I was ecstatic to have the opportunity to review the new Motion XT series speakers from MartinLogan. I am a long time MartinLogan fan as well as a technophile/cinephile/audiophile type person.
The equipment I used with these speakers are as follows:
Denon AVR-X4700H (using 8ohms impedance setting due to 4ohms being more of marketing gimmick on this receiver than a true, stable 4ohms power delivery – those wanting true 4ohms should look for a dedicated amp that can handle 4ohms properly, never use a receiver for this setting despite advertisements saying otherwise)
iPhone 14 Pro using Thunderbolt to USB to DragonFly DAC (for 96kHz ‘lossless’)
In full production use at my house, I have these paired with the rest of the MartinLogan Motion series and using these as my rear surround speakers. I’ll start off by describing my experience with these in this setup, as I am sure a lot of you will be doing as well. I always like to match my surround speakers with equal quality to deliver an appropriate sound stage. Using anything less could result in improper balance. Despite not being overly used during a movie, these speakers carried the affects brilliantly. Anything that came from the rear was easily distinguished through the booming, and/or other surround effects coming from the other speakers. Nothing was lost. Sounds were exceptionally accurate and clear. I also have these mounted on the wall with a slight downward direction towards the viewer. I witness 0 vibration or distortion despite these being on a stand. The construction of these speakers are of the highest quality I have ever seen from any speaker manufacture. The sounds delivered is free of any distortion or vibration from the cabinet or speaker covers. The speaker covers are easily removable should you be able to tell they are impeding the sound, or, if you simply prefer the look of the exposed cones. The horn tweeter, while normally a show stopper for me as they tend to produce a harsher sound than I like, was excellent at producing both sharp, crisp highs but also added a softness to the majority of higher pitches to not feel overly sharp or offensive to the ears. It was very natural and pleasant. I think MartinLogan has knocked it out of the park with this specific feature. These speakers also have a rear woofer so keeping distance from the wall is important. With mine angled, I was able to get the suggested 24″ from the wall with my left surround but was about 15″ on the other. I did not find this to be a problem in my specific room, where sound typically does not reverberate much at all.
Moving to place these in a 2 channel configuration for music, as I am sure there are those out there looking to place these as standard bookshelf’s for all use cases. Playing music through my receiver using AirPlay 2 (48kHz CD quality) was phenomenally clear and precise. I could hear details in the music down to fingerprints sliding on the fret of a guitar to the tiny back ground effects in more electronic based tunes, to the sharpness of horns and other percussion instruments in classical, ska, etc. Switching over to my DAC to get even higher quality audio was apparent by volume only. I could not tell a detailed difference between CD quality and the 96kHz “lossless” from Apple’s digital master albums. I find this to be true with anything I’ve attempted to discern from “lossless” music, headphones, highly amped setups, etc. I simply do not hear it. Volume wise though, there is a touch more clarity and volume that comes from the higher bitrate at the same volume as the CD quality tracks, so that was noticeable here as well. While not being as large as floor standing speakers, the volume output, depth, clarity and overall experience rivals that of much, much larger speakers. In most rooms, these will do the listener right and would make any artist proud to have their products reproduced with these.
In conclusion, MartinLogan has done an exceptional job with these bookshelf speakers. At this price point, you will be hard pressed to find a better pair out there. You likely will be hard pressed to find a better set of bookshelf speakers period. These are a truly masterful line of speakers, and MartinLogan has brought their A game to the table. These are an absolute must have for any home theatre, or, bookshelf setup.
Thanks to MartinLogan for providing such a stellar experience. I will be raving about these for quite some time.

I felt these speakers are beautiful and well made. I really liked the look and preferred the gloss black..just know that it will show fingerprints and must be wiped down if that sort of thing bothers you. First off the tweeter is pretty sweet. Even at high volumes I was never able to make it lose its composure. Detail and high frequency extension is all there with this speaker. I tried these with an AVR, a tube amp, and 3 different solid state. Eventually I settled on an Elac Alchemy, which is a Class D and is capable of 325watts x2 into the B100’s 4ohm impedance. Feeding the Logans with a nice clean signal and the B100’s can sound very nice with a sense of refinement due to their looks and extension of the tweeter.. but for me I felt the overall experience was lacking a little something in the mid to lower bass frequency range. Paired with a SVSpro subwoofer definitely helped but wasn’t enough to make me completely happy. Very nice speakers but i think I would prefer the fuller range of the new Martin Logan floor standing speakers. I’m currently using the Polk R200 and Wharfedale Linton’s. Both of these lack the finesse and refinement of the B100’s AMT tweeter..but better the Logans in other areas in my opinion. I will be returning the B100’s but have nothing bad to say about them, it is just personal preferences. Beautiful speaker though

Great midrange clarity. Build quality is excellent… these are solid! It was between these and the Bowers and Wilkins 706 s2/3. I enjoyed the sound of these compared to those (and a few others). Love the new design and the tweeters on the new motion xt series. Using a Denon dra-800h for a 2.1 set up and very pleased so far!

finally graduated from a soundbar setup and ended up with these bad boys. was looking between some KEFs, B&Ws, and these guys. after getting some demos done for me at my local best buy the Martin Logans sounded the best to me. highs, mids and lows all sound level and these speakers fill any room masterfully. these are the best there is in my opinion. the gloss finish on the black colorway is a huge plus as well