Dali Epicon 2

Dali Epicon 2 Bookshelf Speaker

If you dream of fantastic sound experiences the EPICON 2 is the perfect escape. Don’t be fooled by the size of the loudspeaker – the most diminutive in the EPICON family.

Sitting gracefully upon its custom-made stand EPICON 2 produces an astonishingly large and accurate three-dimensional sound that will impress even the most rigorous demands of true audiophiles.

The Powerful Younger Sibling
The two channel speaker features a 6 ½“ bass driver and a soft cone dome tweeter. In fact, the technological breakthroughs designed for the larger EPICON 6 and EPICON 8 models have been channelled into EPICON 2 to create a loudspeaker that performs way beyond its size expectations.

EPICON 2 demonstrates perfectly what this new series is all about: Minimal signal degradation… or put bluntly: Transparency and revelation taken to an – until now – unseen level!

This speaker demonstrates a highly linear and coherent response, and integrates well with small to mediumsized rooms. The woofer roll-off is slow, and the speaker reaches deep into the lowest frequencies. All in all, in most setups this will sound like a much larger speaker than it really is.

Within its working range the EPICON 2 will fully match the performance quality of its larger siblings, the EPICON 6 and EPICON 8. This is the new compact loudspeaker for the purist seeking high-performance.

Note: To mount the EPICON 2 securely on the EPICON Stand, the EPICON 2 should be fastened with the included bolts.

SMC

For years designing magnet systems has been a DALI specialty. For the EPICON 2 we decided to challenge the highest market standards and to take magnet system design further than ever before in order to reduce distortion generated from less than perfect magnet systems.

The answer turned out to be a Soft Magnetic Compound (SMC) material which offers exactly the right physical properties: Very high magnetic conductivity and very low electrical conductivity (approx. 1/10.000’s of iron). The result is a dramatic reduction in distortion caused by mechanical loss in the magnet system.

The high magnetic conductivity is instrumental in more or less eliminating the frequency depended effect of hysteresis. The electrical non-conductive nature of the SMC material eliminates the induction of modulating magnet fields in the magnet gab and significantly lowers the eddy current on the pole piece caused by the movement of the voice coil.

The resulting reduction of distortion is both very clearly measurable and indeed audible.

TWEETER

Low resonance frequency, high power handling, and exceptional headroom for high sound pressure levels and extreme excursions are all characteristics of the oversized soft dome tweeter. Incorporating an ultra-thin magnetic fluid for cooling, the fluid has a very high flux saturation point for greater power handling. This also means superb control of coil movement – even at very high sound pressure levels.

Free of artefacts, e.g. resonances and high Q peaks the EPICON 2 tweeter features an extremely smooth and wide horizontal dispersion – one of our sound design trademarks. Even the detailing of the faceplate of the tweeter module is designed for optimal horizontal dispersion.

WOOFER

With the background of in-depth loudspeaker driver design for years, and having engineers with loudspeaker drivers manufacturing experience in-house, DALI started up the process of establishing in-house production of drivers in 2009. Today we are proud to present the result: The DALI EPICON 2 woofer are not only developed – but also manufactured at the DALI headquarters in Denmark.

At DALI we believe in designs based on low mechanical loss. Actually we were among the first to insist on controlling the frequency response by carefully balanced designs. We want the amplifier voltage and current to be the factor to control the frequency response by carefully balanced designs.

The wood fibre technology has proven to be a key in reproducing the finest details and dynamics in the music with very low loss of information. Wood fibres add stiffness to very light paper cone membranes, ensuring non-uniform break-up characteristics within the material. The result is a structural stiffness showing top-class behaviour.

The wood fibre cone terminates in a low-loss rubber surround that is fitted to a die cast aluminium chassis. Assembly of the cone, surround, voice coil and chassis is done in highly accurate tools for the maximum alignment accuracy.

CABINET

Working both as an acoustic tuned ‘spring’ for the drivers, as well as getting rid of reaction force (resonant) energy, the cabinet is an important part of the entire speaker system.

A rigid construction is necessary to optimize the working environment for both woofers and tweeter. The front baffle, sides and top of the EPICON 2 are heated in a process that allows us to press it into an organic shape. This design increases overall rigidity and severely reduces cabinet resonances. Furthermore standing waves are practically eliminated as there are no parallel surfaces reflecting sound waves.

With a thickness of 33 mm the dual-layer front baffle ensures that energy from the drivers is radiated as acoustic energy, and not as vibrations in the cabinet. The curved shape of the front baffle is also a contributing factor in ensuring a stable acoustic platform.

At the very bottom of the cabinet, you will see that the hardwired crossover is mounted in its own enclosure – free from the dynamic variation of cabinet pressure inside the bass reflex enclosures.

The finish of the cabinet is real wood veneer which is lacquered for a total of 10 times. And in between, each layer is hand polished to ensure a deep, high gloss and elegant surface. 10 times of lacquer also ensures a sturdy finish with a thickness of almost 2 mm. That means that the entire CNC cutting for drivers, ports and terminals is done after the paint process to ensure perfect fit.

SPECIFICATIONS