What Hi Fi Sound and Vision
01 APR 2004
Mordaunt-Short MS309i
Superbly priced compact sub suitable for kicking your movie soundtracks up the backside
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The MS309i has a surround for its 25cm neatly engineered aluminium bass driver – it varies in thickness to smooth out the movement – and also has a revised port design on the twin rear-facing vents.
There’s a 175w digital amp and, in addition to the usual gain and cross-over controls, a variable notch filter to counteract any bass ‘humps’ caused by room interactions – using the test CD and a sound pressure meter, you can find any bass boom and dial it out using the frequency and cut controls.
There are switches to bypass this and set phase, plus an auto-sensing power selector, but no high-level inputs. This isn’t a problem if you’re using the sub with an AV receiver, but means you can’t connect the sub to a stereo amp with normal speakers.
Mordaunt-Short is a monster with movies
The MS309i provides a whopping bang for a small box. The flipside is that it’s not always the most agile or weighty sub – despite that hi-tech driver, it can sound a shade slow and ploddy at times with crisply recorded music.
Where it comes into its own is its ability to hit hard with explosive movie moments: War of the Worlds is delivered with satisfying force, cleanly enough to make you jump. At this price, this compact sub makes an excellent base for a budget movie system.
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