Fyne Audio F501
Fyne Audio has been around now for a couple of years now, but it's still relatively new company. Yet it has already made a significant splash with its comprehensive speaker range. The F501s are the smaller of the brand’s two floorstanders, measuring 98cm tall, 20cm wide and 32cm deep. In terms of build quality and finish, they’re exactly what a £1200 floorstander needs to be – they’re sturdily made, from the chunky spikes beneath the substantial plinth to the gently curved MDF-beneath-real-wood-veneer cabinets and the finish is smooth and seamless.
On a technical level, the F501s are an intriguing combination of the predictable and the unusual. The broad strokes are pretty predictable: a two-and-a-half way design using a 25mm tweeter, 15cm mid/ bass driver and 15cm
bass driver, nominal impedance of 8 ohms and 90db sensitivity won’t raise any eyebrows at this kind of money. But Fyne Audio has brought some interesting thinking to bear. The tweeter – a highly rigid titanium dome – sits in the throat of the mid-bass driver in an arrangement Fyne calls Isoflare. The aim is to preserve the time-alignment and the stereo imaging of the sound.
The bigger drivers are multifibre paper cones, with unusually sculpted surrounds. Fyne Audio calls this design Fyneflute, and claims it offers more efficient dissipation of cone energy and reduction of unwanted resonances.
A new approach to diffusion
And at the bottom of the cabinet, Fyne has employed some technology so singular its patent is pending. Called ‘Basstrax Tractrix Diffuser System’ (and we can’t help thinking Fyne got a little carried away there – try saying it fast), it combines a fairly conventional downward-firing port above a carefully profiled, conical diffuser. This is designed to convert the standard plain-wave port energy into a 360-degree wave front.
All of this low-frequency regulation takes place behind some slatted vents, which also add a little visual pizzazz.
The F501s’ grilles are, like many a rival design, held in place by magnets. Unlike many rivals, though, Fyne has fitted magnets to the back of the cabinet too, for safe, convenient grille storage.
We give the F501s the chance to show off with Diana Krall’s version of Almost Blue. This is a high-gloss hi-fi recording, with painstakingly recorded piano and close-mic’d vocal supported by stand-up bass, brushed drum kit and economical guitar – and the F501s lap it up.
Initial impressions are of a broad, well-defined sound stage, solid stereo focus and a lavish amount of detail. No nuance of Krall’s phrasing, no creak of double-bass fretboard, no lingering decay of a piano note is ignored. But, while they’re borderline-fanatical about laying out the last scrap of information, the F501s don’t sacrifice the coherence or unity of a performance in the process. Timing and integration are excellent.
Upping the assertiveness quotient more than somewhat with a switch to Burn With Me by DJ Koze allows the F501s to show off their beautifully even, consistent tonality. This, along with sweet timing and transparency, paints a very convincing picture.
A move to Rhapsody In Blue by the Los Angeles Philharmonic under Leonard Bernstein allows the F501s to demonstrate their dynamic prowess. Rhapsody is full of attention-seeking shifts from ruminative piano to full-orchestra outrage, and the F501s handle each with confidence, snapping into the leading edges of notes, alive with well controlled drive and attack.
Punch and assertiveness
There’s low-frequency punch, speed and body aplenty, and the treble response is absolutely as confident and assertive as it can be without becoming hard or tiring. Just make sure you avoid leaner electronics for your partnering kit.
And while we’re laying out our few caveats, we don’t think the F501s are that tolerant of background-music levels of volume. They remain cogent and listenable when quiet, but their vibrancy properly comes to the fore once the volume nudges above ‘polite’.
It’s a bold move to set a loudspeaker against these three capable rivals, but Fyne Audio has no problem with acting boldly. And, in the case of the F501s, that boldness is more than justified.