Which option to go with? Epik Tower or two av123 MFW-15's?

I bought my Tower a couple months ago and could not be happier. Here are some of my thoughts on your choices:


MFW15s look gorgeous and appear to be great value (cost/performance) for a pair, but if you can place the Tower (it's pretty big.....to me at least), I believe you'll have some SIGNIFICANT advantages with the Tower. I am NOT purely guessing (although I haven't heard the MFW) but basing my opinions on Craigsubs initial FR graphs and giving the MFW benefit of doubt as far as sound quality.....it is Seaton design afterall. I've graphed my Tower and know what it is capable of and DO know that the driver used in the Tower can deliver Tuneful/Tight/Stop on a dime bass.....as well as Subsonic Crunch that you can feel, rather than hear.


If you want the sub(s) for all purpose use (HT & Music), there is no question you want the Tower. You can buy a pair or can even buy 6 MFWs and you won't get the output below 20hZ that the Tower gives effortlessly. And if you've never owned a sub that can deliver flat output from 80hZ down to 14, you don't know what you've been missing on modern movie soundtracks!


If you are 100% music it's a tougher choice (or more of a tradeoff). Like I said, I can't deny that the MFWs are beautiful........and assuming they are as musical (or at least close to) the other subs rated well for music by Craigsub, then they may be a great deal for you. Two furniture grade pieces set up to even your FR at a great price.


But.......you won't get much incremental SPL out of the pair unless you co-locate.......and you wouldn't come close to fully enjoying HT experience like with a more capable low down sub like the Tower.


The Castle rates incredibly well on Craigsubs, especially in comparison to Conquest and PB13U. I don't have Castle, but there's a lot of speculation on what Tower can and can't do in comparison to this model that i'd like to share my two cents opinion on. Some of the speculation I will attest to that I don't think is correct is regarding FR tradeoff of +20hZ performance to attain lower response with lower tuning.


I have my Tower calibrated 3 dB hot (compared to the rest of my 7.1 setup) and have the amp set at only slightly more than 50% up and when I push my Emotiva DMR-1 to reference levels I get clean, clear output up to 112db peaks. The Tower alone can run flat (i say can, because I intentially have it calibrated with a small house-curve with an 8dB rise from 80 to 30) from 80 to 14hZ!!!! This is without ANY EQ boost whatsoever. I use three PEQ cuts with my cheapo Behringer FBD to achieve my desired curve. This is not in a small room either. Room is roughly 18x30x8 open to another room and another hallway.


The ONLY things I wish were different with my Tower:


1. I wish it were smaller.......but such is physics!


2. I "sometimes" wish it didn't protect itself.........On the most demanding of movie subsonics, the amp will shut down when driven to ridiculous (10dB hot pushing continuous >114dB) levels. Re-evaluating this, i should probably be happy it does protect itself, as there is no SANE reason to run the system like that, as the rest of my 7.1 system can't keep up with the Tower at more than a 50% setting on Epik Amp calibrated -3dB with receiver anyways. Running 3dB hot which is more reasonable, it runs effortlessly and puts out flat clean bass at 104dB from 80 down to 14 hZ hitting dynamic peaks up to 112 ish.


Not sure what i'm going to do once I get my Swan system to ouput more.......i'm waiting on release of 5x200 separate EMO XPA5 amp to be released. At that point I'll be looking for a little more woofage (perhaps another EPIK). We'll jump off that bridge when we get there........but more than happy with what I currently have.


Good luck, whichever way you go.



Quote:
Originally Posted by warlord260 /forum/post/12840982


wow johnny, best real world review of the tower i have yet seen. thx alot! looks like the conquest, tower, castle are right on the money. now if the caliber and the knight fall where they should. i should be happy with my caliber. mondays the day!

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I second that.

Great discussion. I started out considering a BIC H-100 (for budget reasons), then to the AV123 MFW-15, now I am actually consider the Epik Tower... ah! Does it ever stop?


I'm afraid I'll get something like the Epik Tower and not know how to place and set it up properly and get half the performance it's capable of.



Quote:
Originally Posted by Jakeman02 /forum/post/12891410


No it never stops, especially if you hang around here. Doesn't matter if you have 20 Epik Towers, read enough post and you'll be thinking you need 30.

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I was afraid of that. So it begins...

Quote:
Originally Posted by Jakeman02 /forum/post/12891410


How big is your room?

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Thanks for asking! 14'8"x15'8"x10' - double doors as entry, can be closed off, but usually isn't - likely would for movies though if performance would be better.