The Imagine T floor standers are the latest models to
arrive from PSB on UK shores.
The Imagine T is an elegant, slim, floor-standing, three-way
design that stands about a meter tall. Most importantly, though, the review
pair are coated in high-gloss white lacquer finish, which is bang on trend and
currently my most preferred finish for loudspeakers, especially floor standers.
This is the second of the PSB Imagine range – it is the next model down from
the flagship T2 – and is being released now in the UK, but has been available
for some time in the USA and Canada.
The gloss white
finish is bang on trend, but more traditional finishes are also available
Compound-curved on every vertical face, and outstanding
sonic performance makes this speaker (and the Imagine Series in general) a real
class leader, says its maker. I do not know about class leading, but it
certainly is way out in front in the appearance stakes and ought to appeal to a
wide variety of home makers. The driver array consists of a 25mm titanium dome
tweeter and a pair of 133mm clay/ceramic reinforced polypropylene cone woofers
covering the frequency range below the tweeter – both housed within their own
discrete internal enclosures, which are individually ported. The upper unit
extends from the bass up to 1.8 kHz, where a 24dB/octave Linkwitz-Riley network
rolls it off to the tweeter. The lower unit also extends from the bass, but
rolls off at about 800Hz, to avoid the interference with its partner that would
result from having their outputs overlap in the midrange. The overall
sensitivity is quoted as 88dB anechoic and 90dB in-room, and so should present
a loudspeaker that ought to be easy to drive and control even with a modest
amplifier.
A cloth grille cover is supplied with the speakers, but I
elect to use them without it, and a rubber plug bungs one of the two
rear-facing ports. Users can insert this in either of the available ports. I
plug the lower port and find that this gives powerful, but agile bass along
with a well-articulated midrange on the powerful Keith Jarret Paris/London –
Testament 2008 piano concert recording.
The speakers are robustly constructed and should inspire
confidence in purchasers. The finishing and attention to detail in their
construction – items such as the neat, efficient 4mm bi-wire/bi-amp terminals
come to mind, here as well as the arrangement for attaching spikes or
floor-protector pads – is very impressive indeed.
The presentation
is wholly engaging and makes you want to listen further
The specifications for these speakers include the expected
black gloss, black ash or dark cherry, and walnut wood veneer as the available
finishes, but as I noted earlier, the review pair came in a high-gloss white
and are all the more attractive for it. This finish certainly seems to be
justifiably gaining in popularity these days.
For the listening test I drive the Imagines with my Naim 250
power amplifiers and Chord Company Signature cables as well as with a
Supernait/HiCap combination. The speakers are none too fussy to set up and
respond well to free space placement and being towed-in by a modest 15° or so
that seems ideal for focusing the soundstage and taking some of the perceived
hardness out of the treble.
