Bookshelf Speaker Reviews

Price: $3,600 At A Glance: Glossy veneer makes a great impression • Crisp, up-front, detailed sound • Bipole/dipole surround provides subtle envelopment

Veritas is the Roman goddess of truth. It’s also a distinguished speaker line from Energy. Since 1973, Energy has passed from its founders through various Canadian and American owners. In 2006, along with its stablemate Mirage, it became the property of Klipsch. Earlier this year, the Klipsch brands—Energy, Mirage, Jamo, and Klipsch itself—became the property of Audiovox. Although Audiovox also owns a couple of other ancient speaker brands (Acoustic Research and Jensen), in recent years, those brands have focused on car audio, personal audio products, small-scale video products, and accessories. That leaves the home theater niche wide open for Energy and the goddess of truth.

Price: $699 (updated 1/28/15
At A Glance: Exceptional sonic performance for the price • Coherent soundfield • Good fit for small rooms • Extreme volume can cause distortion • Lacks depth and punch of larger systems

The ProCinema 600 5.1 speaker system is small, compact, and unobtrusive, capable of blending into any environment. This sub-$1k system effortlessly provides a highly coherent surround field in a small room without degrading the sound quality, even at relatively high volumes. Using patented technology, the system delivers surprisingly good bass and midrange for a sat/sub system. Yes, it lacks the sheer depth, high impact, and fine details of more expensive systems with larger drivers and enclosures. But for basic home theaters in multi-purpose spaces, it not only gets the job done, it performs quite admirably for its size and cost.

Price: $1,398 At A Glance: Silk-dome tweeter with thermal protection • Race-car-inspired woven-fiberglass woofer • Sub’s passive radiators kill port noise

From Canada with Love

Canada has traditionally been a cornucopia of loudspeaker manufacturers. That isn’t exactly an accident. The Canadian government maintains a research facility in Ottawa with an anechoic (non-echoing) chamber that lures speaker designers like a garden lures honeybees. But Sinclair Audio’s roots are in Montreal, as is its Canadian distributor, Jam Industries, which began manufacturing, importing, and distributing musical instruments and other equipment in 1972 and expanded to include consumer electronics shortly thereafter. The company’s scope subsequently expanded to include lighting and audio equipment for concert, broadcast, and recording use. Sinclair is distributed in the U.S. by American Audio & Video. It’s sold via the same dealer network that handles Arcam, whose audio/video receivers and other products have attracted well-earned rave reviews in these pages.

Price: $528 At A Glance: Substantial and good-sounding monitors and center • Sub of modest size and power • Jaw-droppingly value packed for the price

Andrew Jones for All

Isn’t it preposterous for the Pioneer Corporation to assert itself as a loudspeaker manufacturer? After all, the company is best known in the home theater sphere as a maker of audio/video receivers. Those with just slightly longer memories recall Pioneer’s world-class KURO plasmas as some of the best HDTVs ever made. There was a time when the Laserdisc format, which Pioneer championed, was the signal source of choice among videophiles. Pioneer was also one of the Japanese audio brands that established the stereo receiver as a staple of dorm rooms (including mine) during the 1970s. But who thinks of Pioneer in connection with speakers?

Price: $1,200 At A Glance: Well-balanced performance • Kortec soft-dome tweeters, ceramic glass fiber woofer cones • Glossy side panels enhance appearance

Born and Reborn

Loudspeaker manufacturers are born and then, in some cases, reborn. Although rebirth doesn’t necessarily ensure continued creativity or even longevity, some speaker makers thrive in their new incarnations. That’s what happened to Boston Acoustics. It was born as an independent company in 1979, was reborn in 2006 as a speaker brand following acquisition by D&M Holdings (the same company that markets Denon and Marantz), and is now healthier than ever.

Glancing over the stylish, diminutive Paradigm MilleniaOne speaker, you might assume it’s nothing more than a flimsy plastic housing packed with 25-cent drivers scavenged from a parts bin somewhere in the bowels of Guangdong Province. But besides its cute looks, the MilleniaOne has nothing in common with the typical “lifestyle” speaker.