Due to some shifting around of some of my current AV equipment inventory in my home, I ended up with an "extra" receiver and decided I'd like a simple 2 channel setup in my home office to enjoy some music between conference calls. I wasn't really interested in spending more than about $200-300 as I have 2 other setups in rooms for movies / music that I'd rather make upgrades to if I were spending bigger dollars. Spent a couple of months on Facebook marketplace and other places in search of some used bookshelf speakers that might be more in the $500 range new. No luck - everyone was charging way to much (in some cases more than current sale prices I saw). On Slickdeals.net, I saw that Acoustic Sound Design products had RP-600M II's on sale for $299 including free shipping. These are on the Klipsch site at $649 msrp but on sale for $499. Did some checking around of "print" and video reviews and by the time I went back to pull the trigger, they were back to the original msrp price. But, I setup an alert and 2 weeks later they popped up again. I didn't even pause a minute before placing my order. I'm not at all an expert, but thought I'd share my novice hot take on my experience with them over the past month+.
Setup
Setup
- Ebony RP-600 II pair
- Receiver - older Sony STR-DH550
- Sub-woofer - No
- Room - Approx 12x12, 8 ft ceiling, Vinyl tile flooring, all hard surface - no rugs or fabric furniture
- Music source - running my laptop through HDMI to play Spotify
- ACD website was fine, though info and pics were a bit limited and I was worried I might be getting 1only speaker or something - based on other postings on Slickdeals, I went ahead anyway
- Took about a week to arrive (ordered on a Friday and arrived the following Thursday)
- Tracking wasn't the easiest to access from the ACD website as the "track" link just took me to a login page - perhaps user error, not sure. But it came UPS and I got notifications from UPS directly due to having an account there.
- Was in a big, unbranded box, with a smaller branded box inside. Had form fitting flexible foam to hold the speakers. Well packed imho.
- Not fancy, but straight forward and attractive.
- Ebony is dark with light oak-looking light gray grain.
- Front of the enclosure has a picture frame style bevel for about 1/2 that provides some visual interest leading down to the speaker grill.
- Woofer has that classic Klipsch copper color with a complementary copper colored ring around both the woofer and tweeter. Makes you want to run without the grill!
- Grill is attached by 6 small magnets - super easy and I love it so much more than posts that break on other speakers - don't ask me why I say that ;-)
- As stated, I'm not an expert, so not always sure how to describe what I'm hearing, but with that in mind...
- These sound great to me! I was worried that they wouldn't pack the bass punch I wanted without a subwoofer since I didn't want to add that to the setup ($)
- Top end is bright and clear. I had to turn up the bass on the receiver equalizer settings, but once I did, these really thumped.
- It's a small room and I don't have a lot of space which is both good and bad. I found that I had to be around 8 feet away to hear the full frequency response for most things. Standing up was more forgiving than moving left or right from center.
- In particular, I noticed that when I'm closer, the bass really disappears. Decided I need a set of speaker stands to give the distance needed as I have them sitting on each end of my L shaped desk at the moment.
- Also, I find that I have to turn up the volume a bit more than is comfortable for background music to really get the most detail out of them. Classical sounds good at lower volumes, but to appreciate Metallica or Muse fully, it really likes to be turned up.
- Only criticism I can offer is that I can sound a bit hollow to my ears sometimes. Not sure if that is my receiver and / or can be EQ'd out.
- I'm unbelievably pleased with what I got for $299. No subwoofer needed for casual music in a relatively small space.
- Have you had a listen to these? Does any of this resonate with your experience?
Enjoy!
