It seems as if nostalgia has taken hold of the hi-fi industry with the relaunch of two classic and well-regarded integrated amplifiers — the Musical Fidelity A1 and the Naim Nait 50. Now, a speaker from the 1980s has been given a new lease of life — the EPOS ES14 returns as the EPOS ES14N.
The EPOS ES14 was launched in 1983 and was revolutionary then as it was a largish bookshelf speaker which came with speaker stands. It was not common to place speakers on dedicated stands then — bookshelf speakers, like their name suggest, were placed on bookshelves or sideboards.
EPOS went through several changes in ownership and is now owned by Karl-Heinz Fink, founder of German speaker designer firm FinkTeam and also head of acoustic design consultancy Fink Audio Consulting, which has done work for Naim, Tannoy, Wharfedale and Mission.
Fink decided to relaunch the EPOS ES14, but not just as a repackaged but modernised version of the original speaker, but as a totally new take on the speaker. The only things in common between the EPOS ES 14N and the ES14 are that the the woofer cone is made of polypropylene, the tweeter is a metal dome and the port is at the rear.
Even the shape of the speaker is different — the original is a simple box while the modern one has a sloped front baffle. The crossover is also different — Robin Marshall, the founder of EPOS speakers was fond of using simple crossovers and the extreme case was to use just one capacitor and depend on the mechanical rolling off of the specially-designed speaker units. However, the new EPOS uses a more complex crossover.
The original speaker stands were made of steel tubes; the new one is mostly made of wood.
So how does the new EPOS speaker sound? Yesterday afternoon, I went to YY Sound Systems in Glo Damansara, Kuala Lumpur, to listen to them. YY Sound Systems is the dealer in Malaysia for EPOS products.
The system set up comprised the CH Precision 1.2 DAC/Controller with the Gryphon Diablo 300 integrated amplifier driving the EPOS ES14N speakers.
I was actually quite surprised that the EPOS ES14N could produce an impressive amount of bass. From what I can recall, EPOS speakers back then were known to be bass light while having a coherent and fluid mid and treble. The quality of the 300 watts per channel from the Gryphon Diablo 300 must have contributed very much to the impressive bass output of the EPOS ES14N.
The soundstage was big and the imaging solid. And the bass…was quite deep and satisfying. It was definitely not a blast from the past, but a modern sound of a new design.
Make an appointment with Shaiful of YY Sound Systems to hear the EPOS ES14N for yourself.
The EPOS ES14N retails at RM25,000 with the matching stands. Without the stands, the speakers cost RM22,000.
