A little history:
The JBL SoundEffects system resulted from a program led by Allan Devantier, who was hired from Canada for the project. The product was developed using the new measurement system and double-blind listening facility that the new Harman Research group had set up under my guidance. It sounded impressively neutral, especially at the price, setting the stage for Allan's continued employment in Harman engineering groups.
When Harman purchased Infinity it had no measurement facility, relying on 1/3-octave steady-state measurements in ordinary rooms. When at the NRCC in Canada before joining Harman in 1991 I had tested several Infinity models, submitted by Canadian audio magazines for review - done showing anechoic measurements and involving double-blind listening by the reviewers, unique at the time, I believe. When an expensive high-end loudspeaker got a negative review Infinity threatened legal action. Who were these mere Canadians to criticize the mighty, Infinity? A mediator was selected and there would be a showdown of their evidence vs. our evidence, with the results to be published. Their total "evidence" was a single 1/3-octave, staircase style, room curve. We had comprehensive 360-degree 1/20-octave anechoic data that revealed several engineering lapses. There was a shuffling of chairs and they decided to withdraw the challenge. The negative review stood.
When I joined Harman, Infinity had begun construction of an anechoic chamber, but the engineers were hangovers from the "golden ear" school of design, and needed education. For a few years Laurie Fincham, assisted by Andrew Jones, both ex. KEF, led design, but they didn't integrate well with the Harman corporate system, and the group was disbanded.
Allan Devantier was then chosen to head the next-generation Infinity loudspeaker design team, and from that point on there were numerous examples of high audio performance at affordable prices, up to and including, Interlude models and the top-of-the line Infinity Prelude MTS, a loudspeaker that exemplified the performance standard for several years. All these products benefitted from comprehensive anechoic measurements and double-blind listening tests. It is no accident that they measure well and sound good, even by today's standards, as is shown in measurements in this forum. Good sound is good sound. It is the result of competent engineering, not magic ingredients or golden ears. Knowing what to measure and how to interpret the data is the key. My books summarize the science.
Allan eventually joined my research group, contributed to the development of the industry standard CTA-2034 standard measurement scheme: the spinorama, and collaborated with Todd Welti in multiple subwoofer configurations for controlling room resonances. He now leads a group of engineers at Samsung (who now own Harman) designing TV centric audio systems, possibly the most active and technically progressive part of the loudspeaker industry at present. I have heard some very impressive sound bars. Science works.
Thank you Floyd,
History and wisdom is actually quite important, as is science.
The part of the
problem challenge today that's it's arguably even harder for people to understand.
A quarter of a decade ago there was a very good speaker, the Infinity Interlude IL60.
You run your speaker cables to it and it splits off the signal to a built-in powered subwoofer. This came out in 1999, IIRC.
Here are some images I found:
Front-
The 12" woofer was crossed to a 6.5" mid-woofer, at 150Hz, which
is entirely appropriate for a side facing subwoofer. There a 3 drivers on the front baffle which is shaped to minimised diffraction and resonances. The 6.5" mid-woofer, 4" midrange, and 1" tweeter were crossed at 500Hz & 2800Hz LR4.
This might be double dutch to some readers, but my point is,
the cabinet and baffle shape, the driver sizes, placement on baffle, and crossover frequencies allow smooth directivity transitions and very easy/comfortable operating ranges for all drivers
Here is a closer pic which better illustrates thr the baffle facets, mild waveguide for the tweeter. Also note the matching centre channel-with the correct Woofer-tweeter above mid-Woofer layout. You know,
designed with the science of directivity in mind
Reference:
An experienced loudspeaker designer can take a glance at this and understand that the polar measurement would be difficult to fault.
The amplitude modulation distortion and Barkhausen noise would also be minimal, thanks to the 4-way design.
In 2025, we would separate the subwoofers from the TMW upper section, and use multi sub and bass equalisation to get a sonic advantage.
Now I don't know whether it was a great sales success, but it certainly deserved more exposure than products that were getting the accolades.
Here is a speaker in a simple rectangular box, with a pair of a 7" midwoofers crossover a 1" tweeter at 1" at 3KHz. It comes wrapped in your choice of exquisite timber (endangered species veneers) and were sold to export markets (ie. in demand, willing to pay top price) for just
$7,200 USD in 2000 (US$13,000 today)
25 years later, perhaps some of our ASR readers can point out the downside of this approach:
Reference:
Fig.5 shows the 3.8's horizontal dispersion, referenced to the tweeter axis. (The off-axis behavior on the tweeter side of the asymmetrical baffle is shown at the front of this graph.) The narrow directivity in the top audio octave can be seen in fig.5 as well, as can a narrow off-axis notch on...
www.stereophile.com
Instead of criticising such a design, the New York based Stereophile praised it.
Who inside the industry is asking the questions? Or does anything go?
Has anything has changed? Or has is, in fact, gotten worse:
A big battery for your hifi, at only $50,000 for the basic version?
In my enthusiastic 2022 review of the Stromtank S-1000 ($16,900), I described the Stromtank as a computer-controlled lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO4) battery array that, coupled with its AC inverters and all the trimmings, supplies clean, constant, stable off-grid AC power to hi-fi components.
www.stereophile.com
It seems we are still measuring poorly designed high priced speakers-
Yamaha NS-800A Review
www.erinsaudiocorner.com
Børresen X3 Floorstanding
www.erinsaudiocorner.com
Hats off to armir for debunking power conditioners, op-amp rolling.
But why did he have to spend his valuable time doing this in the first place?
Meanwhile we are still measuring/displaying speaker distortion incorrectly e.g. THD, yet simultaneously measuring distortion in things that reached sonic transparency decades ago. eg. DACs
Does science and evidence translate to people "getting it" a quarter a century later?
One could argue that that is getting harder every year...
... and now I'm not even talking about speakers anymore...
) are just on another level, much closer to Revel M16 (with EQ applied).
www.soundandvision.com
