Review on 🔊 Polk Audio 70-RT 3-Way In-Ceiling Speaker (2.5” Driver, 7” Sub) - The Vanishing Series with Power Port, Paintable Grille & Dual Band-Pass Bass Ports, White by Tiffany Bobcats

Bought 4 of these to install in our new home in the living room home theater due to Dolby Atmos/DTS:X top Ducts installed in it are leaking ceiling. Luckily you have a fairly low ceiling, so these three-way speakers could be used in place of the classic MC-60/80 speakers that people often go for in this configuration (and only at a small price premium). Don't let my 4 star overall rating on the quality of these speakers discourage you. Being a bit of an audiophile I find the speakers to be of a fairly high standard and the 4 star rating is pretty good IMO. The build quality is very good and they feel like solid hardware when you first unbox them. Weighing in at about 6.5 pounds, they're not flimsy, but still light enough not to worry about installing them in regular drywall ceilings. The electronics all look like quality components and my only concern is that they are under the ceiling where dust will collect which I bought several speaker bags to wrap before installation. The speaker terminals are gold plated and in general I couldn't hear any signal noise other than what I usually hear on my regular Hi-Fi audio systems using the same cables. After receiving my 4 speakers I spent a couple of hours with them yesterday. to test them out before installing them in a new home in the coming weeks. I should note that they have all been tested as shown in the attached image, ie not installed indoors, which reduces the base part somewhat. The sound quality for these speakers is pretty good, however, there is a very noticeable drop off. from midrange to bass, where clarity falls off noticeably, where low frequency volume just doesn't match the midrange, and the powerful dome tweeter that dominates the sound field. After tweaking a stereo receiver I used to relax with some EQ and boosting the bass by 4dB, I tested it again with demanding music incl. Skrillex, Metallica (Lightning and Black Album), Game of Thrones S8 soundtrack, Jupiter from the planets. The EQ setting allowed me to balance the punchy mids and highs for a fuller soundstage (I didn't hook up any subs for the recording), which was pretty impressive after hearing them in their native mode without any EQ. The most impressive change I noticed was on GoT S8 23's excellent recording "Stay a Thousand Years" @ 1 minute 39 seconds where the strings gradually merge with the chorus and create a very smooth transition between the lows of the create strings (violoncello and violoncello). basses) and high frequencies of the female voice of choir and violin. Similarly on track 32 "A Song of Ice and Fire" where a deep base of cello and drums forms the basis of the entire GoT theme song and the choir sings the lyrics in the high frequency range. These speakers held up without the help of a subwoofer, but obviously needed EQ tweaking. Problems arose with slightly more complex soundstages such as Skrillxx's "Kyoto" where electronic low drums form the basis of the sound. The soundstage boosted by high-frequency electronics and the sheer suppression of the mids and highs were a constant problem, even with the equalizer. This is obviously an extreme test as these speakers were never designed to provide a single source for demanding music such as dubstep. The placement in Atmos high allows for a good frequency response up to around 150Hz without losing too much volume to the mids and highs (oh and they can play LOUD!), combined with a good omnidirectional base from the (set) subwoofer. I'm pretty sure you'll shiver with thunder or fighter jets overhead to a well-mixed Atmos track. For those who can build them into their ceiling, I highly recommend them for high-elevation channels if you want to build a theatrical setup with just the ceiling/wall speakers (I recommend you ditch that idea for now) that you're getting You can get enough base from them, but the sound field may seem too flat to you as they don't have a directional tweeter and direct the sound downwards with some spread. Will update when final Atmos tweak yields other decent results. Notification.