Ascend Acoustics Sierra LX Review

[mck22mck]

Hello. I'm new to this thread. I'm in the market for some new stand mount speakers and the Ascend Sierras are in my price range. (I've also been looking into the Philharmonic BMR monitors, and Warfdale Aura 2s, among a few others.) At first, I won't be using a subwoofer, but will be considering one for later use in a different room.

I've heard a lot about the RAAL ribbon tweeters, and I looked up the ASR threads on the Ascend towers, where there is some discussion about the difference between the Titan domes tweeters and the RAAL ribbons. But the difference in price is so much greater between those two options ($600) than between the Sierra-LX and Sierra-EX2s ($150) , that I wonder if those comparisons are really relevant. I really like a wide horizontal sound field, but I'm a little skeptical about the RAALs narrow vertical contour. I'd really appreciate any thoughts from folks more experienced with the Sierra versions or other speakers with RAALs vs dome tweeters.

 

[kma100]

Contact Ascend Acoustics directly as well. They are very open and honest.

 

[CleanSound]

Hello. I'm new to this thread. I'm in the market for some new stand mount speakers and the Ascend Sierras are in my price range. (I've also been looking into the Philharmonic BMR monitors, and Warfdale Aura 2s, among a few others.) At first, I won't be using a subwoofer, but will be considering one for later use in a different room.

I've heard a lot about the RAAL ribbon tweeters, and I looked up the ASR threads on the Ascend towers, where there is some discussion about the difference between the Titan domes tweeters and the RAAL ribbons. But the difference in price is so much greater between those two options ($600) than between the Sierra-LX and Sierra-EX2s ($150) , that I wonder if those comparisons are really relevant. I really like a wide horizontal sound field, but I'm a little skeptical about the RAALs narrow vertical contour. I'd really appreciate any thoughts from folks more experienced with the Sierra versions or other speakers with RAALs vs dome tweeters.

I am speaking on behalf of published data, so no experience. But I don't see a huge difference with the RAAL ribbon tweeter vs
The SEAS tweeters used by Ascend. They have a return policy, so you can try. And yes, talk to Dave, he is super honest and upfront.

As for Philharmonic, again, strictly based on data. The Ascend edges out the Philharmonic marginally, but the Philharmonic in my opinion is a better value for the extraordinary quality parts used.

I went with Ascend.

 

[JAJDACT]

Hello. I'm new to this thread. I'm in the market for some new stand mount speakers and the Ascend Sierras are in my price range. (I've also been looking into the Philharmonic BMR monitors, and Warfdale Aura 2s, among a few others.) At first, I won't be using a subwoofer, but will be considering one for later use in a different room.

I've heard a lot about the RAAL ribbon tweeters, and I looked up the ASR threads on the Ascend towers, where there is some discussion about the difference between the Titan domes tweeters and the RAAL ribbons. But the difference in price is so much greater between those two options ($600) than between the Sierra-LX and Sierra-EX2s ($150) , that I wonder if those comparisons are really relevant. I really like a wide horizontal sound field, but I'm a little skeptical about the RAALs narrow vertical contour. I'd really appreciate any thoughts from folks more experienced with the Sierra versions or other speakers with RAALs vs dome tweeters.

I have owned the Ascend Sierra LX,ELX RAAL towers,and Philharmonic BMR's. It's hard to pinpoint the exact differences between the LX tweeter and the RAAL with most content,and if I'm being honest the differences in response and off axis energy may account for what I did hear,but I felt like there's something different about the RAAL tweeter when it comes to acoustic recordings and string instruments,it does sound more realistic. With that being said I preferred the LX tweeter overall compared to the RAAL's

 

[Haint]

Hello. I'm new to this thread. I'm in the market for some new stand mount speakers and the Ascend Sierras are in my price range. (I've also been looking into the Philharmonic BMR monitors, and Warfdale Aura 2s, among a few others.) At first, I won't be using a subwoofer, but will be considering one for later use in a different room.

I've heard a lot about the RAAL ribbon tweeters, and I looked up the ASR threads on the Ascend towers, where there is some discussion about the difference between the Titan domes tweeters and the RAAL ribbons. But the difference in price is so much greater between those two options ($600) than between the Sierra-LX and Sierra-EX2s ($150) , that I wonder if those comparisons are really relevant. I really like a wide horizontal sound field, but I'm a little skeptical about the RAALs narrow vertical contour. I'd really appreciate any thoughts from folks more experienced with the Sierra versions or other speakers with RAALs vs dome tweeters.

The ribbons much wider dispersion is going to sound brighter and more "detailed", regardless of how similar the measurements may look. Your preference between the 2 will probably vary by content.

 

[CleanSound]

The ribbons much wider dispersion is going to sound brighter and more "detailed", regardless of how similar the measurements may look. Your preference between the 2 will probably vary by content.

I don't believe wider dispersion results on brighter sound, wider dispersion will result in wider soundstage, but sometimes at the cost of imaging.

 

[Haint]

I don't believe wider dispersion results on brighter sound, wider dispersion will result in wider soundstage, but sometimes at the cost of imaging.

The theory is that the wider dispersion results in a lot more lateral reflections (particularly the higher frequencies), which our ears and brains interpret differently than a "dumb" omni-directional mic does.

 

[CleanSound]

The theory is that the wider dispersion results in a lot more lateral reflections (particularly the higher frequencies), which our ears and brains interpret differently than a "dumb" omni-directional mic does.

As far as I am aware, when we refer to wide dispersion, we don't mean for high frequency only. It means even wide dispersion across the frequency band. As such, early reflection would not mean only high frequency.

In fact, I have never seen a radiation pattern where high frequency dispersion is wider than low frequency, that's due to the physics of sound wave beaming in relationship to the tweeter size.

 

[robh]

I really like a wide horizontal sound field, but I'm a little skeptical about the RAALs narrow vertical contour. I'd really appreciate any thoughts from folks more experienced with the Sierra versions or other speakers with RAALs vs dome tweeters.

I own three Sierra-LX speakers for my home theater. The center one is on its side. Being a dome tweeter it does a decent job of horizontal and vertical dispersion from any orientation. I can't speak to the RAAL ribbon, but I don't think the Titan gives up anything to it. However, I am not a fan of hyper resolving tweeters. FWIW, I came from speakers with Scanspeak soft dome tweeters and the metal Titan's gave me pause before I bought the LX's, but every review said I had nothing worry about. And I don't. They sound fantastic.

 

[prestigetone]

Ascend is a phenomenal company to deal with. Wish they made bookshelves with larger drivers and perhaps an active crossover.

 

[Zapper]

With that being said I preferred the LX tweeter overall compared to the RAAL's

Could you elaborate on what you preferred about the LX dome tweeter?

 

[CleanSound]

FWIW, I came from speakers with Scanspeak soft dome tweeters and the metal Titan's gave me pause before I bought the LX's, but every review said I had nothing worry about. And I don't. They sound fantastic.

About the Sierra LX tweeter, from Dave:

"This project then took another turn due to an email I received from my friend and the then CTO at SEAS, Claus Futtrup. SEAS had a new tweeter that would meet or exceed every performance specification I specified. I had very strong doubts about this, but I had them send me samples.

Samples in hand, I was impressed with the build quality and overall look. Removing the face plate revealed a very large and tuned damping chamber which lowers the resonant frequency and better absorbs the dome’s back-wave energy. I also noticed a large copper cap over the pole piece which significantly lowers inductance for better transient accuracy and extends the high frequency response while also lowering distortion. The dome itself is an anodized metal alloy, more specifically – aluminum and magnesium.

I have avoided metal domes in the past due to the majority having a resonance mode in the audible frequency range (ringing) – which leads to listener fatigue. This is where the advantages of Beryllium and Diamond come in. However, I knew our tweeter would require a very stiff dome to meet the dispersion requirements. The stiffer the dome, the higher in frequency the dome will continue to act like a piston and according to the specifications, the breakup modes on this new tweeter were above the audible range."

However, I am not a fan of hyper resolving tweeters.

Elaborate more on this, what do you mean by resolving?

 

[JAJDACT]

Could you elaborate on what you preferred about the LX dome tweeter?

Yesh sure,better vertical dispersion,a little more of a roll off in the higher frequencies compared to the ELX RAAL,and to me they sounded better with studio recordings and certain music genres as well as with movies.The 70-20 XRAM RAAL in the ELX was really good,although It sounded sharp with some recordings.I also noticed this with the BMR RAAL,as every so often I would hear something that made me wince a little and reach for the treble controls,I didn't feel the need to do that with the LX Titan domes. As I stated before there is definitely something about the sound of the RAAL tweeters with guitars and acoustic music. I can't really explain it,I don't think it's just the extra high frequency energy or an elevated response,as I used eq and treble controls to see if it eliminated my perception of detail,and I still felt like it reproduced those instruments in a more realistic manner. Not sure if that answers your question. I know I can't scientifically explain my preference other than the vertical dispersion and tweeter's off axis response being different. I should note that the times I have tried speakers with a very narrow vertical listening windows,I often ended up preferring something that had more energy in the vertical off axis response. Another example being the CSS Criton 1TD-X vs the 2TD-X MTM. I much preferred the sound of the 1TD-X,even though the 2TD-X had more output.

 

[Haint]

As far as I am aware, when we refer to wide dispersion, we don't mean for high frequency only. It means even wide dispersion across the frequency band. As such, early reflection would not mean only high frequency.

In fact, I have never seen a radiation pattern where high frequency dispersion is wider than low frequency, that's due to the physics of sound wave beaming in relationship to the tweeter size.

The dome tweeter increasingly starts narrowing and beaming in the higher frequencies, ergo the "wider dispersion" of the ribbon is pretty much entirely in the higher frequencies.

 

[CleanSound]

The dome tweeter increasingly starts narrowing and beaming in the higher frequencies, ergo the "wider dispersion" of the ribbon is pretty much entirely in the higher frequencies.

The ribbon tweeter's dispersion is still narrower than the frequency below it. Hence, it does not cause more reflected high frequency compared to the lower frequency. And therefore counters to what you said how it would sound brighter due to wider dispersion.

 

[Haint]

The ribbon tweeter's dispersion is still narrower than the frequency below it. Hence, it does not cause more reflected high frequency compared to the lower frequency. And therefore counters to what you said how it would sound brighter due to wider dispersion.

I'm comparing the Ribbon's dispersion to the Dome's, which says nothing of, and has nothing to do with the lower frequencies. I don't even know how to respond to this, cause I can't even begin to imagine how or where you're getting lost on the notion that a ribbon spraying 86dB across the full frontal 180 degrees up to 20Khz is going to sound very different from a dome that starts beaming around 5Khz and is down like -24dB by 20Khz. You're talking about full volume lateral reflections Vs. basically inaudible lateral reflections across much of the upper treble region. Much louder upper treble reflections = much more treble energy = a perception of brighter/detailed.

 

[Zapper]

the notion that a ribbon spraying 86dB across the full frontal 180 degrees up to 20Khz is going to sound very different from a dome that starts beaming around 5Khz and is down like -24dB by 20Khz.

The differences in horizontal dispersion between Ascend's ribbon tweeter and their Titan dome tweeter are not nearly so dramatic as you describe. There isn't much difference until above 10kHz. Both tweeters have about +/- 80 degrees of dispersion at 8kHz, dropping to +/-50 degrees at 20kHz.

q

 

[Zapper]

Here are the vertical contour plots. The beaming of the ribbon above ~5kHz is evident.

 

[CleanSound]

I'm comparing the Ribbon's dispersion to the Dome's, which says nothing of, and has nothing to do with the lower frequencies. I don't even know how to respond to this, cause I can't even begin to imagine how or where you're getting lost on the notion that a ribbon spraying 86dB across the full frontal 180 degrees up to 20Khz is going to sound very different from a dome that starts beaming around 5Khz and is down like -24dB by 20Khz. You're talking about full volume lateral reflections Vs. basically inaudible lateral reflections across much of the upper treble region. Much louder upper treble reflections = much more treble energy = a perception of brighter/detailed.

I am the one who don't even know how to respond to you.

It makes zero difference if it's ribbon or dome tweeter, you made the incorrect statement that wider dispersion will have more high frequency reflection and therefore it will sound brighter. What kind of nonsense is that?

That can only happen in theory, if the high frequency dispersion is wider than the low frequency dispersion which Zapper has shown you th graph that it is not possible.

 

[CleanSound]

The differences in horizontal dispersion between Ascend's ribbon tweeter and their Titan dome tweeter are not nearly so dramatic as you describe. There isn't much difference until above 10kHz. Both tweeters have about +/- 80 degrees of dispersion at 8kHz, dropping to +/-50 degrees at 20kHz.

View attachment 354313
qView attachment 354314

His claim it's the wider dispersion having more reflected high frequency, hence will sound brighter.