Totem Arro Vs. Sttaf

To the individual who claimed the Arro's bass is not integrated I have to question what source and placement of speakers. I owned the Arro's and am possibly moving back to them within the next couple weeks (after owning the Mani's Sigs and Forests). The Arro's bass is very well balanced and integrated

Sandman,

I'll offer my limited 2 cents. I just this week purchased a (used) pair of Arros for my 12X18 dedicated 2CH/HT room. Ceiling is single slant cathedral running roughly 8.5' up to 11/12'.

One evening of listening, since they are 2 years old, I am assuming they are pretty well broken in (though not sure what impact shipping during the winter in the northern midwest may have on that).

Do they sound good? Yes, they sound very good in many ways. Was the bass lacking? That's a good question, after watching a movie with my 6 year old daughter and finally getting down to some music, I found myself turning up my sub (for the first time in my life). Maybe I wouldn't have had to do this if I wasn't running a sub in the first place? Maybe the result of watching a movie b/4 music, movies are always bass heavy. BTW, B&K 507 S2 receiver driving them.

Tomorrow night, I will run them through my Golden Tube SE 40 and see the impact on these speakers with tubes at only 40 watts.

Not sure if I have found the right placement yet. Lot's of moving around, trying to get them dialed in for imaging. Close to the rear wall, out as far a 2.5-3'. I don't necessarily agree that placement is unlimited. As a note, they sit on either side of my 40" tall by 60" wide entertainment center with a TV mounted to the wall above it.

Anybody else with a similar set-up and Arros, I would surely appreciate any placement advice.

I am intersted in listening to the Sttafs, so I can't comment on that. If I could find a used pair, I would buy them.

BOL and if you buy a pair for testing and decide to sell them (Sttaf, Hawk, Forrest), contact me and I will consider buying them.

ckoffend

Update from my last report after having just received the Arros.

Today I ordered a pair of Hawks.

I love the Arros and am going to move them to a second zone/room and run them as stereo speakers in there.

I want a little more and felt the Arros in my 12X18 room with the cathedral ceiling were a little less. Anybody else have experience with a similar sized room?

Don't get me wrong, I love the Arros and bought the Hawks without ever getting a chance to listen to them. Hopefully they won't be for sale in the near future. I doubt it.

Intergrated is probably the wrong word. More of a singular note bassline. It's not suprising really, look at the size of the driver. Small ported speakers give the illlusion of defiying physics but it is just that, an illusion.

Ckoffend - I have a big room (bigger than yours actually) with cathedral ceilings and lots of hard surfaces and I own the Hawks. They sound great in the proper listening position but not everyhwere in the room - a small speaker is not going to "fill the room" with quality off-axis response. The bass extension is not as great in my big room as advertsisd in the spec - the Hawks struggle below 40 Hz so I recently added two subs to fill out the sound and although hard to set up initially, they sound great. I think the Hawks will be fine in your room and even better if you add a quality sub of which there are many at affordable prices.

As for amplification, I have tried a few different things but for my tastes the Hawks sound best with lots of power. I tried a highly regarded 40 watt tube amp too and was disappointed across the board. I do have a tube preamp which really has added a richness to the sound and the 150 watts of Classe SS power provides the oomph the Hawks need.