Buchardt Audio S400 MKII

Is the S400 MKII the right one for you?

Even though the speakers share the same appearances as its predecessor, they are actually quite a different experience when you listen to them.

It is a speaker that is all about enjoying the music! Being more engaging, it lets you dive right into your favorite music collections and forgetting all about HiFi equipment for a moment. The physical appearance is both compact and elegant, yet it carries a level of bass performance you would expect from a way larger speaker.

A short summary of the individual parts:

1. Soundstage

We are experiencing both an enhanced width and especially depth, thus providing a remarkable improvement. It provides a big, spacious 3D experience, and if you close your eyes, it places you right into the concert hall at the center row! The background is very dark, and you have an amazing instrument separation within the soundstage which is highly addictive! Dynamics tend to really pop out within the soundstage as well.

It is projected differently than what you get from most speakers in this price range. We are used to getting a more forward projected soundstage that stands in front of the speakers as a wall of sound. This does not give you much depth within the soundstage and tend to limit the dynamics within the soundstage.

It brings the soundstage a bit further back, which gives much more "room" for the soundstage to unfold in terms of depth and dynamics. It can take a little while to get use too depending on what you are coming from, but it would reward you with a much more engaging experience.

2. Tweeter

Although it's the same tweeter as its predecessor, it sounds way different with the new crossover in place. We find it to be very well-balanced between detailed and relaxed. In fact, with the new version, the tweeter is one part that you will more or less forget about, in a good way.

This is partially because of a new crossover design with the use of high-end components. We did use a great amount of time reviewing different combinations of capacitors and resistors. In the end we settled with using an ultra high-end CU/paper/oil capacitor from Miflex mixed with amazing parts from Jantzen Audio Denmark namely their Cross-caps, baked air core inductors and Superres resistors. The results are an amazingly balanced and neutral presentation.

3. Midrange

The tonality and balance of how it presents human vocals is quite remarkable, and is one of the things that we have been putting a lot of attention towards in the new design. It should be pretty apparent that human voices have taking a very high priority here.

4. Bass

As all of our previous speakers, the new version is no slouch either when it comes to bass extension. The new 6" bass driver delivers very deep bass notes both defined, tight and articulate. The big, oversized air inductors in the new crossover design are also worth mentioning. The inductors are wound with thick 1,6 mm high-purity copper wire, assuring clean non-distorted sound.