High Efficiency speakers

[ThomasOK]

As all those here who have experienced or followed the thread on the JBL 3677 are aware, a high-efficiency, horn-loaded speaker can, if designed properly, provide a very musical and engaging listening experience - especially when driven by our favorite electronics (not to discount those using other musical components). That they can do so probably came as a surprise to pretty much everyone who bought a pair (it certainly did to me) as the 3677s don't seem to have the "horn" colorations that at least I had come to expect.

In learning more about the 3677s I found a lot of information on various similar designs and the cult of high efficiency, much of which I have shared elsewhere. But I thought it might be worthwhile to start a thread devoted to these types of designs to put the info in one place and see if anyone has heard any that they found worthwhile.

For starters I just saw an interesting review in Stereophile of the Volti Audio Rival speaker. It is their entry level unit at $7900 a pair and uses a 15" pro audio paper cone woofer in a front-ported cabinet and horn loaded mid and tweeter drivers with a claimed efficiency of 100dB. Their two bigger speakers use similar drive units with the top of the line being basically a heavily re-engineered takeoff on the Klipschorn.

Fredrik and I also noted that the DeVore Fidelity room at the last RMAF was making good music with vinyl and their Orangutan O/93, a high-efficiency (93dB, hence the name) two way with a 10" paper cone woofer and a soft dome tweeter with a short horn. These are in a relatively wide but shallow dual-ported cabinet.

These are some examples of the upturn in the sales of efficient, simple, wide baffle speakers. Any others of interest?

[Charlie1]

Have you heard Living Voice speakers Tom? I heard a pair several years ago fed by a 300B amp and enjoyed the music they made. It was all new to me though, including the room, so no idea what was doing what.

[John]

I've been running these along with a pair of Tannoy System 1000's for several years and really enjoy the music they make. Here's a bit about the DMT15's:

http://stereonomono.blogspot.com/2014/0 ... tm-ii.html

[matthias]

The debut of a new HE speaker at Munich High End 2017:

Azzolina Audio Hadron

https://electravolt.blogspot.de/

Some listening impressions:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mpnGCf4SDE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xpa0_fKrmiA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAMrZuT ... e=youtu.be

Matt

[lindsayt]

I have a pair of EV Sentry III's. This particular pair were originally installed in the Royal National Theatre in London in cut-outs on either side of the stage. They came my way a few years ago when the Theatre did a refurbishment and the refurbishment engineer put them on ebay. I bought them for £415. When I went to collect them, they were in the same room as a pair of Altec Vott's that dwarfed the Sentrys.

As per the ebay advert description, my Sentry's had rotten foam surrounds on the 15" bass drivers and one of the tweeters wasn't working. I fixed these issues with about £80 in parts and 3 hours of my time.

The strongest areas of the Sentry's are the midrange and treble which are particularly tuneful. Weakest area is the bass, which I would rate as average median tuneful. EV Patrician 800's are better overall than the Sentry's, which is fair enough considering that the Patricians were twice the price new and were over 10 times the price 2nd hand when I bought them.

They are more tuneful than my Linn Isobarik and Linn Sara speakers. They manage to do this even when used with ultra budget amplifiers like my Creek CAS4040. IE, Sentry's are not amplifier fussy.

I've taken the Sentrys to a few bake-offs at other people's homes now. All of which they have won in terms of sound quality / tunefulness. And all of which they have lost in terms of small size and looks.

The most recent bake-off I took them to, pitted them against £4500 worth of ATC 11's with a Hegel 360 amplifier and £1800 worth of AVI DM10's with a subwoofer. For tunefulness, the ATC's lost, the AVI's came 2nd and the EV's won, even when used with a £15 Denon C630 CD player and £99 Creek 4040 amp.

I'd rate my £485 EV Sentry III's with £15 used Denon CD player and £99 (new in 1983) Creek amplifier as more tuneful in the bass and midrange than £30,000 worth of Linn Klimax DS, Linn Klimax Kontrol, fully active Linn 4200 into Linn Majik Isobariks.

[matthias]

I'd rate my £485 EV Sentry III's with £15 used Denon CD player and £99 (new in 1983) Creek amplifier as more tuneful in the bass and midrange than £30,000 worth of Linn Klimax DS, Linn Klimax Kontrol, fully active Linn 4200 into Linn Majik Isobariks.

I bet they would be even more tuneful at the end of a passive Linn Klimax system.
Source first rules.

Matt

[sunbeamgls]

Unfortunately I didn't get the chance to hear the Azzolina Hadrons - they were playing the large blue horns when I was in that room, which unfortunately suffered from many of the usual horn challenges being harsh, coloured and thin. I don't know if they were musical or not because they were too unpleasant to bother.
However, the massive Avante Garde horns with subs were very musical indeed and didn't seem to suffer from any of the usual horn challanges. Very enjoyable - they even had a live drummer feeding his electronic drumkit through them to good effect.
Another very musical horn based system was the over 100dB/W Living Voice Palladians with their matching subs. A very fluid and coherent kind of sound - not the last word in definition but very tuneful.
Neither of those systems can, in any way, be thought of in the same ball park as the likes of the JBL3677 in terms of affordability nor the required room size of course.

[lindsayt]

I'd rate my £485 EV Sentry III's with £15 used Denon CD player and £99 (new in 1983) Creek amplifier as more tuneful in the bass and midrange than £30,000 worth of Linn Klimax DS, Linn Klimax Kontrol, fully active Linn 4200 into Linn Majik Isobariks.

I bet they would be even more tuneful at the end of a passive Linn Klimax system.
Source first rules.

Matt

I think you're right there about the Sentries sounding better on the end of a Klimax system. There's nothing special at all about the Denon C630 CD player and the Creek 4040 is the least tuneful 2 channel amplifier I've ever bought.

However, source first clearly does not apply when comparing the Klimax / 4200 / Majik Isobarik system against the Denon / Creek / EV system.

[matthias]

....... they were playing the large blue horns when I was in that room, which unfortunately suffered from many of the usual horn challenges being harsh, coloured and thin. I don't know if they were musical or not because they were too unpleasant to bother.
Neither of those systems can, in any way, be thought of in the same ball park as the likes of the JBL3677 in terms of affordability nor the required room size of course.

Agree.

Matt

[lejonklou]

However, source first clearly does not apply when comparing the Klimax / 4200 / Majik Isobarik system against the Denon / Creek / EV system.

Source First always applies.

[lindsayt]

However, source first clearly does not apply when comparing the Klimax / 4200 / Majik Isobarik system against the Denon / Creek / EV system.

Source First always applies.

Then how do you explain the results of my Majik Isobarik and ATC 11 listening tests, where the systems with the better source / amplification sounded less tuneful?

Source first does not apply when comparing systems with digital sources with speakers as different as EV Sentry III's and Majik Isobariks / ATC 11's.

The superiority of the Klimax DS and Klimax Kontrol was not enough to overcome the inferiority of the Majik Isobariks.


Source first may always have applied to your listening tests. They haven't to mine.

[lejonklou]

Then how do you explain the results of my Majik Isobarik and ATC 11 listening tests, where the systems with the better source / amplification sounded less tuneful?

Simple: We listen for different things. Source First applies to musical differences, nothing else.

You have previously said that Source First doesn't work with digital sources and that a Denon C630 CD player is as good as a Linn Klimax DS. Conclusion: We're listening for different things.

[sunbeamgls]

Source First applies to musical differences, nothing else

Source first doesn't only apply to musicality. It often contributes to many other aspects improving too.

[lejonklou]

Source First applies to musical differences, nothing else

Source first doesn't only apply to musicality. It often contributes to many other aspects improving too.

True, but there is no real consistency as there is in the musicality.

I have doubted Source First so many times, thinking that 'this change of speaker is just overwhelming, surely a small improvement in the power supply of the source can't possibly compete!' And then when I hook up the slightly improved source with the previous, lesser playback, it's just better musically. And every time I'm surprised.

[sunbeamgls]

Source First applies to musical differences, nothing else

Source first doesn't only apply to musicality. It often contributes to many other aspects improving too.

True, but there is no real consistency as there is in the musicality.

I have doubted Source First so many times, thinking that 'this change of speaker is just overwhelming, surely a small improvement in the power supply of the source can't possibly compete!' And then when I hook up the slightly improved source with the previous, lesser playback, it's just better musically. And every time I'm surprised.

I wasn't questioning your view on that. I just questioned the idea that a better source 'applies to musical differences, nothing else' which, in my opinion, and above you seem to agree, is too narrow a view of the improvements a better source can bring.