Can the new 700 standmounters reinforce Mission’s current retro-fuelled success?
Standmount speakers | £1299 | whf.cm/Mission700
The formula seems simple; take a well loved product from the past, re-engineer it to modern standards and then wait for nostalgia to take its course. It’s a formula that has worked brilliantly for the likes of JBL with its Classic range, and now Mission.
We reviewed the Mission’s first retro-themed speakers, the 770 (£3499, p64) a few months ago, and they are terrific. We suspect that the order book has been healthy, seeing as the company has quickly followed up with the more compact and affordable Mission 700 speaker we have on test here.
Both the original models were part of the same range, with the first 770 launched in 1978 and the smaller 700 a couple of years later. The importance of these speakers to Mission cannot be underestimated. At the time they were fresh, cutting-edge designs that were fundamental to establishing the brand as a major force in the market.
‘Compact’ is a relative term
When we call the Mission 700 ‘compact’, that’s only relative to its pricier sibling. By modern standards their 51x26x27cm (hwd) cabinet is pretty large. That size offers these speakers useful engineering advantages over the generally smaller modern competition.
On paper, a larger cabinet promises more extended bass, particularly as the wide front baffle allows for the use of a bigger mid/bass unit than would normally be found at this level. All things being equal, a larger driver delivers wider-ranging dynamics and the potential of higher replay levels. This is one of those cases where looking backwards really does offer some significant gains over modern slim and small designs.
Google the original 1980s 700 speakers and you will see that Mission has really worked hard to keep the look similar. There are differences, of course: the new one has a white polypropylene mid/bass unit (that looks like a scaled down version of that used on the pricier 770) and the front-firing reflex port is significantly larger with more flare. Yet the position of the drive units (and port) are the same, as is the use of Mission’s distinctive but rather unsubtle original logo on a white front baffle. Place the two generations side by side and the resemblance is unmistakable.
The speaker’s appearance may hark back to the dim and distant past, but the engineering is very much of today. Both the 16.5cm mineral-loaded polypropylene mid/bass and the 28mm microfibre soft-dome tweeter in the 700 are thoroughly modern units, designed with great care to
