Introducing the Marten Coltrane IIs

[lio]

Wow...Howie....I am really so jealous. How I wish I won the last Mark 6

[howiebrou]

Originally Posted by lio

Wow...Howie....I am really so jealous. How I wish I won the last Mark 6

Win the next one!

howie

[Jimmy64]

Howie... Congrats on the Marten Coltrane II's! What a beautiful build and I am sure a beautiful sound. Enjoy...

Jimmy

[Still-One]

Howie
Way to go. As I noted in your other thread they had the Ongaku/Coltrane combo at RMAF 2010 and it was great. Now just try some Nordost and see if that improves the sound.

Jim

[Elberoth]

Howie, what happned to your Soulution gear ?

[Elberoth]

Should have waited for the darTZeel ... I know that the lead time is horrible (14 months for a dart pre, 9 months for the power amp), but it is well worth the wait IMO.

BTW, Kondo stuff is great, has a certain magic to it. I certeinly liked it in my system:

Kondo M-1000mk2:


Kondo Ongaku:

[ehoove]

Howie,
Congrats on your Martens. What a beautiful rig, just stunning!
Regards,
Jim

[Milimetr]

Hello Howie,
Congratulations on your new speakers. You have choose truly awesome ones!

I have never heard any Marten speakers but I wish I will be able to audition them. These speaker could be very interesting upgrade patch for my current setup :-)
I am very curious how these ceramic drivers sound. I have only auditioned ceramic drivers once – in Avalon Opus Ceramique and I would like to try other speaker in this technology.

I think that you pushed your speaker performance to the limit considering your room size.

Probably there are even pricier, larger and maybe better speakers on the market (let’s say Magico M5, Wilson Alexandria) but not for the room this size. I am sure that for your room it is dead end with the speaker at the moment. You can focus on other elements in your system.


Congratulations and enjoy!

[JohnThomas]

Originally Posted by howiebrou

Well I've gone and done it now. Bought a pair of speakers that cost more than my car but boy ol boy these speakers can sing!

To be honest I have always been wary of speakers with ceramic drivers but Marten has always produced great sounding speakers. Their Coltranes have sounded wonderful on the various occassions that I have listened to them.

They are a very neutral speaker but ol lordy lord, the resolution and detail is to die for! Don't take this to mean harsh and bright which they certainly are not, but incredibly revealing. I have literally never heard so much detail coming from a singer's mouth as I do with these Coltrane IIs.

Previously you could hear the air being inhaled with the Stradivaris but now you see the pout, the licking of the lips, the swallow before the note etc. It really is incredible to hear all this detail.

They are a great fit with the Kondo Ongaku which drives it with some ease, and it produces a clean and pure mid range with well controlled base from the 11 inch ceramic drivers. The huge diamond tweeter reproduces high frequencies without being bright like some diamond tweeters I have heard.

All in all I am very pleased with these so far.

Howie,

When your done breaking them in I'll take them off your hands if the price is right.

[Masterlu]

Howie... Give us an update, how are the Coltrane II's?