Another "Voodoo" Question

[sdclc126]

Regarding ScottG's thread "The "Voodoo" of Vibration in Loudspeakers" -

I had to start a different thread here because mine is a different subject - at least I think so - I didn't get beyond his first post. I went to one of the links he provided:
http://mother-of-tone.com/speaker.htm and was quite shocked at what I read.

Namely, that modern driver manufacturers don't know what they're doing, that the best, indeed ONLY cone and coil former material that should be used is paper, that magnets are designed wrong, and that drivers should all have phase plugs instead of dust caps, forget measuring and just listen, etc. etc.

Well I don't know where to start - I don't want to sound hyperctitical of this guy, so I'll just ask, how many of you people out there agree with him? At the very least he sounds VERY opinionated and rather crude. He doesn't seem to say what he prefers, he more just declares himself right.

Certainly there has always been subjectivity and "art" in the design and creation of loudspeaker systems and individual drivers, but there has also always been a substantial (and growing) amount of science applied to the endeavor, and it certainly appears, though I haven't heard them all, that science has been steadily helping to devise better and better sounding products over the years - NOT worse. Look at Linkwitz for one - his site is almost all mathematics.

I wonder what would happen if we took this guy and had him blind audition several different speakers with different drivers of different materials, etc. and asked him to pick out his favorites? Do you think he would ALWAYS pick those with paper cones & coil formers, etc. etc? It would be a semi-scientific test of subjective preferences, but I'd sure like to see the results.

Of course to make such a test more scientific you would want to do the experiment with several people (at least 30 or so, according to statistical principles) and see what kinds of trends show up (if any).

I said I didn't want to be hypercritical of this guy, but he seems hypercritical of a HUGE chunk of the audio industry and current thinking therein. And since many of us here have designed with non-paper drivers, tons of measuring, and endless hours of listening, he seems to be, indirectly, rather hypercritical of us.

I'm editorializing and soapboxing here, but I feel resentful of what this guy has said and implied; it doesn't ring true to me and I'd like to hear some feedback from the good folks on this forum.

Thanks.

[poobah]

1) Look at the guy's fingernails.

2) He doesn't know squat about materials so shouldn't speak about them. Speaker builders look for new materials in an effort to address known issues with existing materials... some work, some don't

3) He is presumptuous to think that only he knows about the cavity behind the dust cap. Resonator... yes... damper... yes... hmmm. Potential pump for moving air across the voice coil... yes... hmm

4) He had nothing to say about surrounds or spiders... so I guess those don't matter all.

5) Trusts ONLY his ears...