Speaker drivers based on magnetostriction

[Nikolas Ojala]

Have you heard these or about these?

http://www.feonic.com/

I haven't but new technologies are always interesting.

[el`Ol]

Here is an other concept with a stripe bending in a magnetic field:
http://v3.espacenet.com/publicationD...064972A1&KC=A1
I asked the inventor for some hints for building it, but he was honest enough to tell me NXT-like conventional drivers are sonically superior.

[Mapper]

Nikolas

I am the Web Developer who built the website (so perhaps slightly biased). But I did get to hear these drives being used at www.studioav.co.uk
Unfortunately I am not an Audiophile so cannot really provide a lot of input regarding the sound quality except by association.

In one room the drives are used as HiFi - Home Cinema where the front speakers are wall panels (not sure of the material) and the rear speakers are artworks in wooden frames. The FeONIC Subwoofer is a another Magnetostriction drive and sits in a cupboard. No wires - no speaker boxes.

StudioAV's main demo room contained hugely expensive kit (multiples of £10K's) and they had FeONIC on test in another room adjacent to that. Playing the Beatles I recall.

Make of that what you will.

The Downloads page includes the Specifications for the F1.3 drive and Subwoofer. That may help you get a feel for the performance.
FeONIC have come a long way from the Soundbug.

Cheers

[tritosine]

The requested URL /downloads/specs/Retail_Whispering_Windows_-_FeONIC_F1.pdf was not found on this server.


google found it here:
http://media.feonic.com/downloads/sp..._feonic_f1.pdf


upper , lowercase mismatch?

[Mapper]

tritosine

Thankyou for taking the effort to report a problem - and apologies for the off topic for everyone else.

The links work for me - from the Whispering Windows Product page.
Where did you link from? May have been a one off server glitch?

Perhaps you can email me direct to avoid cluttering up the board.

Cheers

Mapper

[Mapper]

Those interested in FeONIC Magnetostriction audio drives may find the whispering windows site interesting.

This is a use of the technology going back to 2003 which came out about the same time as the SoundBug.

See also FeONIC - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
and
Magnetostriction - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[LineArray]

Hi,

i remember an article about an inventor from france.

AFAIR he build a globe shaped surface from a magnetostrictive

metal - nickel ? some alloy ? - and applied an oscillating magnetic

field to the structure. Since nickel can only shrink in the magnetic

field - independent from field polarity - he had to apply a bias to

reproduce sinusoidal signals without distorsion.

Could be more than 20 Years ago ... would be interesting

to find some information on his approach.

[Mapper]

Hi,

FeONIC have added a Youtube channel and a Facebook page. Subscribe to the channel and become a fan of the page to keep up to date.

FeONIC Invisible Speakers on Youtube

See the neat 3d animation for an overview of the technology as compared to traditional cone speakers. Hope it doesn't start a Flame War... ;-)


FeONIC | Facebook

Cheers

[Pano]

Very nicely done website, Mapper. Fast, too.

It would be fun to hear these in action.

[Mapper]

Thanks for that, panomaniac. I assume you are referring to FeONIC: Invisible Speakers, Public Address, Marine Speakers, Flat Panel Speakers, Sound Zones

Feedback about websites is a rare thing. I worry constantly about the speed. The novel navigation approach makes for a very big site. But as you are in the US the site will be quicker than here over the pond (hosted by Webfaction with Texas based servers).

Are you near any big cities? I'll try and find out if there are any F-Drives nearby. A long shot but worth a try.

I have listened to the drives in a Home Cinema setup. Weird to look at a wall and floor producing good quality sound with not a box or a wire in sight. And importantly the excursion is much lower than other hidden speaker solutions so no risk of shaking the plaster off the walls.

Cheers