Monitor Audio’s latest Silver package could well be the template for a modern full-size surround set-up. It’s beautifully presented and quite obviously made with an obsessive attention to detail.
Yet, look back at our 2001 review of the first Silver speaker package and you’ll see not much has changed over the years.
We were taken with the company’s construction standards back then too. Dig deeper and you find the similarities between old and new go far deeper than just build standards.
It’s the use of metal drive units that draws our attention. Those used in the latest package may be far superior in terms of dynamics, detail and resonance control, but their DNA is easily traceable to the earlier designs.
The newer package pulls ahead by using dedicated surrounds rather than the conventional standmounters of its ancestor.
These specialist surround speakers are designed with great thought, and give the option to change from bipole to dipole operation at the flick of a switch - the correct choice of dispersion depends on their positioning.
True, the earlier package’s conventional rear speakers are the better choice for music replay, but in this case, for us at least, convincing cinema sound has priority.
We can’t help but be impressed with Monitor Audio’s consistent approach to speaker design.
With well over a decade to fine tune the engineering it’s no surprise to find the latest Monitor Audio Silver 6AV12 package is so polished a performer. Long may it continue.
Click here to read the original review of the first Monitor Audio Silver system.
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