The very top half octave (15-20kHz) is slightly rolled off, particularly when listening per M-L's setup instructions. Most listeners won't correlate the roll-off with the M-L's sounding polite. There are other reasons why some describe M-Ls and other electrostatics as polite sounding, but I've never heard them described as muffled. That said, the ribbbon tweeter used in the Magnepans has far greater extension than anything used by M-L.
Are Martin Logans considered polite?
I've been going through this saga with some Magnepan 3.6Rs. I originally thought they were bright in my room, so decided to keep the Martin Logan Odysseys I bought at the same time and put the 3.6Rs up for sale. Since I've been trying to sell them, I've kept the Magnepans hooked up to demo them and tried some different speaker cable. With a different speaker cable and better termination, they sounded pretty damn nice, enough so that my wife even provided unsolicited feedback on a few occasions on how nice they sounded. So, I've been listening to them for the last few weeks. I've never heard piano sound as realistic in my room ever.
I literally just sold the speakers and they went out the door an hour ago (for those of you who have read my other posts, I ended up selling them at a steep discount to nice couple who can take the time and effort to get them repaired and still come out ahead). I hooked up my Martin Logans again. Now they sound a bit rolled off and muffled to me. After having lived years with a system that was on the bright side (with my PSBs), I naturally found the sound the Odysseys are producing attractive. Poor recordings are not so irritating, but this seems to come at a cost.
So, in the end, my question is are MLs generally considered rolled off/polite/laid back in comparison to other brands? Is it also a function of the narrow dispersion as well? This is a new room for me so have not yet started with room treatments and a lot of glass on one side, hard wood floors so i would expect this room to be brighter than many.
I literally just sold the speakers and they went out the door an hour ago (for those of you who have read my other posts, I ended up selling them at a steep discount to nice couple who can take the time and effort to get them repaired and still come out ahead). I hooked up my Martin Logans again. Now they sound a bit rolled off and muffled to me. After having lived years with a system that was on the bright side (with my PSBs), I naturally found the sound the Odysseys are producing attractive. Poor recordings are not so irritating, but this seems to come at a cost.
So, in the end, my question is are MLs generally considered rolled off/polite/laid back in comparison to other brands? Is it also a function of the narrow dispersion as well? This is a new room for me so have not yet started with room treatments and a lot of glass on one side, hard wood floors so i would expect this room to be brighter than many.
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