Andrew Jones’s new speaker brand - Jones and Cerreta

[Mr. Widget]

Try searching for "Alon Wolf" on Stereophile. He is very far from guru status.

Ok, just don't tell him that.

 

[MarkS]

That won't be a problem, since I never heard of him before your post ...

 

[Audionaut]

Nah I will gladly throw boulders. Society is just messed up and a portion has normalized spending something like 30k on a hifi home speaker. Not to mention the mark up on these things is massive.

One could argue that.
However, that quickly leads to a blanket criticism that includes cars for $80,000, houses for a million, and watches for $40,000.
According to this view, all luxury is utter nonsense, and very few people pay attention to technical specifications when buying luxury items; other factors are much more important.
The entry-level price at Patek is around $30,000, and a Patek Philippe Nautilus can easily cost $100,000. Any Casio F91 for 19 bucks tells the time just as accurately, and a Square with radio reception is significantly more precise.
Do anyone need sneakers for a few hundred dollars?
A meal at a restaurant for 100?
34,000 for a pair of speakers is peanuts for many people, while others around the world have to survive on that amount for decades.
Where exactly do you draw the line?

I’ve said it before: Anyone who looks around the niche market for speakers with field-coil drivers will find that the Jones & Cerreta are neither overpriced nor do they have an overly exotic tuning. There are far worse examples.

 

[MarkS]

The difference is that nobody buys a Patek for its timekeeping ability; it's all about looks, craft, and status. Whereas people do buy boutique audio believing that it actually sounds better.

 

[MattHooper]

The difference is that nobody buys a Patek for its timekeeping ability; it's all about looks, craft, and status. Whereas people do buy boutique audio believing that it actually sounds better.

Though either example is still addressing the issue of criticizing people for “spending excessively” and where the critic draws the line.

 

[Sokel]

Price is always debatable.

In an honest fashion, they are usually tied to SPL abillity with all else equally nice.
One can take a look at the prices of even smaller studio mains monitors, they are not far from equally capable "lifestyle" designs minus the finish, etc.

 

[sigbergaudio]

The difference is that nobody buys a Patek for its timekeeping ability; it's all about looks, craft, and status. Whereas people do buy boutique audio believing that it actually sounds better.

I think many buy boutique audio for the exact same reason they would buy a Patek.

 

[sigbergaudio]

One of the choices that would need to be made in the design of the Troubadour is, where to cross over between the midrange cone and the woofers? I would guess that the midrange cone is good down to 100 Hz ballpark, and I would guess that the woofers are good up to 1 kHz ballpark. Even if the overlap is less than this, the question still remains: Where to cross over?

The higher the crossover frequency between woofers and mid, the less movement of the midrange cone, so the less modulation of the concentric tweeter's output. And the lower the crossover frequency, the wider the frequency region covered by the coaxial unit, so the greater the coherence (theoretically at least), but there may be a power handling reduction if the crossover frequency is too low. There might also be an intermediate crossover frequency region that is above the coaxial's floor-bounce notch frequency, and below the front woofer's floor-bounce notch frequency, at normal listening distances.

And regarding what is essentially a bipolar configuration for the two 12" woofers: There will be a frequency region where the significantly different path lengths to the wall behind the speakers for the two woofers results in their speaker/boundary interference response (SBIR) dips occurring at different frequencies, the one woofer partially filling in the dippage of the other and vice-versa. And then there will be a frequency where the wrap-around energy of the rear-firing woofer will reach the listening area 1/2 wavelength later than the sound of the front-firing woofer, resulting in a cancellation dip... but it would be a comb-filter effect and therefore perceptually more benign than eyeballing the measurements would predict, similar to the way the floor-bounce notch looks alarming but is perceptually fairly benign.

There are probably more competing legitimate considerations than these. Which ones matter the most, perceptually? How should they be prioritized? Well, it might not be obvious (even to Andrew Jones!) what the theoretical best crossover frequency between midrange and woofers would be.

And it just might be that the quickest and most reliable way to pick where the crossover frequency should be is to temporarily use a DSP crossover with quickly-selectable presets and listen to see which actually sounds the best.

In my opinion.

On the topic of crossovers, I was a bit surprised that the tweeter was crossed as low as 1000hz. Seems a bit low for what I understand is a traditional dome tweeter(?), even with the large waveguide.

 

[MattHooper]

On the topic of crossovers, I was a bit surprised that the tweeter was crossed as low as 1000hz. Seems a bit low for what I understand is a traditional dome tweeter(?), even with the large waveguide.

Doesn’t crossing a tweeter over lower, if you can do it, help with things like filling in between the crossover?

(please treat me kindly. I’m an ignoramus on this)

 

[Audionaut]

Whereas people do buy boutique audio believing that it actually sounds better.

I don't want to argue about that, but in fact it's at the high end the same about looks, craft, and status.

As the now somewhat overused quote from Alan Parsons goes: Audiophiles don’t buy hi-fi equipment to listen to music; they buy it to listen to the hi-fi equipment itself.

I think this quote can easily be applied to ASR’s clientele as well, because here, too, there are an incredible number of people who own multiple sets of hi-fi equipment. Some people have entire storage units filled with speakers and equipment.

Certainly not because they base their decisions solely on measurements or because they’re only interested in the equipment that delivers the best measurements or just to hear some good music, but because they enjoy tinkering with all that gear. And those who have the money—they just keep buying more and more unnecessary stuff, whether it’s their tenth hi-fi system or their twentieth luxury watch.

 

[Audionaut]

Doesn’t crossing a tweeter over lower, if you can do it, help with things like filling in between the crossover?

It is difficult to achieve uniform sound dispersion with a 10-inch woofer and a 1-inch dome tweeter; therefore, while the crossover frequency is acceptable for sound dispersion, it is pushing the limits of the tweeter's mechanical durability.

 

[sigbergaudio]

Doesn’t crossing a tweeter over lower, if you can do it, help with things like filling in between the crossover?

(please treat me kindly. I’m an ignoramus on this)

The challenge I was thinking of was the capacity of the tweeter, especially if the crossover slope is shallow. I don't remember if that has been shared, I felt I remembered it was said it was a 1.order crossover, but perhaps I remember wrong.

 

[Vuki]

I think 1.order/1kHz/30mm dome is highly unlikely.

 

[Audionaut]

The tweeter has a 28 mm voice coil, and the mid-woofer has a 60 mm voice coil.
See below for crossover frequencies.

I would guess that the crossover frequencies use a crossover with at least 24 dB, but I couldn't find any information on that.

 

[Frank Dernie]

I think many buy boutique audio for the exact same reason they would buy a Patek.

Really?
I have spent quite a bit on my system over the years, including on speakers, but pre-internet nobody outside the family had ever seen or heard it and none of it was for show.
OTOH I do know a lot of people who bought a Rolex watch as soon as they could afford one, entirely as a status symbol that everybody they knew and people in the street, pubs, restaurants etc could see. I don't like the styling of Rolexes so continued to wear the watch my parents bought me for my 21st birthday.

 

[sigbergaudio]

Really?
I have spent quite a bit on my system over the years, including on speakers, but pre-internet nobody outside the family had ever seen or heard it and none of it was for show.
OTOH I do know a lot of people who bought a Rolex watch as soon as they could afford one, entirely as a status symbol that everybody they knew and people in the street, pubs, restaurants etc could see. I don't like the styling of Rolexes so continued to wear the watch my parents bought me for my 21st birthday.

I did not say that you did it for that reason. I think many people purchase expensive stereo systems the same way the purchase expensive other things, not necessarily because they're super interested in getting the best hifi system possible.

 

[prerich]

Well I do:

View attachment 524800

And that's why you have this platform....you're memory is much better than mine!

 

[Pearljam5000]

I don't know, not sure I'm liking the vintage design
It's just not as sexy as the TADs

 

[levimax]

The tweeter has a 28 mm voice coil, and the mid-woofer has a 60 mm voice coil.
See below for crossover frequencies.

View attachment 525043

I would guess that the crossover frequencies use a crossover with at least 24 dB, but I couldn't find any information on that.

View attachment 525044

Interesting choices, everything is "crossed low" which is helpful is some ways but it seems like it might limit peak SPL. While I am not in the market for these I would love to see measurements.

 

[delta76]

I think many buy boutique audio for the exact same reason they would buy a Patek.

in my view the people who can buy a $1M audio set up are likely too busy (to either make money, or to spend them) to sit back and listen to those. They just need something to show for their $50M mansion.
But we still have people who are saving to buy their next $10k speaker cable, because it must sound better.