I have an opportunity to pick up a pair of Totem Hawks at a really reasonable price. I owned this speaker once before and loved it but of course got a case of the upgrades and moved on to the Forest, which I liked, but it didn't seem to have the midrange of the Hawk. My question is, has this speaker changed at all since I owned it? I bought my original Hawks in 2010. I also have an opportunity at a pair of Revel F206's for a couple hundred more and was curious to see what everyones thoughts were on that speaker as well. Thanks so much for the feedback!
I bought a new pair of Totem Hawks in the cherry finish. It's obvious I had previously not powered these speakers correctly because they now sound unbelievable. I am powering them with a Blue Circle DAR integrated amplifier and all I can say is WOW! I highly recommend this match.
I bought a used pair of Hawks and rebuilt the crossovers with Mundorf parts throughout, which was relatively affordable as the crossover network is quite simple. I don't believe the drivers have changed over time, they appear to be the same Scan Speak units.
I'm a Totem fan and I appreciate the engineering ideal of matching drivers as well as possible before XO design, therefore requiring minimal crossover interaction (and hence signal manipulation) to finish the design. That said, there are physical limits to what a single 5.25" woofer is capable of, of course. All Totem speakers I have owned or heard can be described as: "They are outstanding, BUT.." and the Hawks are no different. It's why there is no "perfect" loudspeaker, and why we will never find it.
I suspect that the F206's may be a better "do everything" speaker, but that the Hawk will outshine the Revel when in it's musical element.
I also suspect that since you posted your question in 2017, you've long since made up your mind lol