Focal CMS40 2-way Near-Field Shielded Monitor

Overview

Spectacular and compact nearfield monitors from pioneering French loudspeaker manufacturer Focal. These took the 2010 Frankfurt MusikMesse by storm and rightly so. The clarity, power, and range of these modest sized and priced speakers is a thing of beauty.

Performance & Application

The word is ‘balance.’ The CMS40 delivers natural clarity and definition and displays excellent stereo imaging. Although there are adjustable controls on the rear panel it’s unlikely you’ll need to do much tweaking.

This monitor’s size/extended bass frequency ratio ensures excellent versatility; guaranteeing ultra-realistic voicing, whilst offering optimum acoustic integration in a small room. The design permits a listening position from 16" (40cm), even in the least advantageous locations (ex. proximity to reverberating surfaces). The CMS 40 is the perfect tool for post-production and home studios (consider the 100w CMS 65 if you’re at all concerned about size/power). Even in the biggest and best studios, the CMS 40 is going to be an excellent second monitoring system, allowing you to quickly check how your mix is going to translates onto smaller speakers.

Design

A two-way active design with a letterbox front port, this 25w powered monitor delivers sound way above their size and power rating.

Unlike 90% of loudspeaker manufacturers, Focal actually designs and builds all its own components. Notable on the CMS series is the inverted dome tweeter. Advantages include the optimization of the mechanical coupling between the voice coil and the dome.

The voice coil is fixed at mid-height on the dome and uniformly moves the cone entire surface. The positive dome is only joined at its edge, causing it to be inactive beyond 16kHz for a flexible surface. The inverted dome directly radiates into the air, with maximum efficiency, which is translated by an extremely precise soundstage. The dome’s response curve is clearly more linear than that of any positive dome. It provides better space dispersion and very low directivity, contrary to ribbon tweeters. The inverted dome tweeter offers unequalled dynamics, enabling sound engineers to very precisely control compression.

The image precision (height, width and depth) is outstanding and makes the positioning of each element very easy, as well as allows one to exactly assess the reverb tails

The 4” woofer would seem to pose a challenge on the low end until you hear it. The Polyglass cone delivers both punch and exceptional clarity.

The large front port lets you wall-mount the CMS 40 from 24” without any loss of control in the bass register.

Construction

The cabinet constructed from reinforced and dampened Aluminum, with a black powdered finish, the CMS 40 looks - and is - modern, tough and stylish.

Inside, the aluminum/magnesium tweeters combine great damping qualities with great rigidity both of which greatly reduce distortion. This unique marriage of metals offers several advantages. The impulse response is incredibly rapid yet benefits from a very short settlement time and excellent damping. This enables the tweeter to extend its frequency response beyond 28kHz (-3dB)…

Polyglass technology, exclusive to Focal, consists in applying molten glass microballs on a cellulose pulp cone. This process combines an excellent paper damping with glass rigidity. The rigidity index exceeds even that of a single skin Kevlar® and is almost ten times superior to one of polypropylene.

The mass/rigidity/damping ratio adjustment results in outstanding linearity of the frequency response curve, all from the inherent design of the cone. This innovation also greatly increases definition in the midrange.