LOUDSPEAKERS: Does the Totem Mani-2 still rate as one of the ...

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Castle Richmond 3i
Canadian distributor, but then
again new ownership too. Castle
was founded many years ago by a
group of former Wharfedale executives,
who had left when the aptly-named Rank
organization had bought Wharfedale.
Those execs are now retired, and Castle
was bought by…a group of Wharfedale
execs. Plus ça change…
This very small and inexpensive
speaker is very much a Castle, though.
Notice the 13 cm carbon fibre woofer
(with a cast metal basket, which of course
you can’t see), and the “upside down”
configuration. Notice the subtle shape of
the Skipton castle pressed into the soft
dome tweeter face plate. Notice the fine
finish, brighter in the centre, darker at
the edges. Inhale the furniture oil while
you’re at it.
Then look at the rear for the cheap
plastic binding posts Castle has long
used on its economy speakers. Only you
won’t find them. These gold-colored
posts are better than most.
We set the Richmonds up on our
Foundation stands (which cost more than
the speakers themselves do), connected
them to our Alpha system, and pulled out
a few potentially difficult recordings.
The first was our familiar choral
recording, but from the SACD version
(Proprius PRSACD9093). Albert and
Listening Room So here’s Castle again…with a new
3 ULTRA HIGH FIDELITY Magazine
Gerard had plenty of praise for the great
clarity of the choral voices, for the way
we could pick them out individually,
and yet for the way they hung together.
The rhythm was at least reasonable, the
recording’s great depth reduced but not
destroyed.
And yet not everything was perfect.
In one passage the women took on a
“honky” tone, and Reine liked neither
the male voices nor the counterpoint
with the flute. Albert would have liked
a little more energy. Turning up the
volume helped, but these little speakers
are not designed to be run that loud, and
we backed off again..
With a large-scale orchestral recording
(Beethoven’s Symphony No.5, Penta-
Tone 5186 102) we realized again how
easy it is to run these speakers too loud.
Summing it up…
Brand/model: Castle Richmond 3i
Price: C$799
Size (HWD): 33 x 17 x 23 cm
Sensitivity: 88.5 dB
Impedance (claimed): 8 ohms
Most liked: Beautifully made, great
energy and clarity
Least liked: Very limited depth
Verdict: The Energizer bunny in
speaker form
The violins were first to tip us off and
cry for mercy. Once we found the right
compromise the Richmonds surprised us
with their energetic sound and the coherent
way they made sense of Beethoven’s
complex orchestration. The music was,
by turns, lyrical and lively. The stereo
image was precise, each orchestral section
well anchored in space. Well…space
is perhaps the wrong word, because the
depth was all but absent.
We were in the mood to make this
speaker work hard! We turned to a
DVD-A of the Ray Brown Trio’s Take
the ‘A’ Train (from Soular Energy, Hi-
Res HRM-2011). Through such small
speakers this recording should have
been unrecognizable, but that’s not what
happened. Brown’s powerful bass was
surprisingly lively and rhythmic, though
of course we heard the slap of the strings
more than the resonance of the instrument
body. Pianist Gene Harris really
pounds the right side of his keyboard
in this piece, and the notes had a decidedly
hard edge. “But that’s the way he
plays,” said Albert. Both the bass and
the (subtle) percussion kept the swing on
track. “What I like,” said Gerard, “was
that even when these speakers play too
loud and they harden up, they never get
blurry or fuzzy. They stay clean.”
We wondered how well they could
render the expressive voice of jazz singer
extraordinaire Margie Gibson (Say It
With Music, Sheffield CD-36). They did
more than honorably, with only a touch
of hardness here and there, but lots of
clarity and expressiveness in the song
itself. We liked the sensuous way Gibson
glides along a note before settling on its
perfect pitch (actually we always like it,
but the Richmonds didn’t spoil it). The
accompanying instruments — piano,
bass and cello — were very good, and
their dialogue was coherent and pleasing.
“It’s surprising how much you can hear
in the background,” said Gerard, “like
for instance the piano solo when she
hums softly along with it.”
We ended with Victor Feldman’s
Secret of the Andes, figuring it might have
trouble with a couple of those exotic
drums that make up the introduction.
If a cabinet is poorly put together, this
recording will spotlight it. The Richmond
wasn’t quite perfect on this test,