Our
last review encounter with Definitive Technology in the form of the Demand
series left a positive impression, but it was a departure from
their normal design practices. It almost looked as if Definitive Technology was
turning a new leaf in terms of sound character, even though we and many others
enjoyed their traditional sound of their bipolar speakers. In the Demand series,
Definitive Technology aced the design of a more traditional speaker than their
usual bipole loudspeakers. However, if it did signal a new direction for
Definitive Technology, they have just launched a speaker series that proclaims
they have NOT abandoned their bipole design. The new Dymension speakers, which
we previewed back in March, take Definitive Technology’s traditional design and
advance it with a host of new features. In today’s review, we take an in-depth
look at the Dymension D70 towers and the DM20 center speakers. We will ask the questions of what Definitive Technology has done to
move their standard design forward, and how they compete among other speakers
in the same product class.
15.4CH Definitive Technology + Denon Awesome Demo Experience!
Appearance
At a
glance, there has hardly been any aesthetic change at all between the Dymension
series and Definitive Technology’s popular BP series. The DM70 are tall, nearly
featureless tower speakers comprised of hard angles. The speakers are wrapped
in a black fabric, but this is not some kind of grille that can be removed. The
fabric shrouds any kind of mechanical elements that would otherwise be visible,
so this is not a speaker where the drivers are visible. There are just a few
touches that save them from absolute minimalism, such as a slim metallic belt
with a buckle that bears the Definitive Technology insignia. The top of the
speaker is a metal panel, and on this panel, there is a plate engraved with
Definitive Technology badging. The feet are visible, but they are just disc
feet mounted on some simple outriggers.
The
DM20s is similarly styled; it is a thin, stretched-out oblong that is shrouded
in black fabric. The only features it has is a small badge in the lower right
corner and some metallic plates that cap the sides (these are actually painted
MDF). The badge is attached by a magnet
and so it can be removed or oriented by 90 degrees for those who want to use
the DM20s in a vertical, on-wall use. There isn’t much more that can be said to
describe these speakers’ appearance. The simplicity of their styling makes them
an easy fit in a wide variety of decor. I think they look nice, and they are a
good lesson in how to make something look upscale through simple, without
spending a lot of money on a real wood veneer with ten layers of lacquer.
Design Analysis
Let’s
start our discussion of the Dymension speakers with the DM70 towers since they
are much more complex designs. A big selling point of the DM70 speakers is
their ‘bipole’ design, which is their ability to radiate sound out of the front
and back. Definitive Technology claims that the bipole design creates a
‘spacious, immersive soundstage’ for an ‘incredible depth-of-field and truly
enveloping listening experience.’ Is there anything to this beyond marketing
hyperbole? Maybe. The DM70s are supposedly able to accomplish this thanks to a
rear array of drivers that is identical to the front array and can project the
same sound out of the rear of the speaker as the front. What that does is
increase the ratio of reflected sound relative to the direct sound for the
listener. That should make for a more diffuse sound field which may sound
‘wider’ and more ‘enveloping.’ The research in this area does suggest that a
higher ratio of acoustic reflections would make the sound sources seem wider
(the technical term is ‘Apparent Source Width,’ or ASW, which is defined as
“the audible impression of a spatially extended sound source.”) Research also
suggests that increasing reflections also increases ‘Listener Envelopment’ or
LEV which is defined as “the listener’s sensation of the space being filled
with sound images other than the apparent sound source.” Much of the science in
this area focused either on concert halls, acoustical properties of the room
itself, or multi-channel listening rather than dispersion patterns of stereo
speaker pairs. However, Definitive Technology’s marketing claims don’t seem to
contradict existing science and may have some merit.
Broadly
speaking, the Dymension DM70s are 3-way speakers that use MTM arrays on the
front and rear and a powered bass section that uses two passive radiators. But
that is an extreme simplification, and there is a lot going on within each
component that deserves discussion. Let’s start our discussion of the hardware
of these speakers at the top of the frequency band with the tweeters. The
tweeters use a 1” anodized aluminum oxide dome set in a shallow waveguide with
a phase lens mounted in front of the dome. That isn’t an unusual design, and it
has been used successfully before such as in the Demand series that we spent
time with. Waveguides and phase lenses can vary greatly in effectiveness, so
the devil is in the details in this regard, and we can only see how well-executed
they really are in the end result.
There
are two 5.25” midranges on each side which use Definitive Technology’s BDSS
woofer which stands for ‘Balanced Double Surround System,’ and it gets that
name because the cone uses two surrounds: one surround on the outer edge of the
cone and one on the inner edge that attaches it to a large phase plug.
Definitive Technology claims that this double surround system allows greater
linear excursion. The large phase plug is something particular to Definitive
Technology loudspeakers, and they call it the ‘Linear Response Waveguide.’ Its job is to block wavefronts from the
different areas of the cone from colliding and interfering with each other. It
looks to me like it would be effective in that role.
The
Dymension DM70 uses one active 10” subwoofer driver and two 10” passive
radiators. The passive radiators are mounted across from each other which is a
good idea. Passive radiators can have a lot of moving mass, so having them
oppose each other will cancel out the momentum that they impart on the
enclosure. They are also coupled together by a foam ring to help mitigate
cabinet vibration. The active driver is powered by an onboard 180-watt, Class-D
amplifier. The level of the subwoofer section can be adjusted by +12dB to
-15dB. DefTech touts a feature of the subwoofer’s volume adjustment system that
they call ‘Intelligent Bass Control’ which raises the level of the subwoofer in
a nonlinear way so that higher or lower levels will not affect the sound of
lower mids (Boston Acoustics implemented a similar feature in their VR960 and
VR 970 speakers in 1998). The bandwidth of drivers in loudspeakers is not
filtered out over a sharp drop-off but rather a gradual roll-off. If you simply
raised the level of a driver within a speaker, the sound that is affected
starts getting into other drivers’ bandwidths. So in a normal speaker, if you
simply raised the level of the bass driver, its sound would start to be heard
in the mids which would degrade the quality. Definitive Technology has solved
that problem by changing the shape of the filter at each notch in the
subwoofer’s volume knob so that the sound from the subwoofer section does not
bleed into the midrange section.
The
cabinet seems sturdy enough with most of the bracing in the upper section MTM
arrays. The opposite-facing driver arrays should go a long way toward canceling
out movement caused by the moving mass of the woofers and voice coils, but
cabinet resonances still need to be addressed by damping and mass. The DM70 is
held up by a set of outriggers where the user can choose either flat or spike
feet. While the fabric sock that covers the enclosure does lend it a unique and
handsome appearance, it could be a real problem for cat owners or rambunctious
children. The fabric is certainly vulnerable to abuse, and I don’t think that
it would be re-upholstered under warranty if a cat decided to use it as a
scratching post. One advantage is that the low reflectivity of the fabric will
do a lot to make the speakers disappear in low-light conditions.
One
disadvantage of the DM70s for home theaters with projection screens is there is
a rear blue LED which is somewhat bright, and if these speakers are placed in
front of a projection screen, the light from the LED will degrade the screen’s
contrast. Users with projection screens could cover the LED with a couple of
pieces of electrical tape to block the light from hitting the screen, but a
switch to turn off the light would have been welcome here. Alternatively, if
appearance of the speaker isn’t a big concern, users could simply rotate the
speaker by 180-degrees since the rear array is the same as the front. This
speaker would sound the same if it was turned around in place, since the
rear-to-front design is symmetrical – so long as the tweeter level switch is
set to ‘0dB.’
Connectivity
is done through some typical 5-way binding posts. There is no LFE input for the
subwoofer section, and that is probably a good idea to avoid confusion. These
speakers ought to be set as ‘large’ in AV processors since they should have no
problem with lower bass. There are also some binding posts for the optional
DM90 ‘height’ speaker for Atmos systems that can be installed on top of the
DM70s. Height speakers on top of the main speakers are not normally the best
solution for Atmos upfiring height channels, so I would recommend users check to see if
ceiling speakers can be used for Atmos height channels before resorting to
setting speakers on top of the left/right mains. Definitive Technology also
offers the wall-mountable Dymension DM95 speakers as an option against ceiling
speakers. Without the Atmos speaker, there is a solid aluminum plate topping
off the DM70.
The
DM70 speaker design seems like it could accomplish its goal of issuing more
acoustic reflections than a traditional speaker, and outside of that aspect,
the build quality and engineering seem sensible as well. For those who might
prefer the bipole aspect toned down, there is a switch on the back panel that
takes the rear array down by 6dB. This could be especially helpful if the user
needs to position the speaker close to the wall.
Moving
on to the DM20 center speaker, it is a 2.5-way slim center/on-wall LCR that is
designed to fit in tight situations. It is a lot less complex than the DM70
tower speakers and does not have a rear driver array. It uses the same aluminum
oxide dome tweeter as the DM70 but not the same midrange woofers. The woofers
are four composite polymer 4” cones. While the use of 4” drivers might not
sound like it would have serious dynamic range, four of them equals the surface
area of an 8” woofer, so the DM20 may be capable of some real punch, at least
in midrange frequencies. The -3dB low-end of its spec’d frequency response is
91Hz, so it isn’t designed to play low bass. Users should set this speaker to
‘small’ in their AV processor or receiver, and they might consider a 90Hz
crossover frequency. The DM20 is a sealed design that uses a low-volume
enclosure, so lower bass would not have been possible, at least without
sacrificing a lot of dynamic range. Definitive Technology made the right choice
in exchanging low-frequency extension for dynamic range since anyone who has
this center will also have a subwoofer.
The
DM20 has rear keyhole slots so that it can be mounted against the wall either
horizontally or vertically. This enables it to be used as an on-wall speaker as
much as a stand-mount center speaker. It is a bit hefty at 22 lbs., so make
sure it is mounted onto studs or anchors. One problem is that the keyhole slots
are spaced 20” apart, and this is awkward because the slots won’t quite line up
with the 16” stud spacing of North American homes or 24” spacing of European
homes. For this reason, I recommend that the non-stud mounting screw use an
anchor, or both use anchors if the keyhole slots can’t line up with any studs.
The
DM20 drivers are arranged with the tweeter sandwiched between two sets of two
midrange woofers in an MTM-style design (although technically this
implementation is an ‘MMTMM’ but the principle is the same). This will
inevitably give rise to interference nulls at off-axis angles that horizontally-aligned
MTMs are known for. We have talked about this at length multiple times in
articles such as: Vertical Vs. Horizontal
Center Speaker Designs, Vertical Vs. Horizontal
Center Speaker Designs – An Alternate Perspective, and Center Channel Speaker
Design Additional Considerations. To boil down a complex engineering
issue, MTM designs can have very good responses at the on-axis angle but can
have very poor responses at off-axis angles along the plane of the drivers. For
horizontal MTM center channels, that means if you are seated off to the side
relative to the center speaker, you can be met with a subpar sound because of a
depression in an important frequency band, typically the midrange to upper
midrange. All MTMs will have this problem to some extent, but some will have it
more severely than others. The DM20 ameliorates this somewhat by going with a
2.5-way design where the outer mids have a much lower low-pass frequency than
the inner mids.
I
decided to test for this off-axis interference cancellation by listening for
any timbral shift in the off-axis versus on-axis sound in the DM20s by playing
a white noise as well as dialogue and music samples. It was quite evident in
this speaker. Listening at an off-axis angle causes a significantly audible
spectral shift in this speaker as opposed to having it face the listener. There
was a definite ‘hollowing out’ of sounds that had midrange energy. I could
still understand dialogue at off-axis angles, but the timbre had shifted at
those angles, and not for the better. At an on-axis angle, everything sounded
full and fairly good. For this reason, I wouldn’t advise the addition of the
DM20 to a set of DM70s for the purpose of getting center imaging for far off-axis
(> 20 deg) listeners. To be sure, the DM20 can anchor center channel sound to the right
location, but the qualitative hit that it suffers at off-axis angles may negate
its advantages. And to reiterate what I said before, any low-profile center
speaker would inevitably have the same problem. The DM20s are not at all unique
in this regard.
It
should be kept in mind that this off-axis interference cancellation only
happens when the DM20 is used horizontally, and users who choose to use it as
vertically mounted on-wall pairs will not have this problem. However, it does
mean that the vertical dispersion will be a bit narrow with vertical mounting,
so users should try to mount the DM20s with the tweeters roughly around the ear
level of the listening position.
Listening
Sessions
In my 24’ by 13’ (approximately)
listening room, I set up the speakers with a few feet of stand-off distances
between the back wall and sidewall and equal distance between the speakers and
the listening position. I angled the speakers to face the listening position.
The listening distance from the speakers was about 9 feet. No room correction
equalization was used. Processing was done by a Marantz 7705 and the amplification
was done by a Monoprice Monolith 5×200 amplifier. No subwoofers were used. All
music listening was done with the DM70s alone in two-channel stereo, and I
brought in the DM20 for movie watching.
I should say that before I sat down to do
some serious listening with this speaker, it took a little while and some extra
positional tweaking to get a balanced sound between the left and right DM70
speakers. For most speakers, I can place them in the same spot for an even
soundstage between the left and right speakers, but the DM70s did take more
work to get a balanced sound. It’s possible that their unusual acoustical
properties were reacting to my room differently than traditional speakers, but
setting these up was a bit more involved than normal. Also, I found that the
soundstage didn’t stabilize until I was at least as far back as my typical
9-foot listening distance. At closer proximities, it was difficult to get a
good stereo-center image.
Music
Listening
A major new release this year came from
Depeche Mode in their 15th studio album, “Memento Mori.” Like so many others, I
have been a fan of the band for decades, and this release is particularly
poignant because it is the first without founding member Andy Fletcher who
passed away in May of 2022 early in the album’s formation. Remaining members
David Gahan and Martin Gore, who famously never had an easy relationship,
decided to finish the album. Since its release, it has been widely acclaimed by
music critics as the best work that Depeche Mode has released in years. I
thought it would be a good opportunity to see what the DM70s could do for the
harder edge of pop music.
The first track, “The Cosmos is Mine,”
opened with a pretty hefty bass line, and the DM70s handled it with
subwoofer-like authority. Gahan’s voice was processed to make it sound nearly
phantasmagorical, and it hovered over the speakers like an otherworldly spirit.
Ambient synth sounds darted left and right, and the speakers could image these
sounds outside of the boundaries of the width of their placement. Subsequent
tracks, such as the album’s single, “Ghosts Again,” had a drier mix on the
vocals, and this gave them a stronger center image. I was afraid that the rear
acoustic emanation might blow center imaging out to huge proportions, but this
wasn’t the case. While the center image was not pinpoint precise as I have
heard with some other speakers, the DM70s could place the singer and
instruments where they are supposed to be around the soundstage. The soundstage
was generally quite wide and expansive, more so than conventional loudspeakers.
On occasion, I did hear an uncanny sense of depth, such as on the track “Soul
With Me” where the processing on the singer’s voice combined with the speaker’s
unique design pulled the voice back well behind the speaker’s distance from me.
By the end of the album, I would say that the DM70s killed it (and I mean that
in a good way). This music sounded great on these speakers, and I am sure most
Depeche Mode fans would agree. The wide soundstage gave “Memento Mori” a ‘big,’
panoramic sound that particularly suits that album.
The DM70s sounded natural and lifelike on this recording…
To see how the DM70s sound with
orchestral music, I selected an album from Qobuz titled “Destination
Rachmaninoff. Departure.” This album contains Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concertos
No.2 and 4 as well as Rachmaninoff’s piano arrangement of Bach’s “Partita for Violin
Solo No.3.” I decided on this music because it would have a piano at the
forefront with orchestral accompaniment, so I could hear what the speakers do
to image a single instrument as well as a full orchestra. Piano is played by
the virtuoso Daniil Trifonov who is accompanied by the Philadelphia Orchestra,
and the performance was recorded at the palatial Verizon Hall in Philadelphia’s
Kimmel Center. I streamed this beautifully-produced Deutsche Grammophon release
in a 24-bit/96kHz resolution.
While the piano was the lead instrument
here, it did not overshadow the orchestra as can sometimes happen. One reason
for that, which can be heard through the DM70 speakers, is that the recording
engineers did not close-mic the piano like is very often done. This,
thankfully, makes the piano a part of the orchestra rather than some giant that
sits atop the orchestra. The piano did image between the speakers, but not with
laser precision – not that such precision should be expected in a recording
done in a symphonic hall. However, the reverb of the performance space wasn’t
very extensive, and I don’t know if that is because the Verizon Hall is not as
reverberant as other symphonic halls or that was just how the recording
engineers set up the microphones. Whatever the reason, this recording style
seemed to compliment the DM70s, and the sound they produced from this album
sounded natural and lifelike. It sounded like a closer seat to the performers,
and that may be partly due to the wide soundstage projected by the DM70s.
Tonally, I never noticed anything that sounded off or colored, and the
instruments sounded correct. During this album, I tried to hear the difference
that the DM70’s rear array attenuation switch made. It reduces output from the
rear tweeter by 6dB, but the difference that it made for this music was subtle
at best. Regardless, in either mode, the music sounded terrific. It’s possible
that the extra reflections from the rear array enhance the concert hall effect
which can be especially beneficial to this type of orchestral music, so I do
think that classical music lovers with a penchant for full orchestras ought to
give the DM70s very close consideration. I can’t imagine anyone complaining
about the sound quality of what I heard when listening to this album on these
speakers.
The detail and timbre of the overtones of the
double bass were terrific to hearon the DM70s.
For something simple and traditional that
focuses on a few acoustic instruments, I found a recent release titled “Uusi
Aika” by the Finnish jazz ensemble Uusi Aika (it must have taken them a while
to come up with the album name). I wanted to hear how the DM70s would image a
smaller-scale performance with its larger imaging. The album is formed mostly
from just saxophone, piano, bass, and percussion with a smattering of a few
other instruments here and there. This is lower-tempo jazz for those in the
mood for a very relaxed pace. The recording doesn’t have a usual studio sound
but instead sounds like a live performance done with a single microphone.
The recording gave this performance an
intimate sound as if I were right next to the performers, and the imaging of
the DM70s added to that effect. The lead saxophone on the first track imaged
big as did the double bass. A similar effect was heard on the shakuhachi on the
second track. I think a more traditional speaker might have squeezed the
soundstage of this album a bit more as well as tightened up the imaging of the
instruments, but I don’t think the DM70s imaged poorly, but rather just not as
precisely as more conventionally designed speakers, especially ones with narrow
directivity control. As with other acoustic music albums that I listened to,
tonality was generally very good. The detail and timbre of the overtones of the
double bass were terrific to hear and evidence that the bass section was
well-integrated with the MTM arrays. Likewise, the texture of the saxophone was
articulate and nicely rendered. The bass was strong without being overbearing,
but that is partly a setup matter since the user has control over the subwoofer
level on the DM70. For my tastes and in my room, the dial at just a couple of
notches under 12 o’clock sounded right. In that setting, nothing sounded off,
even by a little bit. I enjoyed “Uusi Aika” by Uusi Aika, and I liked the sound
that the DM70s imparted to this music. Some might prefer the smaller soundstage
and more focused imaging of traditional speaker designs, but I am sure there
are many who would quite enjoy the presentation given by the DM70s.
For something that can push the
loudspeaker hard, I threw on Malux’s “Destroy the Machines.” This is a
drum’n’bass album that begs to be played at a loud volume. It is chocked full
of ferocious breakbeats, scorching lead synths, and hard bass with everything
mixed at high levels. It is dance music, but Malux mixes things up enough so
that it is not too repetitive to be enjoyed while seated in an Eames Chair and
enjoying a glass of 30-year-old Macallan in your finest smoking jacket. On
paper, the DM70s should be able to rock hard, but we have to test it to know
for sure, so I cranked the volume to see what it could do.
I knew right away that the DM70s had more
dynamic range than my ears did, at least for the mids and treble. I backed down
on the volume in the interest of preserving my hearing, but there was no doubt
that the speakers could rock. While I backed down to a loud but not insane
volume for the system as a whole, I still wanted to see what the limits of
subwoofer sections would be, so I decided to max out the subwoofer sections,
since loud deep bass is a lot easier on the ears than loud treble and mids.
Taking the system volume up with the sub volume at max, I could drive the MTM
arrays to louder levels than the DM70’s subwoofer could follow, but that was at
a very loud level. At very high levels, the bass tonality did change indicating
that the subwoofers were running into some distortion, so the limiters aren’t
so strict as to only permit clean bass. I wasn’t able to drive the system into
bottoming out, but it could be audibly pushed past linear behavior above a
certain point. However, normal users are unlikely to drive these speakers that hard. Those who want very loud bass should probably supplement these speakers
with subwoofers. Perhaps the Definitive Technology DN15 15″ sub with dual passive 15″s would do the trick.
Movie
Watching
To see what the DM70s could do for a
typical movie experience, I selected the 2013 crime comedy “American Hustle.”
This film takes place in New Jersey in the late 70s and concerns a con man who
is caught in one of his own schemes and is forced to work with the FBI along
with his accomplice/mistress to help an investigation into political
corruption. I hadn’t yet seen “American Hustle,” but this big-budget movie with
an all-star cast is sure to have a top-notch sound mix and should be a good
demonstration of the DM70’s sound with a major Hollywood movie.
the DM70s did a terrific job in executing the
sound reproduction.
“American Hustle” turned out to be a fun
caper with talented actors turning in great performances with strong,
well-written roles. The dialogue was ripe with 70s New York and New Jersey
vernacular and profanity, and it sounded terrific on the DM20 center. Dialogue
intelligibility was never a problem even when muttered, whispered, or
improvised. The sound mix was rich in music, not just from the period with
pieces from Donna Summer, The Bee Gees, and The Wings, but also from prior eras
that reflect the film’s characters. Duke Ellington’s “Jeep’s Blues” played a
major role, as did Tom Jones’ “Delilah,” and they sounded terrific on the
DM70s. The sound mix was also rich in the sounds from the era. The rumble of
the V8s from massive old Cadillacs, Buicks, Oldsmobiles, and Lincolns was
impeccably rendered, and it is a once-common sound that is seldom heard in real
life these days. There weren’t that many more sound elements from a dialogue
and music-driven film, but the artistry of this sound mix certainly deserves an
audio system worthy of it, and I would say that Definitive Technology’s
Dymension series is certainly that.
For a more fantastical sound mix, I
watched the 2022 Marvel movie “Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.” The
first Dr. Strange film is one of the few Marvel adventures that I actually
enjoyed, so I was looking forward to seeing this sequel, and the DM70s
presented a sound system that seemed worthy of the endeavor. With the legendary
Sam Raimi in the director’s seat, this outing promised to be a wild experience
in both sight and sound, so I turned the levels up and strapped in.
The movie, and thus the sound mix, was
indeed a riotous excursion, and the DM70s did a terrific job in executing the
sound reproduction. There were many instances of creatively bizarre sound mix
choices such as when the doctor and his traveling companion were falling
through the many bizarre universe incarnations or when the Scarlet Witch
attacked the Sanctum Sanctorum in alternate New York City. Raimi never lets the
camera sit still for long, and the whirling, manic perspective was echoed by
the sound mix. While this movie was prime material for a surround sound mix,
the DM70s could image the restless point-of-view nicely, and I didn’t miss the
surrounds at all. The bass was also good, although I do think there was some
very deep bass that the subs did miss. They thundered and rumbled my room, but
not quite with the same authority that a large, ported 15” sub might have.
However, I think most people would be very happy with the bass ability of these
speakers and feel no need for an extra subwoofer at all. The dialogue
intelligibility of the DM20 was fine. I had anticipated the DM20s being badly
outgunned by the DM70s, but that didn’t prove to be the case. Even though it is
a much smaller speaker, I never noticed any weakness in the center of the
soundstage. Director Raimi’s longtime collaborator Danny Elfman does the music
score, and the DM70s really shined with this energetic orchestral music.
Indeed, the film as a whole had a quite complex and multi-layered sound mix,
with the lively music running alongside a plethora of effects noises as well as
dialogue, but it never became a confused or jumbled mess on these speakers. In
the end, I quite enjoyed “Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” with the
DM70s and DM20, and if they make a sequel, I hope I will have a sound system as
good as these speakers to watch it.
