So far Edifier is well known as a “value class” speaker maker. Now they’ve just released (at least a sample) of their new speaker product in a higher level, the S2000. Actually, it wasn’t designed as a multimedia speaker, but as a Consumer Electronics. I’ve got chance to hear this one, the sample one 😉


It’s a bookshelf speaker, passive, with external amplifier box. Extra unique remote control provided. On the amplifier you can find a bass and treble control. A bypass switch also provided to disable the tone control. Two inputs available (CD and Aux), can be switched via remote or button on the front of amplifier. Digital input also available (Coaxial and Optical). The volume control is motorized one. So you can drive it with your remote and see the button turn left or right as you control it. So you can use this system as a D/A to 🙂

The speaker uses two way system, contains a 1″ silk dome tweeter with ferro fluid and 5.5″ long throw woofer made from High Strength Cotton Composite. Well, you also have a nice piano black finish on the MDF enclosure 😉 Cool.

The Crossover
Another interesting part is the crossover.


It was designed by Phil Jones, a famous loudspeaker designer. According to Edifier, the F3 is at 3 kHz, 3rd order design. The critical paths use Metallized Polyester capacitor (the red tube on the picture). If the main concern of using such caps is for lowering the cost, then I think we can have a better sound with better capacitor. The inductor for the high pass is air core based (excellent), while the low pass uses ferrite core (acceptable). Upgrading to foil based anybody? 😉 just joking, too expensive for this type of speaker. I also note a Electrolytic capacitor (yellow and purple tower). I hate them inside my crossover. The white brick should be the resistor to provide equalization or as a Zobel network (not yet examine it in detail). Also could be better with better resistor. I hate sand cast resistor 🙁

Simply to say, this is a seriously designed crossover. Despite of the component used.

The Amplifier
Edifier inform us that the amplifier uses D/A from BurrBrown (the PCM 17xx). This is a quite good D/A. The amplifier inside uses the famous LM3886 “GainClone” circuit to provide adequate power in a small stell enclosure. Also according to Edifier, they use Toroidal Transformator inside. The amplifier itself is quite heavy. The power output on the spec sheet is 40 RMS. I think this is a little bit lower than the maximum LM3886 potential. But off course, Edifier has their own consideration choosing this rating.

The Tweeter
A 1″ treated silk soft dome tweeter is used with ferrofluid cooled. Off course this one is magnetically shielded.

The Woofer
A 5.5″ super long throw High Strength Cotton Composite (HSCC) is used with aluminium voice coil and symmetrical motor assembly. Magnetically shielded of course (seen on the picture below). You can see bullet type dust cap.

Overall First Impression
Well this is the sample version, not yet breaking-in. I have used it for about 30-40 hours. The overall conclusion is this is a serious designed system. The high is enough detail, quite soft (I think due to the ferrofluid cooled), but a little bit lacks of dynamics for my taste (again because of the ferrofluid, perhaps?). The mid extension is excellent (they should be excellent because this is a 5.5″ woofer). The low extension is a little bit below my standard (I prefer at least 6.5″ mid woofer). I hope the low extension could be lower, but I guess the 5.5″ is the limitation. You have to trade between an excellent mid of lower bass. I think Edifier chose the first one.

Staging and separation are also excellent.

I upgrade the speaker cable to Synergistic Research HDAV (around US$ 10/metre) to get better improvement. Since I use it in my office (I use EMU 1820M card), I can’t find a better 1/8″TRS->RCA converter. So the stock “poor” cable was used. Upgrading it to a better interconnect will provide a significant result.

The amplifier provides enough power for the speaker. Though on some music, I need to pump up the volume over 50%, but this is not a problem for both speaker and amplifier.

I enjoy the Rim Banna and Don Williams much better with this speaker 🙂

Final Note
There are a lot room for improvement for S2000, both for the crossover and the amplifier. I haven’t checked inside the amplifier, but I believe some components could be upgraded in to a higher level. LM3886 is very popular amplifier, quite few components, and easily improved.