Italian manufacturer Sonus Faber has announced the launch of its second-generation Stradivari loudspeaker at this year’s High End Munich show, but it isn't going to come cheap. Retailing at a whopping £45,000, the sleek new speaker is a reimagined and enhanced version of the first Stradivari that entered the world in the early 2000s.
Those enhancements should allow this stylish (and pretty sizeable) new model to justify its similarly weighty price tag. Sonus Faber teases delicate craftsmanship combined with the brand’s “most advanced and cutting-edge sound technology” under the cabinet.
For a start, the speaker is fitted with a low-frequency adjuster, a feature that gives full control of the ultra-low range tuning to provide an “unprecedented sound experience” and “uncompromised room response optimisation”. Reading between the lines, you should be able to receive supreme audio fidelity wherever you choose to place the new Stradivari pair.
The premium loudspeaker also boasts an anti-resonant organic basket within its woofer, designed to stop vibration from the woofer membrane, while “Clepsydra technology” around the reflex port maximises low-frequency performance.
There’s also something called “INTONO technology” (Sonus Faber loves a fancy term), a boon that promises to give natural reproduction of medium frequencies while reducing the size and the filter components of the crossover.
For Sonus Faber’s chief of design Livio Cucuzza, the task of redesigning an iconic model from around 20 years ago was a challenge: “How do we recreate a product that continues to stand the test of time and has almost become an artefact?" he said. "We wanted to ensure that the new Stradivari represented all the advancements Sonus Faber has made in sound technology to date, while still keeping the brand’s classic external look and feel."
However it turns out, it’s always exciting when a premium brand like Sonus Faber drops a high-end product with aspirations of being the best in class. The five-star Sonus Faber Omnia wireless speaker, for instance, is a feast for the eyes and the ears, so seeing a standalone loudspeaker with such a mammoth price tag can only have us wondering how good the Stradivari is going to sound.
From the beginning of June 2023, the second-generation Stradivari will be available in graphite, red and wenge (a dark-brown shade of wood) via authorised Sonus Faber dealers for £45,000 / €50,000 / $50,000 / AU$89,995.
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