This podcast episode discusses the pros and cons of bookshelf versus tower speakers, helping listeners understand the trade-offs and make an informed decision based on their preferences, room size, and budget.
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Hey guys, welcome back to the One Bit
Podcast. Uh, today we're going to be
discussing bookshelves versus floor
standers and which may be a better
choice for you. But before that, a
message from the sponsor of today's
video. So today's sponsor is actually a
good friend of mine named Boris. He is a
character. When you speak to him, you're
going to hear a thick Russian accent,
but he is one of the good guys in audio.
And he runs a very unique business
because not only is he a retailer
carrying brands that many of you are
familiar with like Cambridge and CE and
WireWorld, but he's also a distributor
for certain brands like uh Acoustic
Quality from the Czech Republic. He has
his own products which are a preamp and
a power amplifier. And on top of that,
he is a very experienced repair tech.
So, if you're somebody who has like say
vintage Macintosh or any high-end
component and you're having trouble
getting it serviced, Boris is definitely
the man to speak to. And in today's
video, he's going to be offering a
giveaway. It's going to be a 7 m power
cord from Wireworld. And at the end of
this video, we'll tell you what you can
do to win it. But on to the topic at
hand. Bookshelf speakers versus tower
speakers is something Jay and I have a
lot of experience with. And today we're
hoping to help you make sense of the
benefits of each design and to help you
decide which one may be best for you. So
Jay, let's go ahead and talk about the
benefits and the pros and cons of both
bookshelf speakers and tower speakers.
Starting with bookshelf speakers. Um,
what do you have to say about that?
Yeah, so as far as bookshelf speakers
go, I have a lot of experience because
my channel started out reviewing
exclusively almost bookshelf speakers
because they're easier to move around.
They're easier. That's inherent benefit
right there, right? Easier to move
around, doesn't break your back. Uh but
more than that, I preferred the sound of
bookshelf speakers um in the beginning.
Uh now we'll talk about why that has
changed, but inherently, and I'm
generalizing here because there are
exceptions like I mentioned with the
modern day technology, but generally
speaking, a bookshelf speaker that's
small tends to be uh more rigid in terms
of cabinetry design. So it's going to
be, you know, because it doesn't have a
lot of, you know, bracing required and
so on, it's going to be more rigid.
Therefore, it's going to have a more
clean kind of cabinet resonance. So
that's one of benefit inherent benefits
of a bookshelf design. And therefore in
my opinion uh how that translate to
subjectivity is that because of the
simplicity of like a two-way which is
usually a bookshelf speaker tweeter and
a woofer that's a two-way you get this
like kind of like a very easy effortless
sound stage and imaging and within that
you kind of get this sense that you get
really nice uh details in the mid-range
and high frequency whereas with a floor
standard you get more dynamics, more
bass extension because of the larger
enclosure size and more woofers. Mhm.
Um, and again, the biggest difference
here is going to be amplification
because of the sensitivity differences.
It's actually a misconception that a
floor stander is harder to drive. A lot
of people look at big floor standers and
go, "Oh, big speaker need big power."
But no, it's the opposite. Small
speakers need big power. Because for a
small speaker to have the same amount of
extension as a floor stander with a big
cabinet, well, it sacrifice sensitivity
and that means that you will need more
power behind that speaker to get to that
same level of SPL or volume level. So,
there's give and take with each design
and most of that surrounds around around
something called the Huffman's Iron Law
and you can look it up, but basically
I'm going to touch upon it here. There's
three parameters: sensitivity, enclosure
size, and extension of the base. And the
laws the law dictates that the designer
can choose and prioritize two of these
parameters and by doing so they
compromise on the third. So basically a
bookshelf speaker design is going to be
more inherently uh you know smaller in
an enclosure which is more ideal for
spaces and have if and if you want that
extension then you're going to be
sacrificing on sensitivity for example
right which is what I explained. So,
those are the general kind of benefits
of each design. Yeah. I mean, you know,
when it comes to bookshelf speakers,
I'll just throw in my take on it.
There's a lot of benefits to bookshelf
speakers. I mean, number one, they're
small. Uh, and because of that, there's
a lot of flexibility in terms of
placement. I think that's why most
people actually buy a bookshelf speaker
because, let's face it, most of us in
the real world, we don't have 3 4 feet
of space to pull something out into the
room. We need to put it next to a wall.
And because bookshelf speakers tend to
produce less bass, there's a little bit
less interactivity between the speaker
and the wall. And it's just easier to
get a more balanced sound out of a
bookshelf speaker. Not only because of
that, but because, as you mentioned,
most, not all, but most bookshelf
speakers, especially compacts, are
two-way designs. And it's inherently
easier to get two drivers, a tweeter and
usually a woofer, to pair up well
together and to perform well together
than it is to get multiple drivers to
all speak to each other and to hand off
the frequencies to each other very
evenly and in a controlled and
predictable way. Uh so beyond that
bookshelf speakers also because they're
typ typically very slim there's less
defraction and what that means is the
imaging you know which most audio files
love is like catnip to audio files. Oh
big sound stage. Well bookshelf speakers
are inherently great at giving you that
huge sound stage. So when you add it all
together, you have a speaker that
typically costs a little bit less than
their floor standard counterparts
because there's just less material cost,
right? Both in shipping material,
shipping cost, as well as the product
itself. And you have this speaker that
doesn't cost as much money as a bigger
speaker. Um, with today's technology,
you can get relatively full range sound
out of a bookshelf speaker. It's easy to
place and it ultimately is more
lifestyle friendly. So there's a there's
a big reason why bookshelf speakers sell
so well nowadays, but there's going to
be limitations. And the limitations are,
as you described with Hoffman's law,
when when you have a small speaker,
there's only so much bass that is going
to produce even with today's tech. And
there's only so much cabinet volume that
there is to work with. So it's only
going to play so loud and give you so
much output. And that's where floor
standers come in. That's where floor
standers, you know, you typically have
more drivers, a much larger cabinet to
deal with, and that's going to translate
into something that'll play louder.
It'll give you more bass. It'll dig
deeper. It'll sound bigger. And there
are going to be people out there who
say, "I want that because when I listen
to music, I want to be impressed. I want
it to be more of a visceral experience."
And a floor standard speaker is going to
be better at delivering that visceral
like listening experience than a
bookshelf speaker or even a bookshelf
speaker with a subwoofer. One could
argue. So ultimately it's more a matter
of choosing well what kind of experience
do I want? Do I care about having that
visceral experience or am I more a
quality over quantity person? You know
it really depends on your budget. I do
think and you may disagree with me here.
I think once you get to a certain price
point, it really kind of doesn't matter.
I think floor standards are honestly
you're you're not sacrificing anything
with quality, but you know, you do have
to start paying a pretty good amount of
money for that. But that's ultimately
the generalized synopsis of the
benefits, the pros and cons of each as
I'm going to give one more benefit to
the bookshelf speakers uh because I'm
going to start slashing it after this.
Okay. Um, so another benefit that I
found with bookshop speakers is that you
can choose the height of your stance.
You can choose the stands. Yes. And that
may seem like a little thing, but it
goes a long way because that means that
you can match the height of the stand so
that the tweeter is in line with your
ears. And if you saw my bookshelf
speakers from the early days, I
mentioned this again and again and again
and again because it's that important,
you know, in those little fine details
and the soundstaging and the imaging you
get. That also has to do with the
inherent benefit of using a bookshop
speaker is that you can choose the
stand, the style, the height and so on
to make sure that it's optimally placed
not only horizontally but vertically.
Yeah. And this is key for integration as
well like seamless integration between
the tweeter and the woofer. So yeah,
very important right and whereas you
know a floor standard is kind of fixed
right unless you get two uber expensive
you know Wilson audio stack you can you
know pull down and all that kind of
adjustments um but we're not talking
about those so uh so there's benefit
with placement I would say when it comes
to bookshell speakers easier to move
around you know easier to test out
placements versus you know versus a big
tower. So, there's benefits there.
However, I personally think a floor
stander is a generally a better choice
for people that don't want to integrate,
you know, multi-sub setups, right, uh,
with a bookshelf speakers, cuz you can
do that, but it takes tremendous amount
of work. And there's reason that people
are, you know, the people have a make a
living doing AV setups for this exact
reason. It's it's not easy. uh you have
to take in room measurements, you have
to have the gear to measure and you have
to you know or you have to do subc crawl
and all that kind of stuff and DSP and
so on and and having a bookshelf speaker
plus you know multi-ubs will also run
you big cash right so at the end of the
day I find that with
bookshelf speakers if you think about
the Huffman's iron law again you're
essentially sacrificing sensitivity and
basically you know um you know for
extension right it's a trade-off between
sensitivity and extension whereas you
know for the for the gain of a smaller
enclosure so that's the benefit you're
getting you're getting a smaller
enclosure right and for the same
extension you're losing sensitivity
which you know it's kind of like a
double whammy in a way the way I see it
whereas a floor stander well technically
the compromise here is that you it's a
size and if you're getting a floor
stander you know that it's going to be a
certain size well there's another
complexity to to a floor standard, which
is the added complexity. A lot of floor
standards are three-ways, you know, and
even more complex than that. And that
means a more complicated crossover. And
while some engineers would actually
argue a three-way is better because now
you have the tweeter is only doing
tweeter things. You can have a mid-range
driver that's only handling the
mid-range and a bass driver that's only
handling the mid-range versus one driver
trying to do both. But again, pulling
off three different size drivers,
especially in the time domain, and
trying to get a crossover to make each
and everyone complement each other,
there's going to be phase shifts and
there's going to be, you know, nesting
crossover, right? So, but generally
speaking, because you have a if you have
a three-way, for example, or 2.5 way or
whatever, if you have the woofers uh in
series, right? multiple woofers in
series or parallel. That's how you
increase sensitivity in a floor standing
speaker. Yes. So that's the inherent
benefit, but you're right, it's more
complicated. So you do need to make sure
that you're getting a floor stander
from, you know, a reputable designer
that knows and has a history of knowing
how to design three ways properly. Yeah.
Uh but yes, I would generally agree that
a simple two-way is more more or less
coherent. More coherent. They're easier
to design. Yeah. easier to design and
easier to integrate into a room. Um, but
generally speaking, I think that in
terms of the compromises,
like if I want the least amount of
compromises without the, you know,
integration of subs, I would say floor
stander is personally my choice now,
which is a pretty big deviation from my
earlier days where I strongly prefer
bookshelves uh over floor standers. But
over time, I've come to love floor
standards a little bit more. Right.
Yeah. And I'm kind of biased in that
sense because look, when I listen to
music, I love I love bookshelf speakers.
I really do. I have tons of them and I'm
happy with them when I listen to them.
There's something inherently satisfying
about a small speaker that defies your
expectations. Oh, yeah. I love that. But
at the same time, I'm a caveman. All
right. I'm a caveman. I buy big speakers
because they make big sound. I'm
listening to music, right? I want that
visceral like I'm feeling it in my
chest. This is cool. The when I'm
listening to rock and roll, like the
scale of the music is larger. It sounds
more confident. I can even if I don't
listen at loud volumes, just the fact
that I know I can't or it's going to be
more dynamic because you just have more
drivers, more radiating surface area,
you know, playing back sound to you. Uh
to me, you can't replicate that even if
you go with a bookshelf speaker. And
again, we're talking about the
stereotypical small bookshelf speaker.
Mhm. Even that with a couple of really
good subs, even if you know how to
integrate subs very well, there's always
going to be the limitation of in the
small speakers, especially a two-way,
you have one woofer trying to do it all.
And it's only going to be able to play
so loud and to give you so much of that
visceral type of sound. Right. And it's
not just about frequency response. Like
when I say integrating, I think a lot of
enthusiasts out there that have done
integration of one or two subs into
their stereo may be thinking, well, it's
not that hard. You just place the subs
and you know, you cross over and stuff,
you know, never mind the optimal
placement. Even if you get the optimal
placement, it's not just about the
crossing of the right frequency. There
has to be the impulse response as well,
cuz the impulse response of the midwifer
is going to be inherently different from
the impulse response of your subs. So
there's going to be a lot of kind of
that's why when I first had subwoers
integrated in my setup with a two-way
bookshelf speaker, I had this experience
where I felt like the bass was like
loose. Yeah. Right. And the timing was
off and I was like figuring trying to
figure out why the frequency measurement
looked beautiful. You know, it was a
textbook. I was like what's going on
here? Why am I not getting a musical
sound right? And it was the impulse
response and that's what I found out
later. So there's many aspects and it's
going to be a learning curve. It's like
learning how to integrate a sub is not a
you know easy task and like I said
that's why there's people that have made
a living you know setting these things
up. So it's going to be a trial and
error thing. So if you are trying to
beat the compromise of a bookshelf
speaker by you know giving it more
extension with a subwoofer integration
and so on it's not going to be an easy
task. Um and same thing for obviously
floor standards as well. Uh you know
again the inherent benefit is that it
gets higher sensitivity. So you can
drive it with two amplifiers, low
powered amplifiers. And that's kind of
where my love currently comes from is
that more flexibility and pairing of the
amplifier. Yeah. But that also means
that your room is going to be the
physical limitation. For example, the
1528 tower speakers. I love that
speaker. And people were like, "Why
aren't you going to buy it?" Well, cuz I
don't have the space, you know? like I
I'm crying, but I did buy the 1528
bookshelf speakers instead, right?
Because of that exact reason. Um, but
that kind of brings me to the socalled
sweet spot and why I have over the years
kind of deviated away from my high
preference for bookshelf speakers to
more the middle ground. And this is
where I call like the sweet spot because
you can't really call the 1520 bookshelf
speakers a bookshelf speaker. Yeah, you
really can't. Um I mean that thing if
you see my video uh sitting beside me
it's like gigantic. It's like bigger
than me. Uh not not difficult to achieve
but yes I get it. Um yeah so and you
know that's you know like the PS Audio
FR5 for example. I put that speaker
beside it to kind of you know compare
the size difference right but it's not a
knock on the PS audio speakers. It's
bigger than most I mean any bookshelf
speaker I have seen and you can't really
say it's a bookshelf speaker because of
how big it is right so with a speaker
like that you kind of get the best of
both worlds um and you got a big cabinet
so you get deep space based extension
it's a three-way by the way so it's you
know um so it has you know very good
kind of middle ground where you get the
imaging and the soundstaging of a
bookshelf speaker but the extension and
the dynamics of a tower speaker Mhm. M
um and that same kind of sweet spot
exists with something you know Sean and
I love which is slim towers for example
the Ross Ferentino to twos love that
speaker right has great mid-range and
high frequency like even better than a
lot of the bookshelf speakers I've heard
right but has reasonable extension you
know as well like did you know they
discontinued that speaker
excuse me they discontinued it they
don't have a direct replacement they
have the new Arno series but they plan
on doing a solder replacement that I
know of. Okay. In that case, I changed
my uh I changed my totem speakers. There
we go. They're calling. Yeah, there you
go. And then there's no Russell Fentino.
I love I I'm I'm right now kind of
shocked and heartbroken by that news. Uh
but there are other options like totem
speaker is a good one too where you get
really good dynamics of a floor stander,
but you also get great imaging and
separation from a bookshelf speaker,
right? Where because it's a slim design.
So, I found like big big bookshelf
speakers and slim tower speakers to be a
good compromise in between. If you're
someone that's like, "Oh, I don't want
to, you know, go straight for bookshelf
or a big ass tower, you know, I want
something in between. That's a sweet
spot in between." I would say I would I
would highly recommend looking into slim
towers and large bookshelf speakers. I
totally a thousand% agree with you. And,
you know, we've had this conversation
before. I mean, that's where my personal
bias actually lies is I I tend to prefer
tower speakers if I had to be entirely
honest. But, I mean, to me, I think a
good recommendation, especially for the
critical audio file, somebody who's not
completely new to this, but you're still
not totally experienced, I would
encourage a lot of these people to look
into a slim tower or a bookshelf speaker
because what it does is you're getting
the audio file things that you expect
from a two-way. You're getting a lot of
the quality and the imaging, but at the
same time now you're getting something
with better base extension, with better
dynamic and out raw output capability
and but it still is not so large that it
takes up a tremendous amount of space.
Often times these products can still be
used in a real world environment to
where you can keep it closeish to a
wall, you know, within 2 ft or something
like that from a wall boundary. And
again, you're kind of getting uh I
wouldn't say the best of both worlds,
but you're getting a very good
representation of what each world has to
offer. So, um I think that's a really
really solid in between, you know,
suggestion. Yeah. And I think, you know,
the the the whole thing with the
amplifier requirement, right? Uh
amplifier requirement for floor
standards are easier again because it's
more sensitive. I'm keep I'm keep
driving this fact because I I get so
many people in the comment section
looking at bigger speakers asking me how
much power it requires. But when I
review a small speaker, despite all the
disclaimers of how much power it
requires, people are like, "Oh, no
problem. No, no need for power. Small,
small, small, no power." So, I want to
drive that home. Bigger speakers tend to
be uh more more sensitive, meaning needs
less power. I would say this too when it
comes to uh you know power and whatnot.
It's it's funny. You would think a small
speaker uh wouldn't need that much, but
it actually does need a decent amount of
power and yet at the same time its
ultimate volume output capability is
going to be limited. So it's like you
don't want to get too much or else you
risk damaging the speaker. And another
kind of consequence of this is finding
bookshelf speakers that actually sound
really good at low volumes. They
definitely do exist. I think my Harbath
P3s in a desktop environment are a great
example of this. Uh but uh it's this is
where floor standards tend to be more
advantageous because not only can they
play louder, but a lot of floor
standards actually can sound pretty good
at whisper quiet volumes, especially
when you start getting into horn
designs. Like that's where they really
have just a tremendous amount of
versatility. The compromise is do you
like the sound of the horn? Yeah. Well,
the the technical compromise of of a
horn like a clip RP600M where it's more
sensitive, right, would be the uh
basically the extension. Yeah. So, you
will be compromising on extension
because you have a small enclosure and
you have high sensitivity which means
your compromise would be no base or not.
And those brands and this kind of you
know is where you know it gets kind of
complex if you really get into the
details. So, every company has their
philosophy. You will find certain brands
that like using, you know, woofers,
maybe a small speaker that has a woofer
that moves a lot. And the whole point is
it can handle mid-range but give you a
lot of bass, but in order to do that,
the woofer needs to move a lot to move
the air. But then you have companies
like Clips, like who do mostly horns and
their whole thing is, yeah, they're big,
but we're not tuning it aggressively
into bass because our philosophy is the
more a woofer moves, the more it
distorts. That's a bad thing. So, we're
going to use big woofers in a big
enclosure. You're probably not going to
get as deep of a base as you expect. But
the compromise here is that it's going
to be easy to drive and it's going to
get really freaking loud and it's not
going to need hardly any power, but at
the same time can take a lot of power if
you do want to go there. So, it's it's a
matter of just determining what you
want. I think for uh for a lot of
people, it's a matter of like, hey, do I
want to feel like I'm in a concert? Do I
want to feel like the performers are in
the room with me and do I want it to be
visceral? If that's the case, you're
going to you're going to have to go with
a bigger speaker. But if that's not as
important to you, I think a strong case
can be made for compact speakers and
even compact with a sub if you're not
trying to go for that experience. Yeah.
And we didn't even mention it because
this is kind of, you know, common sense,
but of course, you have to put into your
room size into account, right? We're
generalizing here because we're not
going to be talking small, medium, and
large rooms. But in a general sense,
large rooms, you're going to want bigger
towers, right? or a bookshelf with
multiple subs. But I'll argue that in a
bigger room like a tower is a better
choice because of that sensitivity level
and that you know higher power handling
so it can get louder um with lower
distortion relatively speaking. So
that's kind of you know where I see
towers almost as a automatic
recommendation is if you're in a bigger
space in a smaller space is 50/50. Um, I
would still go with a slim tower like I
said or a big bookshelf, which is what
I've done. But if you are someone that
is heavily into like jazz and you know
you only like sound stage in mid-range
and high frequency with adequate bass,
right? Then a bookshelf speaker is going
to be the choice. Cuz at the end of the
day, for a lot less money, you're going
to be able to get that sound stage
imaging um that you're looking for.
if you want dynamics for the x amount of
money, then you would probably get more
dynamics from a slim floor stander or a
full size floor stander. Um, you know,
so it's a trade-off on what you're
trying to put towards, but once you get
to that, you know, above ridiculous
high-end, you know, price levels. Once
you get a certain price, it doesn't
matter at that point. Like the kind is
good in every way. Yeah. Like like the
Platinum on VC1, VC2, that's like the
speakers I'm rocking right now, right?
And that's like both, right? It's like
both. Has bass, has mid-range. Yeah,
that's what I want to hear. Um, and that
leads me to kind of the final question
here or the final thing I want to cover.
And this is more personal. So Jay, what
do you prefer? Bookshelf speakers or
towers? And then on top of that, in each
category, what would be your favorite
as far as like a certain product? I
should have clarified like what's your
favorite bookshelf speaker? What's your
favorite tower speaker? Okay. Uh, well,
I'm going to cheat. Uh, well, my
favorite favorite bookshelf speaker is
the one that I have uh I'm still waiting
for my purchase to come. Okay. Uh,
because it's sold out and it's being
delayed uh until September, which is a
1528 bookshelf speakers. Okay. Um, and
that's like I said, great sweet spot.
It's a big bookshelf speaker, right? So
it has you know um benefits from
bookshelf speaker design like
soundstaging imaging and then it also
has the bass capability uh much like a
tower speaker. Weird thing about that
speaker is that when I measured it and
even according to a Rendle's own
measurements, the bookshelf speaker has
deeper extension than the towers, which
is but in terms of dynamics, the tower
is still much more dynamic in in person
and and then both of those speakers
extend so much to where it's almost nil
like you know talking about floor versus
bookshelf speakers. But that would be my
bookshelf choice um if I'm cheating. But
if I'm not cheating, I would say still
like the Bard S400 Mark II hits the
right spot. Yeah. For compact like
bookshelf, bookshelf. If you want a
large sound stage and, you know, a
smooth listening experience
um with adequate good amount of
extension in the bass and quality, then
I would say that speaker really tickles
my feathers. And uh why my feathers?
That expression. Yeah, your feathers.
Yeah, let's not talk about your feathers.
feathers.
Uh, and as far as uh uh Towers go, still
I know it's discontinued, but Ross
Ferentino twos are going to be one of my
favorites. Yeah. Um, but again, I
usually own stuff that I like a lot. So,
obviously, so I have the VC1 and VC2
from from Platimon, uh, sorry, Platimon,
VC1, VC2 from Moustic, which are my main
speakers that I'm rocking right now. And
those are kind of like slim towers,
right? Medium format towers. Um, and I
like those a lot because it has a lot of
flexibility, adjustability, especially
in the high frequencies and the overall
tonality of the speaker through the
adjustments of the harmonic tweeter. And
that kind of flexibility is great
because the bass is excellent. It has a
bass, you know, woofer, you know, design
designed in house has a lot of ports. So
the bass extension is great, has great
amount of bass, but I can adjust the
mid-range and high frequency to make it
more clinical or more transparent or
warm or rich, you know. So I can control
that aspect. Um, and because of the, you
know, smaller form factor like a it's a
slim tower basically, uh, once you go up
to the top cuz it kind of tapers up. Um,
I get that kind of bookshelf benefit.
And the VC1 is a bookshelf speaker just
sitting on top of the VC2 module. So
that's why I kind of like it. So once
you get to that kind of specialized
designs, you're going to find speakers,
you know, and the platinum is not cheap.
It's like 16 grand, 17, 18 grand. So
once you get to that kind of, you know,
higher end kind of speakers, you're
going to find a lot of design choices to
kind of fight or mitig mitigate the
downsides of a certain design aspect.
Yeah. Yeah. That's what I find. So yeah,
those are my choices. How about you? Cool.
Cool. Um,
Um,
well, jeez, you know me and favorites,
this doesn't really work out well. Okay,
so when it comes to bookshelf speakers,
let me go ahead and just use something
that I have in my house, right? Mhm. Um,
you would think it'd be the Confidence
20s that are behind me. And don't get me
wrong, they're really good, but it's the
Special 40 is a very The Special 40
because it's a picky speaker. It's very
sensitive to placement. It's not really
equipment matching so much as placement
that makes or breaks this speaker,
right? Mhm. But if you get it right,
that speaker, I love the fact that it
can give I mean, I love the look of it
and the the black vine finish that they
have. Number one, I think it's it's
beautiful. But number two, when you get
it set up right, or at least to my
taste, I think it's a speaker that gives
you a strong taste of the high-end. It
looks high-end, but it's just
approachable enough to where I feel like
I can listen to darn near anything
through it. And it has really good tone
to it. And o overall, uh, again, it's a
speaker that I can't recommend all the
time because of its pickiness. Like,
somebody really has to be committed to
working with that speaker. But, um, but
if you get it right, yeah, that's the
one that I really like because for the
money, and I wouldn't say it's the, you
know, it's expensive. It's very
expensive, but for the money, I feel
like that one does a great job of
defying my expectations time and time
again. Like I I set it up, I get it
where I like it, and it's like, God, if
I had to if that was it, if I just had
to like move into like an apartment or
something like that, that's all I would
need. I'd be I'd be good. And you're not
you're talking about the special 40, not
the heritage, right? Yeah. Okay. Okay.
Yeah. Special 40. So, the heritage I
also love. Um, but I think the special
40 impresses me the most for what it is.
Interesting. So, the other two are
definitely better. Let's be clear,
they're better speakers, but for me,
sometimes it's not about better, it's
about what I, you know, am impressed
with, and that one impresses me more for
what it is. Um, and then when it comes
to towers, it's really almost impossible
for me to choose. Um, if I were to go
with something more affordable, I would
say the Clips Cornwall 4. Oh, yeah.
Surprisingly enough, that thing again,
another speaker that I can't recommend
all the time because it's even more
picky than the Special 40 when it comes
to positioning. Literally a millimeter
here or a millimeter there could be the
difference between a lot of bass and no
bass out of that speaker. Bright sound
or actually pretty balanced sound. Very
particular. But again, when you get that
set up right, God, it just makes music,
man. The the amount of air the amount of
air that speaker moves is insane. It is
really good. Yeah, that was I was kind
of surprised how well it worked in my
room. Even it was so big though. Like it
was way too big for my room, but the
sound was so good. I still I still love
that speaker. It's because the throat of
the horn that they use the Traxx horn
like it's it's not that deep. And
because it's not that deep and the way
it projects out into the room, you can
still sit fairly close to the cornwall
and get a fairly balanced sound. It's
their larger speakers with the actual
proper horns, you know, that uh you need
more distance. I I still think that
that's my personal favorite clip speaker
to this day. No, same here, man. The
Cornwall 4, they knocked it out of the
park. And um normally I do prefer
speakers with a little bit more fidelity
um or whatchamacallit. But I think for
the money, even though they're more
expensive now than when we reviewed
them, I still think for well under 10
grand, that's a lot of speaker for your
money. Both physically and when it comes
to just raw performance, I think Yeah.
But the cabinet the the veneer job is
absolutely God, you look at that speaker
and it just scratches. You just Yeah.
Yeah. That's one of the reasons I that
it broke my heart. I couldn't keep them
around because of the sheer size, but
also because like I literally like put
my lens cap, you understand? It's a
plastic cap. It has no possibility of
damaging anything. It's the most It's
supposed to protect my lens. Okay, I put
it on top. I took it off and there's
micro scratches and I was like freaking
out. I was like, "What the heck? Who the
But yeah, you breathe on that speaker.
It scratches. The veneer job is
terrible." It is. It's It's true. It's
great to look at, but yeah. Yeah. Once
you when you get it. When you get it get
it after a week, it looks like it's been
three years. Then you go and dust it and
then forget it. Yeah. Never dust it.
Never dust. But yeah, that's going to be
uh my choice. Well, I tell you what, I
think we're just about ready to wrap up
this video. Anything else you want to
add? No, that's pretty much it. Cool.
So, the giveaway,
um, so we're the, uh, Audio Legacy, had
to think about it for a second, is going
to be giving away a 3 m pair of, I think
it's called the Aurora power cord from
Wireworld. Um, so, fairly expensive
power cord and it's a very long power
cord. And all you have to do to enter to
win is respond in this video in the
comment section down below as to which
you prefer, bookshelf speakers or tower
speakers. bonus points if you actually
explain, you know, why you feel that
way. Who knows, you guys may have
something that uh Jay and I haven't
covered here or maybe even haven't
thought of ourselves. So, it' be
interesting to see your responses, but
this is going to be our take on the
subject. And hopefully, if you didn't
learn anything new, hopefully you were
entertained for a half hour or so. This
is our third take, by the way. We're
brain farting hard. But thank you for
joining and thank you for withstanding
this uh longass video. And we'll see you
guys on our next one bit podcast. Until
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