This article is on the flagship Hyphn Reference Floorstanding Loudspeaker from our friends at Monitor Audio. Monitor Audio developed the Hyphn to celebrate their 50th anniversary in 2023. These were first shown at the 2021 Munich HiFi show as a prototype they initially called the Concept 50. With some feedback from listeners at that show, they made some small tweaks and changed the name to the Hyphn. Audio Advice Live, our annual audio and home theater show, hosted the first United States public demonstrations of this amazing loudspeaker. Company History Monitor Audio was founded way back in 1972 just outside of Cambridge, England. Interestingly, many long-lived British audio companies were founded around that time and in a similar location. They have since moved to a town called Rayleigh, which is a short ride east of London near Britain’s east coast. Hyphn Concept The planning for this very unique speaker design started several years ago. Monitor Audio is a privately owned company, which meant the owners could give the engineers and designers free reign over their 50th anniversary creation and not have to worry too much about the cost. We spent some time with their industrial designer from the UK at Audio Advice Live and he told us, management told them to make the best speaker they could. When they started looking at other anniversary celebration speakers, they noticed a lot of them went back to a vintage design to celebrate the history of the company. Their design team wanted to go in an entirely different direction, as they didn’t want to have any constraints on the design by trying to make it look like Monitor Audio speakers of the past. The goal was to make the best speaker they could and to think about how speaker design might evolve in the future. Hyphn Technology When you see the Hyphn for the first time there is no question that these are like no other speakers we have ever seen. And then when we heard them on some of our favorite tracks, even in a show environment, we could tell, these were world class speakers. The Hyphn is made up of two towers with an array in the center called their M-Array. Monitor Audio starts with a solid surface material that is a composite of acrylic, minerals, and natural pigments. This acrylic stone material is then machine cut and hand polished to achieve the unique shape that supports the Hyphn’s components. While this creates a cabinet that weighs 235 pounds and stands 55” tall, the material is so rigid and inert, there are no unwanted vibrations. M-Array We’ve said this before in a lot of our speaker overviews, that many engineers believe the ideal speaker would be a perfect point source but also have controlled directivity. This, in theory, would give you the most realistic three-dimensional sound stage possible. The M-Array uses a single third-generation MPD tweeter surrounded by 6 third generation RDT midrange drivers. That is certainly a mouthful of part numbers, so let's unpack exactly what the M-Array consists of. Monitor Audio has been using a Micro Pleated Diaphragm for many years. This design harkens back to the AMT tweeters made famous by Dr Heil but with many improvements. It has the appearance of a flat diaphragm with tiny pleats in it. This new third generation of the MPD tweeter extends out to 60,000 Hz and has less distortion than the previous model. The MPD tweeter is surrounded by 6 small RDT flat diaphragm midrange drivers. These are only 2” in diameter, but combined give you much more surface area than a typical single midrange driver. The way they are arranged around the tweeter gives you that point source that Monitor Audio was after. These are no ordinary small drivers either. RDT stands for Rigid Diaphragm Technology used to create a composite ‘sandwich’ structure made from ultra-thin low-mass skins, bonded to a honeycomb Nomex® core material. Extremely light and strong, it can respond with great speed without bending. This combination reduces distortion by over 8 dB above 300 Hz, which makes RDT the lowest distortion cone technology in Monitor Audio’s history. And they are very wide range in response allowing them to cross the tweeter over higher for a better transition to the tweeter. These all sit on a very cool-looking aluminum baffle right in the center of the Hyphn and at what will be most listeners' ear height. The arrangement to handle the lower frequencies is equally unique in the Hyphn. Unique Bass Driver Configuration The Monitor Audio team designed new bass drivers with four of them used directly behind the M-Array that couples the two cabinets together. Two pairs of 8” woofers face each other in a force-canceling design and are bridged together. Having these directly behind the M-Array contributes even more to a point source effect. Their in-room response is a very impressive 18 Hz at minus 6 dB. And not only does it make the Hyphn more of a point source, it greatly improves its appearance in the room. Rather than seeing 4 large woofers facing forward, they are hidden behind the M-Array so visually you are struck with the beautiful contemporary design of the cabinet. Hyphn Finish Option Anyone lucky enough to purchase a pair of Hyphns will then have to decide on three beautiful finish options. These come in a striking white, black, or green finish. We hope Monitor Audio will offer even more color options in the future as these are quite the statement piece and more choices would allow them to fit into even more environments. Performance We sat down and spent some time with these at Audio Advice Live. They were being driven by a Mark Levinson stack using their 50th Anniversary ML-50 mono power amps. These amps put out 850 watts each into the Hyphns 4 ohm load. This is the only disadvantage we see to the Hyphn. You will need lots and lots of power to wake them up. Their sensitivity is rated at 86 dB, and the engineers told us they recommend power amps up to 1,600 watts per channel. After spending a few minutes going through some of our favorite test tracks, we have to say, Monitor Audio has produced one of the best speakers we have ever heard. The soundstage is incredibly wide and accurate with the speakers just completely disappearing. When you are in the center sweet spot, the stage they paint is just stunning. We’ve heard speakers with a taller stage, but these have an uncanny ability to place instruments in a 3-dimensional field that feels like it's about 5’ tall and extends far beyond the sides of the speakers. Vocals and strings sounded totally effortless and just floated with no sense of strain at all. And you could tell with percussive cymbal attacks, the top end flowed with ease. Bass was fast, tight, deep, and fully integrated with the upper frequencies. You could tell the huge room they were in at the show was holding back the deep bass attack a bit, but in a normal room, that aspect should be just awesome. Overall Recommendation No speaker is perfect and they all have some compromises. Monitor Audio has totally delivered the best speaker the company has ever produced and by a very wide margin. These are just spectacular. Are they inexpensive, no. Are they easy to drive, no. Do they weigh more than a refrigerator, yes. But if you can get past those points and set up a pair of Hyphns in your system, you will know what we mean when we say these are some of the best speakers in the world today.
