Enjoying Music With The Magnepan 1.7i & .7 Speakers

[Fair Hedon]

Enjoying Music With The Magnepan 1.7i & .7 Speakers

Enjoying Music With The Magnepan 1.7i & .7 Speakers – Fair Hedon

[dalethorn]

"Speaking of bass, the only issue that I could possibly complain about concerning the performance of these speakers is that certain notes in the lower register, seems to activate a “rattle” in the panels. I understand this is known as panel slapback. This came up infrequently, and mostly with acoustic bass, interestingly enough. It seemed to happen with notes played on the lower strings, higher up on the fretboard. But again, it was infrequent, and random."

 

This is a little concerning.

[Fair Hedon]

16 hours ago, dalethorn said:

"Speaking of bass, the only issue that I could possibly complain about concerning the performance of these speakers is that certain notes in the lower register, seems to activate a “rattle” in the panels. I understand this is known as panel slapback. This came up infrequently, and mostly with acoustic bass, interestingly enough. It seemed to happen with notes played on the lower strings, higher up on the fretboard. But again, it was infrequent, and random."

 

This is a little concerning.

Yes, no doubt. It is a known design flaw, but I must say in no way is it a deal killer.

[dalethorn]

5 hours ago, Fair Hedon said:

Yes, no doubt. It is a known design flaw, but I must say in no way is it a deal killer.

 

I used to visit a guy years ago who had big Maggies and a fire-breathing amp - great sound at that.  I don't remember any vibrations or other issues with those, so my instinct tells me these current Maggies could be sandbagged or something around the edges to damp those rattles.

 

BTW, I'm still considering the $1500 or so desktop Maggies.

[davide256]

 

 

9 hours ago, Fair Hedon said:

Yes, no doubt. It is a known design flaw, but I must say in no way is it a deal killer.

 I got my 1.7s  within a year after they were in market, have not ever observed this after several years of use. What I have observed is that you can't make them work well in less than a 12 x 20 room. And that you should absolutely get an amp with 4 ohm taps, they will not sound as good on 8 ohm taps. I'd also ponder whether the amp used for to drive the Maggies had an adequate damping factor to control them.

[Fair Hedon]

3 hours ago, dalethorn said:

 

I used to visit a guy years ago who had big Maggies and a fire-breathing amp - great sound at that.  I don't remember any vibrations or other issues with those, so my instinct tells me these current Maggies could be sandbagged or something around the edges to damp those rattles.

 

BTW, I'm still considering the $1500 or so desktop Maggies.

Yes, those vibrations are random and infrequent...but they do happen.

 

You are spot on..I believe there are some mods that can be done to mitigate the issue.

 

My bottom line is Maggies provide an immersive experience but are not perfect.

[Fair Hedon]

5 minutes ago, davide256 said:

 

 

 I got my 1.7s  within a year after they were in market, have not ever observed this after several years of use. What I have observed is that you can't make them work well in less than a 12 x 20 room. And that you should absolutely get an amp with 4 ohm taps, they will not sound as good on 8 ohm taps. I'd also ponder whether the amp used for to drive the Maggies had an adequate damping factor to control them.

Good questions.

 

I used the 4 Ohm tap of an Audio Research amp and a top shelf solid state amp that puts out 400 wpc into 4 Ohms.

 

The effect is known as "panel slapback" according to what I researched.  You may NEVER hear it if you don't listen to music with the specific frequency information that causes it.

 

Aside from this issue, I find the bass performance on the 1.7is to be exceptionally good.

[davide256]

23 hours ago, Fair Hedon said:

Good questions.

 

I used the 4 Ohm tap of an Audio Research amp and a top shelf solid state amp that puts out 400 wpc into 4 Ohms.

 

The effect is known as "panel slapback" according to what I researched.  You may NEVER hear it if you don't listen to music with the specific frequency information that causes it.

 

Aside from this issue, I find the bass performance on the 1.7is to be exceptionally good.

I did some reading on this... you have to have a high powered amp and you have to be playing a bass tone loudly that’s too low for the panels to handle within their excursion range. Suspect when you heard it was on lowest string bass notes. 

[Fair Hedon]

14 hours ago, davide256 said:

I did some reading on this... you have to have a high powered amp and you have to be playing a bass tone loudly that’s too low for the panels to handle within their excursion range. Suspect when you heard it was on lowest string bass notes. 

I suspect in general you are correct. Although volume levels were not crazy, Interestingly I noted it only one one track with

electric bass, but a few with acoustic bass.

[Mshenay]

I actually had a chance to spend a whole afternoon listening to a set of 1.7s and I found myself quite smitten with them! 

 

 

Powered by a Rouge Audio Tube, and fed by my own HM 901. I too really enjoyed listening to them! I've got a set of LSR 308s I like for movies in a smaller room, I'll likely wind up with a set of these in our larger space here shortly! 

 

Either way nice read

[Ralf11]

once ya go maggie, ya can't go back