Review Details

Reference High Performance 3-Way Floorstanding Loudspeakers

Product Rating:

Product Review (submitted on October 30, 2022):

After having these for 4-5 weeks, I am not happy with these. The speaker treble has a harshness and raspiness to them. The mid-range seems to miss part of the transition between the treble and mids. The bass is present and goes low, but doesn't have the 'punch' I have come to expect. It just doesn't hit, more rolls. I have previous Fluance speakers, that are 5-6 years old and I use them every day - the XL7S bookshelves and Signature centers. So when I was looking to upgrade my 15 year old Energy towers (before Klipsch purchased then), top of my list was Fluance. I watched a bunch of online videos and saw everyone singing praises. I believed it given my prior experience with Fluance speakers, so after listening to a bunch of options and even trying another brand (heco) in house, I pulled the trigger. These are 'okay'. But while watching movies and playing video games (in 7.1) I would notice odd sounds from time to time. It was hard to put my finger on it. So I started auditioning music with a more discerning ear. Female vocalists and acoustic guitar seem to make the issues extremely pronounced. You get crackling from both speakers and raspiness that makes it tough to listen to. I go and play the same source on Energy, Jamo, Mordaunt Short, and even some vintage define technology; no issues. Either a bad pair of speakers or my ears just don't like the new tweeters and woofers. The final straw was when I was driving my truck listening to a song I had just listened to on these towers and it sounded better in my truck than it did in my home theater. Spent the last 3 hours swapping between my old energy towers and these fluance towers and while Fluance has some benefits over the Energy's - the older Energy speakers just produce a better sound, sound stage and don't become fatiguing.