Polk Monitor series going out of production?

Systems

Hey guys I work for Circuit City and I noticed a few things that make me think the Monitor series is going out of production. We have far less than we usually do in our warehouse and all the monitor prices just changed to .96 which almost always indicates a product on its way out.

Has anyone heard anything about the monitor series being replaced already? Its not that old.

It could be that Circuit City is not carrying it anymore or it could be nothing at all but I thought it was really strange. Ever since we replaced the RTi series with the Monitor I have never seen that price code on them.

brettw22

I'd guess that if anything, CC won't be carrying them.......

The line's too new to be disco'd IMO, unless it's a complete non-seller.

Audiokarate089

zachwhite0 wrote:

Hey guys I work for Circuit City and I noticed a few things that make me think the Monitor series is going out of production. We have far less than we usually do in our warehouse and all the monitor prices just changed to .96 which almost always indicates a product on its way out.

Has anyone heard anything about the monitor series being replaced already? Its not that old.

It could be that Circuit City is not carrying it anymore or it could be nothing at all but I thought it was really strange. Ever since we replaced the RTi series with the Monitor I have never seen that price code on them.

I work at circuit city as well. From what I understand .96 means qaunties are limited or it is a new product which we havent recieved a whole lot of yet or none of at all. .95 means discountinued The only reason I think this is because new products like tv's and everything come in at the warehouse as 96 and eventually change to the normal 99 price. I dont think they are going anywhere they are not that old.

PolkThug

.96 = clearance. bye bye

Systems

The line between .96 and .95 is a thin one. Ive seen both used and to mean the same thing before. I do feel like they are being discontinued atleast from Circuit City.

If they are I wanna know what were gonna have to replace it. If they dont all were gonna have is some Infinity Beta50's...

I cant believe Circuit City would be the one to discontinue them becasue they just scheduled almost all the stores to have an area in TV's with a second set of Monitor 70 and 30. Hmm.

Gaara

At the CC I worked at 96 meant that it was being discontinued, and 95 meant that it was discontinued. 96 Stuff we would push, but try and not discount, but 95 stuff we would push and always discount.

I know there is a big polk sale coming up over the next month, maybe someone put in the wrong number and it should be a 97 or 98.

Jared

Systems

I emailed Polk but I dont know if they would even be able to shed any light on it. I will let you all know what the response is. Hopefully Circuit City is going to carry the RTi series once again in addition to the LSi...Ya right. That sure would make work more fun though.

Audiokarate089

.96 does not mean clearance. I have seen product move from .96 to 99. I doubt highly they would stop selling them there that would leave the stores with only one type of floorstanding from infinity.

RuSsMaN

I would hope not, great sounding speakers. Re-defining the 'entry level' market, in my opinion.

Cheers,
Russ

Systems

Yes I forgot about that.

I did see the old RM6005 go .96 and then back to .99 for awhile so that is a possibility.

Toxis

CC doesn't sell anything that can even run the LSi's... so why even waste your dreams on that?

Systems

We didnt even have anything that could run the RTi10 when we had it. The HK 6xx is teh best series we carry.

aaharvel

There's no way Circuit City is phasing out the Monitors. Not only is the speaker line fairly new but the Monitor series were part of a big deal made with Circuit City chains to feature Polk Audio Speakers over anything else in their stores at that pricepoint.

When Tweeter dropped their affiliation with Boston Acoustics (or vice versa?) Polk decided to move their RTI line to those stores for more upscale buyers that couldn't quite afford their LSI line.

Although I wish C.C. would go back to carrying Rti's so Polk would have something to compete with Infinity's BETA which IMO are the nicest speakers that Circuit City carries now- not that that's saying much.

Florida was grrrreat! :cool:

screxer

Although I wish C.C. would go back to carrying Rti's so Polk would have something to compete with Infinity's BETA which IMO are the nicest speakers that Circuit City carries now

Polk doesn't need to have the RTi to compete with those crap speakers....I compared the Monitor 70 with the BETA 50....it was no comparison....the Monitor won hands down...better soundstage, better imaging, better highs, better midrange, overall just a better speaker for less money (at least to my ears). I find the Monitor 70 to be an excellent speaker. Is it a RTi? No, but it isn't as power hungry and still kills speakers that are more expensive (which the Infinities are)

aaharvel

screxer wrote:

Polk doesn't need to have the RTi to compete with those crap speakers....I compared the Monitor 70 with the BETA 50....it was no comparison....the Monitor won hands down...better soundstage, better imaging, better highs, better midrange, overall just a better speaker for less money (at least to my ears). I find the Monitor 70 to be an excellent speaker. Is it a RTi? No, but it isn't as power hungry and still kills speakers that are more expensive (which the Infinities are)

that's your opinion. THe Monitors are better than the primus line. IMO the Betas are better than the Monitors.

ND13

As with all speakers, you can't judge them, critically, at the store. Most likely, the store will be driving, the said speakers, with a receiver. Some might have seperates, like the Onkyo gear that CC used to sell or may still??? I haven't set foot in a CC in over two years. I doubt that any of us have a room with the same dimensions or acoustics. Like it has been said here a million times before, don't judge a pair of speakers until you get them in your home environment and driven by your gear. It might not be feasible in all cases, but if you're looking for a "semi-permanent" pair of speakers, the best thing to do is to try to get them to let you audition them at your home. If I'm not mistaken, BB and CC will give you a full refund within 30 days of purchase, as long as there's a reciept, all the original materials and no damage.

screxer

It may not be the same room dimensions, but I did run them off the same receiver I have (H/K AVR635) with the same settings I had (minus EZset)....the Monitor's sounded much better....to me it offered a more natural sound. The Infinities seemed to struggle to try to provide correct sound (one test I used was the opening scenes on Star Wars as I'm very familiar with it and how it should sound.....the main theme sounded natural with very distinct structure to the overall orchestra so it was very easy to hear percussion, horn, etc with the Monitors.....the Infinities simply seemed too muddy....the horns seemed low in the mix and not distinctive at all. Is this an indication that I in fact enjoy somewhat brighter speakers when I always thought I enjoyed slightly warmer sound? Possibly since I've read time and time again that the Monitor's are a bright speaker, but I know from testing with the gear I have, the Monitor 70's are the best bang for the buck at circuit city....the BETA's pale in comparison. I may be relatively new to the home theater/home audio front with only about a year and a half experience in the mid-range stuff, but I know what sounds good to me, regardless of where products are placed in a company's lines. BETA may be a mid to higher end line for Infinity, whereas Monitor may be the low to mid line for Polk, but I know from my personal listening experience, the Polk low to mid line is very much comparable to Infinity's mid to higher end lines).

ND13

I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with your findings at all. I'm hoping that your findings are correct for that matter, seeing that I love Polk and am indifferent about Infinity. I like detailed highs, also, but most confuse "bright" and "detailed" from what I can gather. Some of my speakers require a little gain in the treble dept, while with others, the dial stays flat. I did notice that since I started using the AMC ss amp I picked up from Warlocks, that the same speakers that required a little gain when running off the HK 3380's amps, no longer need that tweak. I guess that the AMC is "brighter" than the HK's internal amps???? Maybe it's just the difference in power???

screxer

I too find that I need to give the Polk's a little push towards the highs (for those that are familiar with the 635's EZset, I often run it with a +4 tilt, thus getting slightly more detailed highs), so I agree that "detailed" and "bright" can be two different things. To me, the Monitor's don't seem "bright" like the Klipsch do. To me, Klipsch can be excessively bright to the point that it gives me a headache after a half hour. I've seen a lot of people refer to Monitor's (and even the RTi's) as bright, yet I don't consider them bright....too me, after listening to Klipsch, Boston Acoustic, etc., the Polk's seem somewhat warm (i.e. they have distinct midrange), but not enough that it colors the sound and makes it muddy (like the Infinities). Polk's to me offer a slightly warm sound to with great, detailed highs to offer a very natural sound.

Joey_V

Boy, if this is true, the monitor series didnt last too long.

If this is just a case that CC wont be carrying the monitor series, then I guess only the CC/Polk business side is being discontinued and not the speaker series itself.

MacLeod

It may be simply a redesigning.

The same thing is happening with their car amps. They are being drastically reduced at all the authorized reatilers but they arent being discontinued, simply redesigned. Once the newer models come out, nobody will touch the "old" models with a stick so they try to get rid of them now with a small markdown.

This is good to know. Id love to have a set of Monitor 50's and I may get lucky and snag a pair for $300!

Systems

I emailed Polk and they said it must have been a mistake. Nothing is changing.

MacLeod

Damn. It wouldve been nice to see the Monitor 50's for $300!