Напольная акустика — Boenicke Audio W8

The W8 is a slim floorstanding loudspeaker from Boenicke Audio of Switzerland, designed by the recording engineer Sven Boenicke. Its enclosure is milled from solid wood rather than MDF, with specialised subcontractors CNC-machining the pieces from oak, walnut, ash or cherry. The model is offered in three builds - the standard W8, the SE and the SE+ - and one UK price quoted for the standard pair was GBP 5,802.

Key specs that matter

Four drivers share a cabinet this narrow. A 3 inch aluminium wideband unit from Fountek faces forward, a 4 inch Tang Band mid-woofer made for Boenicke uses a paper cone with an apple wood phase plug and maple backing, a 6.5 inch long-throw Tang Band woofer handles the bottom, and an ambient tweeter fires to the rear. Bass tuning is set at 28 Hz. Sensitivity varies between 84 and 88 dB per watt at 1 m, with the figure changing across the band, while the nominal load is 4 ohm. Each speaker measures 77.6 x 11.4 x 26 cm and weighs about 10 kg, with the exact figure changing with wood species and version.

Engineering and use context

Inside, the solid wood block is machined into a labyrinth of partitions and conduits, giving the drivers separate chambers so that the tweeter and midrange are isolated from bass pressure. The crossover uses first-order slopes throughout. The mid-woofer has only a first-order low-pass and no high-pass, the wideband unit has a first-order high-pass, and the long-throw woofer runs without an electrical crossover. An electromechanical parallel spiral resonator of 8 cm sits in the wideband circuit. Internal wiring is silk-wrapped stranded Litz, and the cable lands on one set of WBT NextGen terminals. The standard version stands on a metal bar with two adjustable rear feet and one front foot. The SE adds 16 cm parallel resonators on the widebander and mid-woofer, Bybee Quantum Purifiers, a phase linearisation network, a Duelund tinned copper bypass capacitor and the Swing Base, where a ball-and-cup front support meets a brass cup and damped spring legs fit at the rear. The SE+ moves to 16 cm spiral resonators in parallel and series, Steinmusic Speaker Match Signature parts, Harmonix Tuning Bases and Mundorf silver, gold and oil capacitors.

Pairing

Its nominal load and a sensitivity that dips toward the lower end of its range favour a solid-state or sturdy valve amplifier with good current reserves rather than a low-output single-ended design. Owners who start with the standard build can later add the Swing Base.

Alternatives

The Boenicke W11 is the larger floorstanding model above the W8 in the same range.