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Their giant white Fiat van included separate boxes for the ProLogos, its box stands, a Mimesis 16.5 digital processor, HDA Telos headphone amplifier, long S/PDIF cables and two long power cords. This was quickly put in place and followed by no sound. I'd inadvertently swapped the right/left channel digital feeds out of the 16.5. Once that was sorted, listening over the fully broken-in factory pair could commence.

Unprompted and whilst the crew was embroiled still with setup, my wife opined upon the speakers' good looks. She really liked the finish, dimensions and conservative appearance. That surprised me a bit. But in my role as punter by proxy, it hit all the right notes. Because the ProLogos on its stand is quite stumpy—as a 6'1" fella I barely had to bend my elbow to rest a flat hand on their tops—listening clearly wanted a fully seated position to get the proper tweeter effect.


After the Swiss had left, I thought very hard on how to tweak the sound which for all intents and purposes seemed locked in. At the lower levels we prefer, it was a bit monochromatic and flat. That changed at SPL stouter than our norm. Considering the signal routing of USB in/twin coax out for the 96kHz-based Mimesis 16.5 digital preamp, I clearly was dealing with digital volume control. Eyeing its display of ±30 with well-trained suspicion, I had an idea.


I activated the 32-bit dithered volume control in PureMusic and set it to -15dB. This reduced the signal trim in the following preamp to get us between 40 and 50 on its dial. Presto. This made quite the difference. Now colorization, substance and grip kicked in fully at our SPL. That's how I'd continue my auditions.


If speakers powered from built-in high-speed ultra wide-bandwidth amplifiers read like a recipe for lean 'n' mean—all edges and blister and close-mic'd energy—we'd have promptly overlooked ScanSpeak's silk-dome/paper-cone artillery. Because that's not what the ProLogos sounded like. With its children's fist-sized downfiring port, optimized damping and DSP assist, bass was very punchy and robust if shy on the last 15-or-so cycles. It behaved far closer to sealed bass than the, ahem, wet farting bass of so many ported alignments.

This combination of warm substance with dry control extended across the bandwidth. If we imagine super-fine dining that leaves one hungry plus the associated 6-month reservation upfront plus 13th-month bonus given the bill—Ivette swallowed hard when told the retail price—the ProLogos was all meat and potatoes followed by upside-down apple pie with vanilla ice cream, all of it at the generous portions of a country-side family restaurant. Forget fussy. This was pure comfort food.

Many audiophiles who've crossed paths with pro-audio active boxes would call the general breed admirably neutral, flat and bass capable given size but also often bordering on the clinical, hard, flat, ultimately fatiguing or unsatisfactory mechanical. For such folks, the ProLogos requires quite the rethink and attitude adjustment.

And it'll have to include a perception change of Goldmund the company.