Peter Mackay, head of global sales for Magico, hasn’t returned my phone calls. He hasn’t responded to my email. Is Peter mad at me? No. Peter is busy. Very busy. Because Peter’s boss Alon Wolf came up with a disruptive idea: let’s build a Magico speaker for under $10k!
Then let’s make them sound great and use Magico’s innovative drivers from their mega-buck speakers. Then let’s go on a global road show, playing them for select dealers.
This is a remarkable speaker. I got to have a nice listening session at Axpona with Magico fan and owner Myles Astor and Magico chief Alon Wolf. It was a great conversation. They have sold out at least two production runs that I am aware of. It seems like there was pent-up demand for Magico speakers that were more reasonably priced.
As usual, Alon has been clever in his design. He has saved money on production by outsourcing the metal cabinet to a third party. But the guts of the speaker remain well within Magico’s high standards. Quality drivers and crossover parts. Beryllium tweeter with an optimized 28mm dome surface? check. Midrange driver with a carbon fiber and a layer of nanographene? check. Two dual 7″ woofers of Generation 8 Nano-Tec cone design? check. That outsourced cabinet? Still amazing. Made of 6061 T6 aircraft grade aluminum with a cutaway that showed extensive bracing. It’s solid. The tower weighs 110 lbs. Like bass? How about a frequency response of 22hz to 50 khz?
This all checks all the gearhead boxes but I wanted to hear them in person and a small room in Schaumburg finally gave me my chance. It was impressive. The trademark bass was there, if not quite as deep as Magico’s bigger models. But solid, tight and natural sounding. The supreme clarity of the tweeter and midrange closely matched very high bars set by the more expensive siblings in the Magico line. The soundstage was quite wide and deep as well revealing the orchestral layers on a couple of classical tracks we played. Female vocals were superb.
It’s very impressive what Alon and team have done here. They are selling a ton of these and keeping up with production may be their reward for such high value for dollar sound which I admit is a bit funny to type as these speakers still cost $9,800 a pair. But the sound is rich in tone and beautiful in flow. It’s not a large speaker at 44″ high and a 9×11″ footprint so significant others may be persuaded to let them reside in the family room. But it really sounds much bigger than it is. It only comes in a black brushed aluminum but I like the appearance a lot.
Alon promised me a pair to review but warned me that review samples may take a while given the demand for the A3. That’s quite alright Alon, I understand that your customers should be first. I will be waiting patiently to hear these wonderful speakers again. This room was an Axpona highlight for me.
Thanks Alon, have your people call my people.
Thanks for the encouraging article. I’ve got a pair ordered and looking forward to getting them.
Leave it to Magico to produce a speaker that goes down to 22Hz in one box for under 10K with a small footprint.
Very impressive.