LX-5
Floorstanding Speakers
By its very nature, speaker design is about balancing variables and finding the best possible compromise. At entry-level price points, where the cost of production is most constrained by the need to hit a specific retail price, the necessity of compromise is at its greatest. But does one have to accept that a ‘budget’ speaker will always deliver a ‘budget’ performance? Mission’s designers are not the easily accepting kind. They push for greatness in design, whereas most would be happy to stop at ‘good’.
What makes a great loudspeaker? What makes it sing? For Mission, the answer is simple: in a well-matched system, the speakers have to allow the performance of the music to shine through. It’s not a group of notes; it’s a performance. It’s not all about frequency response, impedance, sensitivity and directivity, although they all play a part. To paraphrase a famous expression, it’s the music, the whole music and nothing but the music – and that, in a nutshell, is Mission’s philosophy.
For the LX Series, the speakers’ design has been stripped design back to its fundamentals to produce a range of speakers that Mission can be proud of in engineering terms, but even more so in terms of the enjoyment the speakers’ owners will experience.
Awards
LX-5 Specifications
| General Description | 3-way floorstanding speaker |
| Enclosure Type | Bass reflex |
| Transducer Complement | 3-way |
| Bass Driver | 6.5" (165mm) aluminium cone x2 |
| Midrange Driver | 5.25" (130mm) aluminium cone x2 |
| Treble Driver | 1.4" (25mm) ring dome |
| AV Shield | No |
| Sensitivity (2.0V @ 1m) | 90dB |
| Frequency response (+/-3dB) | 38-30kHz |
| Crossover frequency | 580Hz/2.8kHz |
| Dimensions (mm) | |
| Height (on plinth & spikes) | 1000+20mm |
| Width | 214mm |
| Depth (with grille) | 325+10mm |
| Carton size | 460 x 340 x 1140mm |
| Net weight | 30kg |
| Gross weight | 34kg/carton |
| Finish | Black wood /Walnut /White |
NEW TWEETER UNITS
High-frequency drive units require extremely consistent parts and manufacturing in order to be selected for a Mission speaker. Given the tiny moving masses involved, one micro-drop extra of high-tech adhesive can destroy the balance of the design, thus affecting sensitivity and frequency response. For the LX Series, Mission has meticulously designed a tweeter with a neodymium magnet, selected for maximum magnetic force in a small space, and a 25mm microfibre dome, chosen for its repeatability and consistency in manufacture. It delivers sweetly incisive upper frequencies, crisp and detailed but never harsh.
Both the LX-2 and LX-3 are two-way designs, combining the 25mm tweeter with one 130mm mid/bass drive unit in the LX-2, and two such units in the LX-3. These drivers sports cones fashioned from an advanced fibre formulation, selected for its reduced susceptibility to hygroscopy as well as being very stiff for its mass with excellent self-damping. A high-strength ferrite magnet ensures that the magnetic field is directed precisely within the area of voice coil excursion, enabling an ultra-linear performance that minimises colouration.
Mid/bass driver
Crossover
The LX Series uses a 4th order (24dB per octave acoustic) Linkwitz-Riley crossover network, developed
through a combination of advanced computer modeling expertise and many hours of listening tests. It is
particularly notable for its ability to balance excellent off-axis performance with a flatter on-axis result.
The cabinet is as critical as the drive units and crossover to the overall performance of any loudspeaker system. Designing an effective low-cost box is tricky, as budget dictates that the designer can’t use expensive materials or high mass to create an inert structure.
With the help of 3D Computer Aided Design, finite element analysis and laser interferometry, coupled with a great deal of experience, a budget cabinet can be designed that delivers better rigidity with lower radiated noise than most designers would believe achievable at such low material cost.