Diamond Audio D1 61

An affordable speaker system from a very high end maker, these have a simple pressed chassis for the midrange driver and tweeters that have trailing wires rather than terminals to affix your own wires to. The set comes complete with idiot-proofed cables with the correct sized insulated metal lug clasps fitted to their ends. It is clear which terminal is the (+) on the mid but the wire on the tweeter is a different colour code to that supplied to connect the midrange. Despite an excellent manual, (with clear instructions to preserve polarity of connection) it was necessary to ask which wire was the (+) for the tweeter. (A red and a black wire can be connected to a striped/unstriped wire, so errors at the connection to the crossover are possible) The passive crossovers are neat and small and the components within bear some Diamond branding. The cables’ distal ends are fitted with neat fork connectors that allow simple and yet solid fitment to the crossover. The midbass cone is a dished, no dust dome design made of lightweight spun graphite. The tweeter is a Titanium dome and comes with a choice of mounting options via a kit of mounting parts.
– 6.5 inch midrange, one inch tweeter
– Power Handling 100 watts RMS
– Sensitivity 95dB 1w/1m
– Frequency Response 55Hz to 20kHz
– Crossover Point 4,200Hz
– Spun Graphite Polymer Cone
– Stamped Steel chassis
– Titanium tweeter with eyeball, flush and surface mount kit
– Complete with crimp-terminated copper wires and steel fixings
Review by Adam Rayner
A slightly newer departure for the Diamond Audio people in that they are offering a much more affordable product in the shape of their D1 range. These, the D1 61 are the biggest coned ones and come in a neat box with wires, passive crossovers and the classic tweeters kit that includes plastic mounts for use flush, eyeball swivelly or else just on the surface in an angled pod. The cables are not too thick but are equipped with crimped ends to let you know where to connect them. The supplied manual is excellent and stresses the importance of preserving polarity. Only thing is, the factory supplied different coloured wires for the bits that connect straight to the tweeters’ terminals versus the bits that go to the passives. It was down to your guess as to which is the (+) wire. The red seemed likeliest but did you know that black is the ‘live’ in American home wiring? Anyway, phase anomalies are harder to hear on high frequencies than low ones and we did send an e-mail request to the USA. The UK distributors would answer any questions any buyer ever had, you can be certain of that. These distributors (AVHQ) know their stuff.
As to build, they are as posh as the budget would allow, with the spend going on the right things like a nice spun graphite cone, rather than just using polypropylene like everyone else does when they want to do good-but-cheap. The tweeters are a hard dome made of Titanium so they cut through. The passives are in smoky-plastic topped boxes, are quite small and have quality Gold plated screw down fixings that are just right for the neatly end-crimped speaker cable forks to affix to.
I fired tham up and tried various tunes. The mean-as-a-waeasel test was to shove Boom Tube the offensively deep Bass CD in the test rig and gave it some huge lows, no subsonic cut off. They performed remarkably well but did unload and purr at the slightest hint of truly deep stuff with any level to it. Turn it down a bit and you can see that these cones are amazingly well suspended for their cost and do in fact wobble down a ways further than you would expect them to. Crossed out sensibly even as deep as 80Hz they could spank like Guy Ritchie on Madge�s butt. Hard. The tweeters are a bit strident and even tiring if you spank the audio but they do reach up easily to the nice tinkly stuff like those tinging triangles on the Pink Panther bass spoof.
I found the system to be tremendously efficient and indeed they are expressly designed to go on headunit power, so that�s as should be. These speakers will please those looking for some real level for their watts, a decent brand behind their audio and a love of playing their music with vigour. A keen value for money purchase that was happily supplied at £125 for testing alongside the best of what the rest could offer, all the way up to £200. they held their own. Worthy kit, hitting a good bit above its weight.
Overall 8.0
Sound Quality 7
Build Quality 7
Power Handling 8
Efficiency 9
Value For Money 9