Dynaudio • Evoke 50 Loudspeakers

by Mark Blackmore | February 14, 2023

© www.theaudiobeat.com

I thought I knew the sound of Dynaudio speakers pretty well. I’ve heard so many different models, at stores and in home demos, including the huge Consequence flagship and the slim Confidence C4, along with any number of small floorstanding and bookshelf speakers. It’s easy for me to sum up the traditional Dynaudio strengths: overall accuracy, great-sounding tweeters, fast and punchy bass drivers, attractive and solidly built cabinets.

After speaking with John Quick, Dynaudio’s Vice President of North American sales, I discovered that Dynaudio’s entire speaker lineup (with the exception of the Special Forty) has been updated since 2018, so maybe it’s time to re-evaluate my impression of Dynaudio speakers. If you haven’t heard any Dynaudio speakers since this revision, the Evoke 50 might be a perfect place to start. The new mid-level Evoke line includes a center channel, two bookshelf speakers and two floorstanders, with the Evoke 50 residing at the top.

The Evoke 50 is a four-driver, three-way design housed in a tall, slender cabinet. At almost 46" tall and 12" deep, the cabinet is less visually imposing than those numbers might indicate. This is due to the front baffle being only 8 1/2" wide, tapering to 7" at the back, resulting in non-parallel side walls. The corners of the front baffle are smoothly rounded, helping reduce edge diffraction. In addition, all drivers are flush mounted with no visible mounting screws, further minimizing diffraction. Around back are a single set of binding posts located at the bottom of the cabinet and, directly above, a large port for the twin woofers.

Four finishes are available: gloss black, gloss white, walnut, and a light-colored wood that Dynaudio calls blonde wood, which reminds me of light maple. The review samples were in the natural walnut, and visitors appreciated the speaker’s attractive, simple design. A magnetically affixed grille is provided and, while it looks nice enough, its inner edges are not beveled in any way, negating the nicely designed radiused edges of the front baffle. I strongly recommend leaving the grilles off when listening, so the speaker’s spatial characteristics are not compromised.

Sturdy metal bolt-on footers stabilize the cabinet, along with the provided coupling/leveling spikes. Additionally, a foam plug is provided to modify the bass response for differing speaker locations and listening rooms. The plug can fully seal the cabinet or the center of the plug can be removed to provide a foam sleeve for the port. Using just the foam sleeve slightly reduces bass response without changing the overall character, which could be very useful if the Evoke 50 needed to be close to a wall. When the full foam plug is inserted, the bass is reduced to an even greater extent, but the bass character changes, making male vocals sound too chesty for my tastes. After trying all the combinations, I settled on the fully open port, as it produced the most natural bass response for my room.

As mentioned earlier, Dynaudio has been working to update their entire speaker lineup, and a particular emphasis for the design team was to create a new version of the high-performance Esotar tweeter. Once the new Esotar3 was finished, a new cost-effective tweeter, named the Cerotar, was developed for the Evoke line, using construction techniques derived from that research. This new tweeter uses a strontium carbonate ceramic magnet Dynaudio calls Ferrite+, instead of the Esotar3’s neodymium magnet. As good as neodymium is, its high price precludes it from inclusion in a mid-line driver. John Quick told me that the new Ferrite+ magnet was almost as good as neodymium and worked perfectly in the Evoke line.

The Cerotar tweeter also utilizes Dynaudio’s Hexis inner dome, developed for the Esotar3. The Hexis is a rigid dome that sits right behind the doped soft-dome tweeter and it has a series of holes and channels designed to minimize any reflections inside the tweeter. Reflections from a tweeter’s magnet pole piece may be re-radiated through the dome, smearing the treble. The Cerotar’s Hexis uses its complex shape as a waveguide or diffuser to keep those sounds from getting back to the soft dome and should result in a measurably superior treble. One last feature is that the bottom of the tweeter’s faceplate has been cut away to allow the midrange to sit closer to the tweeter, which results in better phase measurements at the midrange/tweeter crossover point.

The midrange has a 6" cone made from Dynaudio’s MSP (Magnesium Silicate Polymer), and its overall construction is similar to that of the company’s more expensive Contour line. The magnet for the midrange is neodymium, and an aluminum voice coil allows for lower moving mass. If the tweeter used the new Ferrite+ magnets, why did Dynaudio engineers splurge for neodymium in the midrange? Quick told me that the neodymium magnet for the midrange can be made significantly smaller due to its strong magnetic properties. As with the tweeter’s use of Hexis for minimizing reflections, this smaller magnet allows all of the motor structure behind the cone to be made as small as possible, thereby reducing any stray reflections so close to the midrange cone.

Bass for the Evoke 50 is handled by twin 7" woofers, using the same MSP material as the midrange driver. Dynaudio’s literature says this material has been used in their designs “forever” and is still a perfect choice for making their woofers. Magnet material for the woofers reverts to Ferrite+, but the voice coils are copper. Another new feature of the current lineup of Dynaudio speakers is the use of fiberglass voice-coil formers. According to Dynaudio, unlike aluminum or titanium, fiberglass formers do not have magnetic properties that interact with the coil and magnet. They are also stronger, more physically consistent from former to former, and more durable than either metal or Kapton. Crossover points for the Evoke 50 are 430Hz and 3500Hz, using third- and second-order slopes. It is rated as being 87dB sensitive with an impedance of 4 ohms and a minimum of 3 ohms at 100Hz.

One final bit of news is that all Dynaudio speakers are now designed and voiced using the company's new anechoic chamber and a new testing rig dubbed Jupiter. Each speaker design is suspended inside the large chamber, and a wide, arced array of microphones is utilized for rapid frequency and dispersion testing. Dynaudio states that the Jupiter system has sped up design considerably, reducing crossover design from weeks to just hours.

One recording that demonstrated the Evoke 50’s best sonic qualities was the Boston Symphony’s new recording, Shostakovich: Symphonies Nos. 1, 14 & 15 [Deutsche Grammophon, 24-bit/96kHz Qobuz stream]. The first few notes from the bassoons and clarinet followed by the orchestra’s big crescendo on the first movement of Symphony No.1 created an almost wall-to-wall sound with some of the deepest soundstage cues I’ve heard in my room. The Evoke 50's layering of depth in good recordings rivals panel speakers or the best minimonitors I've heard. It is easily as good as my Magnepan LRS or Innersound Eros, two dipole designs that excel in imaging and depth. I was unprepared for a front-firing, mid-priced speaker to perform so well, and I imagine that some potential buyers will be tempted to purchase the speakers solely based on their outstanding soundstage reproduction.

The timbre of the muted trumpet in the first few measures of the same movement had just the right amount of bite from the straight mute, accompanied by a good bit of trumpet tone underlying the mute's sound. Next, a brief clarinet solo was spot-on in its balance between reed and wooden body. Solo and massed strings were smooth in tone and well-controlled, an indication that Dynaudio’s work on the Cerotar tweeter has paid off. The timbre of acoustic instruments was surprisingly close to the real thing and made it easy to get lost in the music, instead of thinking about the speaker’s response. My Falcon Gold Badge LS3/5a speakers are similar in this respect, with the difference being the Evoke 50’s greater bass and pronounced dynamic swings. This is to be expected, considering the differences in size and price. Still, getting instrumental tone right is not an easy task for loudspeaker designers, and the Evoke is quite good in this respect. For one more example of “truth of timbre,” play some of Symphony 15 from the same album. Shostakovich borrowed a snippet of the “William Tell Overture” for the trumpet parts, and their tone is spot on.

The lower midrange and bass of the Evoke 50 are slightly tilted to the warm side, a welcome departure from my experience with older Dynaudio designs. The St. Louis Symphony’s concert venue, Powell Hall, is also known to be on the warm side and very complementary to low string sound. While attending a recent SLSO concert and listening to the string basses playing a pizzicato line, I thought back to my Evoke 50 listening sessions. Some of the string basses in the Shostakovich recording exhibited the same plucked-string speed, followed by the darker tone quality of the instrument and finally the resonance of the hall. Not so far off from what I was experiencing during my Powell Hall concert.

Because the Evoke 50 did so well with orchestral bass and dynamics, it was time to challenge it with something more modern. The song “Beautiful” from Rhye’s album Home [Loma Vista, 24-bit/44.1kHz Qobuz stream] is a favorite of some of my listening friends that I never really appreciated it until heard on the Evoke 50. The disco-flavored string tremolo at the beginning is expansive, and then the bass line hits, full of punch and energy. I remember thinking that this was the Dynaudio bass I remembered: taut and powerful, with great pitch definition. The little woofers were doing a great job of energizing the room and making this song more exciting than I’d heard before. To be clear, the twin 7" woofers cannot match the power of the woofer in the Wilson SabrinaX I recently reviewed, nor can they control the room acoustic like the bigger woofers in a speaker like the Volti Razz or my Altec Valencia. The Evoke 50 may not reproduce the first octave of bass with great authority, but their bass is energetic and tuneful.

“Beautiful” also revealed how transparent these speakers are. I used this track to test multiple amplifiers on the Evoke 50, ranging from lower-watt tube designs to high-powered class-D amps, and each had a different vocal presentation of Rhye’s lead singer, Mike Milosh. Some of the amps made his singing sound like a single voice modified with a chorus plug-in for a digital-audio workstation, while the best amps revealed that it was actually Milosh merely overdubbing his melody line. It’s a tribute to the Evoke 50’s midrange and tweeter that minute details in this recording were easily heard.

“Birds” from Dominque Fils-Aime’s album Nameless [Ensoul, 24-bit/88.2kHz Qobuz stream] has become a favorite track for listening tests. Compared to the Altec Valencia, the Evoke 50 moves her voice slightly back in the soundstage and smoothes out some of the harsher studio tricks. The new Cerotar tweeter proved its worth on this album. Interestingly, the manipulated slap echo in the beginning of the tune that I so enjoyed during my review of Wilson Audio’s SabrinaX sounded less like an “odd studio effect” by being more integrated into the fabric of the song. Jacques Roy’s string bass is a bit ripe, but pretty potent in the room considering the Evoke 50’s two smallish woofers. I particularly appreciated the increased soundstage width and depth the Dynaudios brought to this recording.

Are there any real downsides to the Evoke 50’s performance? For the price and my listening preferences, the answer is not really, but there are a few things to consider when you audition the speakers. They are not audio extroverts in their presentation. Primarily due to the smooth blending of the midrange and the Cerotar tweeter, the Evoke 50 is neutral and balanced, so initial reactions may favor a flashier-sounding speaker. I’d urge you to audition the Evoke 50 a bit longer than normal and try a wide range of music in order for their special qualities to grow on you. Also, as a midline speaker offering, the Evoke 50 may be paired with less-revealing electronics and many of their special qualities may be masked. I tried the Evoke 50 with some moderately priced solid-state amps and the results were good but not up to my best electronics. My BAT VK-60 tube amp driven directly by the preamp section of a dCS Bartók 2.0 sounded wonderful, with the best presentation of voice and soundstage depth, but the Evoke’s low impedance caused that amp run out of steam at moderately loud listening levels. For more spirited sessions, I got good results from the Bartók 2.0 paired with my 300-watt Innersound ESL or a 500-watt Peachtree amp500 on loan from a friend.

One final bit of advice is that the seating height is fairly critical. At 44" from the floor, the tweeters are significantly higher than your ears when you are seated in a normal-height chair. If you have a low-slung couch, as I do, the tweeter develops a shelved-down response above 2kHz. The tweeter will sound nice and mellow, but will diminish the instrumental timbre I’ve discussed, due to the reduced level. I had to remind myself to sit up straight to get the best sound from the Evoke 50s.

As you can probably tell, I think the Dynaudio Evoke 50 is the rarest of things: a great speaker at a fair price. I find it engaging and poised, allowing for long listening sessions with a wide variety of music. Contrast that with my Altec Valencias, which will not tolerate poor recordings, resulting in a splashy treble and midrange shoutiness. Or my little Falcon Gold LS3/5a's, which sound superb but manage to urge me to crank up the volume until I’ve exceeded their capabilities. The Evoke 50s solve these problems, and one could certainly use them as a reference speaker for a very long time, concentrating on improving electronics feeding them before the speakers would be a limiting factor. After hearing them with the Shostakovich recording I mentioned earlier, I thought long and hard about purchasing the review pair, solely based on their outstanding reproduction of the soundstage.

If the Evoke 50s are any indication of the rest of Dynaudio’s new offerings, the accuracy and dose of "humanity" that made the brand famous result in an even more engaging sound. Dynaudio has created a speaker that has understated good looks and a sound that draws you in with great bass drive, realistic timbre, and some shocking soundstage abilities. The Evoke 50 is a winner.

Price: $5499 per pair.

Warranty: Eight years parts and labor with registration.

Dynaudio A/S
Sverigesvej 15,
8660 Skanderborg, Denmark
+ 45 86 52 34 11
www.dynaudio.com

Associated Equipment

Room treatment: Zanden Audio AP-1 panels.

© www.theaudiobeat.com