What are some really good values in speakers?

[Shawnb]

So, to answer the original question without the sensitivity issue, I'd list

Q acoustics
Nht
Emotiva
Anything on accessories4less
Chane
Philharmonic audio
....and that's about it as far as excellent sound to cost (high value)

Most everything else....can sound good, but is priced accordingly.

 

[yepimonfire]

I would say this is more a matter of preference for one type of interaction with local acoustics over another. Wide dispersion seems to appeal to the masses, but some folks, for perfectly valid reasons, take the "more source, less room" approach, which demands speakers with controlled patterns. Here's something Dr. Toole had to say on the topic in a thread over at avs:

Honky sounding horns a far and few between nowadays. With the invention of high power solid state amps, a majority of horns are designed with pattern control in mind over acoustic loading, although any horn or waveguide still offers some acoustic loading, the benefit of this loading is that a horn loaded driver can be crossed over MUCH lower than if it were mounted without a horn, allowing the directivity to match the woofer. All waveguides are horns to some degree. Secondly, modern computers can model horn designs, just like they can model cabinet designs and crossover designs. I have never heard a modern horn that was properly designed that sounded honky, even in most PA systems.


I’m a fan of controlled dispersion for two reasons. 1, anybody sitting within the defined coverage area of the speaker will receive tonally similar sound, and 2, it ensures that the speaker sounds the same regardless of room placement (above the Schroeder transition, obviously)


While a narrow pattern can be used to avoid reflections in scenarios such as live sound (where big, echoing rooms can be problematic), controlled dispersion does not always mean narrow dispersion or lack of room interaction, especially when speaking of both pro cinema or home cinema speakers, which are often designed with uniform audience coverage in mind, since commercial cinemas are generally treated acoustically to avoid this.

With a 90x90 coverage pattern, unless you place your speakers 3’ apart in a 30’ wide room and sit 3’ away from them, it’s almost certain that the first reflection points will fall within 45 degrees. If the speaker displays uniform dispersion off axis, that reflected sound will have almost the same timbre as the direct sound, isn’t that what the whole point toole makes with wide off axis dispersion? A good majority of dome tweeters have a falling response in the highest frequencies that crap out after about 5khz off axis, a horn or waveguide designed with uniform controlled dispersion in mind will not have this problem, or it will be significantly reduced

The above graph is a Klipsch RP 150m with a 90x90 (+-45 degrees) dispersion pattern. While the spl of the high frequencies is about 6dB below the lower frequencies, the shape of the response curve is nearly identical to the on axis curve, all the way out to 14khz.

No horn resonance here, the close miked unsmoothed response of each driver is +-2dB

The second graph is a B&W 703 up to 45 degrees off axis. There is nothing terribly wrong with the off axis response (no unruly peaks or dips), but as you can see, above 5khz the response drops off rapidly.

Which dispersion pattern would you rather have if the goal was “wide dispersion” and uniform off axis dispersion (and therefore flat response from first reflections). Not only will the first speaker offer uniform coverage at the highest frequencies across all seats in a room, but the direct sound and reflected sound will be of the same timbre, giving us the benefit of first reflections “spaciousness” without negative effects on the frequency response, regardless of the room placement. You don’t get the wide dispersion toole suggests without waveguides or horns designed for uniform dispersion. It’s why every JBL studio monitor is horn/waveguide loaded.


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[yepimonfire]

I agree with you. I'm only 44 years into speaker ownership, but I've found that high- or low-sensitivity isn't directly involved in what makes for a good sounding speaker. The presence or absence of a horn loaded woofer, mid-range, or tweeter has little to do with good quality sound. This assumes there is no audible horn resonance, as there too often is.

There are many other features that can directly contribute to quality sound in speakers, including but not limited to:

• Quality drivers with low distortion, capable of creating detailed sound.
  
• Flat frequency response with no audible resonance or break up noise.
• Wide dispersion across the all important mid-range. The wider the better.
• Crossovers that don't introduce audible peaks or dips in a speaker's frequency response.
  
• Bass driver-cabinet alignment that results in non resonant (low Q) well-damped bass.
• Cabinets built to minimize their vibration and resonance.

As long as you have an amplifier powerful enough to drive such a speaker without going into clipping, the speaker's sensitivity doesn't matter. As amplifier power is now cheap, this becomes less of a problem than it was years ago.

Horn-loaded, controlled dispersion (whatever name you choose to call it) does accomplish one thing. It allows speakers to play louder with limited amplifier power. In large auditoriums, movie theaters, and outdoor venues, this is essential. But in homes, limited dispersion becomes more of a problem than a benefit. Because amplification is cheaper today that it was years ago the argument for high sensitivity speakers disappears.

Of course sensitivity doesn’t have an effect on sound quality at lower volumes, try cranking a really good sounding bookshelf speakers with low sensitivity up loud enough to get 100dB 10’ away, and tell me if it still sounds good. All things being equal, two speakers with the same flat frequency response and same -3dB low end response, the one with greater efficiency will sound better with less distortion and offer much better dynamic range at high playback volumes, that’s the only point I was trying to make.


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[Mikado463]

If you add that up it's longer than we've had electricity ...

LOL, check your math !

 

[Dennis Murphy]

Honky sounding horns a far and few between nowadays. With the invention of high power solid state amps, a majority of horns are designed with pattern control in mind over acoustic loading, although any horn or waveguide still offers some acoustic loading, the benefit of this loading is that a horn loaded driver can be crossed over MUCH lower than if it were mounted without a horn, allowing the directivity to match the woofer. All waveguides are horns to some degree. Secondly, modern computers can model horn designs, just like they can model cabinet designs and crossover designs. I have never heard a modern horn that was properly designed that sounded honky, even in most PA systems.


I’m a fan of controlled dispersion for two reasons. 1, anybody sitting within the defined coverage area of the speaker will receive tonally similar sound, and 2, it ensures that the speaker sounds the same regardless of room placement (above the Schroeder transition, obviously)


While a narrow pattern can be used to avoid reflections in scenarios such as live sound (where big, echoing rooms can be problematic), controlled dispersion does not always mean narrow dispersion or lack of room interaction, especially when speaking of both pro cinema or home cinema speakers, which are often designed with uniform audience coverage in mind, since commercial cinemas are generally treated acoustically to avoid this.

With a 90x90 coverage pattern, unless you place your speakers 3’ apart in a 30’ wide room and sit 3’ away from them, it’s almost certain that the first reflection points will fall within 45 degrees. If the speaker displays uniform dispersion off axis, that reflected sound will have almost the same timbre as the direct sound, isn’t that what the whole point toole makes with wide off axis dispersion? A good majority of dome tweeters have a falling response in the highest frequencies that crap out after about 5khz off axis, a horn or waveguide designed with uniform controlled dispersion in mind will not have this problem, or it will be significantly reduced

The above graph is a Klipsch RP 150m with a 90x90 (+-45 degrees) dispersion pattern. While the spl of the high frequencies is about 6dB below the lower frequencies, the shape of the response curve is nearly identical to the on axis curve, all the way out to 14khz.

No horn resonance here, the close miked unsmoothed response of each driver is +-2dB

The second graph is a B&W 703 up to 45 degrees off axis. There is nothing terribly wrong with the off axis response (no unruly peaks or dips), but as you can see, above 5khz the response drops off rapidly.

Which dispersion pattern would you rather have if the goal was “wide dispersion” and uniform off axis dispersion (and therefore flat response from first reflections). Not only will the first speaker offer uniform coverage at the highest frequencies across all seats in a room, but the direct sound and reflected sound will be of the same timbre, giving us the benefit of first reflections “spaciousness” without negative effects on the frequency response, regardless of the room placement. You don’t get the wide dispersion toole suggests without waveguides or horns designed for uniform dispersion. It’s why every JBL studio monitor is horn/waveguide loaded.


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Honky sounding horns a far and few between nowadays. With the invention of high power solid state amps, a majority of horns are designed with pattern control in mind over acoustic loading, although any horn or waveguide still offers some acoustic loading, the benefit of this loading is that a horn loaded driver can be crossed over MUCH lower than if it were mounted without a horn, allowing the directivity to match the woofer. All waveguides are horns to some degree. Secondly, modern computers can model horn designs, just like they can model cabinet designs and crossover designs. I have never heard a modern horn that was properly designed that sounded honky, even in most PA systems.


I’m a fan of controlled dispersion for two reasons. 1, anybody sitting within the defined coverage area of the speaker will receive tonally similar sound, and 2, it ensures that the speaker sounds the same regardless of room placement (above the Schroeder transition, obviously)


While a narrow pattern can be used to avoid reflections in scenarios such as live sound (where big, echoing rooms can be problematic), controlled dispersion does not always mean narrow dispersion or lack of room interaction, especially when speaking of both pro cinema or home cinema speakers, which are often designed with uniform audience coverage in mind, since commercial cinemas are generally treated acoustically to avoid this.

With a 90x90 coverage pattern, unless you place your speakers 3’ apart in a 30’ wide room and sit 3’ away from them, it’s almost certain that the first reflection points will fall within 45 degrees. If the speaker displays uniform dispersion off axis, that reflected sound will have almost the same timbre as the direct sound, isn’t that what the whole point toole makes with wide off axis dispersion? A good majority of dome tweeters have a falling response in the highest frequencies that crap out after about 5khz off axis, a horn or waveguide designed with uniform controlled dispersion in mind will not have this problem, or it will be significantly reduced

The above graph is a Klipsch RP 150m with a 90x90 (+-45 degrees) dispersion pattern. While the spl of the high frequencies is about 6dB below the lower frequencies, the shape of the response curve is nearly identical to the on axis curve, all the way out to 14khz.

No horn resonance here, the close miked unsmoothed response of each driver is +-2dB

The second graph is a B&W 703 up to 45 degrees off axis. There is nothing terribly wrong with the off axis response (no unruly peaks or dips), but as you can see, above 5khz the response drops off rapidly.

Which dispersion pattern would you rather have if the goal was “wide dispersion” and uniform off axis dispersion (and therefore flat response from first reflections). Not only will the first speaker offer uniform coverage at the highest frequencies across all seats in a room, but the direct sound and reflected sound will be of the same timbre, giving us the benefit of first reflections “spaciousness” without negative effects on the frequency response, regardless of the room placement. You don’t get the wide dispersion toole suggests without waveguides or horns designed for uniform dispersion. It’s why every JBL studio monitor is horn/waveguide loaded.


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My problem with this analysis is that you don't always need a horn or wave guide to achieve uniform off-axis response. If you use the right drivers and the right crossover points, you can accomplish even room response without risking coloration from a horn. I'm sure there are speakers out there that have managed to avoid ill effects from horns, but I can assure you many designs aren't that successful. I've had 4 of those in my house over the last year.

 

[EW Hall]

You should also divide products in several classes. Cost and benefit makes something valuable. Speakers under 500$, then under 1000$ and so on.

Higher and lower sensitivity is just a different way of doing things. If you want...

• small box, deep lows - you have to have low sensitivity
• high sensitivity, deep lows - you're going to end up with a large box
• small box and high sensitivity - it won't go as low

Good designer knows his goal and chooses drivers accordingly.

Wow...talking about summing up efficiency in simple terms. That's how to post!

 

[killdozzer]

Wow...talking about summing up efficiency in simple terms. That's how to post!

Ah, quit pulling my leg!

Just don't confuse me for an expert. I don't know Diddley and I don't necessarily mean Bo.

 

[yepimonfire]

My problem with this analysis is that you don't always need a horn or wave guide to achieve uniform off-axis response. If you use the right drivers and the right crossover points, you can accomplish even room response without risking coloration from a horn. I'm sure there are speakers out there that have managed to avoid ill effects from horns, but I can assure you many designs aren't that successful. I've had 4 of those in my house over the last year.

A good three or four way design can obviously avoid a lot of this, but it doesn’t negate the fact that direct radiating tweeters still have narrowing dispersion pattern as the frequency increases. I have yet to see an off axis measurement of a speaker without some form of waveguide or horn to control the pattern display uniform dispersion across the highest frequencies. Most tend to roll off sharply as the angle off axis increases and the frequency increases.

For home theater, where multiple seats are off axis by 30 degrees or more, I’d rather have a speaker that had a controlled pattern of dispersion, ensuring the person sitting on the sofa along the wall in my living room hears all of the high frequencies as equally as the person sitting directly in the middle.

In addition, I like the fact that I can turn music on while doing something such as cleaning, and even though I’m standing about 3’ above the tweeters, I don’t experience rolled off highs, which was always a pet peeve of mine with typical direct radiating dome tweeters. Except for the bass, I hear exactly the same timbre no matter where I sit or stand in my room.


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[KenM10759]

The day I would engage Mr. Dennis Murphy in any technical discussion about loudspeaker design is a day I would just STFU and LISTEN.

 

[MrBoat]

A good three or four way design can obviously avoid a lot of this, but it doesn’t negate the fact that direct radiating tweeters still have narrowing dispersion pattern as the frequency increases. I have yet to see an off axis measurement of a speaker without some form of waveguide or horn to control the pattern display uniform dispersion across the highest frequencies. Most tend to roll off sharply as the angle off axis increases and the frequency increases.

For home theater, where multiple seats are off axis by 30 degrees or more, I’d rather have a speaker that had a controlled pattern of dispersion, ensuring the person sitting on the sofa along the wall in my living room hears all of the high frequencies as equally as the person sitting directly in the middle.

In addition, I like the fact that I can turn music on while doing something such as cleaning, and even though I’m standing about 3’ above the tweeters, I don’t experience rolled off highs, which was always a pet peeve of mine with typical direct radiating dome tweeters. Except for the bass, I hear exactly the same timbre no matter where I sit or stand in my room.


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Sometimes, perhaps more often than not these days, waveguides at least, seem to provide wide dispersion with a lot less fuss in a lot of different rooms.

You couldn't have given me a horn type speaker a year ago, and I have quite a few different speakers for reference. But after screwing with these waveguides, I'm certainly more open minded about it these days. I also cannot discount JBL's implementation of this approach. As prescribed, it's pretty evident there is something to it and I am currently in a situation where I can do back-to-back comparisons and do so often.

My experience thus far is like your own regarding a seemingly infinite sweet spot.

Coloration. . . .meh. I know what instruments sound like up close and far away. Everything recorded that we listen to is colored somehow. I used to play piano a lot. It certainly sounded way different sitting at it, than listening to someone else play it from even a few feet away and more so the further away I got. Still, the identifiable nuances that make me know it's a piano, or even what type are pretty darn accurate. I can use my imagination to fill in the missing dimension or dynamic and it doesn't take much to translate it into something believable, ultimately immersive and enjoyable.

I think it's possible to have overexposure and perhaps lose appreciation for just how good a lot of speakers actually sound these days. All the ones I own sound great within at most, a 3 hour listener break-in period with regard to what different individual tonal personalities they may possess.

 

[yepimonfire]

Sometimes, perhaps more often than not these days, waveguides at least, seem to provide wide dispersion with a lot less fuss in a lot of different rooms.

You couldn't have given me a horn type speaker a year ago, and I have quite a few different speakers for reference. But after screwing with these waveguides, I'm certainly more open minded about it these days. I also cannot discount JBL's implementation of this approach. As prescribed, it's pretty evident there is something to it and I am currently in a situation where I can do back-to-back comparisons and do so often.

My experience thus far is like your own regarding a seemingly infinite sweet spot.

Coloration. . . .meh. I know what instruments sound like up close and far away. Everything recorded that we listen to is colored somehow. I used to play piano a lot. It certainly sounded way different sitting at it, than listening to someone else play it from even a few feet away and more so the further away I got. Still, the identifiable nuances that make me know it's a piano, or even what type are pretty darn accurate. I can use my imagination to fill in the missing dimension or dynamic and it doesn't take much to translate it into something believable, ultimately immersive and enjoyable.

I think it's possible to have overexposure and perhaps lose appreciation for just how good a lot of speakers actually sound these days. All the ones I own sound great within at most, a 3 hour listener break-in period with regard to what different individual tonal personalities they may possess.

No speaker or recording can sound exactly like the real thing, but darn close.

I’d have to agree with earl Geddes, in that all waveguides are horns but not all horns are waveguides. A horn can be designed for maximum acoustic loading, or maximum control of directivity. These days with high power solid state amps, acoustic loading is secondary.

I don’t think that extremely wide directivity or an infinite sweet spot is necessarily a desirable characteristic. Many “omnidirectional” speakers have a diffuse , blurred soundstage. You want the sound to cover the listening area, but not necessarily just sprayed all over the room and walls in every direction. With a 90 degree horizontal pattern, that covers everywhere +- 45 degrees from center reference, which is about perfect for home/pro theater or music listening.

Even many pro PA speaker designs sound quite good. Honky , colored horns are a thing of the past, and any modern horn displaying these issues has been poorly engineered.


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[MrBoat]

No speaker or recording can sound exactly like the real thing, but darn close.

I’d have to agree with earl Geddes, in that all waveguides are horns but not all horns are waveguides. A horn can be designed for maximum acoustic loading, or maximum control of directivity. These days with high power solid state amps, acoustic loading is secondary.

I don’t think that extremely wide directivity or an infinite sweet spot is necessarily a desirable characteristic. Many “omnidirectional” speakers have a diffuse , blurred soundstage. You want the sound to cover the listening area, but not necessarily just sprayed all over the room and walls in every direction. With a 90 degree horizontal pattern, that covers everywhere +- 45 degrees from center reference, which is about perfect for home/pro theater or music listening.

Even many pro PA speaker designs sound quite good. Honky , colored horns are a thing of the past, and any modern horn displaying these issues has been poorly engineered.


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The rest of it kind of goes unsaid, don't you think? Is why we toe in the waveguides just so to get it where it needs to go instead of just sprayed allover. Egad, man. 'Infinite' meaning, with regard to where we live comfortably within the space. My entire listening room sounds good. I don't Spider-Man to the walls, but more like a quarter distance of the room away from them most days is where I live, even while on this pc. The waveguides even make this off axis spot a great one.

Blurred soundstage at this point in the game would be kind of ridiculous unless dealing with cheap, undocumented designs and perhaps, white van specials, or perhaps blown has-beens from craiglist and really crappy rooms. Most speakers on this forum used by regular posters here are typically known and well regarded and likely. . .not blurry.

 

[shadyJ]

No speaker or recording can sound exactly like the real thing, but darn close.

I’d have to agree with earl Geddes, in that all waveguides are horns but not all horns are waveguides. A horn can be designed for maximum acoustic loading, or maximum control of directivity. These days with high power solid state amps, acoustic loading is secondary.

I don’t think that extremely wide directivity or an infinite sweet spot is necessarily a desirable characteristic. Many “omnidirectional” speakers have a diffuse , blurred soundstage. You want the sound to cover the listening area, but not necessarily just sprayed all over the room and walls in every direction. With a 90 degree horizontal pattern, that covers everywhere +- 45 degrees from center reference, which is about perfect for home/pro theater or music listening.

Even many pro PA speaker designs sound quite good. Honky , colored horns are a thing of the past, and any modern horn displaying these issues has been poorly engineered.


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Wide dispersion speakers can create a very nice and lucid soundstage. Just yesterday I was doing an A/B comparison between a very wide dispersion speaker, a wide dispersion speaker, and a narrow dispersion speaker. They all had a good sound stage with very distinct imaging. Of course, I took the time to set them up correctly, and that took a while. The funny thing is they all sounded more alike than different, even though the narrow dispersion speaker had a greater ratio of direct-to-reflected sound than the other two. That isn't to say they all sounded the same; they sounded different, but not in a major way. I could easily live with any of them. I have heard terrific examples of all kinds of acoustic radiation patterns: omnipolar, dipole, wide-dispersion monopole, narrow dispersion monopole, etc. They all can sound amazing. One advantage that narrow, controlled dispersion monopoles can have is they can use time/intensity trading to create a good center image even when the listener is not seated directly between the speakers. For all the other designs, in a two-channel system, you have to be seated equidistant the speakers to get that center image. If you get a bit closer to one speaker or the other, the center image collapses to the nearest speaker right away.

 

[Dennis Murphy]

Wide dispersion speakers can create a very nice and lucid soundstage. Just yesterday I was doing an A/B comparison between a very wide dispersion speaker, a wide dispersion speaker, and a narrow dispersion speaker. They all had a good sound stage with very distinct imaging. Of course, I took the time to set them up correctly, and that took a while. The funny thing is they all sounded more alike than different, even though the narrow dispersion speaker had a greater ratio of direct-to-reflected sound than the other two. That isn't to say they all sounded the same; they sounded different, but not in a major way. I could easily live with any of them. I have heard terrific examples of all kinds of acoustic radiation patterns: omnipolar, dipole, wide-dispersion monopole, narrow dispersion monopole, etc. They all can sound amazing. One advantage that narrow, controlled dispersion monopoles can have is they can use time/intensity trading to create a good center image even when the listener is not seated directly between the speakers. For all the other designs, in a two-channel system, you have to be seated equidistant the speakers to get that center image. If you get a bit closer to one speaker or the other, the center image collapses to the nearest speaker right away.

A good three or four way design can obviously avoid a lot of this, but it doesn’t negate the fact that direct radiating tweeters still have narrowing dispersion pattern as the frequency increases. I have yet to see an off axis measurement of a speaker without some form of waveguide or horn to control the pattern display uniform dispersion across the highest frequencies. Most tend to roll off sharply as the angle off axis increases and the frequency increases.

For home theater, where multiple seats are off axis by 30 degrees or more, I’d rather have a speaker that had a controlled pattern of dispersion, ensuring the person sitting on the sofa along the wall in my living room hears all of the high frequencies as equally as the person sitting directly in the middle.

In addition, I like the fact that I can turn music on while doing something such as cleaning, and even though I’m standing about 3’ above the tweeters, I don’t experience rolled off highs, which was always a pet peeve of mine with typical direct radiating dome tweeters. Except for the bass, I hear exactly the same timbre no matter where I sit or stand in my room.


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I wasn't even thinking of high frequency roll-off. That's not a primary factor in controlled dispersion designs. The idea is to avoid peaks and dips in the lower and mid treble that can result when the broader dispersion of the tweeter doesn't sum well off axis with the output of the larger mid or bass driver. If a tweeter starts to beam at higher frequencies, I don't believe the wave guide will cure that issue (I'll stand corrected if it can somehow broaden a tweeter's dispersion once it starts to beam). A ragged off-axis response is certainly not a good thing (although I think some designers obsess over little peaks that in my experience get lost in the reflected sound soup). But as I stated, you can avoid that problem with the proper drivers and crossover points. At 45 degrees off axis, my Phil 3 measures almost exactly the same way it measures on axis. I have heard wave guide speakers that sounded very accurate to me (most from the House of Harman). But I've heard many that didn't, and I personally haven't found it necessary to use them.

 

[Pogre]

A good three or four way design can obviously avoid a lot of this, but it doesn’t negate the fact that direct radiating tweeters still have narrowing dispersion pattern as the frequency increases. I have yet to see an off axis measurement of a speaker without some form of waveguide or horn to control the pattern display uniform dispersion across the highest frequencies. Most tend to roll off sharply as the angle off axis increases and the frequency increases.

For home theater, where multiple seats are off axis by 30 degrees or more, I’d rather have a speaker that had a controlled pattern of dispersion, ensuring the person sitting on the sofa along the wall in my living room hears all of the high frequencies as equally as the person sitting directly in the middle.

In addition, I like the fact that I can turn music on while doing something such as cleaning, and even though I’m standing about 3’ above the tweeters, I don’t experience rolled off highs, which was always a pet peeve of mine with typical direct radiating dome tweeters. Except for the bass, I hear exactly the same timbre no matter where I sit or stand in my room.


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Dude, are you really trying to tell Dennis what's up when it comes to speakers?

 

[everettT]

No speaker or recording can sound exactly like the real thing, but darn close.

I’d have to agree with earl Geddes, in that all waveguides are horns but not all horns are waveguides. A horn can be designed for maximum acoustic loading, or maximum control of directivity. These days with high power solid state amps, acoustic loading is secondary.

I don’t think that extremely wide directivity or an infinite sweet spot is necessarily a desirable characteristic. Many “omnidirectional” speakers have a diffuse , blurred soundstage. You want the sound to cover the listening area, but not necessarily just sprayed all over the room and walls in every direction. With a 90 degree horizontal pattern, that covers everywhere +- 45 degrees from center reference, which is about perfect for home/pro theater or music listening.

Even many pro PA speaker designs sound quite good. Honky , colored horns are a thing of the past, and any modern horn displaying these issues has been poorly engineered.


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What's the great "horn" loaded imrovements made over the years?

 

[MrBoat]

Dude, are you really trying to tell Dennis what's up when it comes to speakers?

A lot of people do it. Whether it be towards Dennis, JBL, Bagby, Klipsch etc. I don't have too much in the way of direct or personal criticism other than how it may be wrong for my space or what I listen to, but I am finding it increasingly difficult as time goes on. A lot of the bargains are even contenders these days.

Half of the negatives seem to come from those who must suffer from what amounts to self-inflicted OCD. People who are just looking for something to be wrong in keeping with their club memberships on the internet, or justifications for having spent too much money for the near same result as everyone else.

 

[Mikado463]

After catching up with some of my buddies that attended this years RMAF the general consensus was the ELAC Debut F5 might just be 'the' bargain speaker out there ............

https://www.elac.com/product/debut-f5/

 

[yepimonfire]

I wasn't even thinking of high frequency roll-off. That's not a primary factor in controlled dispersion designs. The idea is to avoid peaks and dips in the lower and mid treble that can result when the broader dispersion of the tweeter doesn't sum well off axis with the output of the larger mid or bass driver. If a tweeter starts to beam at higher frequencies, I don't believe the wave guide will cure that issue (I'll stand corrected if it can somehow broaden a tweeter's dispersion once it starts to beam). A ragged off-axis response is certainly not a good thing (although I think some designers obsess over little peaks that in my experience get lost in the reflected sound soup). But as I stated, you can avoid that problem with the proper drivers and crossover points. At 45 degrees off axis, my Phil 3 measures almost exactly the same way it measures on axis. I have heard wave guide speakers that sounded very accurate to me (most from the House of Harman). But I've heard many that didn't, and I personally haven't found it necessary to use them.

I was mostly referring to two way designs. Your run of the mill speakers with 5.25” or 6.5” woofers and a 1” dome tweeter with a 2500hz xover.

If you follow the rule that a driver should have a ka=2 at the crossover frequency, an effective piston diameter of 5” sets this point at 1706hz, a 6” diameter 1312hz. Most soft dome tweeters would be destroyed by such a low crossover point, ignoring the massive distortion from them that low as well. With a two way design, the only way to manage such a low xover point is a waveguide or horn, which controls the excursion of the driver within it operating range. A titanium dome tweeter attached to a horn/waveguide in, for example, the RP-150m speakers I own, are crossed over at 1500hz, perfectly matching the directivity of the drivers. Klipsch uses the exact same tweeter for all of their reference speakers, but each one is crossed over differently depending on the woofer diameter and horn size. An rb 10 with a 4” woofer has an xover of 2200hz, while the 150m using a 5” driver has an xover of 1500hz, matching the directivity of both woofers.

You are correct that a horn by itself cannot reduce beaming, but horn/waveguide mounted tweeters are usually fit with a phase plug in order to direct the highest frequencies into the horn/waveguide for dispersion control.

I 100% agree with what you have said, that good crossover design and matching of drivers can provide perfect off axis response. As previously stated, I was only referring to typical direct radiating two way designs. 3 way or 4 way speakers can be better matched with good crossover design for excellent off axis dispersion. With a two way direct radiating design, a “proper crossover point” matching the drivers directivity doesn’t exist in designs utilizing 5”+ woofers. The woofer will start to beam as the wavelength of the frequency approaches the diameter of the woofer, and even if some magic tweeter could somehow survive a low xover point, a 1” tweeter will start beaming at about 8500hz. 9/10 polar plots I’ve seen of common two way designs display problems at the 2500 xover frequency vertically off axis, and a rapid drop off off axis beginning at around 8khz because of this.

The solution is (like you mentioned) a multi way design with good driver/crossover matching based on directivity or a tweeter mounted to a waveguide/horn that allows a lower crossover frequency, using a phase plug to direct the highest frequencies into the waveguide for controlled dispersion.

So I agree, you don’t necessarily need a waveguide or horn to get wide off axis dispersion, but it is certainly one way of achieving it, and really the only way to achieve it in two way designs.

While I don’t agree with everything he says (especially his aversion to line arrays in live sound) I think this guy makes a good case as to why he insists on 4 way designs (or 3 way with a sub) http://education.lenardaudio.com/en/05_speakers.html




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[yepimonfire]

What's the great "horn" loaded imrovements made over the years?

The fact that they can now be designed by computers, and the fact that most horns are now designed for the purpose of pattern control vs just loading. If you dig around and look at some of the research and designs introduced by Klipsch and Harman, you’ll find both of them have gone to great length to perfect them, with an emphasis on uniform controlled dispersion. Not surprisingly, both jbl and Klipsch horn designs are use similar principles in geometry. None of the modern designs used by both manufacturer are straight up horn curves (ie pure tractrix, pure CD, or pure exponential) but have been heavily modified.

Have a listen to a Klipsch Reference premier or jbl m2 monitor, or visit a cinema utilizing either modern Klipsch or jbl cinema speakers, and you’ll see what I mean.




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