Hi CKK. Are based in HK? If so maybe yo ucould find things about MK2 easily.
The E1s... Is a very good speaker. Actually best I have listened to at that price level, or even higher. I have been listening to the whole range at home. Started with the E1, than got the CR1 and finally the R1. GOt the chance to listen to them all in my system and for quilte a long time, so I guess I have a very good idea of how they compare... all to my taste, system and room, of course.
Let me jump to the end. If R1 is out of the equation for size, the best you can go for is the CR1. There is a good difference for the CR1 vs E1. Having said that, here is things I wrote in other posts regarding the E1
My room is almost a square. It is a dedicated room, and although seems squares are not the best, it sounds quite well with different speakers Ive tried, given size. Size is 5,45 X 5,35 meters (so like 17,8 X 17,5).
With the 800Ds I sat aprox 10 feet away from them and theybwere some 8,5 feet away from each other. There was plenty of room to the sides and over 3,5 feet to the back wall.
They played fine. Took me a while to find the best position. Kept moving them back and forth. But at the end I think I got it. I liked the sound. In my room, to my ears and with my music, it sounded big, sweet, powerful. With time I noticed I kept tweeking to get more detail and faster, more articulated bass. I think at the end they sounded very good. In terms of detail I thought they were very detailed (compared to others Inhave tried here).... Until I tried the TADs E1....
In terms of Bass, it was big and powerfull. Somewaht adicting. But also a bit slow and heavy. but Inguess tha is a bit in the DNA of the box, at least for my experience.
Image and soundstage, excellent. Overall a very good box for that price range.
The E1 is a different box. Much more detail, more transparent, faster. Even better image. More neutral all over the range. Bass way faster and articulated, although "smaller" and less powerfull (but it is big still). To me a very good improvement over the 800s. I hear much more "music" and much more clear what the artits are trying to show, be it a soloist or a conductor or an orchestra. Inner detail is fantastic, overall presentation deep nad wide with lots of air.
In brief the 800 is a great box. The E1 is well worth the extra 6000 euros it costs in europe over the 800, (actually I think at these levels what I have seen is much less of an improvement for that kind of money). I have tried boxes costing over 3 times as much and altough they were better than the 800 s, the improvement would not justify the extra cost (at least to my ears and in my room/set up/music). But with the E1 is totally the other way around.
Now the only thing tha keeps me from siging off to the E1s, are the CR1s I am trying to listen but havent been able still. If thenprice/performance improvement is the same as it was with the E1s I would not like to miss them. Although design is si different I am not surenwaht to expect.
) Looks like their changes include some kind of lamination layer to the woofer cone and a lot of increased stiffness in cabinetry...trying to get stiffer cones and cabinetry maybe...lessen any minor vibrations?
