The best 5" midbass ever

[gainphile]

I got the legendary Vifa P13WH last night and they're nice. Apparently they are unobtanium now and I snatched the last 4 existing in Melbourne.

The obvious question is: Is there anything better? What about ribbon/planar territory?

[Moondog55]

What are you planning to do with yours?? I have plans to build this
http://undefinition.googlepages.com/diy-aethers



But have not decided absolutley yet on the woofers, don't want to go over 8inch wide to keep the baffle about 10inches at most. I imagine there are better mids just that these are reputed to be easy to work with.
Did you get yours from Speakerbits?? Then they may well be the last in Melbourne.
I have no experience with either ribbons or planar panels, but the Quad ESL was one of the best speakers I ever heard, just no bass to speak of

[gainphile]

Sorry I meant I bought 2 of the last 4 at Speakerbits.

Yes the Aethers and Ariel discussions were the main factor for me to purchase these speakers. Apparently Linkwitz too had tested these nicely as well when selecting the drivers for Phoenix/Orion and decided to go with the bigger ones for SPL purposes. They ranked 1st on burst and may explain the blindingly fast snare drums emitting from them.

http://www.linkwitzlab.com/mid_dist.htm

Currently it's used on an open baffle, tri-amped and equalised for low freq. Viva tweeters and midbass, 10" jaycar paper woofer. Not too sure if I want to box the woofers as aethers but they sure look damn nice.