MONTAN VII

Rating: Reference class 1+ outstanding

"Sound:

The title’s voluminous and widely tiered basses come over with impressive power without tranquilizing or overwhelming the listener.

Right from the start the duo amazes me with the agility with which it goes about its work, and effortlessly reproduces the song with vigour and emotion without laying it on thick.

Especially the crisp, almost dry-as-dust aural depiction of the bass drum and the clean and precise performance of the instruments prove that the big Vulkans can not only generate a superb deep-down bass response but also offer an equally musical reading.

The bottom line:
In quadral’s AURUM series the name delivers what it promises. As expected, the VULKAN’s performance in our test room was very fiery and dynamic with acoustic consistency at all volume levels, and it impressed above all in the more deep-down, intense passages. However, the unit surprised me with its sensitiveness and agility in terms of acoustic detailing, two qualities that will not only make the VULKAN interesting for aficionados of rock music but also for musical aesthetes as well."

Overall score in relation to price: Outstanding - perfect.

"The internal wiring with very high-quality Real Cables (with a generous cross section) makes a contribution to the top marks, as does the frequency crossover unit with a level of quality way in excess of the average, with strictly selected, top-notch components sourced from well known, high-quality suppliers.

The AURUM package also serenely handles brief, staccato instrument passages without any unpleasant ringing. Each sound mode is picked up within a matter of seconds and reproduced highly appealingly, so that the benefits of TrueHD can be emphasised very clearly: This clarity is highly apparent across all frequency ranges, with great prominence accorded to fine modelling in the treble range and masterful separation between individual instruments.

Excellent spatial illumination of the treble range with complete authenticity up into very high level regions means that Montan VII as well as the Base Prestige T put many competitors - some of them considerably more expensive - in their place.

Anyone who enjoys listening to emotional, intensive film and music material of practically all kinds and who also likes to indulge themselves in this pleasure at high volume will find that the AURUM 5.0 ensemble consisting of the Montan VII and Base Prestige T leaves them practically entirely satisfied.

The AURUM 5.0 ensemble consisting of four Montan VII speakers and a Base Prestige T centre impresses with excellent spatial response, first-class level stability, universal applicability and very sturdy workmanship.

Overall reference for top-of-the-range multi-channel loudspeaker system

• Excellent spatial reproduction capability in the treble range
• Very precise and impressive effect reproduction
• Montan and Base Prestige T separate the acoustics from the loudspeaker in an excellent way
• All components with very high level stability
• Powerful bass that is also fast
• High efficiency
• Outstanding component and production quality

"

“... high-precision sonic colouring and understated, it performed through the brightly mixed “Magic Fire Music” (Wagner, “The Ride of the Valkyries”, Karajan, DG) with never-pushy trebles, and in so doing combined the precise detailing of a ribbon with the homogeneous performing style of a dome. As a result, it quickly gained the sympathies of AUDIO colleague Bernhard Rietschel, who praised both the impulsively crisp bass and the balance, even with CDs recorded at the limits (Lyn Leon, “Private Pop”). The chassis team mastered the dynamic test “Let there be light” (Haydn, “Creation”, Bernstein) with flying colours, and even in the fortissimo it didn’t lack overview and clarity.

... The quadral is, to the contrary, a surprisingly cultivated speaker despite its wolf’s skin, and thus provided a tireless and balanced performance with precise basses. Anyone not yet a lover of ribbon units will find a potential starting point here . ...”