PLAYBACK TOP PICKS FOR DESKTOP AUDIO
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DESKTOP SPEAKERS
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Top Passive Desktop Speakers
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PSB Imagine Mini ($740/pair)
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• The Imagine Mini is one of PSB founder Paul
Barton’s two newest speaker designs, and
one from which he derives a considerable
measure of personal satisfaction.
• The glory of the Mini is that it channels the
sonic virtues of larger, more costly Imagineseries
designs, yet makes them available in a
small, elegant, affordable package.
• In simple terms, the Mini sounds larger, more
full-bodied, and more refined than it has any
right to for its size.
• The Mini is small enough to work well in
desktop settings, but capable enough that it
can be used for whole room applications.
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overview
Consider this speaker/subwoofer system
if: You’ve been looking for a balanced, open
sounding, compact speaker system that
gets the midrange and treble right, and that
also can provide solid bass performance
(especially if you’re willing to spend time
dialing-in the speaker/subwoofer interface
to tweak bass performance). Consider the
Imagine Mini, too, if you prize a speaker
that does a good job of minimizing artificialsounding
“hi-fi” artifacts.
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Look further if: You insist on a speaker
system that offers maximum dynamic
range, superb mid-bass articulation or that
produces large soundstages—qualities
that, in our experience, can generally only
be provided by much larger speakers.
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BOTTOM LINE
PSB’s Imagine Mini/SubSeries 1 delivers a
natural, low distortion sound that is beguilingly
balanced. This is a system capable of revealing
subtleties with the big boys, though it is
probably not the ideal answer for aficionados
of power music.