martin logans' decline

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Here we go again. This place may turn into Trollsville soon.

Jed, can you give us some facts or details to substantiate your statement.

My new Prefaces are the finest speakers I have owned.

I cannot agree with the OP. Maybe there are other parts of your system that need attention.

jed said:

Bass that is muddy, speakers that are designd to please the wife verses speakers designed for music. Current ml speakers are more designed for their looks instead of being designed for qualilty reproductin of music. Making a sexy speaker instead of making a good sounding speaker

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You have obviously never seen or heard a pair of CLX....one of the best sounding speakers made...it has to be because it is ugly as sin...Kinda blows your argument all to hell, doesn't it?

jed said:

Bass that is muddy, speakers that are designd to please the wife verses speakers designed for music. Current ml speakers are more designed for their looks instead of being designed for qualilty reproductin of music. Making a sexy speaker instead of making a good sounding speaker

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Jed,

With all due respect, your post is insulting to many members (including myself) who own the current model(s).

On the surface, it appears to be self serving, has no basis in truth, and is counterproductive to the spirit and intent of this forum.

The last thing we need at this point is a p*ssing match between members as to which ML model sounds the best.

Chill, please.

GG

PS: FYI, prior to purchasing the Summits, I owned three "legacy" models including the CLS2A's, the Aerius, and the SL3. And yes, the Summits are quite capable of reproducing high quality music and do sound quite good. I also am confident that other members who own other models in the newer line would say the same thing. But, what do I know? I've only been listening to the ML line for some 23 years now.

Hello,
Jed, you would have to admit that the Aluminum Frame that replaces the MDF is a far superior solution? Moreover, using ICE Amplification to drive the Woofers certainly is not a way to make things cheaper.

It is hard to argue that the Panel size has gotten smaller on the main ESL Models, however the Xstat Panel has received almost unanimous praise by all Professional Reviewers. Be it the English A/V Press (Summit, Vantage), Secrets of Home Theater and High Fidelity (Spire), and The Absolute Sound(Summit, Vista), every review has been complimentary.

HT and Multichannel Music (SACD/DVD-A) are important to many. That does not mean that in 2 Channel applications, these Speakers do not get the job done.

As has been said above, many of us have spent tens of thousands of Dollars on the current generation of Martin Logan Speakers. And many of us owned the earlier generation. Myself included. If they were that horrible, do you honestly think that many of us would put our money where our mouth is?

I do wish that ML would make a larger Panel ESL with the far superior Aluminum Frame aside from the 25k CLX. Hopefully, they will. However, the current generation truly has some attributes that make them superior to your beloved Odyssey. I also think the Odyssey is an excellent Speaker.
Cheers,
JJ

Jed,
This is your post from Oct. 2009. Were you wrong then or are you wrong now?

Quote:
Just wanted to say thanks for all the information I have receive from this forum. Now I'd like to add something myself. While I have always liked the sound of my Martin Logan Vistas, I felt they lacked good bass reproduction and felt a little weak at higher volume. To my great surprise and happiness all this has changed since adding a Pass Labs X250 into my system. No longer need the subs to get really good bass. Man this amp really makes my vistas sing. THANKS GUYS>

Having just borrowed my old Aerius i's back from my friend that bought them years ago (and yes they have been recently re-paneled), we did a quick comparison to the Vantage and the new speaker is superior.

While the Aerius was and still is an excellent speaker, it is less resolving and hence more forgiving of the components placed behind it. As someone who gets to listen to a LOT of speakers on a daily, the current ML product is not a step down. You just need to feed them good gear.

Even when I first bought the Aerius, years ago, the salesman demoed them with an Onkyo receiver and they sounded awful. Because I had already owned the CLS, I knew what they were capable of and was not disappointed.

I may get some arguments on this, but I also found my CLS and Aerius to be a little more "tube friendly" than current product, which may contribute to some of this...

Hello,
Jeff, I would believe that. When TAS Reviewed the Vista, they made note that the Impedance went as low as 0.7 Ohms. That is a tough load for any Amplifier.
Cheers,
JJ

I spent a fair amount of time listening to the Summit X and I thought that they were very, very good. They were in a properly treated room and dialed in well at a high end dealer and I was amazed. I've heard the CLX in this same room. Both were awesome.

I gotta be honest. I'm getting a bit sick of some of this junk. Last I checked - nobody's speakers started to suck over the past several weeks. Gordons summits still sound awesome as do my Odysseys A lot of people here are jumping to bs conclusions because of changes in the company. nobody has come up with any evidence thar r & d is changing or that there is going to be less emphasis on high end speaker development. R&d is the key element for freaks like us. We don't care about profit or marketing. If ml wants to continue to expand into lower markets SO WHAT!! If r&d continues to improve and that creates a summit Z tell me why I should care if they also have an affordable home theater option

timm said:

If ml wants to continue to expand into lower markets SO WHAT!! If r&d continues to improve and that creates a summit Z tell me why I should care if they also have an affordable home theater option

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There has been no indication that they are expanding their R&D department. All indications are that they are cutting staff at the Kansas facility. The R&D department is being asked to create entirely new lines of lower end speakers. It takes an awful lot of R&D time to come up with an entirely new speaker from the ground up. Much less whole lines of them. There are only so many R&D staff and they only work so many hours in a day. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that the more time they spend designing and building home theater speakers, the less time that is available for them to put into the higher end lines. And it isn't like they are developing new technologies for the home theater speakers that will "trickle up" to the higher end products.

Perhaps they will be able to diversify into the lower end while still designing new high quality speakers at the higher end and advancing the state of the art of electrostatic speaker design. But personally I have my doubts. We will have to wait four to five years to really find out the answer to this question. It takes a while for these sorts of decisions to shake themselves out and to develop new products. A lot depends on who stays and who leaves (or is kicked out the door) during this volatile time. I wonder how long until Joe Vojtko is gone?

jed said:

It seems that martin logan is now a name that is more associated with the home theatre crowd, than the two channel crowd. Let's face the facts, ML speakers are not made the same as they were before. They are just not that good anymore. A pair of odesseys will trump a pair of vantages or summits in 2 channel mode. The new logans are a disgrace to the older ones.

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One thing about the panels being smaller is that the have smaller holes and are able to produce more sound than an older pannel of similar size

If martin logan didnt do home theatre then they wouldn't be very good money maker .Besides HT is where its at these days, if it wasnt for HT then I would never have introduced myself into this hobby . HT is basically gona keep 2CH advancing forward and food on the table for audio brandmakers

Jed my advise to you would be not to post ,sell your logans to me for $50 then go buy yourself a huge pair of cerwin vega and stick a concert video on your vcr and play it real loud to drown out the voices in your head

Haha. Cerwin Vegas. You are brutal

Rich you make some good points. I will counter with this. . What about the paradigm connection. Whose to say that paradigm r&d would not be used to help enhance the lower end products allowing ml to focus onthe high end r&d.
Companies do this type of thing all the time.

Hello,
In addition to the smaller holes is the fact that more of the Panel is exposed due to the combination of the Aluminum Frame and the Panel no longer being in direct contact to the Woofer Cabinet. These changes are not minor.

Again, many of us wish that the Panel size was perhaps a bit larger, but the amount of sound produced by the newer Panels is exceptional.
Cheers,
JJ

timm said:

What about the paradigm connection. Whose to say that paradigm r&d would not be used to help enhance the lower end products allowing ml to focus onthe high end r&d.
Companies do this type of thing all the time.

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It certainly is a possibility. But Paradigm has a pretty big lineup of speakers, so I imagine those guys are pretty busy too.

timm said:

I gotta be honest. I'm getting a bit sick of some of this junk. Last I checked - nobody's speakers started to suck over the past several weeks. Gordons summits still sound awesome as do my Odysseys A lot of people here are jumping to bs conclusions because of changes in the company. nobody has come up with any evidence thar r & d is changing or that there is going to be less emphasis on high end speaker development. R&d is the key element for freaks like us. We don't care about profit or marketing. If ml wants to continue to expand into lower markets SO WHAT!! If r&d continues to improve and that creates a summit Z tell me why I should care if they also have an affordable home theater option

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Would you feel the same if your panels were discontinued tomorrow? That is one of the reasons that has gotten the ball rolling.It is compounded by the fact that arguably a man as popular or more than Gayle Sanders himself, by the name of Jim Powers was thrown aside like nothing.Maybe you or other people do not consider loyalty as important as many of us do.I have always purchased ML speakers knowing that I would be able to get parts if needed.I would argue that many of the newer designs were already developed before Shoreview took over the helm.I would be curious to know how Mr. Sanders himself feels about the direction that his company has gone.

When and if my panels fail I'll probably look for something else. I purchased them knowing they had a five year warranty. But maybe that isn't important. Re: my loyalty. Every second of every day somebody is getting screwed. I feel sorry for Jim if what is being inferred has happened. You don't want to see that happen to anyone. Does that change my
mind about how great my odysseys sound? Maybe I have loyalty to all of the other people that still work at Martin Logan or maybe for the guys that still work in r&d there??

But honestly I guess I don't have any loyalty to any electronics company. If they make a good product that I like that is first on the list. Secondly, if it is made in the US that is a bonus for me.

I respect your opinion TIMM.We see the 2 sides completely differantly.I look as a speaker purchase as a investment.I am investing my money with the notion that I can buy replacement parts to continue to enjoy them for far longer than 5 years.Gayle Sanders would never of allowed this to happen if he was still in charge.I am a union employee and look at loyalty in a far differant manner.If my fellow workers are laid off,I would never volunteer to work overtime.IMO I would be spitting in their faces if I did.I respect you and your opinion but I do completely disagree.

jed said:

It seems that martin logan is now a name that is more associated with the home theatre crowd, than the two channel crowd. Let's face the facts, ML speakers are not made the same as they were before. They are just not that good anymore. A pair of odesseys will trump a pair of vantages or summits in 2 channel mode. The new logans are a disgrace to the older ones.

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Even i have to disagree with this post. The Spires i received were
in perfect shape without a single manufacturing blemish. I think
the bass is very fast and tight, not muddy, and the integration
between bass and panel is seemless. There's less cabinet weight
for sure, but i think it's more attractive than the earlier designs.