KEF Blade 2 vs Ascend ELX Towers as End Game

[Multicore]

You beat me to it!

Thanks for taking the time to contribute here, David.

 

[Karmacoma]

Yes, in the mechanical side and electrical side. A dome tweeter is a mass-spring system, for all mass-spring systems - there exists a moving mass and a restorative force (the suspension). All mass-spring systems have stored energy, this can be seen on the impedance measurement of any dome tweeter (or woofer) by way of the resonant peak (Fs). That resonant peak is the energy of the moving mass equaling the energy of the restorative force (there is basically no damping at this frequency so there is full undamped movement), which represents the release of stored energy.

On the electrical side, the "force" - this is the voice coil wound around a former. This is an inductor - by definition, an inductor stores and releases energy.

A true ribbon tweeter is not a true mass-spring system, the moving mass is the conductor itself (the force), there is, technically, no restoring "spring" other than that same conductor and air itself. You will not see a resonant peak on the impedance measurement of a true ribbon tweeter. This is different than AMT, planar or "leaf" tweeters. In addition, the moving mass of a true ribbon tweeter is typically at least 1/50th of the moving mass of a dome.

This is all easily verifiable by way of impedance measurement, impulse response, but likely the easiest way to see this is by way of CSD. I had published a a bunch of measurements showing these comparisons maybe about 15-20 years ago, but I can't seem to find it since we redid our website and forum.

Luckily, there is Google's wayback machine:

Wayback Machine

I believe this is why both the attack and decay sound more distinct and defined on true ribbon tweeters (at least with RAAL, been a decade since I listened to a non-RAAL true ribbon tweeter, but I wouldn't expect greatly differing results). It is also fairly easy to hear this with acoustic guitar, piano, cymbals once you recognize it and the recording is of high quality.

I know many will have a differing opinion regarding this, and that is OK - but the one thing I can assure anyone of is that there is very likely no person who has done more investigative work on this or has more experience in these comparisons than I do. Frankly, I would love to not offer the RAAL 70-20xram as an option as these tweeters are incredibly expensive and with the now unbelievably high tariffs on imports from Serbia, the RAAL 70-20xram is practically priced out of reach. However, our demos continue and the large majority continue to prefer the 70-20 (sighted or not-sighted) over any other option.

What's your experience with beryllium tweeters?

 

[mj30250]

You are viewing this thread as self-promoting? Do you not understand we had nothing at all to do with this comparison? Ascend clones? what are you even talking about? Do you honestly think the OP or anyone in this thread is employed by us or encouraged by us?

I'll think twice before posting here again...

Before allowing a single user (particularly one who has a history of becoming strangely reactionary and emotional over certain brands of loudspeakers) to impact your participation here, please consider making use of the Ignore function.

 

[Gyosa1]

Haven't seen this much unsubstantiated garbage in a ASR thread for awhile. The thing is even if you shut this thread down the self promoting Ascend clones keep opening a new thread with the same crazy comparisons. Wouldn't this be better kept in the desperate dealer section or not posted at all?

Why such an Ascend hater ?

I’ve had a pair of ELX Ribbon Towers for the last 18 months and absolutely love them .
The best pair of speakers I’ve heard , they beat my Salk SuperCharged SongTowers - which also use the Raal 70-20 XRAM and SEAS woofers - and those are great speakers in their own right.

I personally think Dave is providing valuable insight , he’s not here to give a sales pitch - he doesn’t need to , and dare I say , he probably knows much more about speaker mechanics and design than most of us would ever hope to.

Bk

 

[Ricardojoa]

Why such an Ascend hater ?

I’ve had a pair of ELX Ribbon Towers for the last 18 months and absolutely love them .
The best pair of speakers I’ve heard , they beat my Salk SuperCharged SongTowers - which also use the Raal 70-20 XRAM and SEAS woofers - and those are great speakers in their own right.

I personally think Dave is providing valuable insight , he’s not here to give a sales pitch - he doesn’t need to , and dare I say , he probably knows much more about speaker mechanics and design than most of us would ever hope to.

Bk

I might have remembered wrong but i think is because he didn’t get a good deal on his upgrade AA parts.

 

[Karmacoma]

Oooh the bitterness...

 

[Beave]

 

[Karmacoma]

I was thinking about this meme without even knowing it LOL

 

[Gyosa1]

I purchased the Ascend Sierra Towers several years ago. They came with an elaborate document about how they were state of the art. While they sounded fine the PR behind them was a blatant over-exaggeration. The new ELX design finally addresses the extremely limited bass response offered in the Sierra Towers but the cabinet is still the same ugly, little box that doesn't fit anyone's definition of state of the art. Starting with a simple black board used as a stand to a tiny cabinet by any modern day standard. It's simply not a design that can maximize sound or visual satisfaction.

When I see several threads on ASR each trying to compare the Ascend speaker to $28,000 offerings it's clear more PR is going on than education or science. In addition, while the RAAL tweeter has its merits it doesn't compare favorably to any of the Revel BE tweeters. The RAAL offers a narrow vertical listening window and is a bit more edgy than the Revel BE. With long term listening, I much prefer the Revel BE tweeter to RAAL. The BE tweeter not only offers wider vertical dispersion but also sounds smoother to my ears. The RAAL is not bad but after owning several speakers with RAAL, I much prefer the REVEL F228Be and F328Be. I'm sure some will be satisfied with RAAL, but if you have both for an extended period, you notice a significant difference. Especially, when moving around the room.

The silly notion that the ELX design sounds as good as the Blade 2, really can't be considered reality. From my standpoint, the Revel F228Be offers superior treble and bass while offering 1,000x better looking cabinet. Dave has been selling speakers a long time. He is probably better at marketing speakers than most. There are easily identifiable short comings in the ELX cabinet. All it takes is measuring the cabinet size and looking at the quality of the cabinet to realize the drivers could do better in a larger cabinet.

If the ELX sounds good to you fine. Just keep your eyes closed as just about every other speaker in that price range looks better.

It’s a trade-off . No doubt my Salks are “prettier” speakers , but the Ascends out perform them at a comparable price point.

I have no problem having the Ascends in my den for all to see - whereas the Salks are in the bedroom now - as pretty as they are , where no one sees them.

So what’s more important to you at any given price point , looks or performance ?
The Ascends , for me , make that compromise brilliantly.

I’m sure Dave could make the ELX’s in a much prettier cabinet and charge significantly more. Would that make you happier ?

Bk

 

[thewas]

Yes, in the mechanical side and electrical side. A dome tweeter is a mass-spring system, for all mass-spring systems - there exists a moving mass and a restorative force (the suspension). All mass-spring systems have stored energy, this can be seen on the impedance measurement of any dome tweeter (or woofer) by way of the resonant peak (Fs). That resonant peak is the energy of the moving mass equaling the energy of the restorative force (there is basically no damping at this frequency so there is full undamped movement), which represents the release of stored energy.

On the electrical side, the "force" - this is the voice coil wound around a former. This is an inductor - by definition, an inductor stores and releases energy.

A true ribbon tweeter is not a true mass-spring system, the moving mass is the conductor itself (the force), there is, technically, no restoring "spring" other than that same conductor and air itself. You will not see a resonant peak on the impedance measurement of a true ribbon tweeter. This is different than AMT, planar or "leaf" tweeters. In addition, the moving mass of a true ribbon tweeter is typically at least 1/50th of the moving mass of a dome.

Let me kindly disagree, first of all loudspeaker driver principles usually are either electromagnetic or either electrostatic so have an inductive or capacitive working principle and corresponding phase and energy transfer relations. Also all oscillating systems have a mass and a stiffness and thus corresponding eigenfrequencies, if such one isn't clearly visible in the measurements its either due to being out of the measurement range (some 1979 Technics magnetostats had their -10 dB point at 150 kHz(!)) which is a good thing and means the stiffness to mass ratio is high or due to high damping factor in that region. The disadvantages of those usually though is a higher distortion at the lower frequencies and thus larger surface needed which leads to higher directivity, everything is a compromise.

 

[PristineSound]

I purchased the Ascend Sierra Towers several years ago. They came with an elaborate document about how they were state of the art. While they sounded fine the PR behind them was a blatant over-exaggeration. The new ELX design finally addresses the extremely limited bass response offered in the Sierra Towers but the cabinet is still the same ugly, little box that doesn't fit anyone's definition of state of the art. Starting with a simple black board used as a stand to a tiny cabinet by any modern day standard. It's simply not a design that can maximize sound or visual satisfaction.

When I see several threads on ASR each trying to compare the Ascend speaker to $28,000 offerings it's clear more PR is going on than education or science. In addition, while the RAAL tweeter has its merits it doesn't compare favorably to any of the Revel BE tweeters. The RAAL offers a narrow vertical listening window and is a bit more edgy than the Revel BE. With long term listening, I much prefer the Revel BE tweeter to RAAL. The BE tweeter not only offers wider vertical dispersion but also sounds smoother to my ears. The RAAL is not bad but after owning several speakers with RAAL, I much prefer the REVEL F228Be and F328Be. I'm sure some will be satisfied with RAAL, but if you have both for an extended period, you notice a significant difference. Especially, when moving around the room.

The silly notion that the ELX design sounds as good as the Blade 2, really can't be considered reality. From my standpoint, the Revel F228Be offers superior treble and bass while offering 1,000x better looking cabinet. Dave has been selling speakers a long time. He is probably better at marketing speakers than most. There are easily identifiable short comings in the ELX cabinet. All it takes is measuring the cabinet size and looking at the quality of the cabinet to realize the drivers could do better in a larger cabinet.

If the ELX sounds good to you fine. Just keep your eyes closed as just about every other speaker in that price range looks better.

I owned the F226Be. The ELX RAAL is a superior speaker in my experience, setup and preference.

The ELX cabinet is a more solid cabinet, while some may not like the looks, but is looks like a typical boxy speaker, which looks fine to me.

Also the Revel speakers are cheaply made. The port, is made of cardboard, if you didn't notice, put your fingers into it, you will see it transition from plastic to cardboard. That is the main reason why I sold it, built quality is on the cheap side.

 

[Mort]

Just get Philharmonic Audio. Absolutely gorgeous

 

[PristineSound]

Just get Philharmonic Audio. Absolutely gorgeous

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I personally prefer piano black finish, which is not offered with Philharmonic.

 

[Mort]

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I personally prefer piano black finish, which is not offered with Philharmonic.

They can do Black Piano Gloss on any product - but there is a short wait of a few months. I've seen it on the BMR Monitors and it's really amazing.

 

[traind]

I purchased the Ascend Sierra Towers several years ago. They came with an elaborate document about how they were state of the art. While they sounded fine the PR behind them was a blatant over-exaggeration. The new ELX design finally addresses the extremely limited bass response offered in the Sierra Towers but the cabinet is still the same ugly, little box that doesn't fit anyone's definition of state of the art. Starting with a simple black board used as a stand to a tiny cabinet by any modern day standard. It's simply not a design that can maximize sound or visual satisfaction.

When I see several threads on ASR each trying to compare the Ascend speaker to $28,000 offerings it's clear more PR is going on than education or science. In addition, while the RAAL tweeter has its merits it doesn't compare favorably to any of the Revel BE tweeters. The RAAL offers a narrow vertical listening window and is a bit more edgy than the Revel BE. With long term listening, I much prefer the Revel BE tweeter to RAAL. The BE tweeter not only offers wider vertical dispersion but also sounds smoother to my ears. The RAAL is not bad but after owning several speakers with RAAL, I much prefer the REVEL F228Be and F328Be. I'm sure some will be satisfied with RAAL, but if you have both for an extended period, you notice a significant difference. Especially, when moving around the room.

The silly notion that the ELX design sounds as good as the Blade 2, really can't be considered reality. From my standpoint, the Revel F228Be offers superior treble and bass while offering 1,000x better looking cabinet. Dave has been selling speakers a long time. He is probably better at marketing speakers than most. There are easily identifiable short comings in the ELX cabinet. All it takes is measuring the cabinet size and looking at the quality of the cabinet to realize the drivers could do better in a larger cabinet.

If the ELX sounds good to you fine. Just keep your eyes closed as just about every other speaker in that price range looks better.

So you call this thread 'full of unsubstantiated garbage' and then proceed to explain your own point of view which appears to be almost completely based upon experience that only includes sighted bias?

Your one reference to wider vertical dispersion does not make your comment some type of ASR gold star winner. It is full of experiential audio commentary and visual preferences. The sad thing is you could have just stated your experience and preferences respectfully and everyone would have gladly accepted them as a productive addition to the thread.

 

[PristineSound]

So you call this thread 'full of unsubstantiated garbage' and then proceed to explain your own point of view which appears to be almost completely based upon experience that only includes sighted bias?

Your one reference to wider vertical dispersion does not make your comment some type of ASR gold star winner. It is full of experiential audio commentary and visual preferences. The sad thing is you could have just stated your experience and preferences respectfully and everyone would have gladly accepted them as a productive addition to the thread.

The funny thing is, he goes off praising the build quality of the Revel.

For that kind of of money, the Revel is not considered quality build in my experience with various speakers. The port is made of paper cardboard, the binding post cap is made of the cheapest and thinnest plastic. Cabinet is the typical MDF (not knocking on MDF) but compared with Ascend, their cabinets are made of bamboo, more expensive and much stiffer.

I sold my Revel 226Be exactly for low level of build quality.

 

[MarkS]

I believe the differences in what is heard comes down to the complete lack of stored energy (which is why there is a clearly audible difference in attack and decay) as well as significantly less vertical reflections (with our ribbon) compared to a dome.

Just looking at your own on-axis plots, the ribbon is a bit brighter than the dome:

That has to be the leading hypothesis for the cause of perceived differences.

Also, I'm generally a proponent of sighted listening as being adequate for many purposes (for which I take a lot of flack here), but comparing two speakers that are almost identical is a situation where IMO it does become necessary to be confident of any conclusions.

 

[PristineSound]

What's your experience with beryllium tweeters?

On the Ascend forum, Dave talked about his experience with Be. If I recalled correctly, he said the RAAL is the absolute best tweeter he has ever heard, with the exception of a SEAS diamond tweeter, which he does sell as a custom order.

I have the ELX RAAL and I also have a pair of Perlisten with Be tweeters. I personally preference edge on the Be side.

 

[Purité Audio]

Isn’t your preference for the total implementation rather than the specific tweeter unit?
Keith

 

[courtesy]

Hi All,
I am a long time Ascend owner, bought my first set in 2005. My main system is built around the Sierra LX, and bedroom system is built around the Luna v2.

Over the years, I have been to Ascend's offices/warehouse many times to listen to speakers, Ascends and others.

I hope this is allowed here, Dave and I worked out a date for me and a couple of other guys to listen to the Blades, and compare them to ELX Towers. That will be Saturday, September 6th. If you are interested in joining us, please let me know. We all live in the South Bay area of Los Angeles and will likely carpool to Ascend.