I’m not exaggerating with that title, nor am I when I say this: Finland’s DSPeaker put together one of the best-sounding rooms at the Radisson Blu Sobieski hotel this year. When I tell you it sounded right, I don’t mean it only felt like it to me—I got proof. Measurements and everything. Mark my words, manufacturers and audiophiles alike will be doing themselves a favor by incorporating DSP-based room correction going forward. DSPeaker’s products make that easier and more accessible than ever before.
First, I apologize for my previous ignorance of this company, and I apologize if anything I’ve said in previous articles indicated that I’m not a fan of DSP. To clarify, I don’t think adding shitty, cheap units with poor specs between source devices and amplifiers, or between a preamp and power amp, is a good idea. DSPing the hell out of your system to achieve a ruler-flat response will almost certainly do more harm than good. But that’s not what DSPeaker or its products are about, nor was it what was going on in the demo room. DSP carefully applied to manage room problems can be a revelation, and that’s what I heard at DSPeaker’s exhibit.
The primary device on display was DSPeaker’s latest product, the Anti‑Mode X4 preamp-DAC-processor. It’s an all-in-one room-correction device that’s been around for a couple of years, and retails in Poland for zł16,937, or across Europe for €3990 (prices follow in euros and in zlotys, or US dollars, where applicable). The Anti‑Mode 4 has two pairs of single-ended (RCA) and one pair of balanced (XLR) analog inputs, three coaxial (RCA) and three optical (TosLink) S/PDIF inputs, a USB DAC input, one coaxial and one optical S/PDIF output, one pair each of RCA and XLR outs, two RCA and two XLR subwoofer outputs, and a headphone output. It can EQ up to four subwoofers.
Also shown in the room were the smaller, more affordable Anti‑Mode 2.0 Dual Core (zł2971, €799), the mid-tier Anti‑Mode X2 (zł2542, €599), and the entry-level Anti‑Mode 8033 Cinema/S-II (zł1264, €299). This report will focus on the X4, but note that the smaller, less-capable devices might be all you need for your system, if you find yourself thinking about going for a DSPeaker product by the end of this article.
Where to begin? I haven’t the time or space to explain how low-frequency room acoustics work, or how digital signal processing is useful in counteracting room-related acoustic issues. Entire books have been written on the subject, so I’ll keep it simple here. All rooms have problems that affect how we perceive the sound of a pair of speakers playing in the room. That includes my listening room, and yours, and certainly a hotel room that’s been temporarily converted for a product demonstration. By measuring the in-room frequency response, we can develop EQ filters and other acoustic solutions that will mostly fix audible room issues. The DSPeaker Anti‑Mode X4 functions as a preamp that does all the hard work for you.
It’s shockingly simple. The unit comes with a measurement mike, so you just hook it up and have the Anti‑Mode processor perform some frequency sweeps, after which it’ll automatically configure its EQ to counteract the problems the microphone detects. The DSPeaker rep I spoke with confirmed that you can make do measuring at only a single seating position, but the X4 allows for several positions to be measured for a more comprehensive solution. It can store up to three different EQ presets, and the DSP can be turned on or off at will. The color LCD screen on the front will even display a before-and-after graph, so one can see as well as hear how the corrected sound differs from the uncorrected one.
Here’s where the rubber met the road. A Bluesound Node streamer (€599, $699) fed the Anti-Node X4 a digital signal. An Audiolab 6000A integrated amp (€899, $1199) served as just a power amp in this setup. The loudspeakers were also from Finland, Amphion’s Argon 7L—Phillip Beaudette raved about them some years ago, when they were available for $6000 per pair in the US. An REL T/9i subwoofer (no longer available) served up the bottom end.
I heard some lovely, jazzy vocal-centric music playing, stuff that really covered the full audioband. With the Anti-Node X4’s DSP turned off, the room sounded pretty good—the Amphion speakers are quite capable, after all—but the bass was a little thick, a bit too heavy. Low notes seemed to hang on a bit too long, such that the bass began to infringe upon the lower midrange. When the DSP was turned on, everything jumped into focus. The bass was tight, snappy, and appropriate in level, and seemed to be confluent with the midrange and highs. It wasn’t a subtle difference.
The Anti-Node X4 came with proof, too: we set its screen to display the before-and-after chart, and the red before trace clearly showed two big, ugly spikes at about 40Hz and 50Hz, with a deep chasm in between. The black after curve was miraculously flat. The DSPeaker rep further explained that the different presets were in use in this device, so the room would sound great no matter if listeners were standing off to the side or were seated centrally. This is absolutely the way rooms at hi-fi shows should sound, and yet many of them at Audio Video Show 2025 didn’t come close. Quite a few had equipment costing several times as much as this setup, and many included pricey room-treatment panels too. But none sounded as clean or as accurate below 400Hz as the DSPeaker room.
Long story short—integrate some DSP bass management into your system and hear what it can really do. That DSPeaker is making affordable products that make doing so easy and accessible to home-audio enthusiasts is, maybe, the best news I’ve heard at this show. I really, really hope to hear more from the Finnish brand.
Matt Bonaccio
Contributor, SoundStage!
