soundstage, clarity

setting up is a b****

I was at a local high end speaker dealer and saw the requests sitting in back collecting dust. Asked if they wanted to get rid of them and the rest is history. If you are interesed in buying these speakers keep these things in mind. If you are running a intergrated reciever w/ monster cable, you may not like what you hear from these speakers. These high end speakers where meant to run w/ high power class A amps and a tubed preamp. If your system doesnt resemble this set up, I would not recomend getting these speakers. Secondly, placement for these speakers are crucial. These speakers need to be atleast 4 feet infront of the back wall and atleast 2 feet from the walls. You may have to play w/ the placement for days just to find the right spot. I see many of these requests on the online market used I think for the reasons mentioned above; dont think they try to find the right placement.

If you do get these speakers dialed in though, the soundstage is unreal.

Similar Products Used:

none

Stunning precision and clarity.

You've gotta have the right setup.

These speaker are incredible -- don't believe the reviews talking about them being muddy. But -- they must be used the right way. They will not work in small rooms. You need at least 3 feet of clearance behind them for the best sound. You cannot properly drive them with a receiver from Best Buy -- they are very power hungry. Also, the impedance drops to a near dead short -- under 2 ohms at some frequencies. Regular receivers will crap out!

With a good setup, you don't just hear a vocalist breathing -- you hear the sound of the air coming into and out of their mouths. On acoustic guitars, you'll hear the sound of the artists fingers touching/moving on the guitar
body!

My setup:

2 reQuest mains
2 ML Script surrounds
1 Cinema center
Sunfire Cinema Grand amp
Marantz preamp
Stewart 123" 16x9 projection screen

Looks if your into that

Sound quality is poor at best. Weak bass and dirty highs.

I can't see why anyone would spend all this money for these speakers. The sound from them is muffeled and unclean. Thier large size makes them unuseable by anyone who wants space in thier liveing room also. Back to the problems with the sound quality, try to play anything but strings on these speakers and all you will hear is half of the song. Play anything with bass and you willjust laugh at it. To put it short don't waste your money on these speakers.

Similar Products Used:

M&K s85, s125 and s5000

Combines the articulateness of the electrostatic panel with the 12" woofer -- and the combination is nearly seamless.

Sweet.I am rediscovering my music collection and hearing things I didn't know was in the recordings. The speakers must be broken-in with about 100 hours of playtime and placement in the room is extremely critical. Electrostats have a narrow sweet spot so the reQuests might not be right for every application. But once properly setup in my room I experienced a sonic purity that I think would be hard to match at this price point. The reQuests image well, creating a sound stage that is wider than the speaker placement with great front-to-back definition. The transition from ES mid/high to standard cone woofer is seamless as far as I can tell. Excellent frequency response with crystal highs, unbelievable mids, and great mid/high bass (something that was missing from my previous kit). I lightly supplement the lowest octave with a subwoofer but this may not be necessay for all listeners and/or rooms. The music has a presence, it simply fills the room without sounding like it's eminating from boxes. Indeed, if you were to drop someone into the sweet spot blindfolded they might have a difficult time pointing to the speakers. A word of caution, the other components in your system will make a big difference in the sound from these speakers. Also, the quality of the recording. It was quite a revelation to me to experience the difference in recording quality in my CD collection. My old stereo made everything sound about the same, mediocre. With the ML's, some recordings are nearly unbearable, others are about the same as when played on my old system. But the *quality* recordings are nothing short of amazing. I heard for the first time: Poncho Sanchez's taped hands striking the skins of his congas, that destinctive "ping" that the skins make when heard live; you can almost feel Bjork's breath in "The Anchor Song"; the absolutely live sound of didgeridoo in Trance Mission's "Head Light" or Brent Lewis and Peter Wood's "Thunder Down Under"; to name a few. If you love live music and want to experience the sensation in your own home daily, and you don't mind large speakers (2 ft. wide by 6 ft. high), then I suggeast you give the reQuests a listen. For the price I am giving them 5 stars.

Stereo Kit:
Audio Research CD2 - CD
Audio Research LS15 - Pre
Classe' CA-300 - Amp
Sunfire MKII (at lowest crossover setting) - Sub
Kimber Cable Silver Streak Balanced interconnect
Kimber Kable 8TC Speaker connect

- G

I heard the Martin Logan ReQuests along with the ML SL3's and Aerius i's at the same establishment. I didn't note the cables, but the amp was a Krell FPB 300 and the source was a Rega Planed CD player. As one might expect based on price, the ReQuests (at $4500) were slightly better than the SL3's (at $3195), which were slightly better than the Aerius i's (at $1995). All cast good soundstages, and the bass responses were fairly good (and in the order previously stated), though not of the punch-you-in-the-gut variety. I liked them very much, but none blew me away. Considering that ML's aren't usually discounted much more than 20% (if even that), I think one can do better for the "out the door" money (Meadowlarks and Totems, in particular, come to mind). Also, be aware that MLs are fairly low impedance, so you'll need a pretty stiff amp (like a Krell or a Mark Levinson) to drive them properly. I wish this were a hundred-point scale (in which case I'd give the three 88, 82, and 80 points, respectively). But I'm forced to give all three a rating of 4 stars.

I have been living with a pair of ReQuests for the last 4 months and am growing to appreciate them more and more. I have a fairly big room with a lot of glass which gave me some early problems with hardness and what seemed like a lack of warmth. With the addition of some absorbers behind the speakers the glare diappeared and the mid bass came up. I am using Adcom 5802 and the matching pre-amp and Monster 2.4 cable. I find the sound a little fatiguing with full orchestra but great on jazz, rock and roll and chamber music which is more to my taste. I am considering a sub Velodyne or Dr Hsu but have not made up my mind. Electrostatics take some getting used to, so don't make a hasty audition if this is one of your choices of interest.

I had a pair of M-L Aerius speakers for a couple of years and just loved them, although I did find them a little bass shy. I augumented the bottom end with an M&K dual 12" sub. This past Xmas I found a "motivated seller" who wanted to unload his Quests at a price too good to pass up, so I bought myself a present. I used my Aeriuses as surround speakers, which, combined with my Krell electronics, worked out just splendidly. Then my brother convinced me to sell the Aeriuses to him, and he loves them.
They are both outstanding speakers, the major difference being that the Quests give you more of a good thing, particularly in the lower end (I use the sub only for home theater now). Both do a fine job of imaging, are remarkably transparent, and have virtually seamless integration between the panels and the drivers. The Aerius is an overachiever that has to be considered a bargain at $2000. The Quests (and reQuests) are more muscular, but still capable of the fine detail. I would recommend both to anyone, provided they have a quality front end to match these babies.

A huge transparency and huge price. This is what makes Martin Logan speakers just unbeatenable. I have heard almost every Martin Logan speaker. The Statements are only there which I haven't heard but maybe someday. My own speakers are now the SL3s. The ReQuests was one time in my home and boy.
This is the best speaker I have heard in my home. The better speaker is only bigger Martin Logan speaker. ReQuest has much tighter bass than SL3 but the midrange is only little better than the SL3s. It's very liveless and musical.
The design, well it's absolutely amazing as everyone else Martin Logan speaker.
The speaker needs very careful placement but when you get that you got life there. Needs high-powered amplifier such as Threshold or Krell.
I drived these speakers with the Wadia 21 cd-player with the digital volume control. Amplifier was Threshold T400. This speaker really is my next speaker I can guarantee that.

Associated Equipment

PS-Audio Lambda CD-transport
PS-Audio Ultralink D/A-converter
Wadia 21 CD-player
Threshold T2 preamplifier
Threshold T400 poweramplifier
Cardas Hexlink 5C interconnects
Cardas Loudspeaker cables
Wadia AT/T cable

I wasn't too happy with these speakers. The imaging is excellent, but there is a "thinness", a "lightness" to the sound. I listen mainly to contemporary British rock, and these speakers don't have the impact or power I was looking for.My Dunlavy SCIV's are better.
Perhaps for classical music or softer music where dynamics aren't as critical they would be OK.