Полочная акустика — Mordaunt-Short Aviano 2

The Aviano 2 sits above the Aviano 1 among the Aviano stand-mounts from Mordaunt-Short, the British company founded in 1967 and part of Audio Partnership since 1999. It appeared around 2009 and was aimed at two-channel music use as well as surround installations, with the rest of the series covering a centre speaker, two floorstanders and two active subwoofers. Finishes listed for it are black, rosewood and dark walnut.

Key specs that matter

A reflex port loads the pair of drivers in this two-way box. A 1 inch (25 mm) aluminium dome tweeter works with a 6.5 inch (162 mm) mid/bass driver that uses an aluminium CPC cone. Mordaunt-Short specifies a sensitivity of 88 dB, a nominal impedance of 4 to 8 ohm and a frequency response of 45 Hz to 22 kHz. The recommended amplifier power runs from 15 to 120 W. The cabinet is 320 mm tall, 205 mm wide and 298 mm deep, and each unit weighs 6.4 kg.

Engineering and use context

The bigger mid/bass unit is the main difference from the Aviano 1, whose 5.25 inch driver stops at 55 Hz, and it lets the Aviano 2 reach 10 Hz lower in a cabinet that is only 45 mm taller. CPC refers to the aluminium cone with radial grooves pressed into it, which raise its rigidity. The tweeter dome was modelled with CAD software. The crossover is described as a damped second-order, minimum-phase network with DVP, built from a small number of precision inductors and capacitors, which keeps phase error between the two drivers low. The drivers are magnetically shielded within 50 mm of the cabinet, so the speaker could be placed beside a CRT television in a home cinema system. The installation guide supplies self-adhesive feet for the Aviano 1, 2 and 5 and recommends dedicated stands for the two stand-mounts, and it describes a running-in period with the pair facing each other before regular use.

Pairing

A 4 ohm minimum means that the amplifier should be comfortable with lower impedance loads, and most receivers and stereo amps within the recommended power window cope with that. With the reflex port loading the mid/bass cone, stands that keep the cabinet some distance from the rear wall give better control over bass output. In a surround system the Aviano 2 fits with the Aviano 5 centre and the Aviano 7 (10 inch) or Aviano 9 (12 inch) subwoofers.

Alternatives

The Mordaunt-Short Mezzo 2 is the stand-mount of the Mezzo series that also uses a CPC aluminium mid/bass driver and reaches down to 48 Hz.