理性派HiFi X5 Speaker Review

[Interference]

The driver looks very much like a Scan-Speak Revelator, I can hardly believe it's a clone. Although the speaker pair costs less than the retail price of a pair of drive units.

 

[Triliza]

Is that a fake JBL horn tweeter? Does anyone else make their waveguides with a geometry like that?

What has JBL patented, the geometry of the horn?

 

[dogmamann]

But it looks like it might just be a copy of what works on other speakers. I was having deja-vu looking at the measurements. The waveguide for the dome tweeter looks pretty much identical to those on my Polk signature series, and the horizontal directivity and listening window are very similar to both my own measurements and Amir's. Its almost like whomever built it looked around for things that worked, and then turned them into off-brand generics to be used in building speakers. I'm very curious to see the provenance on the woofer. Be willing to bet it came from Big Rock Shenzhen Mountain

It’s really sad that people put off good engineering from china, as some work copied from somewhere. See brands like Topping and SMSL, now the west need to copy them to get to their level! Also, that tweeter is how most tweeters with a waveguide would look. You cannot design a waveguide to look like something else.

 

[GXAlan]

US9924249B2 - Loudspeaker horn - Google Patents

A horn for use with a loudspeaker may include an entrance disposed at a first axial end of the horn and configured to receive a driver. A mouth may be disposed at a second axial end of the horn opposite the entrance. A contoured surface may extend between the entrance and the mouth. A cross...

patents.google.com

 

[notsodeadlizard]

What has JBL patented, the geometry of the horn?

Yes, and you too can spend a chunk of your life learning, then a chunk of your life achieving professionalism, then a chunk of your life developing and learning new horn geometry.

 

[sarieri]

That horn speaker is still for sale in his store for about $2000. Looks like a knock off of the JBL4349 with a 12 inch woofer but a 3 inch tweeter like the one on the JBL4367.

 

[Nathan Raymond]

Fading Sun from Teje Insugset

I hadn't heard of this artist, did a Google search for that text, and was shocked to get a "It looks like there aren't many great matches for your search" response, tried searching for just "Teje Insugset", same response. Is this artist not on the internet at all?

 

[dtaylo1066]

The driver looks very much like a Scan-Speak Revelator, I can hardly believe it's a clone. Although the speaker pair costs less than the retail price of a pair of drive units.

Yes, mid-bass looks like slit cone of Scan-Speak Revelator. Either that or blatant rip off there or. One ScanSpeak 18W/8531G in the U.S. costs $223.00.

​

 

[Gounsbairg]

I hadn't heard of this artist, did a Google search for that text, and was shocked to get a "It looks like there aren't many great matches for your search" response, tried searching for just "Teje Insugset", same response. Is this artist not on the internet at all?

Terje Isungset - Fading Sun (2010)

 

[Nathan Raymond]

It’s really sad that people put off good engineering from china, as some work copied from somewhere. See brands like Topping and SMSL, now the west need to copy them to get to their level! Also, that tweeter is how most tweeters with a waveguide would look. You cannot design a waveguide to look like something else.

There is good engineering, and then there is counterfeiting and not respecting intellectual property, and trademarks. There have been issues in these categories not just with Chinese companies copying Western products, but also with China domestic products. A few years back the Seagull watch company in China was dealing with some major counterfeiting of their products in China:

https://web.archive.org/web/20170220160217/http://www.seagullwatchstore.com/category-s/1838.htm

In the audio space, a couple of years ago the U.S. ITC Investigation No. 337-TA-1186 ruled in favor of Knowles and their patents against Shenzhen Bellsing Acoustic Technology:

https://investor.knowles.com/news/n...Case-Against-Bellsing-06-30-2021/default.aspx

I'm all for good engineering, but it's also important to respect patents, intellectual property and trademarks. I'm not a lawyer and no expert in these areas, so I can't really offer any specific advice with regards to this speaker and it's components other than there could be a lot of different things that need to be considered, and that intellectual property laws vary from country to country. For instance, unlike the United States, China doesn't provide clear protection for trade dress, and there are other differences in how their patent system works, as covered here:

https://www.chinabusinessreview.com/design-patents-vs-trade-dress-protecting-ip-in-china/

 

[Triliza]

Yes, and you too can spend a chunk of your life learning, then a chunk of your life achieving professionalism, then a chunk of your life developing and learning new horn geometry.

Fair enough. Say I take your advice and reach the same conclusion as JBL, than what? Could I use it?

Thank god the first one that had the idea to put a tweeter vertically above a woofer in a speaker didn't file a patent for it.

 

[Robbo99999]

@amirm , I was gonna ask you what you meant by "I hope to take this data and refine it. Once there, I would love to re-test it.", but now I know you really meant to write: "I hope they take this data and refine it. Once there, I would love to re-test it."

 

[Ricardojoa]

Google and patent doesn’t work on this speaker origin country .

 

[somebodyelse]

Does anyone else make their waveguides with a geometry like that?

http://www.at-horns.eu/ Ath4 produces some similar shapes for rectangular mouth horns/waveguides as you can see from the user guide and related diyaudio thread. That's just what falls out of the mathematics for a certain set of input parameters.

 

[Mario Sanchez]

Id be curious as well to see if the cabinet finish is just a veneer or is it actual hardwood. If its made from hardwood panels with no bracing maybe that might explain the sharp resonance, in that its acting like the bars on a marimba and ringing away.

The cabinet is particle board (aka mdf), there are other finishes available including painted over variants.
Edit: I stand corrected, it is hardwood. I was wondering how they worked the rounded corners with veneer, guess I have my answer.

 

[Cars-N-Cans]

http://www.at-horns.eu/ Ath4 produces some similar shapes for rectangular mouth horns/waveguides as you can see from the user guide and related diyaudio thread. That's just what falls out of the mathematics for a certain set of input parameters.

Yes but is there IP on the waveguide profile? How extensive is it? Harman indicates they have been at least persuing it. And yes, reality will naturally dictate certain shapes to things since that is a natural byproduct of physics. But, is the profile a generic one like those on dome tweeters, or is it from, as someone indicated earlier, his prior work at Harman? There is a difference.

 

[lc6]

"Fading Sun from Teje Insugset. I use this track to test sub-bass response..."

I do, too. Any idea how low this Terje Insungset's track goes in Hz? (I do not have a digital copy of it or the spectrum analyzing software.)

 

[Cars-N-Cans]

What has JBL patented, the geometry of the horn?

They have indicated it as “patent pending technology”, at least as far as I know from past literature on them off the top of my head. If it was never granted, then the geometry is fair game. Edit: And you would be surprise what good patents can do. Even something as simple as putting silicone rubber around something to absorb shock allowed a patent to be so comprehensive that it cornered the market.

 

[sarieri]

The dome tweeter’s waveguide. Well, obviously. But the potential IP theft on the horn speaker. That is no good, and there are other undesirable characteristics to some of these Chinese electronics, such as their checkered reliability. The Chinese have been quite good at the numbers game, but not so much on innovation. More just perfecting. I have worked and gone to school with Chinese nationals. They are very nice and intelligent people, but with the CCP at the helm, saying Chinese society is having a bit of a crisis with respect to principals and credibility is putting it mildly. It’s one of the many reasons companies are pulling out of China and setting up shop elsewhere in Asia. The CCP and it’s culture of corruption are the kiss of death to innovation and quality control.

Patent law is a LAW. It has nothing to do with social respect to principals of whatever. Sadly, CCP does not even respect the law they themself make. That is the problem.

 

[sarieri]

Yes but is there IP on the waveguide profile? How extensive is it? Harman indicates they have been at least persuing it. And yes, reality will naturally dictate certain shapes to things since that is a natural byproduct of physics. But, is the profile a generic one like those on dome tweeters, or is it from, as someone indicated earlier, his prior work at Harman? There is a difference.

He did not design that horn speaker. As someone mentioned before, Lei Gu designed that one.
Here: https://www.zhihu.com/people/94f35d50c3837dd71321e09b4b112041