The point was, why aren't established phile companies making OBs and a large part of that is they're not applicable to most rooms.
I simply rephrased your own comment on your skills and your preferences because of that. That is simply restating what you have disclosed as your reality.
Sure, most peoples rooms are just too damn small - sure!! But hey, the same can be said with Wilson and Magico speakers: they are BIG.
Top of the line ATC speakers are big also, Rockport. Too big for most rooms. Yet, they sell them.
Because its for the rich folks who have big rooms.
So again, why do these companies do not construct even one Big, open baffle model for their clients who ALREADY have huge rooms?
Thats what i try to figure out 😉
I guess its the fact, that a company must be coherent in their offer, PR, message, niche. Too many different products confuse clients.
This of course has nothing to do with sound quality, only with corporate mumbo-jambo, corporate identity, blah blah.
Imagine Wilson trying to win a client with 15 page long lecture how great their Material X for cabinet is, and hyper-expensive to make, only to offer something else with no cabinet 😀
The same goes with cones. Raidho with their tantalum-diamond-beryllium-unobtainium cones will never have paper cones or even a sandwich cone when there is even gram of paper..... like not in a thousand years.
I think we can all agree on that?
Because there is little to no demand for it and what is is already taken up with panels.
Show me wrong and produce a commercially successful OB dynamic driver speaker that actually makes money.
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You're making a lot of guessing. What is the true purpose of your line of questioning?
Are you trying to uncover some vast audiophile conspiracy?
Are you attempting to do your own business market research?
Are you attempting to figure out if there is some inherent deficiency in OBs that make them unattractive for manufacturing?
What are you really trying to answer and what are you ultimately going to take away from that answer?
If someone makes a self-deprecating comment, it's usually regarded as somewhat impolite for others to pick up on it...
I like the inclusion of the piezo, along with the dome(s). Someone must've sat for a while with a switch, throwing those in and out, then deciding to keep 'em in that design...
Yesterday I posted something, and didn't really appreciate the meaning of my own post until I thought about it for a while:
My $150 Behringer speakers have been in my listening room for longer than any speaker I've ever owned.
Obviously what I'm about to say next is going to veer into a big ol' rabbit hole of "subjectivity." But I think that a big mistake that audiophiles make, in general, is to obsess over things that are different instead of things that are better. Basically our brains are wired in such a way that novel experiences are more "exciting" and that's created a scenario where the best / easiest way to sell a set of "audiophile" speakers is to just make something different.
Vandersteen speakers are a good example of this. I bought a pair off of Craigslist, mostly because they were well regarded in Stereophile. When I first bought them, I appreciated that they had impressive intelligibility and they imaged really nice. The longer I had them, the more I resented that they weren't even remotely dynamic. It's not just that they CAN'T get loud, it's like the speaker just sucks all of the dynamics out of music and movies in general. I spent years trying to sell my set, and eventually parted with them for something like $200.
Behringer beat the Linkwitz Orions, and possibly part of that is that they don't really do anything wrong. They're not going to knock your socks off or change your world, they're just inoffensive. My Gedlee Summas were a million times more dynamic, but they were also FIVE CUBIC FEET each.
If that comparison doesn't make sense, here's another one:
There used to be a restaurant in Spain that specialized in extremely exotic dishes. Here's one of them, "smoke foam." I know some Rich Dudes who've been known to travel halfway around the world, simply to eat at restaurants like this. The restaurant that served this, "El Bulli", eventually failed.
Basically there's a niche for restaurants that serve extremely exotic dishes. But do you want to eat "smoke foam" three times a week? I doubt it. The audiophile market is a lot like that; exotic/weird speakers that are great for bragging rights and impressing your friends. But the idea that they're fundamentally superior to "conventional" speakers from Genelec, JBL, Revel, etc? I have my doubts. I think a great deal of their appeal is that they're different. The same with El Bulli.
That brings us to the Bastanis. I've heard their older designs at audio shows. To me, they always seemed like someone's half baked DIY project. Not terrible by any means, and certainly DIFFERENT, but nowhere near as refined as the horn speakers from JBL.
I think there's an incredible amount of circle jerking going on in the world of audiophiles, and I think the people who participate in the hobby often lavish praise on speakers based on:
1) how "different" the speaker is
2) a feeling that they need to "support" small manufacturers
3) a belief that corporations like JBL and Genelec should be judged by a different metric, because every time that JBL sells a speaker, that's one less sale for a boutique manufacturer
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Brett,
Thanx for stating my thots on construction prowess.
I expect there is more work to get a good baffle to be inert than a box due to the natural flimsiness of an OB. And i have always been baffled by the unbaffled OB.
The difference comes down to what is done with the output of the back of the driver.
dave
Thanx for stating my thots on construction prowess.
I expect there is more work to get a good baffle to be inert than a box due to the natural flimsiness of an OB. And i have always been baffled by the unbaffled OB.
The difference comes down to what is done with the output of the back of the driver.
dave
QFT.
Especially point 3 where some artisanal product is deemed better than something from a manufacturer like JBL because something mass produced cannot be better than something made by hand. Apply the same to a car made in some guy's garage vs a Toyota or Honda.
Plus in recent times there is a cultural shift that anything commercial is deemed evil my a certain segment of the population.
Yep.
On Reddit, there's a damning review of the Keele CBT. And that stupid review has made me doubt the design about a million times:
It took me about a week to "acclimate" to the sound of the Gedlee Summas. The treble sounds noticeably "weird" at first, because it's spread out across the entire beamwidth. Conventional speakers tend to beam, and I think most people are just acclimated to that.
That dumb Reddit post always haunts me, because part of me agrees with the author, that the measured performance of the CBT is quite bad above 5khz or so.
Then again, maybe the author should have just hung in there for a few weeks until he grew used to how they sound.
I know there's a dude on diyaudio who's had both CBTs and constant directivity speakers, and it's one of those things where I really wonder if I'm "missing out" because the CBT is so unconventional, or if a plain ol' two way is the way to go.
Last night I was watching an interview with Kevin Voecks, Revel's designer, and he was diving into all of the technology that his speakers feature. But there in the background was a JBL CBT and I kept wondering if maybe I need to "expand my horizons" and try something more "unconventional."
Ideally I'd just have five different listening rooms lol
I think one of the most important reason there are not many commercial OB speakers is that an OB needs a lot of eq if you don't want to compromise.
That means a good OB design is almost by definition an active speaker. You need active filtering or dsp and separate power amps for all drivers. Basically you need to design and sell it as a complete package, speakers, amps filter and in case of dsp multichannel volume control between dsp and the power amps if you want to maintain good gain structure.
This makes it commercially very difficult to market such a system. Not only will the price tag be huge compared to any passive boxed system, but also the typical high end buyer almost certainly has a very pronounced opinion on what amps, cables etc he thinks are acceptable and probably they already have invested in such equipment. They will be very reluctant to invest big $$$ to buy what is basically an all in one system (line in sound out) leaving little room for personel choices.
That means a good OB design is almost by definition an active speaker. You need active filtering or dsp and separate power amps for all drivers. Basically you need to design and sell it as a complete package, speakers, amps filter and in case of dsp multichannel volume control between dsp and the power amps if you want to maintain good gain structure.
This makes it commercially very difficult to market such a system. Not only will the price tag be huge compared to any passive boxed system, but also the typical high end buyer almost certainly has a very pronounced opinion on what amps, cables etc he thinks are acceptable and probably they already have invested in such equipment. They will be very reluctant to invest big $$$ to buy what is basically an all in one system (line in sound out) leaving little room for personel choices.
Took me no time at all to adjust to my Unitys.
Yeah, your designs are far too conventional.
It's a planar and not what I meant. The person I was responding to had been referring to cone drivers since the OP.
any of you working on those big audio companies? if no, then this discussion will be meaningless
it's like all of sport commentator or fans, online/offline who criticize the Management/Coach/Technical Director etc for their decision on A/B/C choice that you might not like, but none of those comments are really matter to them during their internal discussion on the bench room
indeed we have some of representatives companiy like PassLabs here in this forum where it produced boxed loudspeaker but never produce OB while it's grand master Nelson Pass posted several articles about OB.
so questioning those companies who might not have any senior level employer in this forum seems will never have it's answer, but anyone can have their own speculations anyway
it's like all of sport commentator or fans, online/offline who criticize the Management/Coach/Technical Director etc for their decision on A/B/C choice that you might not like, but none of those comments are really matter to them during their internal discussion on the bench room
indeed we have some of representatives companiy like PassLabs here in this forum where it produced boxed loudspeaker but never produce OB while it's grand master Nelson Pass posted several articles about OB.
so questioning those companies who might not have any senior level employer in this forum seems will never have it's answer, but anyone can have their own speculations anyway
It would have taken me longer than that to voice them and set them up in the room.
I'm unaware of how much Earl chose to prioritise voicing but it's a trivial thing from a design perspective, even though it can be heavily involved in practice. Still it leaves me unsure what to make of this.