Worst measuring loudspeaker?

[Purité Audio]

But an essential component of the audiophile bingo card.
Keith

 

[MattHooper]

Said it once and I'll say it again: first order crossovers are stupid!

Having owned numerous Thiel (first order crossover phase/coherent) and plenty of other speakers, nothing I’ve heard image with the precision of the Thiels.

Whether that is because of or in spite of the phase coherent design I don’t know.
But even other coaxial designs that use higher order crossovers (eg KEF) don’t seem to me to image with as much precision and density. Dunlavy speakers also had this quality as I recall.

In the end, whether first or crossovers are actually dumb or not, some very smart speaker designers used them, and for my money produced excellent sounding results.

 

[Arindal]

first order crossovers are stupid!

There are actually some rare cases of driver combinations for which they might make sense. For example coaxial designs coming with a naturally narrow band of overlap. Ask Matt who owns Thiel CS3.7!

For a conventional inline design with broadband drivers and quite some distance between midrange and tweeter, I tend to agree. The resulting lobing and combfiltering pose serious problems.

Whether that is because of or in spite of the phase coherent design I don’t know.

My guess would be that rather absence of lobing and smooth transition of directivity are the key advantages resulting in an excellent imaging.

 

[MattHooper]

My guess would be that rather absence of lobing and smooth transition of directivity are the key advantages resulting in an excellent imaging.

Could be. I’m not competent to have a strong opinion.

Either way, the 3.7 was the most coherent box ‘n drivers speakers I’ve ever heard. I simply could not hear out any transition whatsoever among the drivers.
My current smaller Thiel 2.7s are the same from the mid range up (they use the same coax drivers) but a little less so in the bass (little bit of a boost where the 3.7s we’re more linear).

As I’ve mentioned I own Joseph Audio speakers that use very high order crossovers, and I think they benefit from that - they sound super clean and pure. And they also sound very coherent. Plus many people rave about the imaging precision from Joseph speakers.
And when I listen to them on their own, they are very impressive.

But when I swap the Thiels back in they sort of show who’s boss in that regard. The Thiels give the impression of perfectly lining up all the Sonic information in the recording associated with any particular instrument or voice, so that it appears as a solid object in the sound stage with no guessing as to the borders of the image. Auditioned right next to the Thiels even a loudspeaker that seemed to image tightly like the Josephs sound a little bit more “swimmy” and less sure - The Thiels dialing in precision sort of like when you go to the Optometrist and you’re looking at the eye chart through the different lenses, and the Optometrist clicks on that lens which sharpens everything up and brings things into perfect focus.

That’s why even though I love the Joseph and other speakers I own for what they do, I simply cannot let go of the Thiels. I’d really miss what they bring to the table.

 

[Bwaslo]

I'm curious whether the response curves (with phase) have ever been measured/published for the Thiel speakers? Can they reproduce a square wave?

 

[mhardy6647]

First order XOs on my Frankenaltecs, by choice and by design.

 

[Arindal]

I simply could not hear out any transition whatsoever among the drivers.

That is to be expected from any coaxial design not suffering from a significant step in directivity between midrange and tweeter. With conventional designs, this comes at the price of increasing directivity index, which I really consider to being a major, frequently overlooked flaw.

The remarkable thing about Jim Thief's solution was the use of a completely flat midrange w/o waveguide to the tweeter, while keeping the directivity constant over a broad band with the help of a gentle filter slope. That's pretty unique, the only similar design I am aware of is Technics SB C700.

'm curious whether the response curves (with phase) have ever been measured/published for the Thiel speakers? Can they reproduce a square wave?

Stereophile published a bunch of them back in the days, also proving that a 1st order filter network can make sense:

Thiel CS3.7 measurements by JA

Judging from the step response graphs, a square wave should not pose a problem to those. Does not say much about sound quality, though.

 

[MattHooper]

The remarkable thing about Jim Thief's solution was the use of a completely flat midrange w/o waveguide to the tweeter, while keeping the directivity constant over a broad band with the help of a gentle filter slope. That's pretty unique, the only similar design I am aware of is Technics SB C700.

Yes, I believe that was Jim’s masterstroke in his final designs of the coax.

I had listened to many Thiels including having the big CS6 in my room, which was a coaxial design as well. (Mid/tweet).

As good as that speaker was, it didn’t totally escape some of the problems associated with first order/time/phase coherent, designs. Especially if I moved my head vertically, there would appear a bit of a suck out or interference effect which hollowed out the mid range or upper mid range a bit.

It wasn’t as bad as other first order/time/phase coherent designs, I owned such as Meadowlark Audio speakers.
Those had a sort of similar problem and then almost “ Venetian blind” effect where movement of my head would cause certain frequencies to feel like they were blinking in and out.

I don’t know if these were destructive interference effects , phase mismatching, vertical lobbing, or whatever. But they were certainly there.

And that’s one thing that totally blew me away with the 3.7s. With the flat corrugated mid range coax design there is absolutely none of that that I could detect. I could listen from a broad range around the loudspeaker horizontally and even vertically, and while vertical position could somewhat alter the frequency balance a tiny bit, the sound remained incredibly coherent and without the type of suck out, I was describing.

Same with my 2.7s.

So it was the first time I experienced a first order time coherent design that didn’t have bits of weirdness happening.


The flat mid range driver had a motor that covered much of the driver area in order to keep it from flexing and keep it pistonic, Jim said even he was surprised the midrange driver managed to remain linear up to around 20 Hz.

Interestingly, he had wanted to do a flat mid range driver and a coax design for its various advantages, and apparently the idea came to him while eating lunch or something, and he did the calculations and drew up the initial design on a napkin. He literally took that design it made the first prototype and it worked just as he had figured out on that napkin.

Whatever misgivings people may have about the choice to go first order, Jim was a talented engineer in any case it seems.

Before he died, he was working on the next flagship speaker, which apparently was going to be an omni-directional design! Boy, I’d love to hear with somebody like Jim Thiel would have come up with in an Omni!

Yes, I’m a bit of a Thiel fan boy

Here’s a picture from when I owned the flagship 3.7s. You can see the aesthetic and ergonomic challenge challenges they posed for my room at the time:

Which is why I downsized slightly to the 2.7s.
Here is my left channel 2.7:

 

[Arindal]

The flat mid range driver had a motor that covered much of the driver area in order to keep it from flexing and keep it pistonic,

It might have been unusual some 20 years ago, but eventually other driver manufacturers have achieved similar things with ring-shaped, plane midrange units (Elac, Technics and Wavecore come to mind). The thing that is still remarkable is how Thiel was dealing with directivity, keeping it constant over a vast band without too much of interference (which the Technics is at least exhibiting in a certain range).

This comes at the price, though, of having a rather broad dispersion and pretty pronounced sound level to the sides in the tweeter band. Not sure if I would want to place such speaker overly close to the side walls.

 

[MattHooper]

This comes at the price, though, of having a rather broad dispersion and pretty pronounced sound level to the sides in the tweeter band. Not sure if I would want to place such speaker overly close to the side walls.

In my room I have thick curtains that I can draw along to any point on the side walls, so I had no issues.

 

[thewas]

Said it once and I'll say it again: first order crossovers are stupid!

Even more considering the fact that the total acoustic slope which matters even then is almost never first order so no real advantages in phase coherence.

Almost no real loudspeaker has real first acoustic order so if it sounds coherent like for example MHs Thiels this has rather different causes as I had written also in the past.

 

[MattHooper]

Manger P2 Loudspeakers, frequency response from hi-fi news review:

Interesting claims for the technology. Pretty disappointing in the frequency response.
Anybody here ever heard a manger driver speaker?

Manger Audio P2 Loudspeaker Lab Report

Lab Report Our last experience of the Manger Sound Transducer (MST)was with the Zerobox 109 [HFN Aug '07] since which time our measurements suggest it has been improved, achieving higher sensitivity and a somewhat smoother response – although it is still far from flat. Manger claims 89dB...

www.hifinews.com

 

[Purité Audio]

Yes early on we had their C1 active, it looked super smart but wasn’t great,we took them down to Phil Ward ( SoundonSound ) to measure he wasn’t impressed ,Daniella Manger wasn’t happy …

 

[Mart68]

Manger P2 Loudspeakers, frequency response from hi-fi news review:

View attachment 485418

Interesting claims for the technology. Pretty disappointing in the frequency response.
Anybody here ever heard a manger driver speaker?

View attachment 485419

Manger Audio P2 Loudspeaker Lab Report

Lab Report Our last experience of the Manger Sound Transducer (MST)was with the Zerobox 109 [HFN Aug '07] since which time our measurements suggest it has been improved, achieving higher sensitivity and a somewhat smoother response – although it is still far from flat. Manger claims 89dB...

www.hifinews.com

Subjective review says very narrow sweet spot, no bass, no top end. Incredible the sacrifices in sound quality that some are prepared to make just so there's no nasty crossover. In 40 years I've yet to hear a 'full range' driver speaker that impressed. And they're £11.5K!

 

[Salt]

I've built a pair of their DIY speakers (1x MSW, 2x Scan Speak 8" woofer) in the 90'th and they really sounded great, but I had no measurement equipment at that time.
The parts are still waiting in the basement for reuse.

 

[Sir Sanders Zingmore]

Yes early on we had their C1 active, it looked super smart but wasn’t great,we took them down to Phil Ward ( SoundonSound ) to measure he wasn’t impressed ,Daniella Manger wasn’t happy …View attachment 485468

I suspect the issue is due to their placement - bolted to the wall facing the ceiling - rather than anything else

 

[DanielT]

PåManger P2 Loudspeakers, frequency response from hi-fi news review:

View attachment 485418

Interesting claims for the technology. Pretty disappointing in the frequency response.
Anybody here ever heard a manger driver speaker?

View attachment 485419

Manger Audio P2 Loudspeaker Lab Report

Lab Report Our last experience of the Manger Sound Transducer (MST)was with the Zerobox 109 [HFN Aug '07] since which time our measurements suggest it has been improved, achieving higher sensitivity and a somewhat smoother response – although it is still far from flat. Manger claims 89dB...

www.hifinews.com

At first I thought it was the German manufacturer Magnat you mentioned. That wasn't the case. I read a little too quickly

By the way, Magnat is sold in Sweden from a place that mainly concentrates on car woofers for young people..


..so I had a preconceived idea that Magnat wouldn't be that good. A lot of bang for the buck sound/SPL but not a good sound but I may change my mind about that. In any case these seem to be good:

Magnat Signature 1109

Auf die taufrischen Lautsprecher der Signature-1100-Serie sind die Macher bei Magnat besonders stolz. Vereint werden hier modernste Technik und feinste Verarbeitungsqualität in formschönen Gehäusen. Wir greifen in die Vollen und testen für Sie das optisch mächtig beeindruckende Flaggschiff...

www.hifitest.de

They seem to have the right attitude:
Klippel-optimized system
Laser-assisted measurements:

 

[Soniclife]

I suspect the issue is due to their placement - bolted to the wall facing the ceiling - rather than anything else

Looking at the measurements above they might sound best like that.

 

[thewas]

At first I thought it was the German manufacturer Magnat you mentioned. That wasn't the case. I read a little too quickly

By the way, Magnat is sold in Sweden from a place that mainly concentrates on car woofers for young people..
View attachment 485493View attachment 485492

..so I had a preconceived idea that Magnat wouldn't be that good. A lot of bang for the buck sound/SPL but not a good sound but I may change my mind about that. In any case these seem to be good:
View attachment 485495View attachment 485494View attachment 485496

Magnat Signature 1109

Auf die taufrischen Lautsprecher der Signature-1100-Serie sind die Macher bei Magnat besonders stolz. Vereint werden hier modernste Technik und feinste Verarbeitungsqualität in formschönen Gehäusen. Wir greifen in die Vollen und testen für Sie das optisch mächtig beeindruckende Flaggschiff...

www.hifitest.de

They seem to have the right attitude:
Klippel-optimized system
Laser-assisted measurements:
View attachment 485498

They make some very well engineered loudspeakers since its basically the same company and engineering team like Heco (which both were bought many years ago by the Voxx International group.

Some Hecos have been (well) measured by Audioholics

HECO Aurora 300 Bookshelf Loudspeaker Review

The Heco Aurora 300 bookshelves produced a nicely balanced sound that is uncommon for a loudspeaker of its price range. How did they do it and how do they compare to more expensive speakers? Read on.

www.audioholics.com

HECO Aurora 1000 Floorstanding Loudspeaker Review

The German made Heco Aurora 1000 floor-standing speakers ($799/ea) were put through the wringer with our in depth measurement testing and yielded surprising results. Are these the speakers to get?

www.audioholics.com

but my personal favourite of the group is the wide baffle Direct which also did surprisingly well in an ASR blind binaural comparison.

Most beautiful speakers in the world ?

It's safe to assume the business calculation is sound. The fake tweeter makes it look like a "proper speaker", and if that helps sales more than it costs, which seems likely, then there you have it. I'd be surprised if anyone who buys this calibre of speaker would actually care. Logitech, have...

www.audiosciencereview.com

Binaural blind comparison test of 4 loudspeakers - II

Since the discussion on the last vote about the sound quality of speakers via binaural recordings was so harmonious, I thought it would be a good idea to repeat the whole thing with other binaural recordings of speakers. And that's why I just plagiarized the thread title (and more) from @thewas...

www.audiosciencereview.com

 

[thewas]

Manger P2 Loudspeakers, frequency response from hi-fi news review:

View attachment 485418

Interesting claims for the technology. Pretty disappointing in the frequency response.
Anybody here ever heard a manger driver speaker?

View attachment 485419

Manger Audio P2 Loudspeaker Lab Report

Lab Report Our last experience of the Manger Sound Transducer (MST)was with the Zerobox 109 [HFN Aug '07] since which time our measurements suggest it has been improved, achieving higher sensitivity and a somewhat smoother response – although it is still far from flat. Manger claims 89dB...

www.hifinews.com

I have heard them few times in German audio shows and they are far from neutral as the measurements show (many German magazines have measured various of their models in the past). They are presented in the shows often with some choral music which I guess helps hiding their weaknesses.
Being a kind of point source (and existing since the late 70s, the person who engineered has passed aways quite some time and his daughter now runs the business but with no real innovations) they image well and have a small but strong audiophile fanbase but imho in today's times of really good coaxials they don't make much sense anymore.