The greatest speakers ever?

[Mart68]

My first time sitting down in front of my friends Quad 63s felt paradigm changing for me. Even though I ended up owning the 63s, I actually somewhat prefer the 57s. (my friend also switched from 63 to 57)

'63' I heard only one time and they were terrible. I was quite disappointed. Not that I think they are intrinsically terrible but something was wrong. Problem with those speakers and the original ESL is they gradually fall apart and repair is a nightmare.

For me, I auditioned the Kii Threes a number of times, including a back-to-back comparison with some Spendor stand mounts. I wrote about the experience here
In the end, I preferred the passive Spendors.

I did too as initially I thought they would be perfect but after three separate demos my head said 'yes' and my gut said 'no'. Went with the gut. Not very 'ASR', I know. But it's my money I'm spending.

I’ve always wanted to hear a TAD speaker.
They tend to measure well and I bet they sound great.

They do. I wish it were otherwise given the cost, they were three times my maximum budget. Their appeal creeps up on you, you go from initially thinking 'Just another competent tower' to gradually realising they are close to perfection.

 

[Purité Audio]

And they are...............................................

Meridian M1 from around 1978, advanced for the time, active, they were really expensive, amps in the base which could slide out.
There were many versions presumably because Meridian were using whatever was around at the time.
I bought their M2 a year or so later and eventually the M10.
I can’t help but have exceedingly fond memories of those designs and would probably get a pair if they ever decided to re-make them with contemporary bits.
Keith

 

[Purité Audio]

I part exchanged a pair of M10 against the customer’s M10s and kept them until a higher authority decided we had too many speakers!

Keith

 

[Purité Audio]

Another speaker I ( in an ideal world) would have kept a really beautiful pair of rosewood M2’s.
Keith

 

[Goldhamster916]

for me the Kef Blade 2 or, probably even better the blade 1 Meta. The Klippel measurements are almost perfect in every category, subjectively they are by far the best speaker I have ever heard, but I obviously haven’t heard all high end speakers. These are also the favorites of the stereophile guy and Erin who both heard hundreds of higher end speakers.

 

[Cogito]

Genesis Physics Model 66

 

[Kal Rubinson]

I part exchanged a pair of M10 against the customer’s M10s and kept them until a higher authority decided we had too many speakers!

Keith

I remember being very impressed with these but they were out of my range at the time. What strikes me now are the resemblances to the KEF Blades.

 

[MattHooper]

They do. I wish it were otherwise given the cost, they were three times my maximum budget. Their appeal creeps up on you, you go from initially thinking 'Just another competent tower' to gradually realising they are close to perfection.

Cool.

Tons of competent speakers out there. I need to feel something special when I listen to a speaker before I’m willing to part with the type of money these things often cost.

Sounds like the TAD do that for you.

 

[Mart68]

Cool.

Tons of competent speakers out there. I need to feel something special when I listen to a speaker before I’m willing to part with the type of money these things often cost.

Sounds like the TAD do that for you.

They do but I'm more than happy with what I ended up with, at a tenth of the cost. I'm not 100 percent that I would swap them for the TAD, if the offer was made.

 

[kimmosto]

for me the Kef Blade 2 or, probably even better the blade 1 Meta. The Klippel measurements are almost perfect in every category,

Actually they are far from perfect. Directivity index of 2 Meta has significant (~3.5 dB relative) step at lower mid-range. Directivity index turns quite fast to negative at quite high frequency. In addition, slope of directivity index is much above the range of traditional power response recommendation assuming flat on-axis. These features make upper bass...lower mid weaker and more obscure than with conventional front wiring mid-woofer(s).

subjectively they are by far the best speaker I have ever heard, but I obviously haven’t heard all high end speakers. These are also the favorites of the stereophile guy and Erin who both heard hundreds of higher end speakers.

They are probably okay in a harsh acoustics due to high DI slope, but directivity step down to negative make them more sensitive to positioning, and high slope does not tolerate casual listening radically off-axis in acoustics with shortish reverberation time. They have lost in comparison to, for example, fairly standard 2.5-way speakers. For speaker designers they probably look more decoration element than targeting really good reproduction. LS60 is even worse design and implementation.

 

[Goldhamster916]

Actually they are far from perfect. Directivity index of 2 Meta has significant (~3.5 dB relative) step at lower mid-range. Directivity index turns quite fast to negative at quite high frequency. In addition, slope of directivity index is much above the range of traditional power response recommendation assuming flat on-axis. These features make upper bass...lower mid weaker and more obscure than with conventional front wiring mid-woofer(s).
View attachment 477265

They are probably okay in a harsh acoustics due to high DI slope, but directivity step down to negative make them more sensitive to positioning, and high slope does not tolerate casual listening radically off-axis in acoustics with shortish reverberation time. They have lost in comparison to, for example, fairly standard 2.5-way speakers. For speaker designers they probably look more decoration element than targeting really good reproduction. LS60 is even worse design and implementation.

I appreciate the answer! I agree the upper bass directivity is a flaw and might be the reason the reference 5 meta sounded clearer in that area, but might have also been the room of course. The question is if the positives resulting from having the driver on the sides (force cancellation, point source design and curved front baffle) outweigh the negative here.

 

[Suono]

TadR1

 

[Arindal]

They are probably okay in a harsh acoustics due to high DI slope,

If ´harsh acoustics´ translates to lots of reflective walls nearby, I doubt that. Heard them several times, and any lively room seems to highlight the imbalance in directivity index, i.e. leading to dominant lower mids, boomy bass and overall tonality lacking air and treble. Ambience/reverb seemingly disappears from the frontal staging, letting phantom images ´sway like in a vacuum´ with very dull reverb. I prescribe that to the lack of diffuse energy particularly above 2.5K.

They seem to work well in open spaces with no walls closeby, particularly no side-walls and walls behind the speakers. Apparently, with a bit of additional delay, tonally imbalanced reflections seem not to bother the overall tonality nor the imaging.

The question is if the positives resulting from having the driver on the sides (force cancellation, point source design and curved front baffle) outweigh the negative here.

Source point design is rather unimportant in the bass region, force cancellation does not apply to the port tuning, and the curved baffle I would rather see as a downside, as it is contributing to an almost omnidirectional behavior in the lower mids, making the subsequent increase in directivity index towards higher frequency even steeper.

 

[diddley]

I ended up with budget speakers as the KEF R3 and the WHARFEDALE LINTON 85, and in my room they sound perfect. no high end for me

 

[Goldhamster916]

I wonder if we will soon see the AsciLab C5C or S6C in here.

 

[kimmosto]

If ´harsh acoustics´ translates to lots of reflective walls nearby, I doubt that. Heard them several times, and any lively room seems to highlight the imbalance in directivity index, i.e. leading to dominant lower mids, boomy bass and overall tonality lacking air and treble.

By harsh acoustics I meant a space that boosts upper mid ... treble, but not so much low frequencies. For example, complex (large) semi-open space with flexible/partly leaking walls, ceiling and floor without concrete foundation, and large windows or other hard surfaces without adequate absorbing and diffusing.
In that case acoustical losses at low frequencies would compensate relative double power at upper bass...low mid that directivity step creates with flattish on-axis.

They seem to work well in open spaces with no walls closeby, particularly no side-walls and walls behind the speakers.

This is easy to understand.

...curved baffle I would rather see as a downside, as it is contributing to an almost omnidirectional behavior in the lower mids, making the subsequent increase in directivity index towards higher frequency even steeper.

Rounded shape is beneficial for sound stage because it reduces diffraction. Sound stage stays logical to much wider and higher listening range and distance without need to adjust toe-in or -out. Of course it should be compatible with the driver and directivity at lower frequencies. "Internal" directivity slope from upper mid to treble does not look too steep so I still think that the main problems are directivity step at low mid and wavefront directed away from the listener at low frequencies i.e. negative directivity index. Both cause weigting of delayed reflected power assuming that the speakers are not in a large open space.

 

[kimmosto]

Source point design is rather unimportant in the bass region

Source point design with high woofer position could also be a problem. Woofer located to e.g. 1 m elevation could start to initiate 2nd order vertical mode. Of course this depends on room height (and it's coincidents with other acoustical features). For example, Blade 1 is so tall that woofers are almost at the half of elevation if room height is just ca. 250 cm (like our local houses and flats). I have listened original Blade in a concrete flat. It was difficult to separate vertical mode from other resonances, but the result in different listening locations was "amazing"

 

[Gringoaudio1]

• Woofer Diameter: 20 feet (yes, feet, not inches)
• Power Output: 1.21 gigawatts (perfect for time travel if needed)
• Frequency Range: 0.0001 Hz to 2 Hz (subsonic enough to vibrate your soul)
• Peak SPL: 200 dB (louder than a rocket launch, guaranteed to clear sinuses)
• Magnet Weight: 3 tons (requires its own forklift)
• Enclosure Volume: 1,000 cubic feet (big enough to host a small concert inside)
• Cable Thickness: 10 inches (standard electrical cable won’t cut it)
• Power Source: Modified Boeing 747 jet engine (turns kerosene into pure bass)
• Amps: 100,000 watts RMS (literally all the watts)
• Material: Reinforced steel and Kevlar (survives a direct hit from a wrecking ball)

As for its capabilities, “Big Bertha” can reportedly produce bass so deep it rearranges furniture. The first test run, held last Saturday, resulted in minor seismic activity and a noticeable uptick in local chiropractic visits. The duo insists that it was merely a “soft launch.”

Grass Valley Duo Shatters Sound Barriers with World’s Largest Subwoofer

Grass Valley inventors Bob "Bassman" Wilson and Doug "Decibel" Smith have unveiled "Big Bertha," the world's largest subwoofer. Powered by a repurposed Boeing 747 engine, it boasts a 20-foot diameter woofer and 1.21 gigawatts of power. Capable of rearranging furniture and inducing seismic...

broadstreetbeacon.com

View attachment 466226

That subwoofers is 6 to 7 feet at best diameter. What is this crap about 20 feet?

 

[Arindal]

In that case acoustical losses at low frequencies would compensate relative double power at upper bass...low mid that directivity step creates with flattish on-axis.

That's the theory, yes, which is partly supported by in-room measurements. In practice, I found these conditions you were describing to be even disadvantageous, as with reduced bass and booming problems, the dominance of midrange in the diffuse field is even more audible. Talking about frequencies below 1.5K which sounded heavily overrepresented, not only the bass which was to be expected.

Rounded shape is beneficial for sound stage because it reduces diffraction.

Beneficial for localization precision and stability thereof - yes. At least in a well-treated room at decent listening distances. If everything is more lively and indirect sound dominating at the listening position, I found imaging to drastically detereorate, with phantom sources still ´holographic´, but completely in a frontal vacuum, reverb midrange-laden, muddy, boomy, chaotic by perceived angle, like in a wooden chamber, if that makes sense.

"Internal" directivity slope from upper mid to treble does not look too steep

I agree, on the graph it does not look dramatic, but I found it to be pretty problematic in real rooms. A potential explanation might be the smooth increase in directivity index towards higher frequencies mainly taking place in the frontal sphere, while the sound going to ceiling and rear wall suffers from dominant bass/mindrange and complete absence of treble >2K. If you stand behind such speaker, your first thought is ´the tweeter has died´, and that impression is dominating the reverb tonality as well.

 

[Goldhamster916]

I really appreciate the deep dive into the blades. I considered getting them at one point but had a feeling they won’t be a a good fit in my rather reflective room with walls relatively near to speaker position. Now I better understand why it would have been a bad idea .