Напольная акустика — DALI EPIKORE 11

The EPIKORE 11 heads the EPIKORE series from DALI, the Danish speaker maker, and it sits above the EPIKORE 9, the EPIKORE 7 and the EPIKORE 3 stand-mount. It was unveiled at CEDIA Expo in September 2023 to mark the company's 40th anniversary, and it carries several technologies first introduced in the DALI KORE. Every unit is developed and assembled by DALI in Denmark. North American pricing at launch was USD 60,000 per pair, and a five-year warranty covers parts as well as labour there.

Key specs that matter

The 4.5-way design uses four 8 inch woofers, one 6.5 inch midrange and the EVO-K Hybrid Tweeter, which pairs a 35 mm soft dome with a 10 x 55 mm planar magnetostatic element. Crossover points are 170 Hz, 370 Hz, 3,100 Hz and 12,500 Hz. DALI rates the range at 29 Hz to 34,000 Hz within 3 dB and sensitivity at 89 dB for 2.83 V at 1 m, with a 4 ohm nominal impedance, a 116 dB maximum level at 1 m and a suggested amplifier power band of 40 to 1,000 W. Each speaker is 1602 mm tall, 422 mm wide and 554 mm deep, and weighs about 75.6 kg with grille. Finishes are high gloss black, walnut, maroon and white.

Engineering and use context

The woofers are split into two pairs, each in its own 64 litre chamber with a rear port tuned to 24 Hz. One pair is rolled off at the lowest crossover point, while the other continues up to the second one, where the midrange takes over from its sealed 6 litre enclosure shared with the treble module. The midrange is a development of the EPICON 8 midrange unit and uses a Clarity Cone paper and wood fibre diaphragm with an embossed lacquered pattern. Bass and midrange motors use SMC Gen-2, the second generation of DALI's patented magnet material, and the same compound forms the cores of the crossover inductors, which DALI credits with about 12 dB less current distortion than iron-powder cores. Titanium is used in the voice coils. The curved, braced MDF cabinet has no parallel inner surfaces, is damped with bitumen pads, slopes at the top toward the front and is finished in real wood veneer under piano lacquer.

Pairing

Impedance minima of 3.7 ohm near 70 Hz and 800 Hz mean the amplifier must stay stable into loads below the nominal rating. Custom binding posts shared with the KORE come with jumpers for single-wire use. Four cast aluminium outrigger feet take spikes that rest in magnetic cups on hard floors, and magnetic grilles are supplied.

Alternatives

The DALI EPIKORE 9 is the next tower down in the same range, a four-way model with half the number of woofers.