IS THIS IT? THE ONE COMPONENTSPEAKER SET BY WHICH ALL OTHERSWILL BE JUDGED? THE ONE THAT WILLREIGN SUPREME AS ITS NAME IMPLIES?Or could Morel have bestowed theSupremo 6 its moniker in order to only tosell a pair of really expensive componentspeakers? Rather than boring you with anintro monologue about Morel and my pastexperiences, let’s jump in with both feet andfind out if the Supremo 6 lives up toits name.

IMPRESSIONSThe Supremo 6 arrived in an impressive

looking, yet exceedingly large box thatspans nearly 31" across. A semi-flat blacksleeve uses cutouts to expose the maincorrugated packing box within while alsodisplaying the model number or logo onthree sides. Underneath, a larger cutoutdisplays a plaque containing the wealth oftechnologies incorporated into the system'scomponents along with cut-away views ofthe speakers. The styling of the box isunique in a way that is fashionable and fit-ting of a component set costing a whop-ping $2,199.95.

Remove the black sleeve and you'll findpacked within the corrugated skin is yetanother box. Grab one of its eyelets andupon lifting its lid you're greeted with thewhole shebang: a pair of Supremo woofers,tweeters and sizable passive crossovers.The only items missing from view are theones lacking visual importance, primarilyhardware. A nice showroom arrangement,and yet the substandard cardboard insertsseem inadequate for its expensivecontents.

Typically I initiate my product investiga-tion by reaching for a woofer, but the twosilver spacecraft casings that bear the-12dB crossover networks drew me in, so I

extracted one from the daft cardboard. Myfirst thought was this must be made of lead,noting it had the heft of five to six typicalcrossovers. Protruding from behind one ofthe cross members of its cast aluminumchassis is the main culprit — a large,densely wound copper air coil. While sizingup this coil, I came across some other hi-fidelity components more commonly foundin nice home audio sets: another good-sized coil, a very large poly capacitor and anexpensive Mundorf M-Cap capacitor (partof the highpass). There’s also a series oflow-tolerance ceramic resistors, some ofwhich are used for attenuation and others inan impedance equalization network.

While the crossover is exemplary, it’ssaid that the success of any audio systemstarts with the drivers. Like any smart com-pany, Morel drew from one of their finestpast designs, the original Supremo tweeter.We reviewed this tweeter in the past andgave it our highest praise for its outstandingperformance, but the Supremo’s accom-plishments were largely afforded by itstremendous size.

The new Supremo Piccolo is a directderivative of that driver, yet arrives in a muchsmaller, installer-friendly package. Like itssibling, the Piccolo uses an Acuflex-coated,28mm silk-dome that, according to Morel,results in “wider dispersion and softersound characteristics.” Also employed isthe use of the company’s proprietary alu-minum Hexatech voice coil — a hexagonal-shaped wire used for the voice coil thatinterlocks when wound. This leaves virtuallyno room for air gaps, thereby providing ahigher concentration of energy, better heatdissipation and increased power handling.

The under-hung Hexatech voice coil issubmerged in another Morel exclusive — apancake-style neodymium motor assembly.This assembly enables a linear excursion ofthe voice coil completely within a tightlyfocused magnetic field, virtually eliminatinginter-modulation distortion.

But that’s only part of the Piccolo story.The driver’s casing is virtually all cast metal,including the cup that makes up the rearacoustic chamber. At the entrance of theacoustic chamber and beneath the 28mmdome is a C.A.R. (Controlled AcousticResistance) Filter. The combination of therear chamber and the C.A.R. Filter all buteliminates unwanted back waves whileimproving the acoustical loading of the driv-er. This improves the speaker’s dynamicrange and transient response while allowingthe Piccolo to be crossed over as lowas 800Hz.

The last item of note is the input connec-tions. Morel equipped the Piccolo with 12”of Van Den Hul silver-plated linear crystalcables. While it might seem like overkill, itshows a level of dedication that is certainlya byproduct of their hi-end homeaudio products.

For the low-frequency stuff, a pair of165mm (6.5”) Supremo SW6 woofers isprovided. The driver’s silver basket is castaluminum and is said to be aerodynamical-ly designed to minimize sound reflection.Like several other Morel woofers, this driveruses the company’s Hybrid linear motordesign, which combines both a neodymiumand ferrite magnet centered within the voicecoil. This allows for a large, 3” diameterunder-hung voice coil using the Hexatechdesign submersed in a tall magnetic field.

MORELSUPREMO 6REIGNING SUPREMEMSRP: $2,199.95

TEXT & PHOTOS BY CASEY THORSON

THE LEADING MONTHLY MOBILE A/V SOURCE

ELECTRONICALLY REPRINTED FROM SEPTEMBER 2007

REVIEW MOREL SUPREMO 6

Out front, the driver uses a speckled gray,one-piece Acuflex Duralay-coated papercone. By using a single piece (cone and dustcap are one), weight is kept to a minimumand the coating helps eliminate conebreakup and distortion. Centered in the rearof the motor behind the cone is a C.A.R.Filter, much like the one in the Piccolo tweet-er. This is told to allow the woofer better con-trol in infinite baffle configurations by improv-ing the acoustical loading.

All together, the Supremo 6 appears tohave all the right stuff to put it in a league ofits own.

SETUPSupplying the amplified signal to this

component system, I wired up an AlpineCDA-9857 head unit directly to a TRUTechnology C-7 amplifier (conservativelyrated at 125 watts x 4). The driving channelswere level-matched within 0.05 volts of eachother. At no time was any processing usedduring the listening test.

Alterations had to be made to my bafflesto fit both the slightly oversized woofers andtweeters of the Supremo 6. This tells me theywill most likely need custom mounts in a car.But, hey, if you can afford the price of admis-sion, you can probably afford to have a cus-tom installation done.

After retrofitting my baffles, I bolted themto my well-damped 2.25ft3 test enclosuresand finalized my setup with some brief listen-ing. I left the tweeter levels on the crossoversat the factory setting of 0dB for the bestblend between the mids and tweets. I deter-mined the best position for the speaker cab-inets to be just slightly turned in from on-axis,although the Morels had such great off-axisresponse, it didn’t really matter — a greatbenefit when installing them into a car.

LISTENINGSOUL/BLUESToni Braxton “Shadowless”

Off of Toni Braxton’s Libra album,“Shadowless” is a simple, serenade-stylesong that shows a lot of emotion withoutbecoming a huge composition. It’s very inti-

mate as Braxton commands the center ofthe soundstage, placing her mere feet in frontof my listening position. Instrumentation con-sists only of acoustic guitars; a single guitaristaccompanies her vocals closely while addi-tional guitarists fill the more dynamic sectionswith resonating strings that encompass moreof the soundstage.

I cued up the track on my Alpine deckand pressed the repeat function. Within thefirst minute of listening, it became apparentthat I had been missing some details in thissong when auditioning other componentspeakers — including the last big dollar set.What I thought was a single guitar throughmost of the song actually includes additionalguitarists that strum in occasionally, addingto the ambiance of the composition. ThePiccolo tweeters picked up the details ineach and every string pluck, providing dis-tinction to the ambient guitars. This is exact-ly what I was expecting at this price level —separation and accuracy second to none. Sofar, I was impressed!

Shifting from her deep, boxy lows to theopen, breathiness of her upper range, thereproduction of Braxton’s vocals was almostamazing. I say “almost” because a small lullin the midrange elicited a slightly unnaturaltransition as she scaled across her dynamicvocal range — a minor inconvenience thatotherwise would have resulted in a perfectscore. But honestly, it doesn’t get much bet-ter than this.Score: 9.5/10

ALTERNATIVENew Radicals “Crying Like a Church onMonday”

“Crying Like a Church on Monday” by theNew Radicals is a make it or break it trackwith a tendency to reveal any negative tonalcharacteristics of a system. Its dynamic levelchanges make it somewhat demanding,allowing me to track change in a system’sresponse at different levels.

Ronan Keating’s vocals drive this song,escalating in pitch and intensity as the com-position progresses. But that didn’t phasethe Morels. They simply handled the vocalslike Schumacher would handle a Ferrari —exacting with nary a mistake. Keating’s voicejust seemed to transpire naturally, with aserene airiness to his voice through the qui-eter passages and a raspy athleticism at fullstride. His image equally good, narrowlyfocused just a tick to the left of center stagethroughout his broad range.

The instruments played through withgreat poise. The electric guitar stood itsground to the far left with pristine compo-sure, while the right side placed the pianoand acoustic guitar, which were easily distin-guished from each other. Each of theseinstruments sounded real, but it was thereproduction of the drums that captured myinterest. At high volume they were seriouslylifelike, particularly through the delicate tapsof the toms in the quiet passages.

As I do with this track, I cranked up thevolume level in small increments. The MorelSupremo 6 just sucked up the power andnever gave into distortion until it was at anintolerable listening level. Another impressiveperformance.Score: 9.5/10

JAZZSara K. “If I Could Sing Your Blues”

The recording notes for “If I Could SingYour Blues” by Sara K. state that the openingtrumpet was recorded 10’ from the micro-phone. This was done in order to provoke a“natural” depth to the soundstage withouthaving to resort to DSP. While the trumpet isdeep in the stage, Sara K. should be veryclose as the reverberation of her voice fills thestudio, conveying the overall setting to the lis-tener. The guitar should sound intimate andhave a nice, warm tonality to it, while the sub-tle details of the plucks should be coherent.

Playback rendered the studio settingproper from the get-go, with the trumpet easyto locate to the far right. Its depth seemedgenuine and consistent with the record label’snotes for this song. The reverb of Sara K.’svoice controlled much of the room bound-aries, which was executed wider and deeperthan I noted in past speaker auditions. And,Sara K.’s guitar was dazzling, subtle anddefined with the gentlest of plucks.

As the song develops to a short-lived fullstride about halfway through, the jazz infu-sion of percussions, bass and piano takeshold. The piano and standup bass werewell balanced, but one of the percussiveinstruments caught my ear. Although theyshould have been rendered on the samelayer, the brushing of the left cymbalseemed to be a bit forward than the rest ofthe set. A trivial detail that I can only chockup to being, well, odd.

Vocally, the Supremo 6 did a fine job. SaraK. imaged fairly focused with a relatively nat-ural presence. I noticed a bit of roughness inher voice toward the song’s end as she getstoo close to the microphone in the recording.At lower levels playback is well controlled,but moderate to high volume resulted in mildmidrange breakup.Score: 8.5/10

JAZZ (INSTRUMENTAL)Monte Alexander “Sweet GeorgiaBrown”

With an array of instruments, the sound-stage, transient response and systemdynamics can be easily compromised inthis instrumental version of “Sweet GeorgiaBrown.” But the Supremos strutted theirstuff and reigned, err, supreme. They didn’tseem to falter

anywhere with this recording, even at high-volume levels. I found their transientresponse spectacular and the projectedsoundstage to exhibit a decent amount oftransparency, layering the instruments nice-ly across the stage plain.

The details of this track go like this: Twosets of percussionists duel it out in the introand play intermittently throughout the song.Each set was distinct and very accurate inits reproduction, while every tom, snare andcymbal never transpired from a single ori-gin. This attention to detail was also evidentin the brass section, where the typically elu-sive mechanical noises of the keys of the farleft horn were crystal clear. I also was blownaway by the distinct “rasp” of the reeds thatcouldn’t have been more tonally correct —a character that often sounds compressedin cheaper sets.

If there is anything negative to say aboutthe Supremo 6 in relation to this track, itwould have to be the low-frequencyresponse. It certainly could have used a littlemore gusto to fill in the fundamental of thedrums and the standup bass. That’s prettyminor considering the demands of this track.Score: 9/10

REGGAEZiggy Marley “Keep My Faith”

“Keep My Faith” comes off as a simplesong with not a lot ofinstrumentation. Butin fact, that isn’tentirely true. While it’sno symphony, it’scompiled using sev-eral instruments thatare spread over theentire song, most ofthem being differentstyles of drums. It’sno secret that the

drums are ap r i m a r y

f o c u sfor me with this track, yet I still

have a keen ear for the lessobvious instruments andZiggy Marley’s vocals.

This track starts offwith a harmonica to theleft and a guitar on theopposite side, followedby a shaker. Each of

these instruments hadgood tone and a stable

position, but it was thedetail in the shaker that blew

me away. I could actually discernthe individual beads as they settled

before the next shake. Brilliant! Neverhave I experienced this level of clarity in

this song, not even from the last set of

Dynaudios I reviewed and praised for theirlevel of detail.

This detail also was evident in the vocals.Marley imaged rock steady and focused. Hisvoice was perfectly rendered with a very life-like presence. The mixed backup vocalsextend widely but never became overbearing.

And then there are the drums. The beatof the bongos to the left and right of thestage weren’t as distinct as I’d prefer, miss-ing about an octave in their fundamentalresponse. About all that was really presentwere the skin tones of the hand meeting thehide, yet that was enough to provide ade-quate division between the left and right —important since the fundamental can befilled in by a mono-driven subwoofer. Whenthe big drum bangs in halfway through thetrack, the extension was again noted aslacking fundamental, but the kick drum anddrum set were perfect and easily distin-guished among all the other percussiveinstruments. Another impressive perform-ance, and a good way to end my listening.Score: 9/10

CONCLUSIONAs I mentioned toward the beginning,

the success of any great audio systemstarts with its drivers. Being no stranger totheir product, this review was just more evi-dence to me that Morel is determined to

build what it takes — exceptional drivers. Inmy opinion, the Supremo Piccolo tweetersare the stars of this system, bringing out theminutest details in every genre of music Ithrew at them. Not to knock the investedtechnology in the Supremo SW6 woofersand surreal crossovers — they do an out-standing job of complementing the Piccoloin delivering a near flawless performance.Their $2,200 price tag may be a little steep,but in this case you do get what you pay for.

So back to my original question: Is theSupremo 6 the one component speaker setby which all others will be judged? Well, Ican’t give an absolute yes, but I can tell youit certainly will be the choice for this review-er to reference in the future. Kudos to Morelfor setting such a standard.

“THEY DIDN’T SEEM TO FALTERANYWHERE WITH THIS RECORD-ING, EVEN AT HIGH-VOLUME LEV-ELS. I FOUND THEIR TRANSIENTRESPONSE SPECTACULAR ANDTHE PROJECTED SOUNDSTAGETO EXHIBIT A DECENT AMOUNTOF TRANSPARENCY, LAYERINGTHE INSTRUMENTS NICELYACROSS THE STAGE PLAIN.”

POINTS MORELPOSSIBLE SUPREMO 6

Overall sound quality 20 19Tonal balance (above 80Hz) 10 09Low-frequency extension 10 07Clarity at low volume 10 9.5Clarity at high volume 10 9.5Image stability 10 09Listening fatigue (moderate volume) 10 10Flexibility/ease of installation 20 13Total subjective score 100 86

Ratings: Average performance is equal to 1⁄2 total points possible.

SUBJECTIVE SCORE CHART

REVIEW MOREL SUPREMO 6

Posted with permission from the September 2007 issue of Car Audio and Electronics ® www.caraudiomag.com. Copyright 2007, PRIMEDIA Inc. All rights reserved.For more information about reprints from Car Audio and Electronics, contact Wright’s Reprints at 877-652-5295

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