Millenium, and the addition of the superBAM takes it to another level yet. I am quite simply astonished at the amount of bass coming out of these speakers, I would not have thought it possible for such a 'small' woofer. It is not just the quantity of the bass, but the quality that is dramatically improved with the superBAM in the loop. Tonal accuracy is so much improved it is uncanny, it's almost like you can hear how old the bass players' strings are. Bass weight and impact are kicked up several notches too. It also seems (although I know it is not possible) that the bass goes lower than before. "Merlins on steroids"?
At the same time, I don't think that you lose any of the other qualities of the speaker. It would be a mistake to say that this only affects the bass. The entire signal obviously passes through the superBAM, so performance across the spectrum seems much improved, I would say more musical and natural sounding, more spacious and open, more harmonically accurate? Hard to put into words. I guess that the most succinct way to say it is that getting a superBAM is really not an 'option', it is a necessity. You haven't heard the MX until you have the superBAM.
Also, there is a pretty significant burn-in for the superBAM. I had two superBAMS here at once, one was burned in as Bobby recommends by draining and recharging the batteries a number of times. The other was left plugged in except when listening, and it never drained even once. The difference between the drained/recharged one and the other was pretty obvious. Once burned in, running on battery, the sound was fuller and more relaxed. The analogy I use is like switching from the 'normal' setting on my Bernings to the 'medium' setting, I know that won't help those who've never heard Bernings but, that's the best I can come up with.
Yes and no on the Stereovox. Right now I have a mix of Cerious Tech IC's, Stereovox IC's, and Stereovox speaker cables. Really like the Cerious, although I think the Stereovox have cleaner, more pristine highs, kind of a trade off.