Mordaunt-Short Carnival 3 Speaker System Review

The Mordaunt-Short Carnival 3 is a compact “bookshelf’-sized speaker, suitable for mounting on a wall or shelf or on the optional pillar stands that support it some 14 inches from the floor. Although normally used vertically, the Carnival 3 can also be placed horizontally, and a matching veneered end cap is available from the manufacturer to replace the black wooden base for such installations.

The Carnival 3 is a two-way system with an 8-inch woofer operating in a sealed enclosure. It crosses over at 3,000 Hz to a 1/2-inch dome tweeter whose voice coil is damped and cooled by ferrofluid. The nominal system impedance is 8 ohms, and the speaker is rated to handle a continuous input of 40 watts of contoured random noise (it is recommended for use with an amplifier rated between 15 and 80 watts per channel).

The free-field frequency response of the system is specified as 80 to 20,000 Hz ± 3 dB at 1 meter on the tweeter axis. Its rated sensitivity is 88.5 dB at 1 meter for a 2.83-volt input of pink noise. The Carnival 3 is sold in pairs whose frequency responses are matched to within 1 dB up to 10,000 Hz.

The cabinet, veneered in teak or walnut, is 16-1/2 inches high, 9-3/4 inches wide, and 7-3/4 inches deep. The base is finished in matte black, and the grille is a brown fabric. The input connectors, recessed into the rear of the base, are spaced 3/4 inch apart to accept standard dual banana-plug connectors, and the connecting cables supplied with the speakers are fitted with matching plugs.

Price per pair: $395. A pair of optional black-finished steel pillar stands is $50.

Laboratory Measurements

The Carnival 3 speakers were tested on their stands, placed about 2 feet from a rear wall. The smoothed room response was unusually uniform from 100 to 20,000 Hz, with only a 5-dB overall variation through most of that range. The maximum output was at about 13,500 Hz, owing to a peak in the tweeter output that affected the response between 11,000 and 16,000 Hz.

The close-miked woofer response was flat within ± 1 dB from 400 to 2,000 Hz, rising to about +5 dB at 100 Hz. At lower frequencies the output fell rapidly, reaching —10 dB relative to the average midrange level at about 50 Hz. The spliced composite frequency-response curve was within 6 dB overall from 60 to 20,000 Hz except for the additional 2.5-dB rise at 13,500 Hz.

The system impedance was about 6 ohms at three minima (20 Hz, 150-300 Hz, and 7-12 kHz), but it averaged 8 ohms or more over most of the audio range. The sensitivity with 2.83 volts input in an octave band centered at 1,000 Hz was 89.5 dB at 1 meter, which is relatively high for a sealed speaker system. The woofer distortion at a nominal 1-watt (2.83-volt) input was low in its useful output range, varying from 0.5 per cent at 100 Hz to 2 per cent at 60 Hz and rising to 6.3 per cent at 35 Hz. At 10 watts input, the distortion was still low at 100 Hz (1.1 per cent) but rose to 5.6 per cent at 60 Hz.

The quasi-anechoic axial response measurements at 1 meter, made with the FFT capability of our IQS signal-analysis system, confirmed the essential features of our room-response measurements. The response was quite smooth, with a 5-dB total variation from 350 Hz to almost 13,000 Hz and a sharp peak of several decibels at 14,000 Hz. The effect of this high-frequency resonance was also visible in a “three-dimensional” spectral decay plot, which showed ringing at that frequency for more than 1 millisecond after the driving impulse and after the speaker’s output had decayed at other frequencies. The speaker’s phase response was good, with the principal (and quite small) departures from constant group delay occurring below 1,000 Hz and at 14,000 Hz.

Comment

Standing well away from room walls on their pedestals, the Mordaunt-Short Carnival 3 speakers produced the excellent stereo effect (often referred to as “imaging”) that is frequently associated with free-standing speakers having good phase characteristics. Their sound, in general, was smooth and uncolored, although the balance often tended to favor the higher frequencies and deep bass (below 50 or 60 Hz) was more likely to be produced psycho-acoustically than physically.

We were concerned that the 14-kHz high-frequency tweeter-resonance peak might be audible as coloration. However, since the peak was relatively narrow and of moderate amplitude, it had little effect on the audible sound from the speakers far above most musical overtones, let alone the fundamental frequencies). Occasionally we detected a trace of “edginess” on some material, but this happened only when the program contained distortion or noise in the frequency range of the tweeter resonance, which then exaggerated it.

The Carnival 3 impressed us as a good, easy-listening speaker whose price and size bring it within the range of most of the hi-fi public. If it does not necessarily outperform some other speakers in the same general price range, it is nevertheless free of any objectionable qualities that we could hear or measure. In other words, this is an honestly and realistically rated speaker, well constructed and tastefully styled. In addition to those basic qualities, it sounds good!

Read all

Mordaunt-Short reviews

Read all