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Review Audio Video December 2002

FOCUS/SUBWOOFERS

M&K K10/K11

Small -- but smitten!

VERDICT

Don’t be fooled by the small boxes: these subwoofers rock with the best of them. K10 a good starting point, but add the K11, and the result is a giant-killing combination.

SUPPLIED BY Extraordinary AV 

WEBSITE www.extraordinaryav.co.za

Mentioning subwoofers conjures up an image of a large, heavy enclosure hosting an equally large drive unit and a muscular on-board power amplifier. And while its sonic contribution may be an attractive prospect, one immediate problem is how to find an unobtrusive hiding place for the beast.

Enter Miller & Kreisel (or M&K for short), the US loudspeaker maker widely credited with pioneering the satellite/subwoofer concept, mainly because it believes that the sonic results prove that they are superior to conventional single-enclosure designs.

The K10 subwoofer, however, is something a little different from the norm. Part of M&K’s more affordable K-Series family, this is one subwoofer that won’t pose too many problems when it comes to concealing it. Indeed, at 257 x 349 x 254 mm (HxWxD), it’s hard to believe that this is actually a subwoofer.

Styling is utilitarian rather than attractive, but then there never was anything wrong with form following function. The sealed enclosure is an all-black affair, including the cloth grille, while the drive unit is a high-performance 200 mm long-throw design culled from M&K’s professional-series MPS2810 subwoofer.

Amplification is provided courtesy of an in-built, 75 watt RMS power amplifier, which may sound humble in the home theatre context -- but then, let’s not prejudge a unit based on its claimed specifications!

The rear panel is neither complicated nor short of versatile connectivity options. Both line-level and speaker-level input signals are catered for, while there is a phase inversion switch, an adjustable bass output level, and a 12 dB/octave low pass filter variable between 50 Hz and 125 Hz.

The secret of successfully incorporating the K10 in a system is to tweak the low pass filter until there is a seamless transition between the satellite’s lower tonal range and the subwoofer’s roll-off point. Get that right, and the results are jaw-dropping.

That little box packs a mean bass punch, and if anything needs to be kept in reign quite succinctly if it is not to dominate the rest of the musical or AV proceedings. More than anything, it’s the pace of the K10’s delivery that is its most endearing trait.

Yes, there are subs that deliver a bigger, meatier bass. And there may well be subwoofers that look more stylish. But the K10 can dig pretty deep in the bass department, despite its humble dimensions, while never losing sight of the need for pinpoint dimensional precision.

However, size does matter, and while it’s unlikely that this subwoofer would run out steam in most applications -- and especially in music-only systems -- there will always be those that want their bass bigger and bolder, albeit without the boom.

Fortunately, there is a solution from M&K, even though the result is somewhat compromised from an aesthetic perspective. The K10’s designers have made it a building block in an unusual two-box subwoofer solution that sees the addition of its K11 stablemate.

The K11 is identical to the K10 except for one critical aspect: its driver is mounted in an inverted position. When combined with the K10 and its conventionally positioned drive unit, the result is an advanced push-pull combination that does a lot more than double bass output: it also adds control, refinement and finesse.

As mentioned, the K10 is already a more than proficient subwoofer in its own right, and easily exceed expectations on every level, be it output, control or system integration. However, the stakes are upped significantly with the addition of the K11, typically stacked on top of the K10.

The resulting combination is still small by mainstream subwoofer standards, but a little on the tall side: positioning the two enclosures side by side instead solves this issue, apparently without any penalty in the sound department.

As is so often the case, delegating the bass slog to a dedicated subwoofer means that the remaining full-range loudspeakers have to cope with less, and can therefore do a better job. That’s also true of the amplifier, which similarly has its load reduced.

Therefore the gains are not only to be found in the nether regions of the tonal spectrum, but also in a greatly enhanced sense of accuracy and realism, and in a soundstage that seems to grow exponentially in all three planes, with depth the greatest beneficiary.

Each component -- voices and instruments --are afforded enhanced space to ensure a clearer contribution to the sonic whole. And there’s a richer harvest of the kind of fine detail all too easily glossed over by lesser systems.

Once you’ve heard the K10 and K11 together, it’s unlikely you’ll be satisfied with the K10 only, so only book that audition if you’re prepared to fork out the extra ash for the inverted K11. Together, the combination works much, much better than the sum of the parts, vindicating the investment -- and proving that here, two is definitely better than one.