This review page is supported in part by the sponsors whose ad banners are displayed below
About our crossovers. Having a degree in electronic engineering, I design all our filter networks myself. My philosophy is to use the least number of parts but no fewer than necessary. I try to avoid high-inductance coils which ruin the impulse response. And without good impulse response we cannot seriously talk about good sound. When necessary I use impedance correction for specific drivers but not in all networks. I mostly choose drivers with very low inductance. The Rhapsody 200 needed no impedance correction, only the 80 did whose filter lacks baffle-step correction. All ports are calculated for a lower tuning frequency which generates less output but more uniformity and greater extension. In my view the response should be as uniform as possible. There's a famous French monitor I don't like because its bass over a very narrow band is too tight. It's as though the music was free but the bass were stuck in the enclosure. It's delicious for the first few minutes but gets irritating later. So I prefer less bass with greater uniformity. Filter parts are exclusively high-grade air-core coils and caps and MOX resistors from Jantzen Audio. I don't count every penny and thus never use cheap bipolar caps or cored coils. I insist on quality parts for all our models so owners needn't bother with subsequent speaker tuning. I have a very hard time looking at costly speakers with cheap components. It's suicide for good sound. And then of course our company is new. We must offer the audience something more than the competition at each price point. So quality parts were one obvious area where we would go the extra mile.

We also don't use circuit boards whose traces are always thin compared to real wire and suffer bad signal transfer when driven hard. It makes no sense to splurge on good crossover components and quality wiring, then suffocate it all with a PCB. Our crossovers are submerged in quartz compound to eliminate microphonics from the internal air pressures. This potting compound also eliminates humidity effects, corrosion and lastly prevents cloning.

The Rhapsody 200 slopes are 3rd-order with a custom Q that's neither exactly Butterworth or Linkwitz. Many view a third-order networks with misgivings because its phase shift is strongest. Yet its power response is best compared to the usual options. Its on-axis response has the lowest ripple and its phase shift right before and after the crossover point is actually lowest. I thus don't care that it sums with the 270° phase shift. It sounds live and natural which is my goal. Furthermore the vertical acoustic polar response only shifts down 15° from horizontal. The speaker leans back 7° so there's merely an 8° axial shift. Relative to the many strengths of a 3rd-order filter, I can live with that. Many people promote 24dB/octave Linkwitz filters because their on-axis response sums flat. But what use is flat on-axis response when the room influences the power response? Everything needs to be factored into the calculations, not only on-axis measurements. And here the Linkwitz filter exposes weaknesses of poor power response, high group delay and high phase shift above and below the filter frequency. From my perspective a 4th-order Linkwitz is good for DIY beginners. That's how I started 9 years ago. As for the sound, I aimed for a speaker that would be quick and detailed but not harsh. The Rhapsody models mostly play best with tubes or high-power class A transistor amps like Pass Labs. Rhapsody speakers should see good amplifier control to avoid bass resonance. I thought of listeners who appreciate music and its nuances, not those who wish to tear down walls. With the Rhapsody Series I imagined a 40 to 60-year old with a good brandy in his snifter who late in the evening turns on his hifi. He spins up a favorite LP and sits calmly on his couch enjoying Jazz or the classics while slowly sipping his drink. Though it may read scripted that was my actual vision then and it is now.


Rhapsody 200 response and harmonic distortion curves

To recapitulate basics, the AudioSolutions Rhapsody 200 is a 5-driver three-way bass reflex floorstander with dual rear-fire ports and impedance-linear crossover. Dimensions are 1360 x 348 x 619mm HxWxD without plinth. The latter is required to lean the speaker back as intended. With plinth the footprint enlarges to 555 x 766mm. Total height then grows to 1447mm and places the 25mm silk-dome tweeter at 1090mm. The bracketing midranges are 150mm paper cones, the paralleled woofers 23cm equivalents. The ideal listening distance is 2.26m where tweeter and midrange axes intersect. Claimed in-room response is 27Hz to 25kHz, sensitivity is 90.5dB. Weight is ~80kg each but the ship weight is significantly higher. That's because each speaker arrives in a massive wood crate whose every panel must be unscrewed to finally remove the solid MDF end caps lined in hard foam. As a result the disassembled crates flat-pack to take up far less storage space. Power handling is 200Wrms and the impedance extremes are 2.8Ω (9.000Hz) and 20Ω (17kHz), with the nominal value being 4Ω.


Buyers will rejoice in the sheer material excess. For the €7.660 price it's flatly enormous. And for this class the finishing is just as luxurious. Standard options include oak, sapele, walnut, smoked oak and zebrano veneers as well as all RAL and NCS colors. Olive veneer comes at a 15% surcharge, Santos rosewood demands 8%. On these counts—including the general cross-sectional shape with narrow spine—the Rhapsody 200 competes squarely against Franck Tchang's speaker whose immaculate high-gloss enclosure is sourced from China's top cabinet supplier. The Tango sells for up to €18.500/pr with the top resonators installed.

With 500wpc AURALiC Merak monos
Once we consider many mainstream vendors, the price-to-materials quotient for the Lithuanian goes up even higher. Its competitive blade is thus honed to a most lethal edge. It really cuts much competition down a size or two. Would the sound follow (exclusive Brioni suit) and be a few sizes too big for the asking price too?