Swan D2.1se Custom reference stand monitor
The D2.1se Custom is The Audio Insider's exclusive redesign and upgrade of the classic Swan D2.1se, Swan's finest stand monitor.
How has the original Swan D2.1se been improved? Starting with the stock speaker, we've redesigned and replaced everything between the input terminals and the drivers - inside every D2.1se Custom is a new hand-made and point-to-point wired crossover network built by the Skiing Ninja. We've also added revised bass tuning, and upgraded internal wiring. The stock D2.1se cabinets, drivers, grilles, and hardware remain.
How does the D2.1se Custom compare to its class? The result of our upgrade to the D2.1se is a superior amplitude response to the original D2.1se, but most striking is the Custom's extraordinary definition, transparency, transient "integrity", focus, and inner-note blackness. In these qualities the D2.1se Custom is on par with anything we're aware of in its class. Downward dynamic range is truly excellent. The soundstage is seamless and unbounded by the speakers themselves. Individual sources take on their own acoustical spaces within it. Bass is extended, tuneful and defined. The speaker disappears, and the spectrum is balanced and well-integrated.
Has the D2.1se's harmonic structure and personality been altered? In some ways we've made specific changes to the D2.1se's tonal balance but we've taken care to not alter the original's overall personality, save to pull much more music out of the recording. Where the D2.1se was engaging, the Custom can be riveting. Where the original was musical, the Custom is musically insightful. And where the D2.1se was integrated, the Custom is a window on the performance, one at times so convincing that you'll probably forget them and relax in the music.
How did we get here? TAI have logged hundreds of hours on a number of custom loudspeaker systems - we've engineered 200 individual projects from award winning autosound to home ultra-fi to innovative high-performance commercial installations around the world. One of our favorite projects was a similar design less sophisticated than the D2.1se that dates back over twenty years. Months of tuning revealed that its 6.5" poly-coned, cast-frame midbass driver and 28mm soft dome ferrofluid tweeter could retrieve recorded information like nothing else we knew of.
Great hifi can suspend disbelief and transport a listener back to the recording venue. Musicians reveal what they meant. A myriad of mixing and microphone techniques are revealed. Such a sound allows a listener to forget the loudspeakers and to use them tool to facilitate changes, upgrades, tweaks, and adjustments elsewhere in the system.
Today the D2.1se Custom is the extension of that design. In early 2010 we decided to relaunch this development in a special Swan D2.1se remaned the D2.1se Custom.
So what's so different? Tuning. Years of experience provided the insight to balance this design within a very narrow musical range, adjusting every internal, tunable aspect in the speaker to blend with and compliment every other. Everything has been optimized: the transient attack and decay, the dimensional aspects of the speakers soundstage and individual images, and the speaker's dynamic "envelope" such that everything integrates into an acoustical whole.
As with all high-definition components, this speaker might not be for everyone. Measurement-only fans won't find anything either exceptional or controversial in this loudspeaker. The D2.1se Custom is made to do one thing, which is to flesh out a great recording. This is a speaker with which to, as is said of all authentic-sounding audio devices, "rediscover your recordings."
Today, the Swan D2.1se is both subtlely and fundamentally transformed from a great stand monitor into a reference tool - the D2.1se Custom takes you to the performance like no other performance loudspeaker we carry.
Will it make magic in my system? If you value great music and have a good system, we think it will. The D2.1se Custom is an exceptional reference-grade loudspeaker system, and it's available exclusively from The Audio Insider...for much less than it's sound would suggest.
Swan D2.1se Custom reference stand monitor
The D2.1se Custom includes one pair of Swan D2.1se loudspeakers upgraded with the following:
- Hand made crossover networks with point-to-point circuit and wiring
- Premium Clarity Cap capacitors
- Mil-spec film-and-foil bypass capacitors
- Low loss heavy ga low-distortion inductors
- PRP and Lynx non-inductive wirewound resistors
- Solid 99.98% copper Electra wire
- SIlver-bearing solder thoroughout
- Revised crossover points
- Revised bass tuning
- Improved damping and definition throughout the frequency range
How are the D2.1se Custom's crossover and tuning different from the original D2.1se? We cannot reveal every detail of our redesign of the D2.1se, but we can relate what they do to the physics of the loudspeaker.
- The D2.1se Custom is tuned about 5Hz lower than the original. We'll spec the Custom at 39Hz and revise the original - already known for excellent bass extension - up to 45Hz. (Swan rates the original D2.1se at 40Hz but it gives up about 5Hz to the Custom. In conjunction with this retuning, we also improved the speaker's midbass tune.
- The D2.1se Custom has a crossover frequency about 500Hz lower than the original. Both crossovers are 4th order designs, and have roughly equivalent directivities, sensitivities, and knee shapes.
The 1.1" / 28mm dome tweeter in the D2.1se is Swan's best.
The special high-tech 6.75" / 170mm midbass is unique in-class and includes many performance features.
- Hybrid Neodymium/ferrite motor, undercut pole piece, and CNC-made magnetic circuit contribute low inductance and reduced back electromotive force modulation
- Huge 75mm voice coil for linear drive and high temperature tolerance
- Ventilated chassis and motor structure for cool, linear operation at high level
- Critically damped shallow polymer cone for low self noise
- Synthetic high-loss butyl rubber surround
- Linear suspension for symmetrical drive and low mechanical distortion
- Special heavy cast alloy basket for low resonance
- Shallow mineral filled polypropylene cone
