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This goes beyond soundstaging with its associated sense of open grandeur where the CDT tweeter rules particularly on a desktop with a computer screen (mine is 27" across). The Strada 2's gush factor seems fundamentally related to highly acute time-domain behavior. I very regularly listen to headphones. The Strada sounds as direct, immediate and hardwired as superior cans do over a premium amp, say my Bakoon AMP-11R/Audez'e LCD-2 combo fronted by Burson's Conductor DAC. The Strada simply adds the bigger air-motion impact of standard speakers and tops it off with scaled holography which even the best mini monitors should remain slightly envious of and headphones can't even dream of.
My original review had called the Strada electrostatic by nature. The Strada 2 ups that transparency and quickness, then overlays or augments it with greater dynamic impact as perhaps a function of lighter moving mass and higher sensitivity. I tried Titi Robin's haunting soundtrack to La Mentale, especially the lengthy "No se que tienen las flores". Superimposed on opulent string orchestra and faraway vocals is close-mic'd exceptionally wiry solo guitar. It seems to have sparks fly off and leave finger blisters in its wake. Later on bowed violin appears, then sax, then accordeon. Each delivers its very own textural imprint well beyond just tone color. This deals directly with how specific sounds are made - blown with an oscillating reed energizing an air column inside metal; popped as a plucked string; more gently coaxed as a bowed string coupled to a smaller or bigger wooden body etc.


Put differently, when your cat reacts to reproduced sounds as though they were real, it's not because things suddenly sound 'good' or 'beautiful'. It's because the types of noises the animal knows from real life exhibit the same startle factor*. The original Strada did this very well. The Strada 2 does it better yet. The main improvements thus are more transient exactitude plus more dynamic meat. Speed and substance. Those two are often mutually exclusive to some degree. Here they coincide. Likely the lighter mid/woofers remain active higher than before to add more weight to the upper midrange aka presence region. Whatever the technical reason, 'electrostatic' no longer will be the typical reaction that greets the Strada 2.
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* Anthony Gallo: "Something hysterical happened earlier today. I was listening to the Gregorio Paniagua CD La Folia de La Spagna. There's a track with some crazy transients of terrifying dynamics to go with them. When a whip cracks out of the silence my dog was so startled that he jumped up on all fours in a backwards trajectory and landed on the couch. I feel terrible for him but it was very entertaining." Perhaps his dog and my cat should meet?
160GB AIFF-loaded iPod Classic, Cambridge Audio iD100, Aura Vita & Vivid
The most typical responses might be to the effect of completely out of the box (read: no box coloration); quicksilvery; amazingly there; like a shot of adrenaline; blown wide open and spread out panoramically; and most of all, extremely communicative and involving. One needn't play these very loud to feel that contact high but they do scale very nicely.


Where are my bloody boxe(r)s? Feeling nekkid is no joke. Here it's the decisive difference. Go strip. Let's back-track a bit. Gallo's Classico range attempted box-less 'spherical' sound from boxes to simplify manufacture and drive down pricing. Compared to the Ref 3.5 and original Strada, the two Classico models I reviewed did succeed in that quite admirably and by perhaps 90%. This aroused suspicion. Perhaps some of the earlier spherical propaganda had been overstated just to differentiate the brand? What else to think if suddenly a recognizably similar though not identical sound was achievable from more conventional boxes with broader baffles and sharp edges?