EgglestonWorks Fontaine.

Manufacturer: EgglestonWorks, 435 South Front Street, Memphis, TN 38103; 901/525-1100; website: www.egglestonworks.com

Price: $5,400/pair

Source: Manufacturer loan

Reviewer: David R. Moran

I don't know when it was I last auditioned and measured a genuine, self-styled high-end loudspeaker. Not counting the B&W Nautilus 802s reviewed here a year ago (and despite their big-ticket sticker and undeservedly high classical-studio reputation, they're kind of mainstream by now, don't you think?), it must have been way back in the mid-'90s. A colleague at work told me his brother had just bought the big megabuck Apogees. So I went and listened and heard and measured, and experienced what most others reported from those big, recently defunct, ribbons: smooth sound (I mean, really flat response), imaging both high and deep from that huge reflection off the bare front wall, and flabby bass. No wonder high-enders loved them so, and also needed to forgive them. (And now must never blow them up!)

So I was psyched when asked to take a look at the Eggleston Fontaine, the second-from-the-bottom product (but $5,400/pair nonetheless) from a comparatively new Memphis company, whose siblings have been gushed over by the high-end press, notably Stereophile. Until the small cartons marked "Caution: Heavy" arrived at the house, I hardly knew what I was in for.

The Fontaine is a conventionally "drivered" two-way comprising a pair of beefy 6" mids, run full-range and vented, with a 1" dome tweeter, on a back-sloping cabinet with beautiful black-granite sides. Each cabinet weighs 70 pounds. It is a fairly good-looking system, massive but not large, inert, with silky, magnetically attached grilles. Its shape-continuing stands are to be filled with something weighty, of course (sand, lead shot), and have big ol' nasty spikes. Bolted on said stands, with those slabs on its sides, the Fontaine sports a pretty cool appearance.