Bass, authoritive presentation and price

Hard to move around - heavy

I have owned these speakers for over one year now. Please note I say owned not (tried). That is the reason I beleive others gave them such a low rating. You must have the right equipment to make these perform. I have put alot of different power through these speakers and just because it is 200 watts plus does not mean they will sound at their optimum. Give them good signal, power and space and they will give any high end speaker a run for their money, it would be like kissing your sister - nothing in it.

Similar Products Used:

Danish, American, Australian, Kiwi and others

These speakers sound okay, but not amazing. For their price they aren't worth the money. Listen to the NHT 3.3 before you buy these. You'll be surprised. Sony doesn't have a reputation for high quality audio equipment. This speaker get two stars.

Great sound. Dynamics. Good load for tube amps except SET.
Construction quality is very high. Great bass

Midrange slightly recessed. Poor parts availability. Read my review before you spend one dime on these.

What a terrible experience I have had with Sony. Three months after these speakers were out of warentee I had a tweeter and a midrange blow. Tube went on my ancient power amp and took out the drivers. Things like this happen, no problem I thought. Sony had no replacement parts available for the mid. I purchased the last tweeter they seemed to have. Took three calls to finally get someone to come up with one. The mid was repairable and hopefully the system will be back together soon.

We are talking about a speaker which retails for $4000 that you can't beg, borrow or steel parts for after just over three years. I purchased for $1700. Got a great discount but would not have purchased if I had been aware of the Sony parts policy. Even on the used market great care should be exercised before purchase. Drivers are European and of course can be sourced but what a hassle on something three years old.

As to the sound they are excellent. Recessed midrange calls for good quality tube amplification. Warm up the mids and they are excellent on all types of music. Very tight bass. Very good deep soundatage. Imaging not quite up to the best minimonitors.

These speakers do require power. No SET amps or low power push pull unless music content is not rich in bass. Stay away from any solid state amp that also has a laid back midrange. With a good matching solid state they have wonderful low end punch. Will soon try 200 watt solid state in the bass and triode for the mids and high end. I anticipate a problem with the pace. The switching options available on the Messa Barron might make the idea work. High end is superb. Revealed the misty mosfet sound very quickly. Transparent enough to reveal system matching problems.

At $4000 they represent poor value for money. For the 1700 I paid the value is excellent. The new SS-M9ED at $16,000 is insulting. Screw a super tweeter on top, paint the box black and charge four times the money. How would you like to blow that super tweeter and be unable to source it after three years. Could happen. I tried to purchase a midrange for the ED version. It was unavailable as well and the ED is still available new. All for the bargin price of 16 grand.

My overall rating will be very low because of the poor value and the parts policy. Remember that this is Sony policy for all products. ES products are expensive. Think twice if you plan to keep longer than two years.

Associated equipment
MFA A3 preamp
Messa Baron power amp
Project six turntable
Grace cartridge
Cal Audio Labs Alpha & Delta CD
Lexicon Surround processor
B&K power amps for the center and rear channels (Sometimes I get crazy and use old Dyna tube amps but with the twelve 5881's in the Barron the room gets quite warm not to mention the electric bill)
Rotel tuner (only until my MAC MR-74 is repaired....great analog tuner)
Tice power conditioner
Sony ES Center channel (Great sound hope the driver holds together cause......you guessed it Sony has no parts available)
Celestion rear surround speakers. Celestion 3's actually
Variety of commercial video junk. Phillips, Sony mostly
Monster speaker cables. Sigma for the mains and 14 guage for the center and rears.
Monster and Audio Quest interconnects.

Similar Products Used:

Celestion, B&W

build, bass, looks

cannot be driven by gutless amps.

rave review in stereophile,driven by passlab 1000s.my amp is one of 25 made in NZ.it is an OCEAN 1 400watts/8ohms,700watts/4ohms.big powerfull anps take control of these speakers and make them sound awesome.itried bryston 7b mono blocks but decided they were not musical enough.i use xa 7 es player,wireworld balanced cables [eclipse] audio synthesis passive preamp passion m8

These are very well-made speakers. Although not on par with the best (Wilson; Platinum Audio; Magneplanar; etc.), Sony's speakers deserve more than one star.Give them a listen... and don't confuse the ES line with what you normally think of as Sony.

To be clear, I would not give them five stars and probably would rather spend my money on Magneplanar.

Considering the low cost, these are excellent speakers. It easily outclasses B&W 801's and Kef Reference 4 speakers. I ended up spending a bit more for Aerial 10 t's though.

These speakers sound great. They have good highs and good bass. The speakers have only 1 disadvantage to me. and that is the Design. It looks to high-tech.

I have no complains so far with these fantastic speakers. They play clean and powerful sounds at high and low levels to satisfy my demands. They are fantastic for music, but can also be used for home theatre purposes as well. I really didn't think that these speakers were any good but these speakers are excellent. Give them a try and you will see for your self.

To Rossross,
You are right: These "SONY" speakers are not actually designed by SONY engineers. If I remember well (I read an article about it in STEREOPHILE last year), they are designed by a guy last-named Agnanos (Greek origin,for sure) who used to work for POLK first and is now helping SONY in this regard (an audiophile friend of mine let me know that Mr. Agnanos was part of the POLK team that developed its "trilaminate" drivers, but I cannot make personal claims on that).

I have auditioned these SONYs twice at showrooms, both in regular stereo and home theater configuration (in this last context, their performance was poor, surely due in part to the fact they have been "matched" with cheap SONY center
and "surround" speakers and a mass market Pro-Logic receiver). In plain stereo, they sounded OK to my ears (powerful, tight bass, yeah)....but not for the money (I fully agree with you on that). For that kind of "green" one might enjoy a superb MARTIN-LOGAN SL-3 (if one is into planars) or the mighty NHT 3.3s (if one is into dynamics). I own NHT VT-2s and even at almost half-price level there is no contest: NHT VT-2 wins hands down.

Three stars for its value.

I'd have to agree with the last review. These speakers don't sound like they're worth $3,000+! I personally don't like the NHT's but that's may just be me. Try AR instead, I've found their speakers to be great.