Focal ST6 Trio6

Single‑driver, two‑way nearfield or three‑way monitors? Focal’s new flagship design can be all three...

Focal have a strong track record in producing serious studio monitors, and while some of their models are on the costly side for the home studio operator, they are actually very competitively priced in professional terms. The ST6 Trio6 is the latest in the ST6 series, and while you might assume that the Trio in its name relates to the number of drivers (there are indeed three), it in fact refers to the fact that the speaker can play three different roles, all of which are valuable in today’s studios. This is down to what Focal call 'Focus mode'. It’s a feature we have seen before in earlier models, but whereas those offered two operating modes, the ST6 Trio6 offers three.

The ST6 Trio6 is a three‑way speaker, then, incorporating an 8‑inch woofer for the bass, a 5‑inch driver for the mids and a 1.5‑inch tweeter for the highs. Perhaps unusually for a modern premium monitor, its signal path is all analogue.

Theory Of Evolution

Like other models in the ST6 range, the new Trio6 is an evolution of the earlier ‘Be’ version, where Be denoted the use of a beryllium tweeter. Curiously, the beryllium tweeter remains, but the ‘Be’ in the product name doesn’t. However, the ST6 series includes a number of other technical improvements to the components, such as the use of Focal’s W composite woofer cone construction, which features layers of woven glass‑fibre composite around a structural foam inner core. The midrange driver has also been tweaked so that it now includes Focal’s distinctive ridged roll surround, with the aim of further minimising resonances — Focal call this their Tuned Mass Damper resonance‑reduction technology. We’re informed that the radial rings moulded into the surround behave as tuned mass dampers to create anti‑resonance nodes that dissipate energy rather than allowing it to reflect back into the diaphragm. And although the beryllium tweeter diaphragm itself is the same, it gains a newly designed asymmetric waveguide to control its dispersion.

The rear panel houses the analogue inputs, EQ controls, and the switches and footswitch jacks for engaging the Focus modes.There’s plenty of amplifier power on board, with a 100 Watt Class‑G amplifier driving the bass end and another handling the mids. Class‑G amplifiers are analogue and utilise multiple power rails at different voltages. They switch from lower to higher power rails as the signal output approaches the maximum that each rail can handle, which in turn...