Paper, Kevlar, or Poly Plas Cones...?

[ImcLoud]

When I am demoing a speaker, I look for balance, then concentrate on the top end, I am sensitive to "bright" speakers, if the voice is realistic and the highs are crisp but not "ringy" {I don't know why but it seems like a lot of speakers I hear have a huge emphasis in the high range, like they are trying to make the highs sound defined by making them bright}, I tend to ignore the low end {sub voice} since 99% of the time I am going to incorporate a sub, I've yet to see the tower that has enough bass for me, I like an unnatural amount, like more than is supposed to be there... It makes me feel comfortable...

 

[Irvrobinson]

+1. However this supports the more established companies, and penalizes the upstarts.

I'm not following your logic here. A database of owners willing to demo products is a benefit to potential owners of Brand X, not a penalty to Brand Y. Let's face it, an upstart in the expensive speaker market is probably going to make sales by providing extraordinary and probably economically unsustainable value to gain marketplace presence by attracting risk-taking early adopters. These early adopters become the basis of the database. If a start-up is lucky an early adopter posts a thread on a forum like this complete with pictures, generating free advertising and marketing.

Frankly, I think anyone trying to start a company to produce high-end speakers these days should visit a psychiatrist, their accountant, and the demo rooms of a few audio stores. If he still wants to start a high-end speaker company there should be a special medal awarded, for bravery in the face of overwhelming adversity. For anyone who succeeds and makes a viable business of it, take a bow on network television. [Big Grin]

 

[cpp]

I'm not following your logic here. A database of owners willing to demo products is a benefit to potential owners of Brand X, not a penalty to Brand Y. Let's face it, an upstart in the expensive speaker market is probably going to make sales by providing extraordinary and probably economically unsustainable value to gain marketplace presence by attracting risk-taking early adopters. These early adopters become the basis of the database. If a start-up is lucky an early adopter posts a thread on a forum like this complete with pictures, generating free advertising and marketing.

Frankly, I think anyone trying to start a company to produce high-end speakers these days should visit a psychiatrist, their accountant, and the demo rooms of a few audio stores. If he still wants to start a high-end speaker company there should be a special medal awarded, for bravery in the face of overwhelming adversity. For anyone who succeeds and makes a viable business of it, take a bow on network television. [Big Grin]

Originally Posted by Philip Bamberg
+1. However this supports the more established companies, and penalizes the upstarts.


I think what Philip could be getting at, is the larger more established companies have on hand more speakers to lend for demo purposes. A upstart is pretty much doing build by order, but in time should be able to build up a few demo sets depending on the speaker. All of these in house demos depending on speaker could be expensive with shipping due to speaker weight not to mention insurance to protect the investment.

 

[Irvrobinson]

I think what Philip could be getting at, is the larger more established companies have on hand more speakers to lend for demo purposes. A upstart is pretty much doing build by order, but in time should be able to build up a few demo sets depending on the speaker. All of these in house demos depending on speaker could be expensive with shipping due to speaker weight not to mention insurance to protect the investment.

You're misunderstanding, there is no lending involved. I am discussing a list of owners who already own the company's products who will volunteer to demo their systems.

 

[Ken Sweden]

The sound of your loudspeaker material should be related to the inherent modulus (stiffness, or preservation of shape as under load of the coil) when the coil acts in the magnetic field. However, since most membranes (cones) are glued to hold them in place this can be viewed as one of the weak links because the glue is in most cases not as stiff as the membrane material itself. This means that a Kevlar (Aramide fiber based membrane) may work really poorly if improperly attached. Paper is also based on a stiff fiber, that is cellulose nanofibers in its purest form, but marketed paper membranes contains much more than just cellulose nanofibers, meaning that papers are different. Sony had some exotic headphone membranes from bacteria produced cellulose a couple of years ago, ...extremely expensive, only because that type of cellulose contains ca 80 % of the pure cellulose nanofibers. Lately this type of pure cellulose membranes have been shown as laboratory prototype, as magnetic, but it is only prototype:

Sustainable materials sound good | Chemistry World

Interestingly, the pure cellulose has modulus very close to synthetic Kevlar. So, best choice is to decide from the sound. /Cheers

 

[Grador]

You're misunderstanding, there is no lending involved. I am discussing a list of owners who already own the company's products who will volunteer to demo their systems.

A startup would have no owners who could volunteer. I think that's what he was getting at.

 

[lsiberian]

Tagband has some bamboo cones I'm going to try for my surrounds. Don't assume all metal cones sound the same either. Believe me there are levels of quality with all materials and once you hit a certain point they all do the job well.

 

[cpp]

You're misunderstanding, there is no lending involved. I am discussing a list of owners who already own the company's products who will volunteer to demo their systems.

Well that actually depends on the location, sure a list of people might be willing to add their home to a list for all to see... And yes, a start is just that, a start up company with little inventory.

 

[Irvrobinson]

Well that actually depends on the location, sure a list of people might be willing to add their home to a list for all to see... And yes, a start is just that, a start up company with little inventory.

I give up, I have no idea what inventory has to do with this, or why one company providing such a service in some way disadvantages another company. Insofar as the security aspects of the list, it doesn't have to be public, and even if it is public the only visible information may be a city and an alias, and of course the list consists only of volunteers.

I especially enjoy the Linkwitz Labs web page on this topic. See: FAQ There's a public list of volunteers, a private list you can contact SL about, rent his cottage to hear them (no joke - I considered it), get a personal demo from SL himself, or, if all else fails, just trust him that the Orions sound great. [Actually, they do sound great, I just thought others sounded even better.]

 

[cpp]

I give up, I have no idea what inventory has to do with this, or why one company providing such a service in some way disadvantages another company. Insofar as the security aspects of the list, it doesn't have to be public, and even if it is public the only visible information may be a city and an alias, and of course the list consists only of volunteers.

I especially enjoy the Linkwitz Labs web page on this topic. See: FAQ There's a public list of volunteers, a private list you can contact SL about, rent his cottage to hear them (no joke - I considered it), get a personal demo from SL himself, or, if all else fails, just trust him that the Orions sound great. [Actually, they do sound great, I just thought others sounded even better.]

Inventory, if a upstart has only made a few speakers and they all reside ( been sold) on the west coast, that's a problem for those in the east coast wanting a demo... unless people just have a lot of cash to spend taking plane rides to listen to a speaker. PS: I do like the sound of Orions but the wife hates the looks. Salons are another story, love them but a little pricy on a retirement budget.

 

[Irvrobinson]

I do like the sound of Orions but the wife hates the looks. Salons are another story, love them but a little pricy on a retirement budget.

I completely understand. The Orions also have to be well away from walls and corners, which makes them unacceptable to many spouses and room arrangements. The Orions sound "different", in the way they image and that they have dipole bass, and there are easily reached limits below about 60Hz. It's not a problem for SL's favorite classical music, but the Yellowjackets Blue Hats album played at realistic levels seemed to find those limits in the bass. Also, I don't know whether it's the tweeter or SL's crossover, but my own recording of my wife tapping her dark ride cymbal didn't have that last smidgen of "reality", whereas on the Salon2s it was (is) an eerie experience due to how real it sounded. IMO, simple sounds like that can tell you a lot about a speaker. A cymbal is also interesting because, at least in my own house, I can make my wife think I'm nuts by bringing a cymbal on a stand up to the living room and placing it between the speakers for quick comparison. My nuttiness has no bounds when I'm bored on a Sunday evening...

 

[Dennis Murphy]

I haven't heard the Orions up close and personal for a couple of years, and not since they added the rear tweeter. I did get a good listen at the house of the guy who helped voice the highs, and although I loved just about everything about the Orions, I did comment on the highs lacking the last smidgen of openness. Part of that could be the slightly oversize tweeter which lacks the dispersion of, say, a Hiquphon 0W1 or a narrow ribbon. But part was a deliberate decision to voice down the highs slightly. That may have changed by now, particularly with the rear tweeter.

 

[fuzz092888]

But part was a deliberate decision to voice down the highs slightly. That may have changed by now, particularly with the rear tweeter.

AFAIK the Orion's highs continue to be shelved down slightly, even with the rear tweeter, as are the LX521's, unless I'm reading the construction manual incorrectly. Although I believe in both it is adjustable so that the user can adjust to taste.

 

[Irvrobinson]

I haven't heard the Orions up close and personal for a couple of years, and not since they added the rear tweeter. I did get a good listen at the house of the guy who helped voice the highs, and although I loved just about everything about the Orions, I did comment on the highs lacking the last smidgen of openness.

Both sets of Orions I heard were version 3.2.1, which have the rear tweeter. I should mention that on some orchestral recordings the Orion's soft upper octaves sound better on massed violins than on, say, the Salon2s, the KEF 207/2, and especially the B&W 800D or 802D. An example of such a recording is Beethoven's Symphonies 5&7 on Telarc. On the Orions the violins sound reasonably good, on the B&Ws a bit shouty. I'm none too happy with that recording on the Salon2 either.

[As an interesting aside, I blamed the lousy sound of that CD on the Sennheiser MK mics Jack Renner switched to, away from his prior favorites, the Schoeps Collettes. I actually wrote to Renner telling him of my lack of enthusiasm for the Sennheisers, and that I thought he should switch back to the Schoeps. I don't think he was amused; he did reply, and told me that he would think of me every time he used the Sennheisers in the future. Thanks a lot, Jack. Renner used a/d/s monitors at that time, and like the Orions they were not all that accurate in the highs. I know, I used to own them too.]

A wooden stick tapping a cymbal has a *very* distinctive sound, and properly trained most people can recognize it as realistic or not quickly. It's also fascinating how difficult a triangle is to get right. It's louder than many people would guess too. (Of course not to you, Dennis, having played in orchestras for years.)

 

[Philip Bamberg]

This thread has certainly turned sideways a couple of times, but it is a lively one! I feel compelled to comment about this recent turn.

IME, whenever I have listened to dipole speakers I concluded they never have a) sufficient resolution in the treble, nor b) truly pinpoint imaging for my tastes. For the former, one can compare it to the box speaker with that drumstick on the cymbal test. (And yes, MOST of the Yellowjackets CD's have this somewhere in the song lineup.) For the latter, one can listen for that sense of "bloom", i.e. where a small sound emanates from a pinpoint spot in space. (In fact, Yellowjackets' Greenhouse is my acid test for this, and what I actually use to verify a good image when I am under show conditions.)

I also have compared rear-tweeter-on with rear-tweeter-off a few times in the past. Every time these two aspects of the treble was degraded by the rear tweeter.

What dipole speakers do well (stating the obvious here) is create a good ambient image, instead of a pinpoint one. This works great with classical music, because the net effect sounds more like a large concert hall. (And I don't think this even requires the listener hold still in the sweet spot, so his room also sounds larger.) This requires pulling the speakers into the room, so that the rear sound can travel some distance before being reflected forward again by the front wall. (Although pulling box speakers out into the room also is required to achieve a large and superior image with that "disappearing speakers" effect. Otherwise the image depth really flattens.)

Because the treble wavelengths are so short, there are endless combinations of constructive/destructing interference among the various "ray-trace" traveling waves in the room. One time I recall specifically listening for the stick-on-cymbal part of the song, and it was completely gone with the dipole speaker! (I think it was an ML.)

What the box speaker gets justifiably criticized for is distortion in the midrange due to the very loud sounds inside the box re-emanating from the woofer cone. (I suspect SL got fed up with this a few years back, and gave up trying to overcome it. So he decided to just let all the sound out - a very effective solution.)

Either format (dipole or box) speaker gets challenged when the volume is cranked up (not to mention the room acoustics quickly turn ugly, too).

So if your musical preference is for classical first, then dipole speakers are a terrific choice. I like classical music, but you are more likely to find me at the jazz or rock club and so that is why a high-quality box speaker pushes my buttons.