Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Advice from Axiom Owners Energy RC-10

Just wanted some thoughts on people who have heard it. How does this speaker compare with the Axiom bookshelf speakers? Thanks.

Can't say I've heard the Energy brand, however, I know this subject has come up. You might search for "Energy" in the subject line.

It's been awhile since I listened to a set of Energy bookshlef speakers, other than a set of Take5's my brother-in-law has. I seem to remember the RC10 sounding similar to the M3's

I'm fond of Energy speakers. If Axiom didn't exist my home system would likely consist of Energy speakers. In fact, it was Energy's (and Paradigm's) 'canadian-ness' that led to my discovery of Axiom.

I still have the remnants of an old 'Take5' system floating around at my house acting as kitchen & workout room speakers. They are/were good little speakers. They share the Axiom goal of neutrality and clarity. Energy used to also talk about the Canadian sound research stuff that Axiom touts. I feel that Energy speakers are acoustically very similar to Axiom speakers. Axiom's give you more bang for the buck, but Energy does make good products.

I've not heard any of their 'reference connoisseur' speakers but I did listen to a few from the 'connoisseur' line a few years ago. As I recall, they were good but not good enough to make me want to switch away from Axiom.

My favorite Energy speaker is the 2.3i Veritas. Very lovely speaker. I think it might even be better than the M80. But they're $3,000/pair. Really good, but not worth double the cost over M80's to me.

My Brother has an Energy 5.1 set with floorstander mains that I can't recall the ver. of.

Different house different room but they sound pretty nice. As I recall, very nice vocals and very detailed highs. I think it is safe to say that in his configuration, they required a subwoofer to fill the bottom end way more than my M60s do in comparison. However, if combined with a good sub, they would be pretty nice I think. His floorstander mains have a fairly small, tight cabinet around smaller drivers compared to Axioms florrstanders, which might contribute to it's heavier reliance on a sub.

I can't actually remember if his sub is Energy. I think it is something else actually but I definitely remember the bass to be weaker than my setup, even compared with my living room setup where my cheap Sony sub is just there to help fill the large room a little and the lone M60s do most of the work in full range mode. Downstairs, the M60s with my EP500 is by far superior.

Of course, it's unfair to compare his setup to one with an EP500 and also, it might just have been how he has things adjusted. Maybe he has tuned out the bass potential as a musical preference and therefore my comparisons are made totally unusable.

Thats interesting Peter. If you look at the measurements on soundstage.com for the M22 and RC10, they are very similar. The M22 has a little less distortion, is slightly flatter to 5KHz and has slightly better off axis response.

I have no idea exactly how all this would affect the overall sound though.

Hi,

I've not heard the Energy RC-10, but generally speaking, Energy speakers--when they were still designed and built in Canada--were very good, with similar properties of neutrality to Axioms, perhaps a little less linear overall.

Now, since Klipsch purchased all of Audio Products International (the parent company of Mirage, Energy and a couple of other brands) and the original designers are no longer part of the company, it's anyone's guess what the current line is like. They're all built in China now, and knowing the Klipsch tendency to horn-load all its tweeters, it doesn't auger well for a smooth, wide-range frequency response.

p.s. Peter: "My favorite Energy speaker is the 2.3i Veritas. Very lovely speaker. I think it might even be better than the M80. But they're $3,000/pair. Really good, but not worth double the cost over M80's to me."

Nope, not better than the M80s. I reviewed the big Energy Veritas speakers, and they're very good, but a little dull in the midrange compared to Axiom's M80s. The midrange sags about 3 to 5 dB, which is quite audible. That said, they're very smooth with excellent bass, but certainly not superior to the M80s.

I would hope that Klipsch leaves the Energy lineup alone and not tinker with the designs.

Regards,

Alan

5db is quite a bit of sag!

Out of curiosity Alan. At what point are veriations from flat audible in the mid range. I have seen numbers that vary from 1/4db (pink noise) to 3db with various bits of research to support the different levels.

I am curious what your personal experience is.

Edit: Im am talking about a broad rise or dip in the midrange. I am aware that the narrower the peak/dip the less likey it is to be audible.

Hi Alan,

I have a different opinion of the Veritas 2.3, I own a pair along with the 2.0C veritas center channel.

I find that, at least to my ears, and with that specific pair that I have, the mids are 3 to 5db more prominent, not less prominent. There has always been this "bump" in the mid range and on certain frequencies it's actualy anoying. Not very often but on a few pieces of music I have the mids are to much. They do shine on female vocals though. I also find that I don't get much bass out of them in their current room / location. At one point I was seriously thinking of selling them and getting a pair of M80s to get more bass, but as it turns out, when I moved the speakers to another room in the house, they produce quite a bit of bass so it's the room not the speaker.

My opinion of my Veritas are really good highs, good mids in general but exagerated bump on some material, yet very good on female vocals. Bass could be better, but the room does not help my situation. I should have gotten the 2.4s at the time, one more driver probably more bass.

I cannot compare directly with M80s since I have never heard them yet.

Cheers,
Stephane

Hi Fred,

Broad midrange sags are VERY audible with music. To be certain of my recollections, I went to the Soundstage NRC curves. First, it was the Energy Veritas 2.4i (not the 2.3i) which I heard at length and evaluated so I don't want to castigate the 2.3i. You can see the 2.4i's measurements here:

http://www.soundstagenetwork.com/measurements/energy_veritas_v24i/
Note, the "Listening Window" curve is the best predictor, in my experience, as to what the speaker will sound like in most typically furnished rooms, because it's a combination of the on-axis and off-axis frequency response measurements. As such it best represents the combination of direct and reflected sounds that reach your ears directly from the speakers and reflected from walls, ceiling and floors in typical rooms.

The Energy 2.3i is the sister speaker of the 2.4i with two 6.5-inch woofers rather than the 2.4i's three woofers. I bet the overall curve of the 2.3i would be very similar to the 2.4i, with perhaps a little less deep bass output and extension (the enclosure is 5 inches shorter and less deep than the 2.4i).

On the 2.4i's curve, you'll note that at 1 kHz, the frequency response is -3 dB relative to the bass output between 100 and 300 Hz. Even if you reference the speaker to its output at 1 kHz, the midrange output goes down another 3 dB by 3 kHz, then by 5 kHz climbs back to the roughly the same level as at 1 kHz. Referenced that way, you could say that the 2.4 has a broad hump in bass output with a gradual depression in the midrange.

But our hearing is really peaked through the midrange, so our initial impressions of any speaker's sound will be formed largely by the shape of the speaker's frequency response between about 100 Hz and 4 kHz. The expression "it's all in the midrange" really does hold true. In the history of the NRC's double blind testing over 25 years, the speakers whose midrange response remained within +/- 1 to 1.5 dB through that region were always rated the highest on the listening tests in terms of being uncolored and musically accurate. Not surprising, given that the important fundamental tones and harmonics for most musical instruments fall into this frequency range.

The Energy's response overall is still very smooth, and in blind comparisons with other very good speakers, the differences would be audible but minor--"slightly muted compared to speaker B" "a little bit dull in the mids. ." (speaker B being the M80 v2). These are typical remarks of mine, but overall I would have rated it very well, on almost the same level as the M80 v2, with perhaps a slight edge to the M80 because of its more detailed midrange.

Regards,

Alan

Hi Stephane,

Oh, that's interesting! My theory about the 2.3i's midrange being similar to the 2.4i's may be wrong, and since I never heard the 2.3i, then what you report is likely accurate and not a function of the room. Certainly the 2.3i's enclosure is quite a lot smaller and with one less woofer, it would use a different crossover. So its bass output relative to the midrange would not be nearly as prominent as the 2.4i's. Hence the midrange would be more prominent relative to the bass.

To summarize what I said to FredK, it just takes a slight readjustment of midrange response relative to bass output and a speaker can be heard completely differently. As an example, when I first joined Axiom in 2002 and heard the M80s back then, I was not happy with the midrange--it seemed to have a glitch, an edginess that made some instruments hard-sounding. Ian re-designed the crossover--it was really a slight adjustment to the midrange--and then we did blind listening tests at Axiom with a bunch of my colleagues. We all chose Speaker B (the redesigned crossover) over Speaker A (the original M80), so the new crossover became a running change in production by 2003.

In my view, making that slight adjustment made the M80 into a really terrific loudspeaker. The change wasn't dramatic and was only noticeable on certain instruments (brasses, violins, vocals) but after the change, I could unhesitatingly recommend the M80 as a great loudspeaker.

Regards,

Alan

Thank you for answering so articulately Alan. Though Dr. Tool has a following in the audio community, it is hard to find anyone who has both an understanding of the research and practical experience in its application.

A number of his followers would tell me that a 3db hump would horribly and unimaginably (is that a word??) colour a speaker and render it useless except as a door stop.

Your answer matches with what I read in the many reviews people do on various boards of speakers they have listened to. Differences between good speakers are more subtle than some would have us believe.

In MY community, I'm often called a Toole.

At least you're called...

Um, Mark, I think you're talking about Tulle

Actually, I was thinking about Tilly. A lot.



(Image cropped since this is a family forum)

Pan down! Pan down!

And the movie is... ?

Great line, Tom. I had a good LOL.

Alan

Peter, that's not a movie still. That's a Polaroid from strip poker night at medic8r manor.

Jennifer does love a good game of poker.

What?! Really??

<internet research commences...>

Wow. I didn't realize that Energy was now owned by the Klipsch conglomerate. I guess you do learn somethin' new every day. That means that pretty much everything I remember about Energy might be null-and-void now. If they've adopted more of a 'Klipschy' sound, I'm NOT going to like them any more.

I don't remember the 2.3's (or were they 2.4's??) having a recessed midrange. It's been years, and memory isn't kind to audio tests, but I just remember their sound as really lovely and clear. Nice and powerful bass, pleasant midrange, and clear highs. Of course, I had also been listening to Klipsch and B&W speakers that day too, so maybe my memory is more tainted than I realize.

All I know is that when I heard 2.3/2.4's, I liked them. But they were way too expensive for me, and M80's are at least even on performance (if not better) for a fraction of the cost.

Asking the great Google, I found a this thread from Audioholics from a few years ago on this very topic. A moderately interesting read, IMHO.

Of course, all of this is straying far off from the original poster's question.... I say, buy a pair of RC-10's from somewhere with a return policy, and then buy a pair of M2/M3/M22 to compare it to. Whichever set you like the least, send back.

Tweeet... Two minute penalty to Peter for offering sensible advice before page 4 in a thread.

revenge of the nerds

Being a desktop-bookshelf man...I think the extremely beefy nature of the Energy V2.2i's to be awesome.

Wouldn't mind if those beauties graced my desk some day :-)



P.S. These are beefy too...



Ok...done picture-jacking this thread

Bigger and beefier still...

Nice camera trick.

Aww shoot. I forgot about that memo. I will do better next time, I promise.

It's no trick,

Chilli

Holly cow batman!

And to think... Peter doubted me.

Has the "Bovine that ate Goteborg" come out on Blu-Ray yet?

I have a link to old speaker auditions that I did a few years back including some Energy speakers.

I have to add that my impressions of the monitor audio speakers have changed slightly since that point since I have had the chance to A\B them with axioms and my big Tannoys.

Do tell.

Yeah, Chess, spill the beans already. As a former Monitor Audio owner (actually, I still own them) I'm interested to hear your opinion.

Just in case it's any help at all...here are my thoughts back in July of '03 after some extensive listening between some Energy Veritas and Axiom M60's.

I also posted some thoughts between the Energy C-3 and Axiom M-22 prior to my earliest Axiom purchase...just a quick note...

"After some exhaustive research, I recently purchased a pair of your M22ti speakers - and love them! I even went so far as to also purchase a pair of Energy Connoisseur C-3's and brought them home for a A/B comparison with the M22's before making my final choice! The M22's were much clearer and cleaner sounding than the Energy's. The Energy's had the edge on low-end, but with the added sub to fill in the lows, the M22's blew the Energy's out of the water."

Hi spiffnme,

Great to read your excellent reviews and comparisons back in '03, and your listening judgements are dead-accurate (they correlate very closely with my double-blind comparisons of various speakers including Axioms).

I took note of this comment especially:

"Soundstage - Another win for the M60's. I think this is where having the Radio Shack switcher helped a lot. Upon immediately switching you could hear the sound just "open up". The Veritas sounded compressed and "closed in" in comparision."

To reflect on FredK's question on the 3-dB or more depression in the Veritas 2.4's frequency response, this sense of "opening up" is exactly what I heard comparing the Axiom M80s or M22s to the Veritas 2.4. Those differences are quite noticeable--even dramatically so--when you do instantaneous comparisons as you did, and I wish more enthusiasts would rush out and buy the Radio Shack switcher to do careful comparisons.

However, to answer Fredk, a 3-dB difference is subjectively "somewhat louder" or "slightly softer". If you hear the Veritas speakers by themselves, in isolation, they sound quite lovely because the gentle midrange dip is that--gradual. No nasty spikes or resonances. But put a pair of M80s, M60s or M22s into the mix and switch immediately and suddenly the Veritas 2.4s sound somewhat dull or "closed in" (as you said) compared to the Axiom M80s or M22s (or M60s).

Regards,

Alan

Thanks for those additional comments Alan.

I suspect that is why some of my observations deviate from others here. I had a chance to listen to the various Axiom speakers in an a/b switched environment. I do not think that the differences between the M60 and M80 would have been so noticable if the comparison had been done by switching cables.

When I auditioned at several dealers, I was dissapointed that none of them had such a simple setup for doing comparisons.

When Mojo and I did our M22/M60/M80 comparo, the M80s and M60s were A/B switched through the Denon, a very slight delay, and the detail/tone of the 2 was easily noticeable when changed. We were both able to pick out which was playing. I suspect a golden eared person might be able to do the same even with cable swap, which is how Mojo and I did the Paradigm Monitor 11 to M80 comparison, again the differences were easily picked out, once you could identify a point of reference, such as the string reverb on the M80 and lack there of on the monitor 11. It just takes some very careful listening to pinpoint the differences, had the M80s not been there, I most likely would not have noticed that bit of detailed difference.

Okay so I recently bought the RC-10 just to answer my own question. Well they are still in the break-in stage and so I won't do a critical comparison with the M3Ti yet. However, from initial listening they sound smoother than the M3Ti. The treble is really amazing. It never sounds harsh or have any glare when playing a bright recording. The mid range is pretty sweet sounding and neutral. The sound is a bit on the laid back side. Sound stage is adequately wide in a smaller room, and imaging is decent though not very crisp. The most impressive aspect besides the smoothness of the top end, is that these RC-10s are great at low volume. There's impact and musicality that shines forth even when playing softly. These speakers would be great for playing background music in the evening. Finally the cabinets and binding posts are top notch quality. I'd definitely say it's a step up from the standard M3Ti vinyl finish.

Thanks for the update, you make the sound like a very easy to listen to speaker, great for all around playback.