Stenheim Alumine Two SE

2-Way Bookshelf Speaker

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Description

When you listen to the Stenheim Alumine Two, your ears will tell you that this is no ordinary compact 2-way monitor loudspeaker. However, your first glance won’t reveal why that is. You need to look a lot deeper – the same way Stenheim looked at loudspeaker design. This brilliance of this speaker is not immediately obvious. Aesthetically, it looks elegant and simple however once you look closely, evidence of ingenious design and execution begins to reveal itself.

Stenheim began by questioning the fundamental thinking, technological choices and materials used in conventional designs. That led them to some surprising conclusions that contradicted conventional thinking and fashionable theory. They decided that the measurable benefits of high-tech cone materials were less desirable than the obvious musical advantages of more traditional approaches. They implemented low-loss, phase-coherent crossovers with sophisticated out-of-band roll-off levels. They chose the low-storage energy signature of a critically damped aluminium cabinet using innovative, low-volume damping materials. They realised that if you design a speaker ‘in a lab’. It may test and measure perfectly but in the real world those designs were often lacking in emotional expression. Their determination to maintain the life and energy in the music, the essence of the original performance was behind every decision.

The Alumine Two is small in stature and footprint but it sounds much bigger than it looks. Despite its compact dimensions, it embodies all of Stenheim’s fundamental design principles:

  • A larger than expected bass-mid driver with a sophisticated, treated paper cone.
  •  A fabric dome tweeter, carefully horn loaded for increased efficiency.
  • A high order, phase-coherent crossover to preserve the fragile but all-important temporal and spatial information in the stereo signal.
  • A thin-wall aluminium cabinet built with hidden fixings and golden ratio dimensions.
  • Low-volume damping materials to kill cabinet resonance and internal standing waves without killing musical dynamics.

The thin-wall cabinet with its inherently low resonant signature maximises internal volume. In terms of the internal air volume, it is literally bigger than it seems – at least compared to thick-walled wooden cabinets. Add to that the classical combination of a reflex-loaded, 6.5” bass-midrange driver and a 1” soft-dome tweeter and you have a system that is both more efficient and has wider bandwidth than can be expected from such a compact speaker. Further extend the system sensitivity with subtle horn loading and a low-loss crossover and the loudspeaker becomes more responsive to input. This translates more of the signal into musical energy and it gives the amplifier an easier job to do, removing another potential bottleneck in the signal path.

Once the Alumine Two was established, Stenheim decided to make another version called the Special Edition (SE). The design concept here was to take this style of speaker and make the very best sounding version of it. This model uses the same cabinet and drivers but it incorporates a cost-no-object crossover, upgraded internal wiring and upgraded binding posts. Stenheim have developed the lightest-touch, lowest loss crossover topology possible for the standard Alumine Two, however improving the components to this degree has a profound effect on the performance of the SE.

Exhaustive listening tests led the Stenheim team to develop their own internal wiring and select the very best parts from Mundorf and Jansen, Duelund, Myflex and Jupiter – a Who’s Who of boutique audiophile component brands. The result is even greater transparency and dimensionality, even more natural separation and perspectives, micro-dynamic and harmonic resolution and a greater range of tonal colour.

With its classical proportions and flawless finish, the Alumine Two SE blends seamlessly with both traditional and modern surroundings. If the standard Alumine Two is a connoisseur’s speaker, the SE is out of this world. There’s simply more music, more musician and less speaker, creating what we firmly believe to be the most musically convincing compact speaker available.

Videos

Stenheim 2 Amazing Speakers

Road Trip Switzerland – Stenheim

Awards

Part-time Audiophile Editors' AwardSoundStage Network POTY 2023

Reviews

Product Specifications

Type Passive 2-way monitor speaker with front Bass Reflex Design
Construction 10-15 mm thick all aluminum construction
Frequency Response 45Hz – 30kHZ
Power Handling 100W IEC, 200W (peak)
Recommended Amplifier 10W – 200W
Sensitivity 93 dB SPL/2.83V/1m (measured in a semi-reverberant room)
SPL max 109 dB
Nominal impedance 8 Ohms
Woofer One 16.51 cm (6.5in) High-strength cellulose fiber-cone impregnated and coated on both sides with damped resins
Tweeter One 2.54cm (1in) Fabric dome, loaded by a small horn machined in the 15 mm aluminium front plate
Crossover Air core inductors, Polypropylene capacitors, Metal film resistors
Finishes Light shiny Grey, Dark shiny grey, Full Black, Wood veneer or Leather veneer, Special finishes on demand
SE Version Special Edition version has ultimate quality components (crossover, internal wiring and connectors)
Warranty 5 years
Dimensions 330mm (H) x 230mm (W) x 275mm (D)

13 inches (H) x 9 inches (W) x 11 inches (D)

Weight 17 Kg each