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STEttA SOUND FROM FOCAT'S NEW UTOPIA EM REPRODUCING TH :.'ARTS . 79 PMC FACT 8 MASTERSOUND EVOLUTION 845 HRT ISTREAMER MARKLEVINSON N" 53 -{mx \ffire SONUS FABET? AIVATI EXCLUSIVEI ,4 A " WIN A TOUR OFTHE * ry LINN FAcToRYI

ffire - Sumiko Audio · Sonus Fqber Amqti Fulurq Loudspeokers by ALan Sircom, photography by Adrian Lyon he Sonus Faber - that very limited, gargantuan and just all-over extreme speaker

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STEttA SOUND FROM FOCAT'S NEW UTOPIA EM

REPRODUCING TH :.'ARTS . 79

PMC FACT 8

MASTERSOUNDEVOLUTION 845

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MARK LEVINSONN" 53

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EQUIPMEI{T REVIEWSonus Fqber Amqti FulurqLoudspeokersby ALan Sircom, photography by Adrian Lyon

he Sonus Faber - that very limited, gargantuanand just all-over extreme speaker titan, whichwas already pre-sold long before it became areal product - taught the company a lot. The'trickle-down' effect that brinqs Formula One

technology to tomorrow's autornobiles applies here; the skillslearned in making the Sonus Faber statement has trickleddown to the new Amati Futura. I

Apart from the name and being a boat{ailed,floorstanderaside, there are almost no points of contact between theAmati Homage and Futura. The cabinet is bigger, it usesdifferent drivers... everything changes. And so does the price,but not so dramatically; the Futura model costing twenty-onegrand is not so very far from the standard Amati Homageprice today. lt's not hard to imagine that this is the first of atrio of Futura models rolling. in above the Homage range, TheAmati Homage stays in production, but one has to wonder forhow long, given the stiff competition from above?'

Part of the trickle-down effect from the Sonus Faber isthe way the Futura is essentially built around an exo-skeletonof a combination of nickel and Avional, a very high-strength,high-stiffness and low-mass aluminium/6opper/magnesium/silicon alloy. The CNC machined backfins and top and bottomplate form this basis, which controls, absorbs and transmitsresonance away from more traditional front baffle, side panelsand internal architecture of the speaker. But 'traditional' isn'treally the right word here; those multi-layered progressivelyrounded side walls act as constrained layers, are ribbed at keyacoustically-significant regions and are thus self-damping. Allof which defines 'science in the service of aft'.

The Sonus Faber ACT (Acronym Creation Team) havebeen hard at work too, moving the LW (Low VibrationTransmission) system and TMD fiuned Mass Damper) -as well as the Stealth Reflex System - from the statementpiece over to the Futura. In fairness, these acronyms andbuzzwords are backed up by a lot of mechanical engineering;TMD, for example, is essentially a tuned shock absorber,which acts to turn another set of stray resonances into heat(in much the same way that shock absorbers in skyscraperswork), LW effectively 'floats' the loudspeaker on an elastomersuspension system to prevent local acoustic feedback and theStealth system is a series of para-aperiodic enclosure vents.All of this means effectively no resonance on the inside, noneon the outside and a poded speaker that is almost completelyfree from sounding like a pofted speaker.

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It's a three and a half way reflex (makethat Stealth Reflex) design, sporting a 29mmdome tweeter, a 179mm midrange cone andtwo 220mm woofers. In many respects, themidrange is the key to the Futura sound; it'san air-dried doped paper cone fed by anoversized 43mm voice coil and special eddy-current reducing copper rings, and the wholedriver is viscoelastically decoupled from thecurved front-baffle. The one bit of trickle-up technology is the crossover, becauseboth the Amati Futura and the Sonus Faber., q, ,flagsnip use the progressrve slope crossoverresponse first seen in speakers like the Liuto.Only this one has Mundorf Supreme capsand Jantzen coils that cost as much as theLiuto itself. Crossover points are at 80H2,22*lz and 3.2kNz, and all of those driversare customised versions of designs made byScanspeak.

There are those who think the mainsource of high-end loudspeakers should bewell-meaning guys in sheds. But not SonusFaber; the finish on Sonus Faber alwaysmade the grade, even in the early days. ltwas that top Homage range that really caughtthe eye. lt made other speaker makers raisethe quality of finish. But the Futura improveson the Homage on dn unprecedentedscale. I can imagine mofe than a few driversaqking Moderna why their latest Ferrari isn'tfinished to Amati Futura standards. I canalso envisage some angry screaming fromother high-end manufacturers, demandingthe same uncompromising quality from theirwoodworkers. lt's that kind of finish.

That's seven layers of hand-finishedlacquer kind of f inish, the l ikes of which youwould normally see growing out of the neckof the violin virtuoso. The red side panelshave a glowing translucent lustre that willmake you walk around and around thespeakers, and not be disappointed, ever.Offset by the 'chrome' top (actually a 'we arenot tell ing' hightech chemical process that )

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Hqlit"Fb€g:{? F"F.z;TEV; I Sonus Fober Amoti Fuluro Loudspeokers

) leaves that almost unbreakable polished finish just 30 microns thick) with thename cut deep, bottom and back and ihe black strings across the front baffle.These could only come from a Catholic country because that sin of pride (ofownership) is going to need a lot of Hail Marys. "lt's been two CDs since mylast confession, Father." This is one of those loudspeakers that sings a siren'ssong; but this one does it even when there's no music playing. This is whatyou get when a country can list Sophia Loren and the Ferrari25O GTO among -its style icons. .'

There has always been something intrinsically lovely about the Amatisound. They have a richness of harmonic structure that befits a loudspeakeras elegant as the floorstanders. lf there was a criticism, it was that they wentfor the 'elegance' and refinement over accuracy and dynamic punch. Not a

I big trade off, but those after t1/agico-grade honesty would find the previousAmati polite in comparison. Lovely, yes... but perhaps too lovely.

Which is where the Futura changes are so surprising. lt manages to?etainthe refinement and elegance of the Amati, but gives it more of an edge. lt stillpaints a sweet picture of the music, but thpre is a lot of detail and precisionthere too. lt manages to give you a very precise s-ense of the studio, highlightingreverb tails and whether the spatial cues in a mix come down to a naturalenvironment or panning.

Whoever voiced these speakers spent a lot of time listening.to voices.They pro1ect into the room with the sort of naturalness you miglt expectfrom a three-way box from the BBC school. Except it goes further, not justthe voice... the passion behind the voice is expressed perfectly. This mightcause you to have some kind of X-Factor-esque play-off, trying to separatethose who 'mean it' and those who 'phone it in' (because this speaker will letyou know in seconds). When you listen to a mUsician that means it - RobertWyatt or PJ Harvey, for example - you feel their pain. Playing Nick Drake orSchumann through these speakers is like a psychotherapy session.

There's an old statement in audio; get the voice right and the rest of thesound will follow. lt applies across the midband, in part because it's the parlof our hearing to which we are so strongly attuned. lt's the crying baby range,and the sound of leaves rustling as the sabre-tooth tiger creeps up on us. lt isalso the place where any mistakes are easy to spot. Sadly, this seems to bethe least remembered old statement in audio, with many companies skippingover the midrange to add more boom and Iizz. The Amati Futura gets thevoice and the midrange very very right indeed. And then it goes on to do thedifficult next step; and making that right sounding midband extend up anddown the frequency range.

It's a truly homogenous sound, not in a wall-of-sound way, bqt a sense ofmusic knitting together perfecily. lt's like a small two-way loudspeaker that hassubwoofer-like extension, but without the almost inevitable change in pacesuch a system produces. lt does this on any kind of music it seems; evenlive cuts like Van Morrison's classic tt's Too Late To Stop Now spring to lifewith a sense of rooted solidity. Not bass burbling along for the sake of havingsome bass, but taut, controlled and deep, with a sense of locking musiciansto their physical spaces on a live stage. lt's not uncanny, but it is extremelyentertaining.

l'm going to get a lot of flak for this, but the main word that kept comingup was 'sensual'. The sound of these speakers is just so damn sexy, and Iwish I knew what it is that made these speakers sound this way, because I'dbottle it and make a fortune. lt might be the voice and the way it can extractthe passion behind the music. Two things emerge from this; the first is thatall you need is a bottle of good wine, your other half's favourite artist playing

softly through the Futuras and... well, letsjust say ihings happen. The other big thing isif you listen to these for an hour of your ownfavourites and don't find vourself moved totears, you have no soul.

In a way, the best of all possible SonusFaber worlds would be a loudsoeaker thatcombinds the small-speaker clarity of theGuarneri with the grace of the Amati and1hebass energy and dynamics of the Stradivari,And, while all of these Homage loudspeakersremain in the catalogue, the Amati Futura isthat best of all possible worlds. lt combinesthe benefits of all three, and adds thatuncanny sensuality and passion. This is areal game-raiser!

OK, so it is first and foremost a SonusFaber in sound, look and build. That it ispossibly the best of all of them in combinationdoesn't change the fact it's still a SonusFaber. Go looking for the sort of gut-churningbass-guitar impact at ear-threatening levels,or plan to make your speakers double up as aPA system and you'll keep looking. Likewiseif you are expecting Quad or Madinloganlike imagery buy a Quad or a Martinlogan.The fact that it can combine the benefits of

TECHNICALSPECIFICATIONS3.5 woy reflex porfed loudspeokerDrive Units: 1x29mm fweeter lx179mmmidronge, 2x220mm boss unitsFrequency response: 25Hz - 3OkHz,including Steolth Reflex PortSensit ivi ty: 90 dB SPL (2,83 V / I m)Nominol lmpedonce: 4 ohmsPorfuer: 30 W - 300 W without distortionDimensions (H x W x D): 1 I 5 x 40.5 x 63.5 cWeight: 1 I 1 kg per poir / 145 kgpocked per poirFinish: "Amoti Red" or "Grophite"Price: f ,21,000 per poir

Monufoctured bySonus FoberU RL: www.sonusfober.com

' Distributed byAbsolute SoundsU R L: www.o bsolutesounds.comTel: +44(Ol2A 8971 3909

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the Guarneri, Amati and Stradivari in one ispretty damn remarkable; expecting it to alsodo a good impression of every other speakerout there is asking a bit too much.

I have to find the good and the bad inevery product. The bad here is simple; formany people, this will be the most expensiveproduct they buy. Not just in more music, butin your furniture, d6cor, house, everything.This isn't the kind of speaker that ends upwith a plant pot on the top three monthsafter buying it. This is the kind of speakerthat makes you call the interior decorator torework your house to match the Futuras.

It even effectively cuts out the one bigproblem every speaker maker faces; cloners.The loudspeaker market is like the fashion,trade, in that 10 seconds after some stick-insect sashays down the catwalk wearingten-grand's worth of couture, the owner of asweatshop somewhere on the planet alreadyhas pattern cutters at work making knock-offs. The audio business isn't so cut-throat,but a small army of bodgers and DIY'ers willtake any new design and.copy it. This hasnearly killed off a number of relatively bignames, that end up finding the ripped-offversion of their own design undermining theirown design. lt's not possible here; the endresult is just too elegantly constructed and itwould end up costing more than thd Futurato clone the Futura.

The worry with any really, really prettything is getting past the surface attraction.It's a seemingly natural human mde afflictionto out their critical faculties on hold in thepresence of beauty. You just go gormless.The great thing here is beauty is not only skindeep; something looking this good reallyshouldn't sound this sexy too.

'Sounds good, looks bad' is not a wayto succeed when designing luxury goods.We collectively need to get past the 'ugly asa sack of hammers' school of desiqn. and theAmati Futura does that beautifullyl

Let's look at it this way.Sometimes non-audiophiles cry"how much?" and laugh whenfaced with the price of some hi-fi.Not this time. This time the expenseis justified and justifiable. Not only do theFuturas look the part, they sound thepart too. Every particle of this speakerbespeaks the best of high-end. *

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