GoldenEar AON 3 Bookshelf Speakers (PAIR) GETAON3

GoldenEar AON3 Bookshelf Speaker ($1080 for pair, $540 each)

You might be thinking if you go with a small pair of speakers, you'll be compromising on sound quality. After all, tower speakers are the best around since they use larger cabinets and bigger drivers, right? GoldenEar's unique, uncompromising Aon 3 stands ready to challenge that. Whether you're into smooth jazz or hair metal (or anything in-between), the speaker effortlessly brings gobs of detail and clarity to your music. Plus, it's a homerun hitter in smaller-to-mid-sized spaces, making it a great alternative to larger tower speakers.

Product Highlights:

• Two-way design
• HVFR™ (High-Velocity Folded Ribbon) tweeter
• 7" cast-basket mid/bass driver
• Two 8" side-mounted passive radiators for enhanced bass response
• Non-parallel cabinet walls and offset tweeter help deliver purer sound
• Keyhole bracket for wall mounting
• Frequency response: 38-35,000 Hz
• Recommended amplifier power: 10-250 watts
• Sensitivity: 90 dB
• Impedance: 8 ohms
• 5-way binding post speaker terminals
• Cloth cover can be pulled down to expose drivers, but not removed
• Dimensions: 9"W x 14"H x 11"D
• Weight: 15 lbs.

Behind the Engineering

 One look at the Aon 3 and you'll see it's not like other speakers. Its machined MDF cabinet certainly has an eye-catching shape. The company chose that shape primarily to reduce standing waves inside the cabinet. The tweeter is also slightly offset to the right. That's not an engineering mistake; with the tweeter offset like that, the sound waves bouncing around off the front baffle and cover won't amplify each other and create harsh, sharp highs.

GoldenEar's proprietary HVFR™ tweeter is one of the company's favorite achievements. It's a trickle-down technology borrowed from their top-of-the-line Triton-Series. It uses neodymium magnets to squeeze and pressurize the air between the folds of a high-density Kapton film diaphragm.

The twin 8" bass radiators mounted on either side gives the speaker what GoldenEar calls an "inertially balanced configuration." By that, they mean that cabinet vibrations are minimized since the two bass radiators' frequencies cancel each other out inside the box, keeping internal resonances very low.