great new review from Herb Reichert in the Stereophile Magazine
“When reviewing audio equipment, I always attempt to elucidate what the reviewed component does different than, or better than, or worse than similar components in its price-performance category. This can be difficult if I'm not in-home familiar with the review component's competition. But it was easy with the Stenheim Alumine Threes.
What separates the Threes from most other top-tier luxury-class speakers is twofold: First, the Stenheims' look is living-room, partner, and family-friendly, not audiophile weird. Second, and more importantly, the Alumine Threes are not dreadful-to-drive, low-EPDR speakers that will only work with massive crazy-money monoliths that are capable of driving 2 ohms. While the Stenheims responded extremely well to large amounts of high-quality amplifier power, they were equally exciting when powered by a 25W class-A solid state amp and a 22W single-ended triode. I regard this as proof that a well-engineered speaker need not be difficult to drive…”