Customer Reviews

Well I have to say it looks good and feels good.
My wireless set up was free it was included with my 1000, need I say you have to Pay For It with other Models “DEF TECH SUPER CUBE” and others but the Martin Logan Dynamo 1000 and my 700 do the BEST!

I have had many subs and by far this is one of the best, I think the sound rivals that of even higher priced non Logan hi end subs. In fact the sound quality is comparable to the grotto. With the exception of the grottos extra control capabilities. A great combination and companion with a grotto or depth . Awesome sound for those that want high end sound without extreme high end price.

This is now my second dynamo 1000 sub. I can't fined a better sub for the money with great control on bass,tightness of bass,and clearness with authority ,oh wireless signal excellent . First sub is for home theater & the second is for music with my Request's,the systems are complete now.

Like the other's said about this sub, this is an outstanding subwoofer. after replacing my Infinity subs for almost 10 yrs. the best sub replacement I buy. I've got to thank to my loyal retail outlet (Magnolia)who ask me to listen and compare to some of there woofers, but in the end Dynamo over top the rest.. sound was so thigh and solid, with my Klipsch RF62 in front and B&W 686 at rear, "viola"cinema quality...

The Dynamo 700 seemed more suitable for music listening, but when I compared the two, I decided I really liked the power of the 1000 and think it was worth the price difference.

It gives very subtle and accurate bass as it's not a ported sub, and though I don't use it for home theatre, I can only imagine the sort of rumble it would produce when down firing for effects based off of the rumble I get from even soft bass lines when I turn it up loud enough:)

Highly recommended.

I have enjoyed my old Hafler system for many years now, and it's still going strong since I added my new Martin Logan Dynamo 1000 to my existing Boston Acoustics RS260 bookshelf speakers. I expect that my two Hafler XL280's will have a life extension of several more years now...I hope. I'm not much of a home theater person, however I am an avid fan of jazz music, and my new Martin Logan sub has injected a much needed dose of adrenaline into my listening experience. John Coltrane is alive again!!

This sub has far exceeded my expectations. It delivers room shaking bass during movies and is capable of blending very subtly with music. If you are looking for a clean yet punchy sub then the Dynamo 1000 should be on your list!

The dynamo 1000 replaced a sunfire (true sub mk2 10" wow martin logan excellent, tight bass, cleaner sounding and no smearing in the upper bass. Well controlled upper & lower bass. The sunfire would go down to 18 hz. and a pain to blend in the system,not a problem with the dynamo.Oh the wire less, love it to death. (NO MORE WIRES).

Well I have to say it looks good and feels good.
My wireless set up was free it was included with my 1000, need I say you have to Pay For It with other Models “DEF TECH SUPER CUBE” and others but the Martin Logan Dynamo 1000 and my 700 do the BEST!

Excellent compact subwoofer "particularly for music", very responsive & precise (not boomy). Wireless option
is a plus.

This tiny subs are awesome I bought two of them running them in stereo for music and theater. The bass is incredible. You can't tell the bass is coming from the subs, is like the front speakers morph with the subwoofers and give out one sound. Very musical and tight and accurate and loud too.

Just unpacked my new surround system -- B&W M1 ( minitheather ) satelites and ML Dynamo 700 with wireless transmitter.

Well ... what should i say ... i also own a superb high end stereo set ( multiple price of above components ) but THE MIGHTY and clear BASS of this LITTLE CUTE SUB is just tremendous and fabulous !

Thanks ML guys for creating this wonderfull piece of music instrument !!! at next occasion i will definitelly go for more ML stuff to fill my hifi world with ...

Greetings

Dear ML

I have the ML CLS IIZ's and have had to deal with my Velodine's 18 sub to add just the little bump on the lower extension.
In doing so, I have always had slow lumbering, bloated, muddy base and an audible 60 cycle hum that the support staff at Velodyne told me is within spec. for the 3,000 watt class D amp and nothing could be done to fix the problem.

I'm am only telling this story not to slam Velodyne, but to show praise for Martin Logan.

Yesterday, I auditioned a stereo pair of the Dynamo 500 subs in my sound room and found them to be quite a speaker for the money. Very nice sound shaping of the lower register. One problem was I still wasn't getting quite the low bass extension that I was looking for and the rear sound ports seamed to be a little bloated sounding. (Very little) In short I still need the Velodyne's help since it goes down to 18 hz.

Today, I have just upgrade to the ML Dynamo 700's and I must say... "My quest has come to completion".

Very tight, fast, base and not a sound of buzz or hum in the units. (Note: I even have them firing forward) Just beautiful black-black rich base. Great sound shape and low register extension. Finally I can retire the 18" buzzing mud maker.

Thank you to ML and your design team. I can only imagine the work that went into pulling this small wonder off.

My short term plan is to now stack 4 of these on each side of my CLS IIz's and create a vertical bank of bass for the left and right side. (Something like your Statement speaker) I just have to work out a coupling rack so that they can be spaced, braced and angled for point sourced direction without damaging the beautiful cabinet.

Just one small concern/problem on the 700's.
Do you have a recommendation on the supplied spikes. They are way to sloppy for good floor coupling the way that they slide into the rubber foot. Is there an alternate solution that I can go with? Maybe a longer spike to replace the supplied "L" foot and rubber foot pad all together.

Once again... Thanks for the ride. I am revisiting my whole music library and I can enjoy that lower mid bass in the music.

Respectfully,
Kevin Franklin

The best for sup clean, deep bass.

I had a Dynamo 700 that went bad after a couple of months and I want to let you know that Martin Logan stands behind its product. I contacted ML and without hesitation they gave me several options on how I wanted to take care of the replacement. I decided to send them the sub directly, I had a new Sub within a few days and was back listening to great music and watching movies with a powerful thump! Thanks ML for your professional service and courtesy.

Martin Logan Rocks

I was looking for a sub that could fill my 14x12 home theater room with tight and accurate bass after many auditions from other subs I decided on this sub. Tight, well defined and accurate and perfect for my polk audio, denon set up. Thanks logan.

precise and tight bass ,excellent for music and HT.

I am very impressed with this sub. I replaced a 12in sub with the Dynamo 700. I was amazed how much more this sub out preforms the old one.

I recently purchased two motion 12 speakers, one motion 8 center, and two motion 4 speakers. I also purchased the dynamo 500 sub. I am extremely satisfied with all the speakers except the sub. It pops when it turns itself off or goes into sleep mode. I was told by Martin Logan this is normal, but i find it annoying on a $500.00 sub.

MartinLogan Response:
Angelo - We agree! We heard feedback from our customers and decided to do something about it. We will replace your subwoofer backplate amp with a new one that has the modification in place to eliminate the "pop" you hear when it's turned off.

Also, all new production units built after August 2010 will have the new modification and will not thump on shut down. If you have a Dynamo500 that does, please contact our service department for a free replacement backplate.

This is a replacement of a, retired to my garage setup,15 year old 12" jbl psw-1200. (2x the size of the ML)

The ML sub cabinet is very well constructed. It is solid and has no signs of resonance. The rear amp controls are easy to read and adjust. The heat sink is huge! I'm guessing it puts out more than the stated 120 watts rms. The speaker appears to be a good sq / spl mixed design. My only concern is the dual rear port design. Besides the inability to put them in the front due to size limitations, I can only guess that it aids in minimizing unwanted port noise.

So far this ML has impressed me with very musical and accurate low end reproduction. Whether the music calls for punch, deep bass, or just low end, the results were great. It blends in well with my satellite B&W 685s and center 62b. And all this at half the size!

Booming base makes floors rattle and shake when loud sounds from bombs or earthquakes are played on movies or TV. Great base sounds!

Lets say i like bass and this sub has what it takes to make a bass head happy. It is accurate and and really works well with the motion 4 on wall speakers. Thanks Martin Logan!!!!

I am very satisfied with punch and clean sound that the 500 provides. I purchased this unit as part of my 5.1 theater surround sound system. It sounds great while watching movies and has a clean powerful bass while listening to music. I listened to six different subs before making my decision on the Dynamo 500. My TV room is 16x20 and the 500 delivers plenty of bottom end for this size room. I would recommend you find a store with this sub and a few others and make your own decision.

Martin Logan offered me a fix to the popping noise on my subwoofer. They are a stand up Company. I am very pleased with the customer service dept.

This is a fine subwoofer and if you use your ears and not all the specs hype of other subwoofers you will be pleasantly surprised! I actually did not intend to buy this subwoofer, I went to test two other subwoofers and came across this one in the test theater. I was amazed at how much cleaner and audible the bass response was compared to the two I went to demo. I was originally looking at the deftech sub1000 and super8. I accidentally switched this one on while looking for the deftech sub1000 input, since the numbers in the demo rooms never seem to match how they are labeled on the console. I couldn't believe how good this sub sounded. I had to search the room feeling the different subs to find out which one was making this amazing sound. Talk about surprised when i finally discovered that this little guy was responsible for the sound quality i was hearing. And the price was comparable to the sub1000 and lower than the super8. I took a chance since I hadn't spent anytime researching this sub and took it home. Now 6 months later I am still amazed at how good this sounds. Fills my 16x20 living room and is a warm controlled sound, not sloppy or boomy at all. Just really great and I get lots of compliments on this sub. People can not believe it is only one 10" and 120 watts rms. Like I said don't believe all the hype, let your ears be the judge! I heard 400 watt subs that cant go as low as this one. Give it a try and you won't be disappointed, I promise!

It was time to update my listening experience. I thought that all I needed to do was find a good base end to augment the older NEC subwoofer on my current home theater system. Larger room, two subwoofers, easy match, eh? Not so fast... When I listened to the bass curve response of the Dynamo 500 unit in comparsion to Velodyne and Definitive Audio subwoofers I didn't image that there could be this great of a difference. The harsh brassinesss of other units was easily offset by the clear, warm response of the Dynamo 500. I wish all other choices were as clear cut. My old NEC subwoofer is now history.

Crazy love, I replaced a sub by Mirage. Clearly hear the difference cost just tidbit more. Definite upgrade.

Incredible deep bass,couldn't be happier.The price, what a bargain.

Exceeded all my expectations for an 8 " sub at the price. I own a vellodyne HGS-8 and did not believe I'd be satisfied for 1/8 th the price. Surprisingly deep,rich,powerful and remarkably accurate! Complimented my master bedroom system well.according to my b.a.s.s. cd(bad ass sound system) it plays down to 29 hrtz at 80 db! Well done Martin Logan.

Sincerely, a bass snob

Bought the Dynamo 300 to 'stand in' for a Sunfire Architectural sub that blew its electronics. Common, I've heard; Expensive to repair, cheaper to replace...the amp, at least...but a replacement amp was MORE than this great little sub!
Anyway, this little gem is named correctly. No, not as low as the Sunfire, but for 1/10th the price I've gotten 9/10ths of the performance. Very adequate for movies, it's now on to music - some low organ notes and real (vs. 'synthed')percussion - to see how well such a diminutive investment distinguishes itself there, too. Thanks for a great product and value!

The Dynamo 300 sub may seem to be under-spec'd for it's price. You can certainly buy larger subs for the money, but this sub does a very good job, being both accurate and fairly powerful. It produces very usable bass into the 30hz region and loads up well enough to create the effect of going even deeper. I've got a primary system consisting of Merlin speakers and Manley tube amps, but this small sub was bought for a 2nd system with Motion 4's and a Denon amp. It's doing an excellent job thus far and, in a medium sized room, can produce a satisfyingly musical bass-fill for small speakers. After a short break-in I found the the 300 was creating a very well blended and detailed accounting of itself. Pressed into action for movie material it handled the likes of Real Steel and King Kong with authority, though please remember that this sub is probably not suited to larger rooms for HT. I own a 10" audiophile sub that costs 6 times the price of this sub, yet the 300 sounds very much like a member of the more elite sub designs, which is quite an accomplishment at this price point. As I said, you can buy larger subs in this price range and get deeper bass, but you'll lose out on accuracy.
Now I know Martin Logan is serious about their image and products, so here are a couple of suggestions:
1) Get rid of the horrible spring speaker connections. They scream cheap on any modern product. Most people will probably use the LFE connections anyway, but every choice made still effects the overall impression of the product. I wish I had been at the meeting when this decision was made.
2) Consider making the crossover control a bit better so far as labeling it in greater detail. This way the user can easily keep track of what they're trying during setup. Little details like this enhance the owning experience and will gain you more loyal fans.
3) Watch quality control very carefully. While the build quality appears good, my sample has the speaker connection assembly mounted a bit askew. You don't want to see that on a ML product regardless of price.
Summary: A very solid choice for a low priced sub, the Dynamo 300 provides a strong entry into the more serious realm of audiophiles and even a great bargain for a 2nd system of someone who's looking for better than mid-fi subwoofer. This would also be an excellent choice for a higher end computer speaker system, though I expect ML to introduce the Dynamo PC100 for that precise application soon (I'll take credit for the idea!). Well done.

I have a pair of Bowers and Wilkins 686 Bookshelf Speakers in my bedroom system and was in DIRE need of the low end, because as great as the low end is in those it wasn't near what I wanted. I was looking at Martin Logan subwoofers at Magnolia at Best Buy but the ones there were just too much, I tested the Energy ESW-C8 but it was way too powerful and it didn't go low enough for my tastes. Then I checked out the B&W ASW608 which sounded fantastic but was way out of my price range. I checked out Martin Logan's side of the showroom and found that the Grotto i was perfect for me but was WAY too expensive, and impracticable for dorm life. I then stumbled upon the Dynamo 500 which was amazing but too big which left me discouraged, so I went on this website only to find a Dynamo 300!!! I was ecstatic! With the quality of the 500 in a smaller package, exactly what I needed!

PROS
Looks: Very simplistic and minimalistic, I love it! It sits between my dresser and wall and looks magnificent, not a show stopper but not ugly by any means!

Connectivity: Basic types, nothing wrong here, very easy to connect and start playing!

Controls: I love the controls!!! Crossover extends to 45hz but I don't know anyone that would make it extend that far, I have it at 90hz (around that) and it is the perfect balance!

Volume: Perfectly loud enough for my room which as I said is a bedroom and in the future dorm for college, I don't want to tear the whole building down but I do want to feel the floor and walls vibrate. I have it set to about 75% volume which is around 100W when my receiver is turned up all the way

Low End: 32hz is pretty good for an 8 inch woofer!!! I was amazed at the bass coming out of this thing! I played 'Venice' by Chris Botti and was astounded at the bass line, I've never heard deep CLEAR bass like that out of anything so small before! I played 'Everything you Love' by Chimaira and the fast clean bass drum was so crisp, not boomy at all!

Price: Nothing comes close to this quality at this price! Sure you can get some bajillion watt 15 inch subwoofer for $300 to bring your house down but there's no clarity in that, and this is the perfect balance!

CONS
Styling options: Would have been nice to chose between different colors....

Overall:
If you have the money to buy a $300 subwoofer and you DON'T get this... I don't know what's going through your head! A GREAT GREAT GREAT subwoofer and will keep until I get a house which I will step up in size.

This subs sounds great for the price its bass is perfect with bose surround sound. Had a polk before and its not even on same level, looks great and sounds even better, got a steal on this sub.