RSL CG5 loudspeaker analysis: Excessive-end sound with a finances value

California-based fully RSL has been turning in video display speakers that defy their measurement and fee for 50 years. The company has manufactured speakers that are the darlings of some Hollywood file producers. RSL’s newest flagship lineup, the CG5, is the successor to the highly acclaimed CG4, and it contains two devices: A two-blueprint video display, the CG5 (reviewed here) and an MTM video display create known as the CG25. 

The CG5’s sonic performance, ticket quality, and fee point ($800 for the pair) left me fright-struck. Study on why you factual might perhaps prefer a pair of CG5 under your Christmas tree.

RSL’s Historic previous

RSL (the acronym stands for Rogersound Labs) is a familiar ticket in die-laborious audio circles, but it surely’s removed from being a family title. Founder Howard Rogers started promoting speakers manufacturing facility convey from his store in North Hollywood in 1970. This advance allowed Rogers to enlighten high-quality substances whereas conserving costs low by reducing out the intermediary.

RSL got a expansive damage when a Warner Brothers Data producer bought a enlighten of RSL speakers and steered his pals about them. Almost at the moment, RSL speakers started taking medications in file companies for the length of Southern California.

Rogers developed and patented his Compression Book speaker technology in the 1980s, and it stays the hallmark of all up-to-the-minute RSL speakers.

Theo Nicolakis / IDG

Snappy ahead and Howard’s eldest son, Joe, now helms the company with his dad, sustaining the identical address bang for the buck and an emphasis on personalized customer provider. You might perhaps presumably well presumably audition any RSL speaker with a free, 30-day in-dwelling trial. The company offers free shipping in the continental United States, and there’s no restocking or return shipping bills in the not doubtless tournament you resolve out you don’t love the speakers. Now that will presumably well even be a upright no-likelihood trial.

Obtain quality beyond their value point

Here’s my third analysis of RSL speakers. My first used to be the CG4 series in 2015, followed by the CG3 series in 2017. Every time, I’ve blueprint away shaking my head in disbelief with the ticket quality and sound of the RSL setups. This time? It’s déjà vu all over the place again.

Theo Nicolakis / IDG

Unboxing the CG5, I used to be directly struck by the CG5’s stable ticket quality. The 16-pound weight is your first clue. The CG5 is love a form of things on the periodic desk whose bodily mass is much increased than its bodily measurement would indicate.

The speaker is bodily deeper than it’s miles huge, measuring 7.625 x 10.75 x 12.625 inches (WxDxH). When looked at face-on, these dimensions make the CG5 speaker peep smaller than it in fact is. Partner-challenged audiophile households salvage an very just appropriate time. The front baffle’s aspect edges are rounded, giving the speaker a subtle, frigid-taking a peep fine that tricks your blueprint into pondering that speaker is smaller gentle.

Theo Nicolakis / IDG

The included metal grilles are magnetic, with velvet-love pads that quit the grilles from marring the CG5’s comely end. Simply enlighten the grilles in the basic neighborhood of the front baffle they in most cases snap directly and firmly into enlighten.

The speaker’s cabinet is fabricated from .75-scramble thick panels on all aspects. I gave the CG5’s cabinet about a just appropriate knuckle raps that easiest reaffirmed a stable, sturdy, enclosure. Here’s no flimsy speaker.

When it comes to building a speaker, it’s not factual the drivers and cabinetry that make contributions to a speaker’s sound. The crossover network is key. It handles that every person-crucial division and hand off of frequencies between the drivers. The crossover network is where some speaker producers elevate to chop bills. Now not RSL. RSL’s  crossover network is made up of high-quality parts, including a polypropylene capacitor and an air-core coil for prime performance and energy handling.

Theo Nicolakis / IDG

The CG5’s ticket quality is matched by its aesthetics. My GC5 analysis pair got here in an honest white gloss end (they’re furthermore available in a high-gloss piano murky). No topic the gloss, all of RSL’s finishes are fingerprint resistant, and I didn’t detect any smudges no topic how many instances I handled these speakers.

Manufacture, adjustments, and Compression Book

The CG5 are a two-blueprint create consisting of a 1-scramble, translucent, silk dome tweeter and 5.25-scramble, aramid-fiber cone woofer. The tweeter is crossed to the woofer at 2,500Hz.

The CG5’s frequency response is rated at a legit 54Hz-35kHz ± 3dB. In layman’s phrases, the CG5’s frequncy response resembles a upright video display speaker. I expose that since the CG3 and CG4, by distinction, easiest went appropriate down to 100Hz and surely indispensable a subwoofer’s aid even for music.

Tweeter adjustment

The CG5 comes with a Tweeter Regulate dial on the speaker’s rear panel factual above the binding posts that enables you to minimize the tweeter. The Tweeter Regulate dial’s default enlighten is decided to “Low” whenever you first unbox the CG5. I directly seen a hotter and a runt bit unbalanced sound that set bass notes a runt bit ahead with the Tweeter Regulate in the “Low” enlighten.

Theo Nicolakis / IDG

Turning the dial to the “Reference” enlighten evened out the tonal stability and gave the speaker a a runt bit analytical quality at the expense of some bass emphasis and warmth. At no time did the CG5’s tender, non-fatiguing quality suffer. You might perhaps presumably well presumably adjust the dial to your desire.

As I’ll detail more under, the CG5 does a just appropriate-trying job rendering its rated audio band cleanly and authoritatively. Indeed, the RSL CG5 does an very just appropriate job with bass frequencies in its vary. Whenever you happen to indicate to enlighten the CG5 with movies or mumble material with deep bass, you’ll wish to add a subwoofer to the combine. On tracks equivalent to James Blacke’s “Limit to Your Adore,” and Dido’s “Northern Skies” the speaker’s frequency limits got here thru. I’d strongly indicate pairing the CG5 with RSL’s Speedwoofer 10S, whose very just appropriate performance gentle says with me three years after I first reviewed it.

Theo Nicolakis / IDG

Compression Book technology

RSL’s patented Compression Book outwardly manifests itself as a horizontal, rectangular opening alongside the speaker’s front baffle. It’s for the length of the speaker cabinet where the magic surely occurs.

RSL

RSL’s Compression Book create divides the inner of the speaker cabinet into high and low tension zones. Resonances are reduced as sound waves skedaddle thru these tension zones, main to tighter bass. Compression Book technology works astoundingly well, turning in a tender, distortion-free sound that it’s good to hear to understand.

Silky tender sound

The total aforementioned is well and just appropriate, but how enact these $800-per-pair speakers sound? I enlighten up the CG5 on stable wooden 30-scramble speaker stands in my Dolby Atmos/DTS:X/Audo-3D dwelling theater setup, where I most frequently salvage RBH Sound SVTR Tower Reference Speakers and SVS Extremely speakers powered by my Denon X8500H receiver, Monoprice Monolith 7-Channel amplifier, and Oppo UDP-203 universal disk participant.

For this analysis, I obvious to enlighten the illustrious Naim Uniti Atom that I’ve had on loan and outdated with my newest JBL L82 Fundamental and Focal Chora 806 speaker reports. It’s not that Denon’s flagship X8500H wasn’t as much as the assignment—on the opposite—but provided that RSL easiest shipped a stereo pair, I indispensable to indicate you would even salvage a superlative two-channel music setup with a minimal bodily footprint.

Theo Nicolakis / IDG

I fed the Roon-ready Naim Uniti Atom from my Roon Nucleus with mumble material produced from high-res music files, ripped CDs, and mumble material streamed from Tidal.

Relaxed is the notice that struck me when I fired up the CG5—and that affect on no fable modified. The CG5 suppose an especially tender, non-fatiguing sound that can will enable you to receive lost in music or movies for hours. The CG5 reveled in Lisa Gerrard’s haunting vocals in “Elegy” from Immortal Memory. Synthesizer notes salvage been tender and freed from compression or distortion. Indeed, it didn’t topic if I cranked up the quantity, the CG5 factual purred alongside.

As is popular with high-quality monitors, imaging used to be stable, with vocals pointless middle and devices placed firmly in enlighten and time. Recalling classics from Patricia Barber used to be for instance. Now not like increased-end speakers, the CG5 couldn’t quite conjure the uncanny dimensionality round a sonic portray.

Theo Nicolakis / IDG

RSL’s CG5 speakers excelled at revealing musical layers. As an instance, on Sarah McLachlan’s “In different locations,” you’ll acquire that some speakers smear the harmonies in the chorus. You might perhaps presumably well presumably expose there are more than one vocals, but you would also’t quite address individual suppose. Now not here. Thru the CG5, I could perhaps presumably well also distinguish each vocal notice in certain enlighten and time.

In my setup, the CG5 created a perfectly expansive, deep, and large soundstage. The CG5 furthermore exhibited a noticeably relaxed presentation, recessing the image well in the aid of the speakers’ baffle. Depanding on whether or not or not you capture a ahead or relaxed presentation will be key to determining whether or not or not you love these speakers.

Bass lines salvage been legit, though I wish to stress that the quality of the bass lines within that frequency vary used to be illustrious. The CG5 gushed chest-thumping bass on Natasha Bedingfield’s “King of the World.” On Sade’s “Soldier of Adore,” the CG5 delivered bass lines with an very just appropriate, tight, spruce, detailed assault. The the same used to be upright on Katie Melua’s “Adore is a Quiet Thief” and Dido’s “Northern Skies:” Heavenly and managed.

I wasn’t quite certain how the CG5s would take care of the low, pulsating bass punch on James Blake’s “Limit to Your Adore.” Needless to stammer the CG5 used to be an unbelievably frigid customer, thwacking me with chest-punching bass whereas sustaining true, detailed regulate. Needless to stammer the CG5s couldn’t reproduce the foundation-rattling, subterranean bass Blake’s classic is capable of. Overall, the CG5 used to be very just appropriate, though not illustrious with dynamics.  

Theo Nicolakis / IDG

But don’t you dare account for the CG5 as a well mannered speaker. Pulling out some Van Halen—in tribute to Eddie Van Halen—proved these infants can rock—laborious. The CG5 brought forth the entire easiest qualities of Eddie’s immortal, “Eruption,” revealing nuances of the mountainous grasp at his craft. The CG5 unrelentingly pumped out the raw rock grit and edge of “Tattoo.” And the CG5 reveled in the inceased energy when I turned up the quantity to immerse myself to Van Halen’s rock anthem classic, “Dreams.”

Tackle yourself to a pair for Christmas

Every RSL speaker I’ve auditioned has left me impressed, and the CG5 are no exception: Impeccable ticket quality; an intoxicatingly alluring, tender sound; and extremely just appropriate high-to-bottom performance are factual the outlet act. The more time I spent listening to the CG5, the more I loved them.

For $800 a pair, the CG5 will present you with pure sonic bliss some distance exceeding their value. Pair them with RSL’s Speedwoofer 10S subwoofer and also you’ll salvage a high octane, sonic setup that can excel at both a two-channel and entire-on dwelling theater assault. You’ll be the envy of the neighborhood.

While there are a spread of speaker alternatives priced lower than $1,000, the CG5 obnoxious among my favourite. Whether or not it’s an upgrade to your contemporary setup or a dive actual into sonic bliss, rob RSL up on their free in-dwelling trial in time for Christmas. You received’t be disenchanted. Enthusiastically steered.

• A tender, non-fatiguing sound; top class ticket quality; and patented Compression Book are the RSL CG5’s recipe for endless nights of musical bliss.

  Mavens

  • Silky tender, distortion-free sound that performs some distance better than its measurement or value
  • Excellent ticket and high-quality substances
  • Lustrous, fingerprint-resistant end

  Cons

  • Relaxed presentation might perhaps presumably well also just not appeal to all
  • Most of us will prefer a subwoofer for movies

Theo Nicolakis is a C-Stage technologist and digital communications authentic. He is furthermore a passionate audiophile and residential theater aficionado.