Worst measuring loudspeaker?

[Ageve]

It makes the GR Research X-Voce / AV123 look good in comparison.

AV123 / GR Research X-Voce Speaker Review

This is a review, listening tests, EQ and detailed measurements of the AV123 hybrid open/closed baffle center speaker. It sold for $499 when the company was in business. GR Research seems to be selling the same speaker as a kit ($239 for pats, $250 for flat pack you assemble/finish). No, I...

www.audiosciencereview.com

 

[Old_School_Brad]

He is just being polite and don't want to insult the buyer. There are no studies on frequency response showing that people prefer this over a neutral response, quite the contrary.

People buy poor speakers all the time. Often due to what they believe in and not actually proper AB tests. They "like" it only because of bias and money they have spent. In the long run, most will sell them and get a new speaker.

Seems like Børresen also are blatanly lying about their speakers. The graph below are their own measurement of the response and phase with the comment that "the speaker is extremely linear and with an equivalent flat phase response". They also comment that the response is unsmoothed.
View attachment 406927

A flat phase response is physical impossible to achieve with such a speaker design BTW.

What? That's absurd. -Where is this screenshot from if I may ask?

This is in the user guide also..

Luckily they don't disclose linearity +/- in the frequency response spec.

I also am puzzled about the six or seven bass reflex ports. I mean, those are very small drivers.

 

[sigbergaudio]

What? That's absurd. -Where is this screenshot from if I may ask?

HIFI4ALL.DK | Anmeldelser | Eben X-centric højttalere

www.hifi4all.dk

 

[Old_School_Brad]

HIFI4ALL.DK | Anmeldelser | Eben X-centric højttalere

www.hifi4all.dk

Alright. To be fair to the reviewer they show third party measurements right underneath. Overall the review is critical and ends up concluding;

For a price of 51,000 DKK, including stands, I would probably look elsewhere, because there are other, more trouble-free designs out there in exactly this price range where the competition, if anything, is really tough.

And;

For the occasion, we therefore had a series of independent measurements taken, which also show that they are not as innocent as one would wish them to be – the measurements showed, among other things, that they are more sensitive to placement than any other speaker I have come across – if you're not sitting pinpointed in the exact position, the image simply tilts."

This is not a review of the Borresen X3 but the Eben X-centric -one of the former brands (there are a few) by the same designer/owner.

 

[sigbergaudio]

Alright. To be fair to the reviewer they show third party measurements right underneath. Overall the review is critical and ends up concluding;

And;

This is not a review of the Borresen X3 but the Eben X-centric -one of the former brands (there are a few) by the same designer/owner.

Yes, this was not a criticism of the reviewer, but of Børresen. And it was not stated by anyone that it was the X3. The point is that this shows Michael Børresen back in 2005 claiming that the following is a "raw and unsmoothed" graph:

First of all the above obviously isn't unsmoothed, and second of all, the yellow line is allegedly the phase response of the speaker. Color me unconvinced. And finally the third party measurement of the same speaker shows this:

I will leave it up to people to draw their own conclusions from that, I know what I think and how I feel about it, and it is not happy thoughts..

 

[Old_School_Brad]

Yes, this was not a criticism of the reviewer, but of Børresen. And it was not stated by anyone that it was the X3. The point is that this shows Michael Børresen back in 2005 claiming that the following is a "raw and unsmoothed" graph:

View attachment 407314




First of all the above obviously isn't unsmoothed, and second of all, the yellow line is allegedly the phase response of the speaker. Color me unconvinced. And finally the third party measurement of the same speaker shows this:

View attachment 407315




I will leave it up to people to draw their own conclusions from that, I know what I think and how I feel about it, and it is not happy thoughts..

I understand what you meant and completely agree with you. My post wasn’t intended to contradict you, but rather to expand on the review in the link and clarify that it wasn’t about the X3.
One could spend much more time than expected searching for the companies Borresen has been involved with.

 

[Puddingbuks]

I also am puzzled about the six or seven bass reflex ports. I mean, those are very small drivers.

It is all about design and impressive looks. That might get you far in a world where attention is a currency. “Look at me and my special speaker, it has seven bass reflex ports, yours only got one…”.

 

[Old_School_Brad]

It is all about design and impressive looks. That might get you far in a world where attention is a currency. “Look at me and my special speaker, it has seven bass reflex ports, yours only got one…”.

 

[Interference]

Why can’t they just design a better speaker is it because,
they don’t know how to
they choose not to
they just don’t give a fig either way ?
Keith

Michael Børresen and Lars Kristensen, heads of Audio Group Denmark, where the original founders of Raidho. Kristensen had a past in Nordost as well. According Roy Gregory on The Audio Beat, Raidho original designs were affected by similar issues. Then, Raidho collapsed in 2009 and was took over by Dantax (a solid audio company of Denmark) that restructured the brand and brought it to a certain success in the following years. Børresen and Kristensen were re-employed under Dantax. At some point, the Scansonic brand was launched as a more affordable spin-off of Raidho. Finally, the two parted ways with Dantax/Raidho and went on with their new ventures. It seems the two are very good marketers, but lack a track record in electroacoustic engineering. Børresen's ideas about speaker drivers are somewhat eccentric and do not make much sense to me, besides the fact that they seem to misuse terms like "induction" or "hysteresis". I simply believe their beliefs are totally detached from common wisdom about speaker design.

 

[Ageve]

Kristensen had a past in Nordost as well.

That explains a lot.

About us | Audio Group Denmark

audiogroupdenmark.com

As his father was one of the first high-end audio dealers in Denmark, Lars Kristensen encountered Hi-Fi at an early age and has been passionately dedicated to the world of Hi-Fi for most of his life ever since, including 20 years of service as a worldwide sales manager at Nordost from 1992 to 2012.
...
When the financial crisis hit the world in 2008, Lars and Michael decided it would be better to sell off the company to a financial partner. Three years later, in 2011, Michael presented his groundbreaking ideas for audio cables and, although Lars had actually sworn at the time never to enter the cable business again, he was absolutely thrilled with the audio cables Michael had developed. Lars immediately saw the potential of these innovative and groundbreaking audio cables

 

[Bjorn]

Michael Børresen are also co owner of Aavik Acoustics besides Ansuz Acoustics cables as mentioned by Ageve.

An Aavik amplifier was tested recently by Stereophile. One has to wonder when this was written:

John Atkinson's measurements of the Aavik U-380 integrated amplifier appeared to indicate that the amp had suffered damage, perhaps during shipping. Aavik U-380 measurements will be published as a follow-up review in a future issue

Source: https://www.stereophile.com/content/aavik-acoustics-u-380-integrated-amplifier-measurements

 

[Purité Audio]

Sonny Anderson ( Phison Audio) was contracted to design those first Aavik amps, certainly the pre but he left over what he considered poor design choices from management.
Keith

 

[Interference]

Michael Børresen are also co owner of Aavik Acoustics besides Ansuz Acoustics cables as mentioned by Ageve.

An Aavik amplifier was tested recently by Stereophile. One has to wonder when this was written:


Source: https://www.stereophile.com/content/aavik-acoustics-u-380-integrated-amplifier-measurements

Review is from 2020. Quite disappointing. It could be worth reaching out to Stereophile and make them accountable.

Erin tested the Axxess Forte 2 streaming amp and it seemed actually fine, if one ignores the ridicolous 7500 EUR price tag. However, that's fundamentally a streaming board paired with a Pascal class D power module (plus a PCB full of their awkward "coils"). That should be easy to get done right. The U380 seems to be a class D as well (not sure from which OEM), so one may expect at least decent performance from the power stage.

 

[VintageFlanker]

Børresen never disappoint.

Full data uploaded :

Børresen X3 Floorstanding Speaker Review

Børresen X3 Floorstanding

www.erinsaudiocorner.com

 

[Interference]

Someone in the comments noted that from the impedance curve it seems like the X3 drivers have extremely weak motors. The DC resistance being just slightly above 2 ohm could mean that the voice coil winding of their drivers is very short.

 

[Mart68]

Full data uploaded :

Børresen X3 Floorstanding Speaker Review

Børresen X3 Floorstanding

www.erinsaudiocorner.com

Seems to be poor in every possible area. What an achievement!

 

[dfuller]

Someone in the comments noted that from the impedance curve it seems like the X3 drivers have extremely weak motors. The DC resistance being just slightly above 2 ohm could mean that the voice coil winding of their drivers is very short.

Even considering they have neo magnets, the actual motor structure itself is tiny. Bet it's a bit of the vc and the magnet.

 

[fredoamigo]

I have a thought for their owners, if they are aware of such a design catastrophe being sold freely .

 

[YSDR]

Someone in the comments noted that from the impedance curve it seems like the X3 drivers have extremely weak motors. The DC resistance being just slightly above 2 ohm could mean that the voice coil winding of their drivers is very short.

As was mentioned, the woofers are long stroke. The unusual low impedance/DC resistance is the result of a 2.5 way design which the X3 is with 2 woofers plus 1 midwoofer, so actually 3 pieces of 8 Ohm woofers (or one 4 Ohm plus two 8 Ohms) in parallel electrical connection.
Look at the graph below which sows that the "midrange" driver is actually a midwoofer, because it runs without high-pass filter. The high Q peak in the bass range is the result of the very low cut-off passive low-pass filter.
The woofer(s) in a 2.5 way speaker is typically used to compensate the baffle step loss in the low frequency range but it seems in the X3 is used to voice the bass in an unusual way.

 

[Ktacos]

How does one even make a speaker with a 10db dip at 200hz. I genuinely don't understand how you do it. You could take almost any typical driver and toss it into a box and you won't get that.