14 DAY TRIAL // Again, looks like the world is turning to extremes: either low-end, entry-level audio gear any poor third-world person could finally afford or top-shelf equipment meant to rock the "finest" ears. And since the goal of these articles is to show you the nicest gear around, we'll let the entry-level aside for now and see to the top gear.
Outlaw isn't a name much of you are familiar with and that's just because they're quite new on the market. Nevertheless, the last years have well taught me not to judge a brand by its age only; furthermore, the world has seen quite a lot of newcomers shaking the very foundations of the industry so nowadays, surprises are to be expected everywhere.
Today is the Outlaw Bookshelf day: a pair of hi-quality loudspeakers built for the intimacy of your home. I was tempted to say "your luxury home" but I realized that the price for such a pair of excellence-graded speakers is rather OK and affordable when you're a diehard fan of cool sounding gear: not crossing the $1,000 border for the standard black color, the Outlaw BLS instantly becomes a very interesting choice for audiophiles who aren't quite willing to pay the annual wage on a pair of speakers. Yep, the BLS cost $999 a pair (hand painted black) and $1,099 (hand painted cheery with matched book veener)!
As for the tech side, the Outlaw BLSs are very well-loaded, much to my very pleasant surprise. Outlaw themselves give a whole heap of specs I have rarely met in other producers' cases, virtually answering almost any question even before it is asked.
The Bookshelf LoudSpeakers have an overall sensitivity of 87 dB (not a concert PA speaker) and run on amps 50-200W rated. The lowest frequency could have been a bit lower but for the 5 1/4" treated paper/lossless rubber-ringed woofers, a 54Hz lowpoint looks almost impressive. A diecast magnesium frame ensures the woofer stays put as the 10mm movement of the 26mm cone would tend to shake the altogether small box. High frequencies up to 22kHz are emitted by the 1" Custom Silk Dome with a 10mm linear travel that makes up for the rather deep bass coming out the BLS.
What make the Outlaw stand up in the crowd is the multitude of switches and wiring capabilities the BLS have to offer in order to make them available for full exploitation. First of all, the BLS are truly bi-ampable (running with separate amplifiers for bass and highs) and sport separate crossovers! Another cool feature is in the shape of the Boundary Compensation switch which allows your Outlaw box to behave differently in wall- or room corner-placement. Finally, one awesomely cool feature is the Outlaw proprietary HF switch which will boost or cut the upper audio spectrum frequencies according to the room the speakers are active in; this means that a heavily dampening room will not suffer that much from loss of highs as the box itself will boost them! The same goes in the opposite direction for reflexive rooms...
Having said these, it's now up to you whether you decide to go for these very tech-y and at the same time - neat blasters or not; I still think that for under 1,000 bucks, they're one nice acquisition.