A couple of years on from the launch of the Sabre-R standmounting speaker, Ruark Audio is revisiting another of its Greatest Passive Loudspeaker Hits — and this Talisman-R is the result.

It’s a compact and unassuming design at first glance, but get up close and that sloping ‘double baffle’ design makes for an interesting point of visual difference and harks back to 1990’s original Talisman design. It has solid acoustic benefits, too. As has long been established Ruark Audio behavior, the Talisman-R is carefully constructed and beautifully finished, with some nice details that elevate the look.

This is a small and discreet cabinet fitted with a 27mm tweeter and a 170mm mid/bass driver, an array bolstered by a front-facing bass reflex port. As such you shouldn’t expect the largest sonic presentation this sort of money can buy, but in every other respect the Talisman-R alternates between ‘very good’ and ‘really very good indeed’. Its powers of organization and control are excellent, it is alert to even the finest details in a recording, it has a respectable amount of dynamic headroom available, and it expresses rhythms with real confidence and positivity. It’s nicely balanced where tonality is concerned, is very even when it comes to frequency response, and is never less than entertaining in its fundamental attitude.

Unless you’re trying to make an entirely different visual statement, and/or unless you’re trying to fill a large space with sound, there’s really no reason not to seek out the Ruark Audio Talisman-R and give it a good listen.

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