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Setup again: In my space Louhivaara's recommendation for shorter front-wall distance was spot on. Most speakers end up at 2.5 meters, occasionally slightly more. Thus positioned the Graphica's many drivers as powered from ModWright's burly KWA-100SE produced less kick and shove than eye sight anticipated they ought to have done. They sounded too polite, even washed out a tad. Reducing that distance to 1.1 meters ameliorated that. Having just come off Mark+Daniel's phenomenal Fantasia S with its tall 650Hz - 20.000Hz air-motion transformer, I was a bit surprised however.

That's because Aurelia's moving mass spread out and driven from so many paralleled motors proved noticeably less dynamic and punchy. The Graphica thus had to be played a bit louder before it arrived. Daniel Lee's dynamic advantage apparently ties to how his Oscar Heil-derivative main driver squeezes rather than pushes air. Competing makers who use their own AMTs like Adam, Burmester and Elac cite for them a propagation velocity advantage between 4:1 and 5:1 over conventional drivers. When extended downward to 400Hz as Mark+Daniel have done, this becomes very audible. It manifests as heightened articulation. This requires very little amplitude. The magic bullet is intensified dynamic contrast. This paints with a finer-tipped brush and causes greater differentiation. In the most basic language things sound loud farther down into subdued levels; and they get louder faster in the other direction.

Expectations for this type of dynamic magnification power also from Aurelia—higher lucidity and intelligibility in the micro range—as though it were merely a function of scaled-up diaphragm surface and independent from whether it be implemented folded or cone shaped would have been wrong. The Graphica actually was the one to move more downstairs air. Any forceful bass transient demonstrated this with the kind of follow-through that's not just initial spike but subsequent mass rolling out into the room. A sighted estimate on raw size would give Aurelia a 2:1 lead over M+D's long-throw 8-inch woofer. Below 200Hz this clearly translated as more displaced air. Groove-based ambient cuts with their shuddering infrasonic beats (particularly those with enhanced reverb), low synth pedals and variously doctored artificial LF sounds really were great fun. I pulled out all manner of examples just to indulge. The Graphica simply wasn't as preternaturally resolved. It thus played with overall softer relief than the Fantasia S. The same had also held true for the more expensive Living Voice OBX-RW. In the general ±$10K range the Mark+Daniel seems sans pareil when it comes to that attribute.

Off axis: Controlled dispersion from the line array definitely works. My office desk sits diagonally in the room's left rear corner (the right corner is much farther back). That puts my writing chair in line with the left speaker. Sitting behind my HP 2710m monitor I was mostly listening to 'mono' when the Graphicas faced straight out. I had barely any coverage to the left of the speaker, noticeably less so to the right than usual. That's because the other Graphica's contributions were overtly diminished and thus practically masked.

For greater off-axis stereo at the work desk I only had to create sharp toe-in. This fired the right speaker more at me whilst the left one aimed away. Naturally serious listening occurs halfway between the speakers. Cylindrical wave propagation really does make for reduced lateral interaction as claimed. As such it also narrows the sweet spot. Though the most pointy-eared listening should be sour on a wide sweet spot (it destroys time-arrival equality to introduce phase errors), pleasure listeners who do it in company will rotate the Graphica accordingly to broaden the window in which stereo happens. Without spikes and that round plinth it's very easy to do without otherwise moving the speaker unintentionally sideways or forward/backward after you have already fixed their exact spot with a laser distance tool down to three figures behind the decimal point (important for most accurate performance).

An unexpected fringe benefit of Aurelia's controlled dispersion is next-door listening. Our kitchen area with its comfy sofa and abutting large balcony with French doors is the open continuation of the living/listening room and connecting area. Guests are naturally entertained in the kitchen and on the porch overlooking nearby snow-capped mountains whilst catching some rays and fresh air. That's why we have a small iDecco/era Sat 5 system there. It can play more quietly in that area instead of using the main system across an empty room. With the Graphicas in permanent residence we could probably pass on the kitchen system without upsetting our neighbors during social occasions. Line source sound waves roll off less quickly whilst passing through space. For the right person this effect could have practical benefits.

Size & staging: The Graphica (obviously) stages tall with complete conviction and solidity. Furthermore the placement of events across the left/right panorama is extremely precise. Shakers and other physically small percussive sounds remain strictly localized and focused without bleeding out laterally. Trick pans as Andreas Vollenweider occasionally loves to use (there's also a swirling roaming track ball on Gaudi's Qawwali Dub, moving steps as ambient percussion on a Ferhat Göçer number and crisscrossing horse-back riders on Curandero guitarist Miguel Espinoza's solo album) become quite spectacular. I suspect the Graphica would work brilliantly in a 2-channel video system with a large monitor or even projector if you can sit far enough away.

The illusion of being able to walk into the virtual venue as though it were a rectangular tunnel between the barn door posts of the speakers also was uncanny. Despite ending up closer to my front wall (which usually would handicap apparent stage depth), the Graphicas' erasure of the wall's physical barrier as a visual end to the soundstage wasn't compromised in the least. That's a décor-friendly asset. These speakers clearly need not be in the middle of the living room to do those expected audiophile things outside the anything-goes man cave.

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