 Magnepan MMG Loudspeakers
Performance, value, and personal preferences. These are the
most important factors to consider whenever buying audio equipment, perhaps never more
important than when purchasing speakers. Performance can be summed up simply: How
accurately do the loudspeakers reproduce music? Value is also determined easily: Do
the speakers perform well and fit your budget at the same time? We all know that most
$5000 loudspeakers sound great, but how many of us can afford 'em? Conversely, most of us
can swing $69 speakers, but they usually don't perform as well as we'd like. Personal
preference is pretty self-explanatory: Some folks -- especially those who listen to
Led Zeppelin, Ozzy Osbourne, and Pearl Jam -- are going to want speakers capable of
delivering a fleshy bottom end, and they're often willing to sacrifice a bit of high-end
detail to get that fat bass. Those who grew up on James Taylor or chamber music aren't
necessarily going to want or need bottomless bass -- they're more interested in precisely
detailed, transparent sound in the midrange and upper end. And folks who listen to
classical music might well find that they want speakers capable of delivering
natural-sounding, high-resolution strings as well as making those tubas, tympanis, and
double-bassoons sound and feel as if they're in their listening rooms.
The Magnepan MMG speakers, at $550 a pair, are an
extraordinary value and their superb performance is matched by very few loudspeakers
anywhere near this price -- taking care of two of the three ingredients in finding a good
speaker in one swoop. That leaves personal preference, of course. The good news here is
that these Magneplanar speakers (more on Magneplanar technology in a moment) will give
almost everyone what they want from loudspeakers. If you've read other reviews of the
MMGs, you've probably noted that the one criticism consistently leveled at them is they're
a bit thin at the low end of the musical spectrum; bass doesn't boom from a pair of these
speakers. But that can be remedied easily and fairly cheaply (more on this later too).
Thinking outside of the box
Magnepan's MMG speakers are available in natural or black
oak trim with off-white, gray, or black fabric. They're 48" high, 14.5" wide,
and 1.25" thick. That's right. Less than two inches thick. These aren't your
daddy's speakers -- these are quasi-ribbon planar-magnetic loudspeakers. Let's break that
mouthful of syllables down, beginning with the second part: planar-magnetic speakers use
an extraordinarily thin sheet of Mylar (.0005") in place of a speaker cone in order
to reproduce sound. In a traditional speaker, electrical signals cause a magnet within a
mechanism attached to the cone to move back and forth, making the cone vibrate. Those
vibrations move air; your ears perceive those movements of air as sound. Magnets are
employed in the Maggies (as they're affectionately known) too. The Mylar, which has a
metal conductor etched over its surface (the conductor is known as a quasi-ribbon), is
suspended between two fixed magnets. The audio signal (electricity) passes through the
conductor, which causes the membrane to move back and forth between the magnets. This is
the movement that reproduces sound.
That 696" of speaker surface area is the equivalent of
what you'd get with seventy-two 1" dome tweeters and
nine 8" woofers! If you get a chance to hear these Maggies, you just might be
convinced that they deliver all of the extraordinary detail that one would expect from a
collection of tweeters and woofers like that.
Setup
Setting up the MMGs is simple and straightforward. The rear
panels of the speakers accept bare wire or banana plugs, which run from your receiver or
amp, and are locked down with an Allen wrench (included). The MMGs are dipolar, which
means that sound radiates from the back of the speaker just as it does from its front;
remember there's no traditional speaker cabinet to dampen those sounds. So you're going to
have to pay close attention to where you place these speakers -- see our article on
speaker placement, "The Best
Things in Life are Free: Speaker Placement" for some hints on how to go about
this. I'm lucky to have a rectangular listening room that allows me to space the speakers
6' apart (about 3' from the back wall), with me sitting 12' away at the apex of an
invisible triangle. If your living room or listening space is more constricted, you might
consider hanging these attractive, flat speakers on a wall. Did you feel a shudder just go
through the cosmic ether? That was caused by audiophiles the world over shivering in
disgust at the thought of speakers being placed on a wall. Ignore 'em.
The speakers come with little "feet" attached,
which allow you to tilt the speakers forward an inch or so. This will aim the sound more
directly at you, but it'll also diminish your sweet spot a bit. (The "sweet
spot" is the optimum place in your room for listening.) You can increase the size of
that desired spot by placing the tweeters on the outside edges of the speakers. You can
determine where the tweeters are by peering inside the cloth covering the speakers. Inside
you'll notice lots of strands of silver running from the top to the bottom of the Mylar,
concentrated on either the left or ride side. That's the tweeter side. So, simply set the
tweeter sides to the outside (when you're facing the speakers) and the sweet spot will
broaden.
Great sound, plane and simple
Once I had the speakers set up, I did as I always do when
trying new equipment: I fired up some of my favorite music. This first listening session
isn't about testing the limits of the new gear, but rather about getting a feel for the
new with old music I know and love. First up: The Nashville Sound. . . Owen Bradley
[Decca DRND-11330] -- a greatest-hits compilation of music from the legendary country
producer. The opening strings on Patsy Cline's "Sweet Dreams" cascaded from the
Maggies as a huge soundstage was uncovered; so sharp and full was the sound that I could
hear the resin-coated bows hit the strings. Her voice was as warm and distinctly defined
as I've ever heard it. When the bass line starting up Webb Pierce's "I Ain't
Never," on the same CD, began its infectious chug, the MMGs displayed incredible
front-to-back layering. The bass was resonant and round and distinctly separate from the
high vocal harmonies behind Pierce's plaintive twang.
So far, so good. But the MMGs, like most speakers, need a
bit of breaking in, otherwise they'll sound slightly bright. I let music play through them
for the next 24 hours before sitting down for another listen. I admit to being impatient
-- Magnepan suggests a one-week break-in period.
This time, the bass extended a bit further and the highs
had lost that very slight hint of metallic ping. Magnepan speakers, from the top to the
bottom of their line, perform especially well on acoustic music, so I decided to let Ted
Hawkins' The Next Hundred Years [Geffen 24627] have a spin on the NAD C521i CD player I was
using. His expressive, worn voice leapt out of the speakers on "Strange
Conversation" with a stunning degree of precision. There was also clear aural space
between his vocals and the backing acoustic and electric guitars, bass, and spare
drumming.
Unfortunately, my own Carver CT-17 preamp/tuner and Carver
TFM-15 amp weren't really up to the job of pushing Ted through the Maggies. These speakers
eat power like Louie Anderson at a Krispy Kreme store, so I hooked up the more powerful
Vasant GA-120S Final Edition 0.1 amp. (If you get the MMGs, be sure to have at least
50Wpc available -- even better would be 100-200W.) Ah, the Vasant gave Ted, and everything
else I played through the speakers, plenty of punch.
It was time to push the speakers a bit harder. Next up:
Maria Callas's "Quand je vous Aimerai? L'amour" aria from Carmen (A
Passion for Opera [EMI 5 65163 23]). Even in crescendos, the level of fine detail was
outstanding; instruments, including heavy strings and percussion, were clearly resolved
with consistency across the aural spectrum. When Callas's soprano seized center stage, it
was with a clarity one doesn't find on many speakers costing two to three times as much as
the MMGs. Coloration (adding of bass or treble) is almost nonexistent here.
Testing the "weakness"
The Magnepan weakness is supposed to be their inability to
reproduce deep bass; if they do have a weakness, here's where it lies. However, when I
cranked up John Fogerty's "Southern Streamline" from his Blue Moon Swamp
[Warner Bros. 9 45426-2] I got all the sharp, tight bottom end I needed and wanted.
Magnepan MMG Loudspeakers
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But when I dug into the deep, dark recesses of my music
collection, I found an ugly test: Mötorhead's 1982 metal opus, Iron Fist [Dojo
3034-2]. The relentless bombast and guitar-hammering of Eddie Clark on every single song
on the album proved to be a bit much too much for the Maggies. So I hooked up my Hsu Research VTF-2 powered sub,
which filled in the bottom of the archetypal speed metal quite ably. (The Hsu subwoofer
goes for $499.)
If you're one of those folks who enjoy a little bombast, or
maybe just bass-heavy rock'n'roll, you'll likely need a sub to accompany the MMGs. The
same might hold true for those who enjoy Wagner or Beethoven -- the lows of their music
might go beneath the capabilities of these speakers.
Conclusion
Aside from the Mötorhead-Beethoven caveat, the Magnepan
MMGs performed beautifully. They're so good that they'll make you look like an audio
wunderkind and make your system sing as never before. They do need to be driven by a good,
strong receiver or amp -- no 25W weaklings need apply -- and they'll expose weaknesses
upstream from them (if you have a cheap, tinny-sounding CD player, for instance). They'll
also expose the intricate layers of beauty that might be hidden by your current speakers,
so if you're tempted to give 'em a try, you can have these Maggies in your home for a
60-day, money-back trial. If you don't care for 'em, send 'em back to Minnesota's Magnepan
and try something else. Here's betting that you'll be singing their praises along with the
sounds of your suddenly improved music collection.
Price of equipment reviewed
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