I can't afford these but was curious if anyone out there was ever used or heard them.
http://www.e-speakers.com/products/manger.html
http://www.e-speakers.com/products/manger.html
I've used them. They are good full range drivers, measuring
quite well, but not particularly efficient. They have two voice
coils, apparently nearly identical and designed to be driven
parallel, as they are about 15 ohms each.
The fundamental resonance is about 80 Hz.
The sound is fairly neutral, although not as apparently dynamic
as the higher sensitivity Lowthers or Fostex - more on the order
of Jordans.
And they are expensive.
I am posting a 400 Hz + curve.
quite well, but not particularly efficient. They have two voice
coils, apparently nearly identical and designed to be driven
parallel, as they are about 15 ohms each.
The fundamental resonance is about 80 Hz.
The sound is fairly neutral, although not as apparently dynamic
as the higher sensitivity Lowthers or Fostex - more on the order
of Jordans.
And they are expensive.
I am posting a 400 Hz + curve.
Attachments
The Manger drivers are, to me, somewhat intriguing. I've been listening to a pair of 109s for about a month now, and have several observations, a few of which I'll share here. The first is that, in a process still ongoing, I have undergone a certain relearning process listening to the Mangers, and this relearning process seemingly has much to do with the way the Mangers reproduce high frequencies. The Mangers seem to offer different sonic cues to other drivers I've heard (I'm familiar with horns, ribbons, electrostats and cones-n-domes) in a way that, on first impression, seemed to deprive the sound of a certain high frequency content. The Mangers, again on first impression, seemed to dull the music, or as some might say, create a less dynamic sound. My slightly more seasoned view is that the missing high frequency content is probably mostly noise in what the manufacturer calls "transient noise." Whatever can be said of the phrase "transient noise," I'm personally growing to prefer the type of high frequency content the Mangers produce which, lacking the fizzz and shushhh of other drivers, especially domes, and extending to 35KHz, is more highly resolved, especially in near-field listening. HF SACD noise, for example, is easily heard on these speakers. Transparency---again, especially in near-field---is the best I've experienced.
I might mention, here, that the difference in sound between near and farther field listening with the Mangers is the difference I hear listening to live orchestral music close and far. I infer from this observation that the Mangers are doing something better than other drivers I've heard.
My second observation is these speakers are wonderfully coherent. They create minimal phase shift, and they lack the overlap/breakup phenomena produced by a 2k/3k crossover.
Robert E. Greene reviewed the Mangers in TAS in what reads to me as a careful, seasoned review. He called the Mangers a "landmark" design. I tend to agree.
BTW, what the Kharma speaker cabinet has done for cone drivers seems the object of what Overkill Audio is attempting to do for the Mangers. I suspect the sonic betterment offered by improved cabinet design marginally favours the Manger driver.
My extended 2c.
I might mention, here, that the difference in sound between near and farther field listening with the Mangers is the difference I hear listening to live orchestral music close and far. I infer from this observation that the Mangers are doing something better than other drivers I've heard.
My second observation is these speakers are wonderfully coherent. They create minimal phase shift, and they lack the overlap/breakup phenomena produced by a 2k/3k crossover.
Robert E. Greene reviewed the Mangers in TAS in what reads to me as a careful, seasoned review. He called the Mangers a "landmark" design. I tend to agree.
BTW, what the Kharma speaker cabinet has done for cone drivers seems the object of what Overkill Audio is attempting to do for the Mangers. I suspect the sonic betterment offered by improved cabinet design marginally favours the Manger driver.
My extended 2c.
serengetiplains said:
There are a few problems with the drivers that should explain the reasons for subjective qualities noticed by you and others..
Hi-freq.s: Off-axis performance suffers, so as you go higher in freq. there is less overall sound-output. This is NOT a dynamic constraint thing, but it will lead to a subjectivly "duller" sound - especially with an extended bass response.
Dynamics: People tend to prefer more moving-mass as freq.s decrease. Increased mass with increased motor gauss/force gives a more dynamic sound. You have to have BOTH (its not an either-or affair). The Mangers have fairly strong motors with a guass aproaching a respectable 1.4, however they only have a mass thats about five times that of a conventional tweeter - subjectivly this isn't nearly enough for freq.s below 1kHz. Most of this can be "made-up-for" with freq.s limited to 400Hz.
Now combine both elements and you'll end up with a subjective "life-less" quality.
The overkill audio uses the beyma lx60 - one of the best woofers PERIOD. Its a high-mass design for a woofer with a fairly high fundamental resonace and an sd typical of 12incher's (though its mass is "medium" in comparison to most woofers with this sd). This woofer has the ability to be used higher in freq. up to 800Hz (on and off-axis) with low distortion and excellent freq. linearity. IF they use a shallow crossover slope (1st order) as high as 300-400Hz then they should overcome the "dynamic" problems people associate with the Mangers (with only a small loss of midrange detail).
They could also alieviate the problem of high-freq. loss over the spectral balance by increasing the output of the Manger as freq. increases (via the digital crossover), AND listen to the speaker off-axis where the response is flat for the listener.
Here them at a dealer's shop, I felt that it did have the dynamic jump factor that a lot of the high efficiency single drivers have. I suspect this is due to the not so high efficiency, the dealer also mentioned that they sounded best high power amps ie power hungry. Of course it has all the coherency that a single driver can give.
ScottG said:
Scott, my observations derive from on-axis listening positions at three sitting distances: 1', 4' and 10'. The HF differences I mention in my note are apparent at all distances and, to the extent apparent in the near field, relate not to quantity of output, per your explanation, but to quality, ie, to a differently shaped HF waveform.
"People tend to prefer ...." Let's put it this way: different drivers sound different. Any such difference, IME, comes with costs and benefits, said costs and benefits usually being inextricably intertwined. Example: getting heavy moving mass bass comes at the cost, in the case of the Manger, of a loss of coherence in the 100-1kHz range. Benefit and cost together.
That's not my experience. Is it yours?
I think the Overkill crossover is in the range of 200-300Hz, 90dB+.
I think you missed my meaning with regard to off-axis performance. I wasn't describing direct sound off-axis or the monopole behaviour between low and high freq.s. Instead I was refering to the summed-output of the driver both on and off-axis where off-axis out-put is decreased relative to on-axis. Graphically this can be seen with a polar plot (and you'll notice a lack of this in the Manger literature). This subjective effect is relativly invariant to distance - though it becomes more pronounced at extended distances due to room reflections, (and made far worse with monopole behaviour in-room between low and high freq.s). Be assured, this will effect quality substantially. (i.e. quantity and quality are often intertwined..)
As to different drivers sounding different - rather than simply saying it, I was giving an emperical reason WHY. (science-wise look to impeadance - not electrical.)
Combining a loss of subjective dynamics with high freq. loss does indeed provide a "life-less" quality (and its not just my opinion).
As to different drivers sounding different - rather than simply saying it, I was giving an emperical reason WHY. (science-wise look to impeadance - not electrical.)
Combining a loss of subjective dynamics with high freq. loss does indeed provide a "life-less" quality (and its not just my opinion).
ScottG said:
There's more to this aspect of Scott's comment than first met my eye. My oversimplifying tendencies suggest to me that a heavy-mass, high-gauss driver will reproduce certain elements of bass frequencies with greater fidelity to the live experience than others. For instance, an important element of the sound of a tympani drum is an explosive, high energy bass transient. I assume the HM/HG driver better reproduces this element of the tympani drum sound solely on account that certain driver properties match the properties of the sound generating source, the drum membrane. But the tympani drum is also a bending wave transducer which by necessary implication produces a characteristic bending wave sound, whatever that characteristic might be. It's not a large leap, at least as an initial tentative assumption, to suggest the Manger driver is better suited to reproducing the bending wave element of the tympani drum sound, despite never accurately reproducing the explosive bass element.
Change the bass sound in question .... say, to a cello. Cello bass lacks the high energy transients of the tympani drum bass (cellos aren't typically struck, though a string may be plucked). Which driver, the Manger or the HM/HG cone, will reproduce which of the perhaps several important elements of cello bass better?
My point, here, is that dynamic heft is one element of a given low frequency "sound" which, depending on the sound in question (drum-sound, cello-sound, tuba-sound), varies in relative prominence, if you will, as a contributing element.
ScottG said:
Some would say (me among them) that the Mangers more faithfully recreate, in a reverberant field called the listening room, the ear's experience of high frequencies in a diffuse field, depending, perhaps, on the type of music. At least for orchestral music, which provides a good reference point, I'm hard pressed to describe row-10+ sound as bright and lively .... "dull" is the more fitting description. "Live" electronically generated music has always to my ear sounded more lively, and dynamically lively, in comparison. Mind you, when was the last time you heard live electronic music generated by a wall of Mangers?
HF quantity issues aside, the Manger reproduces HFs of a different *character* or quality (I prefer the term character as it does not imply better/worse the term "quality" does in its usual use). That difference is in part measurable and accounts for a different listening experience, much like the differing tympani drum "character" and cello "character" produce a different listening experience.
Again your not quite there on the high freq. issue. What you have just described is the interaction of driver and room. I'm not saying that this isn't a factor BUT it isn't THE effect I was describing. In otherwords you prefer fewer reflections (most certainly near-arrival reflections, but also late arival reflections). This is an issue thats gone back and forth between horn proponents and omni-directional proponents.
think of it like this:
speaker in a "dead" room (anechoic chamber). Zero boundry reinforcement at any freq. (accepting the speaker itself).
Speaker A has a flat on-axis response from 20Hz to 20kHz but has a wave-guide (without artifacts) from 800Hz up with only a 60 degree radiation because of the wave-guide.
Speaker B is omnidirectional from 800Hz up but is otherwise identical to Speaker A.
Output on-axis of the two speakers is identical.
The percieved "balance" of the two speakers will be quite different despite the lack of boundry gain. Speaker A will be described as "thin" or "dull" by comparison - having the subjective effect of a depressed freq. response from 800Hz up.
(I hope this explains it better..)
think of it like this:
speaker in a "dead" room (anechoic chamber). Zero boundry reinforcement at any freq. (accepting the speaker itself).
Speaker A has a flat on-axis response from 20Hz to 20kHz but has a wave-guide (without artifacts) from 800Hz up with only a 60 degree radiation because of the wave-guide.
Speaker B is omnidirectional from 800Hz up but is otherwise identical to Speaker A.
Output on-axis of the two speakers is identical.
The percieved "balance" of the two speakers will be quite different despite the lack of boundry gain. Speaker A will be described as "thin" or "dull" by comparison - having the subjective effect of a depressed freq. response from 800Hz up.
(I hope this explains it better..)
ScottG said:
Driver/room interaction accounts for perhaps 10% of my description.
jdybnis said:
IMHO, the speakers will necessarily sound different depending, to consider only one importantly obvious variable, on whether the speaker uses ribbon, cone/dome, horn or bending wave drivers or a combination of which. My posts above describe my perception of the different sound character the Manger produces, which character I assume derives as a necessary incident of the Manger being a bending wave driver. *That* character, in its essential respects, has nothing to do with the relatively less complicated, and less important, variable called dispersion.
I have experimented with a Mangar design that places the drivers inside a damped stainless-steel enclosure. Based on that experience, I can state that the Mangars are capable of sounding quite dynamic indeed. Far more dynamic than with a more conventional MDF or plywood cabinet, and I don't find the treble of this metal enclosure design to be dull, either ("quiet" is a far better word to describe the character of the top end).
If the sound from a Mangar is perceived as being dull and lifeless, IME the cabinet construction is a very likely culprit.
In general, I find that the Mangars are a rather difficult driver to work with, but well worth the effort.
regards, jonathan carr
If the sound from a Mangar is perceived as being dull and lifeless, IME the cabinet construction is a very likely culprit.
In general, I find that the Mangars are a rather difficult driver to work with, but well worth the effort.
regards, jonathan carr
sorry, I should have prefaced it to your first paragraph (determined by the first sentence) - which appeared (at least to me) to be exclusively about speaker room interaction. (2nd paragraph, to me, is quite different.)
I'd strongly disagree on dispersion being either less complicated or less important. With regard to hearing, dispersion is extremely complicated, (spectral balance is just the "tip" of the proverbial "iceberg"). As to all the reasons why, well you'll need to start reading a LOT of material (and even then I think the thesis papers are only "scratching the surface"). (Start by searching for HRTF's if your interested. Remember though that Head related dispersion and soud locus dispersion are quite different.)
In any event, I'm not disputing that the Manger may be doing things more correctly than other drivers - my focus was on WHY they might be subjectivly described as dull or lacking dynamics. However the belief that the driver's dynamic time domain performance would cause a "dull" or less "dynamic" sound is in error. While "transient noise" (or dynamic time domain errors) are certainly a distortion, they should not cause the aforementioned subjective effect. Nor should static time domain errors cause this effect, (errors seen in a cumulative spectral decay).
Finally, a bending wave driver is nothing special. Indeed, what their litereture fails to mention is that virtually ALL so-called fullrange drivers (for loudspeakers) are in fact bending wave drivers over most of their operating range. What is special about the Manger is that the process is far more controlled than most and in particular controlled in..(drum roll please).. dispersion - though not off-axis dispersion but rather on-axis with regard to where freq.s eminate from the drivers surface (i.e. that the high freq.s are centered on the diaphram).
jdybnis:
this is again a VERY complex issue that requires a LOT of reading. The short anwser is Intensity and Time, or "it just does".
I'd strongly disagree on dispersion being either less complicated or less important. With regard to hearing, dispersion is extremely complicated, (spectral balance is just the "tip" of the proverbial "iceberg"). As to all the reasons why, well you'll need to start reading a LOT of material (and even then I think the thesis papers are only "scratching the surface"). (Start by searching for HRTF's if your interested. Remember though that Head related dispersion and soud locus dispersion are quite different.)
In any event, I'm not disputing that the Manger may be doing things more correctly than other drivers - my focus was on WHY they might be subjectivly described as dull or lacking dynamics. However the belief that the driver's dynamic time domain performance would cause a "dull" or less "dynamic" sound is in error. While "transient noise" (or dynamic time domain errors) are certainly a distortion, they should not cause the aforementioned subjective effect. Nor should static time domain errors cause this effect, (errors seen in a cumulative spectral decay).
Finally, a bending wave driver is nothing special. Indeed, what their litereture fails to mention is that virtually ALL so-called fullrange drivers (for loudspeakers) are in fact bending wave drivers over most of their operating range. What is special about the Manger is that the process is far more controlled than most and in particular controlled in..(drum roll please).. dispersion - though not off-axis dispersion but rather on-axis with regard to where freq.s eminate from the drivers surface (i.e. that the high freq.s are centered on the diaphram).
jdybnis:
this is again a VERY complex issue that requires a LOT of reading. The short anwser is Intensity and Time, or "it just does".
sbolin said:
If your looking for empircal evidence I believe John Dunlavy among others has done testing in this area. (perhaps some from Canada's research facility - understanding that such enviorments are quite rare). While I'd like to have a test facility like it, alas I'm stuck with the same basic testing software thats commonly available today (thankfully).
ScottG said:
"Should"?
ScottG, in your experience, how do time domain and transient speed affect one's subjective perception of the sound? More particularly, in what terms do you describe the sonic difference between a driver, such as the Manger, having a 13us rise time and a step function as on the attached graph, and a typical cone or dome driver having a much slower rise time and an identifiably different step function (see almost every edition of Stereophile)?
My Manger 109s replaced a well regarded (Swiss) ribbon/cone speaker in my system costing >3X the Manger. My girlfriend, who only amusedly follows my audio related meanderings, said about the Mangers, "wow, are those ever clear .... I really like their sound." (Why are not more women in high end audio .... would have prevented so many wasted diversions into ridiculous sounding amps/speakers/source components. OTOH, I'm not surprised to see a woman at the helm of Manger.) This "clarity" about which my girlfriend remarked likely speaks to the Manger's time domain and step performance, which I suspect to be the source of jcarr's comment that the Manger driver is "quiet."
The interesting point, here, is why the Manger sounds so different from a first rate ribbon---and IME subjectively cleaner. Driver mass evidently is not the determining factor. Nor is dispersion, as my ribbons are more directional than the Mangers.
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