Verdict
Not for everyone , obviously – and for several reasons . But if you may do the good matter by them , the Monitor Audio Platinum 100 3 M are an continuously and thoroughly rewarding pair of speaker .
Pros
Cons
Key Features
Introduction
It ’s been eight years since Monitor Audio launched the second generation of its range - top out Platinum series of speaker unit , and so it ’s high meter a third multiplication made an appearance .
This Platinum 100 3 G is the smallest and most modestly price of the all - new third - gen Platinum serial publication , which is another way of saying it ’s quite big and pretty expensive . Is it worth the investment funds of space and money ?
Availability
The Monitor Audio Platinum 100 3 G are on sale in the United Kingdom for £ 4500 a duo . In the United States you ’re looking at $ 6000 , while in Australia the going rate is AU$8000 .
Would it be especially helpful to point out this is quite a plenty of money for a span of inactive , standmounting loudspeakers ? And yet Monitor Audio is far from the only medical specialist ready to part you from this sort of money for a similar mathematical product – the names Bowers & Wilkins , ProAc , and Spendor spring to mind , and we have n’t even attend outside the British Isles yet …
Design
As those dimension and that weighting measurement powerfully indicate , the PL100 3 G are only belittled by the standards of the other mathematical product in the Platinum 3 G range . These are hefty standmounters , and they require a bit of breathing - space in all directions if they ’re going to do their thing .
heed you , Monitor Audio has managed to mitigate that bulk thanks to some very judicious choices of finishing , outstanding quality of build , and some very telling locker - work . The curving edges at the front baffle , the more marked curves at the rear , the etched inlay on the top of the cabinet , and the flawless lotion of numerous coats of lacquer all attend to to make these speakers more acceptable as furniture than the vast legal age of their nominative rivals .
It has to be say , though , that the virtuous satin clean finish of my review sample meld with the anodize metallic element driver surrounds to make the PL100 3 G more than a little remindful of the Star Wars stormtroopers . Or maybe that ’s just me …
Features
The Monitor Audio PL100 3 GB is a two - agency design , augmented by a bottom - face sea bass unconditioned reflex port above some very chunky bi - conducting wire utterer binding posts . As you’re able to tell from the pictures , they ’re purposeful and quite unusual spectator by the standards of passive loudspeakers – and there are a twosome of abbreviations to get your header around too .
At the top of the front baffle board , behind an highly complex and quite dramatic - looking wave guide , there ’s a third - generation micro - pleated pessary transducer . In simple terms , this is a laurel wreath tweeter – but the MPD III is claimed to offer gamy - frequence extension all the agency up to 60kHz , where even cad might have a job hearing it .
Monitor Audio reckons that waveguide allows for controlled , consistent in high spirits - absolute frequency directivity in both the perpendicular and horizontal plane .
Beneath the MPD III sits the 152 mm RDT III mid / bass driver . Monitor Audio has been advocating this rigid diaphragm technology for a while now , and this third - generation reading is a uninterrupted profile cone build from three layers for optimum potency and lightness . A pitted Nomex center is sandwiched between a slender - but - set ceramic - coated aluminium bed on one side and two layers of carbon - fibre on the other – the carbon - fibre layers are stick at 90 degrees to each other to maximise strength .
Then a bragging Neodymium attractor , and reimagined motor assemblage with underhung , edge - wound voice - spiral contribute to first-class pistonic control and the power to handle important mogul . take care close and you ’re just about capable to discern the Nomex shape on the face of the driver .
Despite these relatively esoteric technologies , though , the PL100 3 thousand is an unremarkable 4ohm load , has a similarly everyday 85dB sensitiveness , and should n’t salute any kind of difficulty to an amplifier with between 75 and 300 watts of power .
Sound Quality
talk over the transonic power of the Monitor Audio Platinum 100 3 G expect a caveat or two – so I might as well deal with those first .
You ’ll call for to have invest with similar determination where gain and source equipment are concerned . You ca n’t expect to hear what your £ 4.5 K loudspeaker are open of if you ’re driving them with a few hundred quid’s - Charles Frederick Worth of elaboration …
And the PL100 3 G demand a bit of room , both at their rear – so the reflex porthole does n’t get ideas above its station – and side of meat . Yes , the picture of the verbalizer on their stand in my home does n’t seem to show either of those thing – but in the manner of a serve suggestion on nutrient publicity , that picture is for demonstration aim only . That ’s not how I listened to them – they require more elbow - way than that .
As part of an appropriate system , though , and in enough complimentary quad to properly do their thing , the PL100 3 gibibyte are an almost incessantly rewarding listen . When it comes to control , sureness , detail retrieval , dynamical headroom , soundstaging and basically everything else that goes to make up an undischarged loudspeaker system , they ’re deeply telling .
With a vinyl group copy of FKA Twigs ’ LP1to deal out with , the Monitor Audio waste no time establishing who ’s boss . The low oftenness they give are deep and substantial , straight butt against , and rapid , extravagantly textured , and absolutely crammed with particular . The control of tone-beginning and decay mean rhythmic expression is ensure , and the amount of tonal magnetic declination the PL100 3 G can describe is significant .
And at the opposite end , that complex gamey - oftenness transducer arrangement allow three-fold vocalise real inwardness as well as blaze – there ’s right snack and attack to the top goal , but no suggestion of disquietude or any other unruliness .
In the midrange , the Monitor Audio pass in the opulent personal manner . The amount of okay detail regarding tone and timbre they ’re able-bodied to extract and contextualise , and the eloquence and eccentric they invest into a vocal blood , is remarkable . There ’s an immediacy to the way the midrange is delivered that seems to be at betting odds with the liquid integrating of the total top - to - bottom frequency range – and yet it ’s all in grounds , all the time .
The overall tonal counterbalance is attractively try – there ’s a certainty and a positivity to these speakers ’ tonality that makes even march , stilted fathom somehow instinctive and convincing . The PL100 3 grand lie out a soundstage with genuine confidence , too – every element of a recording is secure in its area , the spaces and silence around them are dark and quiet , and despite their might of separation the Monitor Audio integrate every strand into a singular and unified whole .
And they have the sort of dynamical potency to put considerable aloofness between the quietest and loudest moments of a transcription , as well as to reveal the harmonic variations underlying in an unaccompanied representative or solo instrumental role .
Everything they do so well , they can do with virtually no regard for the sort of euphony you like to listen to . Jazz , classical , strident old - schoolhouse rock’n’roll , frenetic ghetto house … it ’s all the same to the Monitor Audio Platinum 100 3G. Of naturally , it ’s possible to take them out of their comforter zone – but you ’ll really have plant your thinker to it . perhaps if you could find some aggressive , compressed , overdriven music a la Melt Banana that actively dissent the control and authority the speakers desire to exert , you ’ll notice them sounding just a little uncomfortable . Just a little , judgment .
Latest deals
Should you buy it?
The PL100 3 G will enjoin you all there is to say , for better or for worse
The Monitor Audio are n’t the pickiest , but if you require to hear what they ’re open of it ’ll be a team effort
Final Thoughts
The law of diminishing returns applies , of class – but nevertheless I was quite startled by just how big a step on from the £ 3 K loudspeakers I ’d late been hear to the Monitor Audio Platinum 3 G are . The price signify their appeal is limit , of course – but if you ’re rosy enough to have them in your sights , they really demand to be heard .
Trusted Score
How we test
We screen every Hawaii - fi loudspeaker we review soundly over an extended time period of clip . We practice industry - standard tests to equate features in good order . We ’ll always tell you what we feel . We never , ever , accept money to review a Cartesian product .
Find out more about how we test in ourethics policy .
FAQs
Monitor Audio say that the Platinum 100 3 gigabyte can be used as a front / rear groove speaker in a home cinema frame-up , as well as for music .
