Not many people in America know Snell brand, but nevertheless Snell ACOUSTICS is a very respected company with a solid history, it exists already more than 30 years. Peter Snell founded the company in 1976 in Newburyport, Massachusetts. He also laid down the special quality standards in the making of the cabinets that distinguish the company to this day, and he made a wide dispersion pattern mandatory for his speakers in order to get a large zone of stereo effect.
Snell D7 sound is distinguished by the noble sound with deep, elaborated bass, mostly natural timbres and pleasant tonal balance. Especially noteworthy is a beautifully designed, voluminous music scene.
Test: Denis Goncharov, Consumer magazine. Video&Audio
CONSTRUCTION
Not many people are aware of Snell brand in America, but meanwhile Snell ACOUSTICS is a highly respected company with a solid history, it has been existing for over 30 years. Peter Snell founded the company in 1976 in Newburyport, Massachusetts. He also set the standard for enclosures that still distinguishes the company today, and encouraged its speakers to employ a wide dispersion pattern in order to achieve a broader degree of stereo effect.
Another feature of Snell acoustics is tuning of the crossover of each speaker with an accuracy of +/- 0.5dB. Snell loudspeakers quickly became popular in the United States, not even the unexpected death of its founder in 1984: Peter Snell had a sudden heart attack. It’s just that Snell has always been led by famous and talented people.
Kevin Voecks was the first chief designer of the company, and it was under his leadership that Snell, in collaboration with Lukasi lm, made the first speakers to meet the THX specs. Snell is also credited with producing the world’s first in-wall THX loudspeaker. In 1995, Vokes moved to Revel and was succeeded by David Smith, known for his work with supercompanies JBL, KEF and McIntosh.
The same year the company was acquired by the famous American manufacturer Boston Acoustics. The current head of Snell’s design team is another famous personality who needs no introduction – Dr. Joe D’Appolito, who came on “watch” in 2003 and has remained in that important position ever since. In 2005, Boston Acoustics, together with Snell, moved under the wing of the large corporation D&M Holding, whose components include such audio industry monsters as Denon, Marantz, and McIntosh.
During all this time Snell not only changed frequently its chief engineers and owners, but also moved several times from place to place: today the company’s production facilities are located in Peabody, Massachusetts, where the company shares a factory with Boston Acoustics.
Joe D’Appolito joined Snell and played a big part in the reshaping of the lineup, designing a dozen or so different models for the redesigned Series 7, including surround back, center and active subwoofers.
The heroes of this review, the D7 models, also designed by D’Appolito. The speakers have a 2.5-way crossover configuration, with two extra loops as a distinguishing feature. The first has a boundary compensation circuit, by turning it on you can “normalize” the response of the loudspeaker in the lower frequencies. The circuit will be useful if the space for the speakers is only near a wall or in a corner of the room. The second scheme connects an additional tweeter, located on the back of the enclosure, by engaging it, you can improve the volume of the stereo image.
Both loops are turned on and off with the help of toggle switches, hidden on the rear patch panel. Besides switches, gold-plated screw jacks are also located there, and the number of them allows to connect the speakers by Bi-Wiring or Bi-Amping method. The D7 models are characterized by a slim cabinet design with softly rounded corners of side panels and front, a metal base and a “head”. From the corners of the pedestal, the legs diverge in four directions, with their regular slots for the metal studs. Black-painted perforated metal grille, which follows the contours of the cabinet.
The black MDF front with speaker drivers is 32 mm thick, while the other cabinet sides are made of plywood and veneered cherry or walnut. In the latter, the veneer is shaded with dark oil. The use of a special oil that preserves the natural texture of the wood, instead of the commonly used lacquer, is another calling card of Snell. All cabinet-making, assembly and finishing operations are performed by the company’s cabinetmakers by hand.
D7 models are equipped with three speakers: 25-mm silk dome tweeter and two 165-mm bass drivers, equipped with paper diaphragms, coated reinforced composition. All heads are purchased from Norwegian company Seas. Configuration of the crossover for 2.5 bands means that only one speaker is used as a pure bass driver, while the other one has to voice the midrange area as well. With the D7, the bass runs up to 400Hz, and the top end comes in at up to 2kHz. The speakers crossover is assembled on two separate boards to eliminate mutual influence of tweeter and midrange/midrange filters.
TEST STAND
BOW TECHNOLOGIES ZZ-Eight turntable
DENSEN Beat 110 integrated amplifier
NORDOST Blue Heaven interconnect and acoustic cables
SOUND
The tonal balance of the Snell D7 sound, perhaps, can not be called ideal. However, the smooth rise in the “performance” of speakers in the lower and upper parts of the spectrum subjectively compensates for the loss of sensitivity of the human ear, so after a short get used to the tone of the Snell D7 begins to like. The sound of the Snell D7 is outstandingly intelligible over the full spectrum, capturing the texture of instruments and vocals. The sound is highly natural, a slight coloration is noticeable only in the lower frequency range, but it is not unpleasant – slight warming of the sound and a slight decrease in articulation.
On the contrary, in the midrange and treble the articulation is wonderful, making the speaker sound emotional, with underlined silver strings, sparkling brass, and inspired saxophone. Very clear and informative through all the treble up to the top: long, detailed cymbals and sonorous triangles give a sound of light mood, while the speakers skilfully balance on the edge of excitement and harshness, never slipping to the latter.
The bass of the speakers is really deep, and in the bottom too, they are not betrayed by the accurate handling of timbres. This combination of comfort and detail is a strong point of the Snell D7, the more so as it plays great at moderate levels, keeping the contrast in sound dynamics and properly depicting the musical scene.
By the way, building a glorious, voluminous and transparent music scene is probably the speaker’s greatest asset. Even on orchestral fragments they separate sources in groups well, the picture is not obscured by crescendos, concert hall reverberations are well shown, and the background of the scene always appears layered. The volume and intelligibility of the stereo image created by the Americans is sure to please jazz and classical music lovers.
The inclusion of the rear tweeters further pushes back the far edge of the stage and pushes its limits to the sides. There is a surplus of light in the tweeter: tambourines, percussion, the upper timbres of brass, strings or, for example, harpsichord get an even more nuanced, convex treatment. At the same time, the images take on enlarged halos, so that the sound field becomes more diffuse – an effect for the amateur.
MEASUREMENTS
On the impedance graphs in different modes of the crossover and the curves of the AFC is clearly visible feature around 140 Hz and its harmonics, apparently related to the resonance of the cabinet. The impedance drops to 4.1 ohms at 120 Hz and to 3.1 ohms around 3.4 kHz, so the D7 needs a powerful amplifier.
Inclusion of the boundary compensation circuit raises the impedance of the speakers in the low-frequency range by 3-3,5 ohms, weakening the bass. Speakers’ inverter is set at 38 Hz.
The response of the D7 is not perfectly linear, with a smooth rise in the bass and treble region. Nevertheless, the unevenness of the amplitude-frequency response in the 40-20 kHz range is within +/-3 dB.
Interestingly, in the direction of 30 ° from the axis of the HF range is brought almost to the same level with the middle, and a noticeable decline in sensitivity begins only after 15 kHz – proclaimed wide directivity of the speaker Snell turned out to be pure truth.
However, the off-axis response shows a drop in sensitivity in the MF/HF crossover band section in the low end by about 3dB from the on-axis response .
There is an extra tweeter on the back of the speaker
PRICE: 99 400 Dollars.
Editors of the Consumer magazine. Video & Audio would like to thank Absolute Audio company for the equipment provided for testing.
The description mentions a speaker test for Snell D7 speakers called “soundstage workers.” Can someone please clarify what exactly is meant by “soundstage workers” and how they contribute to the speaker test?
Could you please provide more information about the Snell D7 speaker test and explain what exactly soundstage workers are? Thank you.
The Snell D7 speaker test is a method used to evaluate the performance of speakers, particularly their ability to reproduce audio with accuracy and clarity. It involves playing various test signals through the speakers and assessing how well they handle different frequencies, dynamics, and positioning.
Soundstage workers, on the other hand, refer to the concept of soundstage in audio reproduction. Soundstage is the illusion of width, depth, and placement of sound sources in a stereo or surround sound system. It creates a virtual listening environment where the music or sounds seem to originate from specific locations. Soundstage workers are the components of a speaker system, such as drivers and crossovers, that work together to accurately recreate this sense of space and positioning of instruments or vocals within the soundstage.