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Review NaN of
Price Paid:
$179.00
from American TV, Waukesh Summary:
Great "little" center channel speaker. The real cherry veneer finish is nonexistent on other speakers even close to this price range. The build quality of this speaker is also excellent. If they put a price of $400 on this, I wouldn't bat an eye. The CSi3's vocal production is also excellent. Voices literally jump from the screen with excellent clarity and tonality. It produces an excellent sound field, even when listening only a few feet away.
For music, this speaker is also right on the mark. In fact, it really adds quite a bit when listening in 7 channel stereo or to multi-channel music sources. Instruments are clear and detailed, although not as much as a speaker designed for musical reproduction as opposed to vocals. I really don't see how anyone could be disappointed in this speaker, especially considering they are practically giving these away.
Polk has also cut a slant on one large face of the speaker, which is nice if, like me, you have this below the listener's ear in your setup. A nice feature for sure.
If there is one fault of this speaker is that the cabinet is pretty big for a "small" center channel speaker. I actually had to remove the top glass on my TV stand and drop the speaker in from the top to get it onto the top shelf of my cabinet. No biggie, but it sure as hell makes me glad I didn't opt for the CSi5, which is a behemoth.
I did also listen to several other center channels, especially the CSi5 from Polk since I was pretty set on Polk RTi8's for my mains. I've got to say that neither I nor my girlfriend could justify the additional $200ish to make the bump to the CSi5, and I'm glad we didn't for the above mentioned space reasons.
I "sidegraded" on this from a Mirage MC-4. The Mirage cost around $75 more new, and I've got to say this speaker is much more for the money and I think it sounds better overall as well. Build quality is DEFINITELY better than the Mirage, which had a junk cabinet with really, really cruddy vinyl stuff on it. Ick.
Overall, at this price point, this is definitely a 5 star speaker. Honestly, if I could give this 6 stars in the value department, I would. This speaker has no right to be made this well or sound this good for less than $200. Strengths:
Price
Build quality and cabinet beauty
Very good to excellent vocal reproduction
Very good musical reproduction, although not quite as good in the detail or imaging departments as its tower speaker cousins.
Nice angle feature for tipping the speaker up (about 10 degrees or so) Weaknesses:
Size -- a little bit big for a small center channel.
Could be a little better in the imaging department, but would probably sacrifice some intelligibility.
There seems to be a little bit of a frequency spike somewhere in the 6khz range which does cause a hint of listener fatigue -- or this could just be the way my system is EQ'd at present. Similar Products Used:
Mirage MC-4, Klipsch Reference series, Boston Acoustics VR series.
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