Best Place Subwoofer Home

Review by Stephen M. Lerch : Good speaker, but you may want Motion 8 to save $$$

As part of the Amazon Vine program, I had actually received a MartinLogan Motion 8 Center Channel Speaker (Piano Black, each) and this was, as stated in my review of the MartinLogan Motion 12 Floorstanding Speaker (Black Ash, each) and MartinLogan Motion 10 Floorstanding Speaker (Black Ash, each), the impetus for my rebuilding my home theater. The Motion 8 eclipsed everything else in my setup (it was a home theater in a box (HTIB)). After hearing the clarity of the Motion 8, I had decided it time to upgrade my setup to something worthy of actual listening instead of a source of annoyance that it had become. As part of my auditioning speakers, I had decided to check out the above mentioned Motion 10 and Motion 12s as those are the speakers that are supposed to be matched with the Motion 8 and I was looking more for floor standers than bookshelf speakers. Also during this auditioning, I found a local hi-fi retailer with a Motion C in stock and I decided to compare the Motion 8 I had received with the Motion C. The Motion C is the more expensive option of the two, so I was curious what the difference was. After carefully comparing the two, both within a 5.1 setup with the other speakers in the Motion line and "side by side" in a blind direct comparison, it turns out that despite the $100 MSRP price difference, the Motion C really isn't worth the extra money. It sounds fantastic, reproducing movie dialog with stunning clarity, along with movie sound effects (clanging shell casings, etc). But then again, so too does the Motion 8! Just for fun I also tried out some music and found that the Motion C does an OK job reproducing that. The frequency response of the speaker doesn't lend itself to subwoofer free music playback (and that's not what it is meant for anyway) but the highs were high and mids were, well, OK at best (this is the same thing with the Motion 8; they weren't designed with music playback in mind in anything other than in movies as mostly background sound). Also to get a better feel, we configured the Motion 8 and Motion C as a stereo pair and played music. They were pretty evenly matched sonically as best I could tell, further lending me to not recommend the Motion C over the Motion 8. I was a little confused by the price discrepancy, and after a little research I found the specs on the Motin 8 and the Motion C. In spec comparison (yes, spec comparison. I did the listening test and couldn't really hear the difference), it seems the Motion C has a SLIGHTLY higher sensitivity. We're talking 1 db difference which most normal people will ever be able to differentiate. This also has a slightly better crossover frequency, but we're just splitting hairs with the differences for most listeners. If you are trying to decide between the Motion 8 and the Motion C for your center speakers and don't want to do proper auditioning, just buy the Motion 8. Most likely you'll never be able to hear the difference AND save yourself at LEAST $100 in MSRP comparison (and I've seen the Motion 8 sell for $350). Which brings me to another point. If you are trying to put together a good home theater, it is imperative that you do a proper audition if you have the means, especially if you are looking at potentially spending $400+ on one speaker alone. There is a lot of competition out there and without properly auditioning speakers you will never know if you purchase the speakers that you feel are perfect for your ears. At this particular price range, your local big box retailer (the one with the sign that is blue and yellow and looks like a price sticker) has plenty to offer you to listen to. I'd still recommend a local hi-fi shop, but those are becoming scarce like Siberian tigers. So why 4 stars? This is a very good speaker, no question. The problem becomes that for $100 less you can get one that you most likely won't be able to hear an audible difference on and performance, sensitivity and frequency response are so close that you are better off buying the Motion 8 and saving the money. You most likey won't hear the difference anyway. So the 4 stars comes into play that if you've decided on purchasing a Motion C, you definitely aren't going wrong. Sound is fantastic for the price certainly.