Martin Logan

[hifinutt]

I am sure many of you have martin logans . I thought I would start a thread . I have had my summit x for nearly 4 years now and they continue to excel . their BIG BIG wide spacious sound very enjoyable .

many folks who come round are amazed and those non hifi types want too know why sound is coming out of the gas fire in the middle of the speakers !!

 

[Cambs12]

Just watched the first video.Licking the panels could be a new activity for bakeoffs ;-)

 

[It Cost How Much!?!]

 

[hifinutt]

On the ml forum there is actually instructions for showering them !!

 

[pmac]

On the ml forum there is actually instructions for showering them !!

I remember reading that when I had a pair. Never did get around to trying it though :nup:

 

[hifinutt]

In case anyone is tempted I think one of our summer members is selling a rather nice ml ethos

 

[hifinutt]

a rather special weekend in london at kj west one if you are a fan of ML

http://www.martinlogan.com/neolith/

15th 16th

 

[Jules_S]

I may be wrong, but I couldn't find a thread for owners past, present & future of Martin Logan, so here's one to get us going!

Not too sure how many current owners there are on the 'Wam, but as of this coming Sunday I shall be joining the ranks! After spending most of last year and all of this year thinking about trying a pair of Summits, and having spent a very enjoyable day at @Lurch Towers listening to his newly-acquired pair, I have pulled the pin and bought a pair.

Sunday is going to be a long day - about 10 hours travelling by car, so I won't be doing anything more than getting them indoors. Setup will have to wait for during the week but I'm really looking forward to seeing if I can get them to work better in my room than my current (and excellent) Q Acoustic Concept 500. I'm keeping everything crossed that the dispersion patterns of the dipole, plus the adjustments available on the bass, will let me dial them in to get the best results from a long, narrow L-shaped room.

So come on Wammers, who else is a proud owner or ex-owner? Share your stories and tips on getting them set up

 

[hifinutt]

jules , here you go . started in 2015 

https://www.hifiwigwam.com/forum/topic/107104-martin-logan/

 

[Jules_S]

Oooo that's done my head in. So I started a thread, but somehow that's now part of an older one? Took me a while to get my head round that! But thanks anyway, and the fact that no-one has posted since 2016 is probably why I couldn't find the original!

Will post more next week once I have had at least some chance to play with them

 

[hifinutt]

ah have no fear , i found the old one and the mods kindly merged . always good to get some more experinces . look forward to how you get on did you get summit or summit x ? . there are a nice pair of ethos knocking about in the classifieds which are very good too . 

these are some pics of my sadly gone summit x . the stella stands improve them even more 



my son loved the blue lights which lit up the room , and the adjustment on the back to give more bass 

 

[Jules_S]

So Sunday was a VERY long day. 9.5 hours and 500 miles of driving, and I am now the proud owner of a new (well, new to me) pair of Martin Logan Summit. Due to being home so late they just got brought into the house and plonked in the office until yesterday.

After hefting them (not light, are they?) into place in the lounge and plugging them into both signal and power, I stuck a CD in the drawer and hit play. And.... nothing. Absolutely nothing. No music, no hisses, pops, squeaks, nada.

Fearing the worst, that the car journey home had done for them, I plugged my old speakers back in, and to my slight relief.... still nothing. So not the speakers then. Only after changing to streaming internet radio did I get some music, and then I realised that for some bizarre reason my CD-player-acting-as-a-DAC hadn't locked onto the signal from the transport. That's never happened before, no idea what happened. Anyway, managed to coax my temperamental CD player into loading and reading a disc, and bingo. So swapped back to the MLs to check they were OK too.

Oh. My. God. Despite being completely randomly placed about 4 feet apart and with absolutely no thought to placement I am absolutely gobsmacked at the sound I'm hearing. I thoroughly enjoyed them at the seller's house, and the previous Sunday I spent a very enjoyable day at @Lurch Towers listening to John's new pair, but somehow there's nothing like hearing things in your own environment, with the usual acoustics etc. Much as I love my Concept 500s, and they really are an excellent and enjoyable listen, I realise what I've been missing here.

The Summits just bring music to life at any volume, with greater dynamics both great and small, more shape and texture to instruments, and a LOT more in the bass department! Having now moved the Q's out of the way and at least attempted an initial placement, the MLs are already beginning to show their potential, and I know there will be a lot more to coax out of them over the coming weeks, with refining the placement. I can't wait to play more and see what they can really do, even with my modest front end (which is now going to need a step-up in performance!)

Pics to come later, although you will have to excuse the lack of care over their current location. Phil, I note your comments about the stands for them, and as I made my own similar version for my current (old?) speakers I will probably do the same again once I have decided on placement. These things are way too bloody heavy to be heaved around on sprung isolating platforms!

I will no doubt be coming back here again for some setup advice over the coming weeks. I've read the advice given in the user manual and looked at the videos on Youtube, but would be interested to hear other's experiences about setup and if they stuck rigorously to the standard advice or found that something else worked for them.

Now, off to enjoy some more music!

 

[hifinutt]

fab , yes i had my trusty torch with me to get the EXACT sweet spot . shining it from my face to get exact position . glad they are working well . one has to hoover the panels gently with a gentle brush every few months as they attract dust a bit 

 

[Jules_S]

fab , yes i had my trusty torch with me to get the EXACT sweet spot . shining it from my face to get exact position . glad they are working well . one has to hoover the panels gently with a gentle brush every few months as they attract dust a bit 

I did have a very quick go with the torch trick last night, but I couldn't seem to get the reflection on the inner third. Even with the speakers facing directly forward the light seemed to bound off the centre. Perhaps I was doing it wrong, or my perception of what was straight ahead wasn't quite right. Anyway, for the time being I've just gone with a slight toe-in as a start point. They are 150cm from the front wall (to the panel, not the back of the bass enclosure) and 75cm from the side walls - I can't bring them in any further due to the limitations of the room dimensions and the size of the telly behind them! That means they are roughly 160cm apart and my listening distance is twice that.

Hoovering one's speakers just seems like the weirdest thing ever! But I shall take a deep breath and have a go in a couple of months.

Out of interest, why did you end up selling your Summit X? Keen to understand if you felt there was a problem you couldn't resolve, or just fancied a change.

 

[Camverton]

Martin Logans are splendid speakers, particularly for a single listener, and they can bring the music to life in a way that box speakers struggle to get close to.

It can be a bit of a time consuming business to get the best out of them in any particular room. Much depends on what sort of sound the listener prefers. Because they react with the room, different presentations can be had according to a combination of their position from the wall behind them, from the side walls, the degree of toe-in and the degree of tilt, not forgetting the relationship of the listening position to the speakers.

My preference was for what I perceived as a realistic presentation of acoustic classical music and as a result I tended to have them closer to the side walls than recommended and with a slightly greater tilt back. This took away from the highly focussed, in your face sound. If I listened mostly to rock and electronic music I might have gone for a more hifi sound by tilting them forward and having them as far from walls as possible. The amount of toe-in also affects the degree of spaciousness but the idea of the inner third pointing to the listener is a good starting point. It’s certainly worth experimenting  and spending time listening between each movement.

Of course, it can be difficult when the ‘best’ position doesn’t work with the other uses of the room. They can be capricious speakers, but can be capable of stunning sound and will make a return to conventional speakers very difficult.

 

[Jules_S]

This sounds like excellent advice, and in line with the manufacturer's own recommendations. The one thing I took away from all the text and videos really is - have fun with playing around with the placement. And that's part of the enjoyment I think, investing that time and having a go. What I will try to be mindful of is not getting frustrated if I think things aren't working - I know they have enormous potential and I shall just do my best to extract as much as possible, given the limitations of the space they are in.

Your last paragraph pretty much hits the nail on the head. The room is not a dedicated listening room, it's our lounge and has to function as a space to enjoy music, TV, working or just chilling out. I have a very narrow window of possible placement to the side walls as the photo shows, this is thankfully over the 2 feet recommendation from ML but I cannot get them any closer together due to the required viewing angles for the telly. Mind you I don't think I'd want that anyway or I suspect the perceived stage width would be reduced. Front to back is no problem at all, they can go anything from 75cm up to 2.5m into the room from the front wall, although that would put them uncomfortably close to the rest of the kit, which might have to relocate. I suspect that keeping them well into the room is the better choice than moving them back, due to the reflections from the front wall. I was reading up about the impact of the time delay on that, apparently over 5ms and the ear perceives the interaction between direct and reflected sound as "ambience" rather than something annoying.

Once the "honeymoon" period is over I'll start with some more critical listening, with emphasis on trying to get the bass correct first. The suckouts are the things that annoy me the most, far more than the peaks, so I am hoping that playing with placement will help minimise this. And hopefully the peaks can be evened-out with the two levelling controls. If necessary I'll investigate some bass traps too.



P.S. Should have said, the room is 21ft long and 10.5ft wide, and to the left of where I'm standing is the dining area which is 10ft x 11ft, making an L-shaped room

 

[hifinutt]

looks great Jules , you are a lucky man if you can have them that far out !! i had to have mine far back near the wall otherwise SWMBO would be on the warpath . Its all about compromise in a shared room . still sounded AWESOME though . having them on plinths or chopping boards helps with moving them as well . is it a solid floor ?  

 

[Jules_S]

looks great Jules , you are a lucky man if you can have them that far out !! i had to have mine far back near the wall otherwise SWMBO would be on the warpath . Its all about compromise in a shared room . still sounded AWESOME though . having them on plinths or chopping boards helps with moving them as well . is it a solid floor ?  

Solid floor? Ha! I wish!! It's basically a wooden trampoline, quite awful. The plan for next year's DIY is to completely rip up and replace it with a far more rigid (and insulated) solution, one that doesn't vibrate with every footstep.

I built my own DIY version of isolation platforms for my Q Acoustics speakers and found they definitely benefitted the bass definition as well as making some improvement to the image focus. Unfortunately the platforms are too small to be re-used for the Summits, so I'll have to make some new ones, but to begin with my intention is to do exactly what you suggested, just put them on something plain that will make it easier to move them around for placement. I can put all the spiky, bouncy stuff on afterwards  Still can't get my head around how a sprung platform can improve things, but I know it works.

Here are the ones I made earlier:







Two granite tiles sandwiching a layer of acoustic isolation sheet, a set of Nobsound spring isolators, then the tile sandwich repeated. Bottom pair on adjustable spikes to allow for levelling and stability (in addition to being bouncy my floor is also not level), top pair sporting some teeny cups for the speaker's feet to sit in.

 

[Lurch]

@Jules_S if you'd like to give my L-R setup a try, centre to sidewalls is 655mm (would get speakers roughly another foot apart) and toe-in, the front is 100mm more from sidewalls than the rear of speaker. 

Whilst rooms are different I have the bass settings as 50Hz - 4 & 25Hz - 2. 

Should you need to sort a solid bass to isolate from the floor void, the dims you need are 350mm x 550mm, the pair of 30mm marble slabs I use only cost me £70.