Polk Audio Monitor 70 Single tower speaker Black (single speaker)

Rating:
Summary: Polk Audio Monitor Series
Review: I just purchased the Polk Audio Monitor 70 (fronts), m40 (rears), CS2(center), and PSW12 (Sub).

I'm powering them with an Onkyo TX-SR502 75 watt receiver and Prolink 12 gauge speaker wire.

Holy crap.

The room is medium-to-large and relatively empty. 8 foot ceiling in an unfinished basement. There is a large shag carpet that covers the floor in the immediate viscinity of the speakers/listening area. The fronts are roughly 12 feet apart, 9-10 feet away from the couch (they're so wide because there is a 10 foot sheet on the wall for the LCD projector)
The rears are about 4 feet behind the couch.
The sub is not in an ideal spot due to a 20' sub cable not being long enough to reach a corner - so it's against the wall just inside and behind the left front speaker.

I plugged these speakers in (one gripe: they will not accept the oversized banana plugs that I had), did a quick calibration with the Onkyo - distance/levels/bass/treble/speaker size/crossover at 80Hz (tweakable) - dialed in about 70Hz on the sub's variable frequency, turned on the 180 phase, tweaked the sub volume to about 60% of max...

Insert Jurassic Park and FF>> to the T-REX scene. boom. booom. Boooom. BOOOOOM! smooth and creamy bass response right out of the box - big smile. midrange that slams you in the chest. The CS2 is exquisite and lacks nothing - no trouble keeping up with the m70's on either side, vocals come through clear as a bell. The m40s in the back have surprising amounts of bass response - or maybe that's just the subwoofer dominating the entire room - i can't tell. the blend of highs/mids/and lows is beautiful, even in a rushed setup.
The cat will never return to the basement, the girls upstairs thought there was thunder+rain outside, and i can't stop smiling.

...and i'm being gentle on the first run. I can't wait until they've loosened up a bit.

If you love listening to music - get yourself a new SACD/DVD player and prepare to be amazed. I've only heard Pink Floyd's dark side of the moon on SACD so far and it's absolutely unbelievable. The cash register and change sounds on 'Money' rotate around the room from speaker to speaker - then the whole band comes in and blows you away with the clarity and detail.

These speakers sound all-round fantastic, I'd recommend them to anyone who wants to spend a reasonable amount of cash and get a whole lot of quality. I don't have a good enough ear to detect any shortcomings - but i know what i like, and I LOVE these!

5 year warranty for the speakers (upgraded to 10.)
1 year on the subwoofer amp (upgraded to 5 year)


You will want to watch every movie you own all over again, for the first time.

hope that helps.