Dynamat inside ML woofer cabinets?

[Rich]

out of curiosity, what "tilting" hardware do you have in mind? it's been a really long time since I had SL3s (my first MLs ) so don't remember how much tilted towards the back they were, but my Odyssey and Ascents' panels are fairly vertical from the get go and there is some additional room to maneuver around that with the spikes. I've noticed that the newer breed of MLs have their panels more "laid back" indeed.

This isn't a problem with the older ML speakers, whose panels were generally vertical. Only with the newer "WAF" designed MLs starting with the Summit generation. ML has made their speakers smaller, narrower, lighter, and more esthetically pleasing, to the detriment of sound quality in my opinion. Fortunately, they have made some improvements in crossover and woofer box design that helped in sound quality, so perhaps it is a wash in the end. I still think the Prodigies blow away the Summits in certain respects. And I do love my Summits. But still . . .

 

[Gordon Gray]

Rich, I totally agree.

Prodigies do a much better job portraying scale, impact, and accompanying nuances given the much larger panel / woofer size.

The Summits et all are pretty good but this is another case where size matters.

Gordon

 

[Pener]

(...) ML has made their speakers (...) more esthetically pleasing

Well, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I love the looks of Ascent-Odyssey-Prodigy series best.

 

[Rich]

Well, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I love the looks of Ascent-Odyssey-Prodigy series best.

Absolutely! And in fact when the Summit first came out there were a lot of people on this forum criticizing the new look. What I meant was "more esthetically pleasing from the standpoint of ML'S design team." They are definitely smaller and lighter, making them easier to assemble, pack, ship, and fit in a room. All of this helps ML a lot, but is detrimental to the sound quality because of smaller panel size and less panel stability. Also, build quality seems lower to me in certain respects. My Summit panels deflect a good half an inch if you press on them at the top front of the panel. My Ascent panels don't deflect at all.

 

[beanbag]

It's this new "Airframe" stuff, where the panels are on some skimpy rails and somewhat loosely bolted to the woofer box. Cf the older models where the frame is a solid chunk of wood running all the way up. But look at it this way: The panel is more loosely coupled, so the woofer won't make it shake as much! Also, I don't know what this "dipole cancellation" thing is, but thin bezels are the "in thing"!