totem arro

They are wonderful, versatile speakers. Great with all kinds of music. Small to medium sized room. Don't go all that low (although impressive for their size, especially with good placement). I've heard them with solid state and tubes and they are good with both. Lots of fun, and very involving speakers. Resale value is generally pretty good, so you can try a used pair and see how you like them. I found that they sound a lot better when mass loaded in the bottom cavity with sand, etc.

Found them to be very good speakers. Good with all music but outstanding with jazz and acoustic instrumentation. As they break in the bottom end really improves and they image very well. Top end very clear without being shrill. If you decide to go in this direction I don't think you'll be disappointed.

i own a pair, look at my system beside my name, the electronics has changed but the speakers have not, does that tell you something. i mostly listen to jazz, but also listen to classical and some rock, although i believe they preform well with all music. rock lovers, if listening to rock all the time, i would not buy the speaker, i would buy a rock designed speaker.....i have used tubes and solid state with them and they work well with both, you just have to be selective with buy the right power. i believe they like power, i am using them with a 75 watt int. and they are fine, i have used them with a 200 watt, and they sounded somewhat better due to the power i believe. i have used naim, krell, unison, cary, cambridge, cayin,rega....naim being the best...cambridge and rega the lowest in rating, but then still sounded very musical. hope this helped...take a look at my system....it is with the cayin tube....by the way, the anti speaker cables and connects work very well with them..dwhitt

I have to admit, I've got a bit of sellers remorse for the Arros I recently sold.
Very transparent with excellent imaging and a sound that is very "free of the box".
True, the bottom end does not go terribly low or loud, but it's very tight. You can almost feel the skin of the drum...
They seem to be quite revealing of upstream equipment, and kept pace very well with numerous amplifier upgrades.
I also found they favored the treble just a bit, so I generaly paired them with warmer equipment

o i forgot, in the picture i owned the rosewood or mag. arro, i never buy the same speaker for the second time around, i have owned linn, maggies, vandersteen,aerial,cary in house made speakers, all in large rooms, i sold my pair of arro when moving into a smaller condo, i never buy a speaker for the second time around, why? because there are too many great speakers both monitor and floorstanders, guess what? i have my second pair of arro....dwhitt

I had a pair of Arro's for a few months. They are very detailed out of the box and throw a very large soundstage with the right material. They go amazingly low for their size, and are attractive to look at. They're going for around US $1350 new, and typically for between $750 and $850 on Audiogon. Build quality is superb.

Granted that my pair weren't nearly broken in (Totem recommends 100 to 150 hours of break in time). Still I found them rather bright for my tastes. Also, the sweet spot in my room was frustratingly narrow... The proverbial ”head in a vise“ situation.

Ultimately, I sold my pair to a fellow Audiogoner (who, ironically, is now selling them on Audiogon himself... See http://www.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/cls.pl?spkrfull&1239573652&/Totem-Acoustic-Arro-(Black-Ash )

I fell in love with the Ohm Micro Walsh talls... Great bass, neutral tonal balance, and a soundstage do die for. And almost identical external dimensions to the Arro.

I like them very much.

I've heard them sound very competitive with larger conventional dynamic box design speakers from PSB and MacIntosh costing 3-4 times as much in fairly good sized listening room.

The OHMs and less expensive Magnepan mmgs are the only other speaks I know of in that price range that I am partial to.

rebbi, i like the speakers you mention also, but how can you downgrade a speaker that you never heard broken in ? i have owned two different pair of arro and you are correct, as totem suggest, give them some time. They are incredible broken in, too bad you got rid of them so soon. dwhitt

I purchased a pair for my father, and he likes them a lot. My mother also likes how small they are :)

I thought they have a very nice sound, although a bit lean on the low end. Seemed very balanced and a great all-around speaker.

If I ever need something for a small room, they're my first choice.

Thanks a lot everyone. Very enlightening.

Dwhitt,

I admit that I am not the best judge of the Arros due to the relatively short time I had them, while acknowledging their many fine qualities. I just fell in love with the Ohm sound and presentation. The presentation of the Totems sounded flat by comparison. But it's a matter of taste, room interactions, associated equipment, and so on.

Tvad,

I'm offering a comparison, for whatever it's worth, with full disclosure of the possible limitations of that comparison, in the hopes that some people may find those experiences useful. Why do you feel a need to chastise me for that? What's that about?

For your part, you have on several occasions shared your negative experiences with Ohm speakers, a sharing of experiences to which you are fully entitled.

Respectfully submitted...

ok everybody..take a deep breathe, i feel as i started something here, not my intentions to do so. we all have strong opinions concerning equipment we have owned, as debbi admitted , and i applaud that. let face it, we all don't know until we do what the builder suggest, we very seldom read the paperwork and give any thing a real chance. I have done it and we all have done it, debbi, enjoy your ohm, ill enjoy my arro, everybody, listen to music and enjoy this hobby which we all take to seriously and become too addicted....dwhiit

Dwhitt,

Well put, thanks. :-)

Tvad,

I understand your point about reviewers, especially professional reviewers who are paid to do a job.

But that's not what we are here so why judge by those standards? We are just people with a common interest sharing insights and observations, right or wrong.

Of course others will form their opinions based on what one says, so caution is warranted for that reason.

But I believe people should not be discouraged from sharing their experiences, even partial ones, as long as they are honest in disclosing the information that they have to share and are not intentionally obfuscating otherwise useful information on purpose in order to help their particular argument.

Back to the original posters question regarding amps for Arros and room size, don't let their small size fool you. These baby's seem to love lots of power, the more the merrier.

When I heard them, they sounded very nice in a demo room approximately 35X25 feet, but they were sucking as much power as the hefty McIntosh amp that was being used to drive them could throw at them. To their credit, though they didn't shake the rafters, they seemed to thrive on the power and turned it into clear fully formed music without distorting or breaking up, quite a feat for such diminutive guys in a good sized room competing strongly with other larger and more expensive speakers in the same setup as well.

That act reminded my of my Dynaudio monitors and even my way way larger (compared to Arros) "muscle car" OHM 5s which also suck up and thrive on whatever amount of power you throw at them.

tvad, enjoy...relax...listen to some music...nobody here is totally right or wrong, just allowing ourselves to be somewhat helpful, instead of listening to music....relax...laugh....look around...there is alot going on besides equipment....

I have owned the Arros for about two years now. In my experience they are not bright, but can sound bright or warm or whatever depending upon the electronics used with them. They are also very easy to set up and sound good close to the wall.

Their only real limitations, in my opinion, are bass, dynamics, and spl. The bass is surprisingly good for their size and better than my old B&W monitors that used a 7" midbass driver, but if you are a bass freak (and I now think that I may be one) you probably won't be satisfied with these or any other similarly sized speaker. As far as dynamics and spl go, you can mitigate the Arros inherent limitations by using proper amplification, which, in my opinion, would be something slightly warm that increased output into lower impedances, the more watts the merrier.

So basically, I think that the Arros are great if you don't care about bass slam, don't listen at high volumes, and use the right amplifier.

Hope this helps.

Agree with EthanH.

That is consistent with what I've read in pro reviews as well.

After all, they are tiny little beasts....only so much is possible. They do push it to the max very well though for their size.

Sorry for my late response but I have been an owner of these great mini towers since 1999. I am on my 2nd pair due to the one of the first pair being slightly blemished by a fall.

Strengths:
Holographic palpable imaging & soundstaging
Realistic Tone
Musical
Involving (like you are there at the recording venue)
Resolving of fine details

Weaknesses:
Limited dynamic range
Limited Bass in the visceral sense
BUT these weaknesses can be almost eliminated with the addition of the Dreamcatcher powered subwoofer which blends seamlessly with the Arros thus my long term satisfaction and pleasure with them.

The Arros are very nice speakers, but I like the Ohm Walsh Micro Talls and Sjofn HiFi's Guru QM 10's even better. They are both more dynamic and sound bigger to my ears.

I've heard the Arros sound as "big" as and competitive with speakers from PSB, which I also like very much, and McIntosh that were significantly bigger and cost 3-4 times as much.

They are definitely overachievers for their size. They do seem to like a lot of power to do this though. Their thirst for power and current was surprising to me given their size, but feed them properly and you are rewarded.

Of course I like the OHM line very much too and believe they are an even better value in many cases, but they are a different breed (omnis) that may take many some time to get used to at first.

Interesting cabinet design on the QM 10s. Never heard them but would like to.

I have heard these at our local hifi store several times with electronics similiar to mine. I found them very detailed, great micro detail, deep soundstage, mid's were a little laid back, Bass was excellent for their size. A bit of a power hog (not too effecient).

In the end I found the Monitor Audio Rx6 to be a preferable speaker (will be purchasing them). Same amount of micro detail but with a warmer midrange, less grittiness on the high end, not as deep of a soundstage, but a remarkable bass (tighter,deeper and with more slam factor) bass drums sounded and "felt" like bass drums. When I watched Cowboys and Aliens with them. Voices were very clear, never had trouble making out words.

If your only using the Arro for Jazz / Classical listening at moderate volume levels I would highly recommend them. If you are going to venture into modern hip-hop / rock or blues with your Jazz, Classical and occasional movie, give the rx6 an audition.