MTS-01 Mini Review

**Warpdrv** · **01-17-08, 09:59 AM**

Ok I got my speakers yesterday.... so I unboxed them and then had to run to work.
I figured I would take a little time for people to get a feeling about the MTS's.
When I have more time in with them, I will post up more pics, and a more thorough review..

UPS, needless to say had an incident with one of the towers, Broke my heart when I opened the box...

you can barely see it in the pic but up close its a disaster.

First observations.....
I just got home from work, and have been running through some different types of music that I am extremely familiar with here, Nora Jones (Come Away With Me, Don't know Why), Ray Charles Duets (Fever - Natalie Cole, Here We Go Again - Nora Jones, You Don't Know Me - Diana Krall) Extremely Smooth, Transparent, just neutral... The imaging is out of this world, which I lend to the tweeters, I have never heard speakers this smooth before... Mid range and mid bass are just clean and clear, non accentuated or punchy in one or the other. I think there is magic in these tweeters, soft dome is smooth, missing nothing here... I can't tell you how many soft dome tweeters I have come across that it felt like someone put cotton in my ears.... The Scan Speak Air Circ's are balanced and true to their source. Turning my head from one side to another I get no differenciation in sound... My room is small here but the sound is just everywhere. The speakers are not placed optimally in my room right now (too close together), but I feel it will make little difference here. They don't seem to be effected by placement thus far. I'm waiting on a new dresser and my equipment will be moving to the basement to be hidden late this week or early next week, waiting on my 25ft HDMI chord.

These speakers are extremely heavy, the Center Channel is a bit to lug around and it is 3/4's the width of my 42" plasma. The towers are awkward, soft smooth sides everywhere make it hard to grab onto anything. Wrapping on the sides on any of the speakers gives one a dead thunk, its seems almost deader then the sub boxes. The bookshelves are bigger then my Paradigm Studio 20's and much heavier. Build quality is amazing, from the solid cabinets, to the magnetic front grills, sweet... The Rosenut is beautiful, really stands out, not glossy or distracting, but just right. I am pairing my new MTS system in my 1700^3 bedroom with a SVS PB-12 Plus. It is clear that everything on SVS's mid level speaker system is very well built. These speakers will not be leaving my house....

I am running them off of a Pioneer Elite 91, which serves as my temp Pre-Amp, and I have yet to figure out what amp I will be going with, Emotiva XPA-5 is due out soon, but obviously there are endless products out there. My Rotel 1095 is working with my Studio .v4 system. I bring this up because I believe that I am under powering them even in 2 channel mode, I measured between 105 - 110 db before they started to compress/break up a bit. That hurt my ears, very very loud, but they still delivered, for a 2 way speaker I think they really held their composure with grace. I can only imagine that the proper amp would really make them sing, loud enough to be completly unbarable, but still hold it together.

Packaging was great, double boxed wrapped in a thin silky plastic mylar, and surrounded by foam padding all around, heavy thick foam on top and bottom, obviously they will not endure a high falling drop like UPS let them have... grrr but the speakers boxed weigh 70lbs. They would have had needed 4-6" of foam to protect against that drop...

So far, I love them... I have yet to put them through the paces of movies. But with transient impactful spikes like in Constantine - 2 minute mark when Manual finds the dagger, and walks into the road and the car gets totaled by hitting Manual - 0 to 110db measured instantaniuosly -Whoa they truly deliver !!!! Not one hesitation... WOW !!

**Bob_99** · **01-17-08, 11:06 AM**

Nice review and it sounds like SVS delivered another great product. Will you be returning the damaged speaker?

Bob

**Warpdrv** · **01-17-08, 12:21 PM**

Yes... I was on the phone Erik@SVS with tears in my eyes right away. Had me Email him the damage to the box, and the speaker. They already issued me an RMA and will be shipping me a new speaker, with a shipping label to return the bad one.

First time I have had a damaged package from SVS but those were all subs, on a palet, and these are individual boxes, where they have no control. Too bad they couldn't pallet the whole shipment, but that would add to the cost.

**Big Worm** · **01-17-08, 07:52 PM**

Very nice review! Thanks. Just looks alone is enough to want to buy them. Congrats on the setup.

**Bob_99** · **01-18-08, 06:35 AM**

Quote:

Warpdrv wrote:

Yes... I was on the phone Erik@SVS with tears in my eyes right away. Had me Email him the damage to the box, and the speaker. They already issued me an RMA and will be shipping me a new speaker, with a shipping label to return the bad one.

First time I have had a damaged package from SVS but those were all subs, on a palet, and these are individual boxes, where they have no control. Too bad they couldn't pallet the whole shipment, but that would add to the cost.

Yes, it's really hard to wait so anxiously for something only to receive it and find out it has to be returned and you have to wait some more. That always drove me nuts.

Bob

**Warpdrv** · **01-18-08, 09:40 AM**

Yeah but the nice thing is, I'm only 2 days away from their delivery... In the mean time I have been using them and they are really sounding great...

Spent the last night with my buddy wiring up a ton of stuff in my house including all new speaker wire, HDMI, Sat cable, Cat6 cables... In wall runs... fun fun fun...
I saved about $1K doing it ourselves.. but the clean look will be great. All the equipment will be in the basement and just the Plasma and speakers in room.

I will post up some pics when Im done...

**mazersteven** · **01-18-08, 02:54 PM**

Quote:

Warpdrv wrote:

Yes... I was on the phone Erik@SVS .

Erik is my man. That is who is hooking me up with the MTS's.

**Warpdrv** · **01-22-08, 11:19 AM**

Can't wait to hear your thoughts on them... Have you gotten them yet...?

**mazersteven** · **01-22-08, 09:35 PM**

Quote:

Warpdrv wrote:

Can't wait to hear your thoughts on them... Have you gotten them yet...?

Not yet. I think I'm just going to get both Towers and Bookshelf's. Is there a big difference or can I get a good idea of what the MTS family would sound like with just the bookshelf speakers? I figure that the towers would have more bass extension, but is that it? Or no?

**Warpdrv** · **01-22-08, 10:32 PM**

Info from SVS about the difference of the two... I would imagine their standpoint as well as my own would be that the speakers either the MTS or MBS were developed to be mated with a subwoofer... I don't think that you will see a huge difference in them, although I will be doing a comparison... I haven't had time..

Quote:

The MTS-01 and the MBS-01 have similar F6 points (actually a better way to describe the FR rather than a +/- 3 dB tolerance because the FR is quite flat over the pass band). With that said, the MTS-01 does have a somewhat shallower roll-off profile down toward system tuning. On our website, you can see the 4th order roll-off “break-point” occur at ~40 Hz for the MTS-01 and at ~50 Hz for the MBS-01. So the MTS-01 does have better bass extension both subjectively and objectively, even though the two models have about the same F6 point.

**mazersteven** · **01-23-08, 02:34 AM**

Quote:

Warpdrv wrote:

Info from SVS about the difference of the two... I would imagine their standpoint as well as my own would be that the speakers either the MTS or MBS were developed to be mated with a subwoofer... I don't think that you will see a huge difference in them, although I will be doing a comparison... I haven't had time..

So according to SVS they are pretty close to one another with the MTS towers going a little lower, but not by much.

**Warpdrv** · **01-23-08, 07:05 AM**

Correct....

**Funkmonkey** · **01-23-08, 12:00 PM**

hey Warp, have you had a chance to compare them to your Paradigms yet? I am not trying to pressure you or anything, it's just that I have heard the Paradigm Studio series and I like their sound, so they would make a good reference point for me. I have been running all over town listening to speakers, and these are one set I know I cannot find in stores. Thank you for posting about these speakers, you seem to be the only guy out there willing to share an opinion.
cheers,
Greg

**Warpdrv** · **01-23-08, 05:12 PM**

I will be having a small GTG at my house on FEB 10th... so Milwaukee area people chime in if you would like to join the shootout..

I have not set them up side by side with the Paradigms just yet... but I can tell you that IMO they are a softer less aggressive speaker then the Paradigm... The Tweeters are just right, not piercing - no EQ'ing needed at all... the mids and mid bass is true to the material.... not as forward as the Paradigms. I do have to take them out to my bright room Hard Wood Floors, lots of high ceilings - echoey...

They seem to me to be more of a natural sound... The Paradigms have some coloration or punchiness to them and the tweeters ring brightly with the metal domes, so much that my delicate ears can't handle them, I have to EQ them down...

Last night I hung my Bookshelves on the wall, and let me tell you that was no easy task, they are heavy, and they look much bigger then I had in mind when thinking about wall mounted side surrounds...

WOW

I'm sure that when the women get a look at those in there,, they will just shake their heads... "MEN

"

So this whole time I have been running in 3 channel mode with no EQ or delays or distances as I never ran the Auto-Config on my receiver, just speaker size and x-over, they sounded fantastic... just clean, smooth, accurate. Anyways, after getting all 5 of them hooked up, I ran the MCACC on the Pioneer, to see what it would do to them, got all the distances perfect, delays were good... speaker size wrong - but it just downright slaughtered them with the EQ - it was all over the map and they sounded obnoxious...

So after resetting them all down to small x-over 80hz and taking out all the EQ back to flat... they were even better then before, where the Receiver accounted for the reverb, delay, and possibly phase in the room...

I continue to appreciate how accurate they are... sometimes to a fault, if you have bad recordings you'll hear that edge of it... with some crappy MP3 stuff, it was noticable... I have a ton of MP3's on my server that I stream, and I could really tell with some of the stuff.

One of my favorite albums that I keep going back to is Michael Hedges - Taproot, Grammy Nominee, (Did alot of recording with Windham Hill Studios) If you haven't heard his stuff, check it out.. http://www.nomadland.com/Point_A.htm Grammy "Rootwitch" & "I Carry Your Heart"
Explosive solo acoustic guitar work... Spectacular voice... They just play so nicely on that material.. If you want to seal the deal with a womans heart, play "I carry your heart", she'll fall for you in a second, if she's listening...

Another fantastic, somewhat obscure/strange album I love - Circue du Soleil - Mystere a type of rock symphony with a western/russian flare to it, saw the show in vegas, had to have the CD... Amazing... Spectacular Vocals - deep bass tracks, great electric violins, plucky electric guitar, AWESOME... Makes me really appreciate what the MTS lineup has to offer... Would I run them without a Sub... no... I wouldn't with my Studio 100's either.

The only thing I have a problem with is - and this is just nitpicky, but they just sit too low for my bedroom, so I am going to build some 4-6" speaker stands to raise them up a bit higher... but that is my room, and I'm sitting on bed up higher then normal..

Well thats all for now, tonight I can finish setting up my equipment with the Pronto TSU- 9600 and then move all the equipment down to the basement out of site... so I have alot of work, but no more ugly equipment or wires everywhere...

**mazersteven** · **01-23-08, 05:50 PM**

Thanks again for sharing your thoughts.

**Funkmonkey** · **01-23-08, 08:55 PM**

Thats what i was hoping for in regards to the Paradigms, a bit more neutral. I thought that the Paradigms were a bit forward for my taste, too. Though I have no problem using an EQ to tailor my sound a little...

Thanks for that, good luck with the GTG. I am looking forward to read about the results,
Cheers

**Warpdrv** · **01-24-08, 08:03 AM**

Yeah they are deffinately more neutral then the Paradigms...

I kinda liken the Paradigms to a Boxer... in your face, and taking jabs at ya...
And I'm with you FunkMonkey, I don't mind using an EQ as long as its only to remove and not to add... where adding EQ tends to introduce distortion...

**Warpdrv** · **01-24-08, 11:28 PM**

Well tonight I finished my bedroom setup, moving all equipment to the basement, finalized my pronto setup for complete remote accessibility to have a clean setup with no electronics, just speakers, sub and plasma.. I am very happy with the results... Please excuse the lack of decoration and color, those will be the next items I will be tackling... slowly but surely, I will get there...

I took the time to take some pictures so you all can see, as well as some speaker dissasembly for some internal views of drivers and tweeters...
Enjoy....

**mike c** · **01-25-08, 12:24 AM**

wow! thanks for sharing the opened up pics. I'd never have the heart to do something like that.

**Sonnie** · **01-25-08, 12:31 AM**

Very interesting... thanks for the pics and review...

I got a giggle out of the password.

**Funkmonkey** · **01-25-08, 03:13 AM**

Nice pics Warp, seeing the the inside of the speakers makes me want to build my own...

**Warpdrv** · **01-25-08, 09:44 AM**

Quote:

mike c wrote:

wow! thanks for sharing the opened up pics. I'd never have the heart to do something like that.

Yeah, I was even on the phone the whole time when I was taking it apart... It went really smoothly, just a philips head, and remove the screws, and the drivers just wanted to fall right out... nice and easy...

They are just really braced well, and thick walled... lends itself to be quite the low resonance cabinet.
The Peerless Nomex drivers are much heavier then I would have thought... the dual ring magnet seems pretty heavy duty...

**mazersteven** · **01-27-08, 08:42 AM**

I haven't auditioned them yet, but here are a few pictures I took. These are gorgeous, and very large bookshelf speakers. Excellent built quality, and finish.

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