who is buying into the ~~hype~~? I mean new is not always better. I think this Beryllium is all hype. ~~ IF indeed this tweet was superior to past proven and tried legends,,why are there not videos on Youtube with the ~~goods~~ the proof is in the listening So far there are no uploads with a compare to old Legends. I am staying with my Millenium. I've read somewhere the Be tweet sounds rather plastic-ity on top end. btw we should mention the Be tweet is actually a mid-tweet which is the best design for a 2 way. If someone can make a series of vids comparing the new kidontheblock Beryllium, I ain;t buying in and have this gut feeling its all hyped. skaneoil buster here.
Regarding the Yamaha NS-5000, here are some "specs" for zylon vs. beryllium. Yamaha says the "sound velocity" is comparable to beryllium. Keep in mind the same material is used for all 3 drivers and Yamaha uses a big dome midrange, not a cone. Go looking for another loudspeaker with those two parameters. I couldn't find one.
A good test for this speaker, or any speker, is the opening of the movie Bladerunner 2049, which is on the soundtrack. The bass is visceral. The 12" woofers really move with no distortion I could discern. They go really low.
From AV Hub Australia June 30, 2016
"As
you’ll read in our interview with Koji Okazaki, Yamaha’s audio division has
long harboured a desire to revisit the elements that made the NS-1000 and its
pro version such a success. But not, we should note immediately, the element of
beryllium. Instead Yamaha claims to have matched and possibly gone beyond this
awkward substance in “adopting a new development diaphragm with a speed of
sound comparable to beryllium in all units” — quite the claim, given that
beryllium already has twice the sound propagation velocity of titanium or
magnesium. The mystery material is a synthetic polymer called ‘Zylon’, which is
manufactured in two varieties, Zylon-AS and Zylon-HM. It is used by NASA and in
Formula One cars, and according to manufacturer Toyobo’s spec sheet for Zylon,
it is indeed lighter and stronger than beryllium, its density 1.55g/cm3
compared with 1.8g/cm3 for beryllium, and its tensile strength 5.8 gigapascals
compared with only 0.24 gigapascals for beryllium, and surpassing even
carbon fibre at 3.5GPa. Zylon is also amazingly flame resistant, according to
Toyobo, hopefully something prospective NS-5000 owners will never need to
discover."
"The zylon fibers are coated with Monel using vapor deposition.
The reason we chose the new material is that it
helps to express the small nuances of wind instruments such as a flute and
clarinet that fibre materials can’t do. In addition, it prevents Zylon from
degrading by ultraviolet rays."
When the speakers are reviewed in the USA, as I expect they will be, I'm not sure how much of all the detail behind the technology such as this will make it into any story, because there's a lot. Yamaha's R&D on zylon diaphragms and the speaker's development began 8 years before the speakers made their debut in late 2015 or early 2016.
Not sure if anyone on this thread invest in high end car audio along with high end home audio. If I didn’t see you at an IASCA Car Audio Sound Quality Championship (top 20 individuals), I’m sure you didn’t invest that much in that field. I won’t have the time to educate you on how some home audio products come from car audio. Example, JL Audio, Straightwire, and Focal Utopia BE to name a few. Pure Beryllium Inverted Dome Tweeter was Designed to be used in Car Audio to drown out engine noise in most Italian and German vehicles. They created massive feedback due to how the ground wire was routed and various ECU/ Computers in these vehicles. American vehicles don’t suffer the same consequences back in the day. I have been involved in high end audio for home as well as high end car audio since 1988. I’ve had the pleasure of experimenting with quite a few tweeter and crossover application. I was very fortunate to experience this. With tweeters of this magnitude, it really depends on your complete setup (amps, CD Players, preamps, speaker wires, etc). For car audio and even some home audio application, it was a bit bright for me but I did have the pleasure of utilizing the Pure Beryllium Inverted Dome Tweeter in several applications. https://www.focal.com/en/car-audio/car-audio-kits-solutions/elite/utopia-be/tweeters/tweeter-tbe https://www.focal.com/en/car-audio/car-audio-kits-solutions/elite/utopia-be
I have some, and they are great at making mediocre amps sound as
horrible as the really are. On the same system, my woven soft domes
alleviate this flaw from crappy electronics.
As I said above, soft domes are more forgiving on bad electronics /components, but not as revealing. Beryllium/Diamond are very revealing, but you need top shelf electronics to make them sing.
Wow! Let's all listen to the sound quality of YouTube to evaluate our components. Besides, beryllium can and does work well with electronics that do not need the high end rolled off. I have some, and they are great at making mediocre amps sound as horrible as the really are. On the same system, my woven soft domes alleviate this flaw from crappy electronics.
one of those people. Most ( say 90%+) of the Beryllium drivers I have heard can get bright and unpleasant to my ears
Thats what i am guessing will be my response after a seassion with the Be midtweet. Metal has that fault at the highest fq;s. Whereas the Millennium has some special fabric, can't recall the name, which avoids these high fq's voicing with a ~~tinnness~. And my guess is the Be will havea bit of ~~Bark~~ in certain fq's when they peak high. The Millennijm has no such faults. There is no such ~~perfect midtweeter~~ But all in all the Millennium meets certain criterion that i wish to hear in a midtweet. With every mod in my system,,the Millennium continues to shine its true inner virtues of purity and clarity.
Lower distortion are faster transient response, are just 2 areas where they excel
~~EXCEL~~~ you are actually describing the superior qualities of the SEAS ~~EXCEL~~Millennium~~ fast, neutral, transparent, voices human vocals with high fidelity,,where i might give the Be higher scores vs the Millennium is perhaps in the lower mid 1K-2K fq's. I left a comment on that YT vid you offered in the link,~~~JUST last night. The guy is talking,,,but not delivering the goods, = no actual audiotion is offered. Whereas you can hear the Millennium singing its magic in my uploads. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M1w_o7sZzJI
Metal dome tweeters all have a high propensity to ring at high frequencies.( the old Focal titanium dome that was used in Wilson speakers was one of the worst offenders). Some folks are lucky enough not to hear this, unfortunately, I am not one of those people. Most ( say 90%+) of the Beryllium drivers I have heard can get bright and unpleasant to my ears, OTOH a silk dome or a ribbon seems to not have these issues. One of the best tweeters I have heard recently is the new YG silk/metal dome...seems to have the best of both worlds.
Yep, a broad-brush assessment is worthless about much of audio technology. It all gets down to the implementation, whether it's with BE or silk. Silly to float float praise or condemnation broadly. It is only meaningful in specifics.
Depends on the implementation and the tweeter - I have heard some dreadful beryllium tweeters that are so metallic sounding I want to take an ice pick to my ears. These will remain unnamed.
Other sound spectacular. Tons of detail and wonderful imaging. I like Magicos sound a lot and think they have one of the best Beryllium implementations.
Incidentally, you could write the same post about AMTs today which are suddenly hot and could have written it in the past about diamond tweeters, silk domes, other metal domes, etc...
There is good and bad. I opted against beryllium partially because I did find the ones I tried a little metallic sounding but I also like to do something a little different and am super happy with the ceramic magnesiums I have in my speakers.
There's also a beryllium ribbon tweeter. First introduced in the early 1980's by Pioneer, designed by their TAD division. Frequency range up to 100.000Hz!
It was available in some top end speaker models like S-955 and S-933, but also as an add-on unit (PT-R7 and updated version PT-R9).
I don't think it is still being made, but they do appear on the used market from time to time. Not exactly cheap, but highly recommended!
Of the above I am familiar with the Revel and Focal Be models, and for my taste the Focal Kanta 2 gives me a more musical experience than the Revel F228 Be. I judge these things with classical, folk, small ensemble jazz, singer-songwriter...no heavily amplified rock (which I love, just not to judge speaker musicality).
Don't intend to hijack this thread but do someone have experience with or knowledge of be tweeters from different manufacturers (Revel, Focal, Paradigm, Magico, Reference, Yamaha, Fritz, Tekton and more)? All the same or big differences in the construction and implementation. I'm looking for to add one to my collection of speakers and wants to be sure to get this "airy" and un-distorted sound at high spl:s. Hopefully this is of interest to the OP as well. Note - just a question about be tweeters.
I had be tweets in my Yamaha NS-1000’s in the 90’s. They did justice to Pearl Jam, Alice n Chains, soundgarden, whatever that band was that did interstate love song, crash test dummies, green jello. We used to joke that the tweets glowed green and were radioactive ☢️ “These speakers could kill you”
I was like 15. They played loud and it was awesome. (Dad was a musician, and owned a small recording studio, I inherited the audio bug)
Better dan the Be-tweeter is the scan-tweeter. Be.sounds “cheep”, plastic-ity, like you said. I made a proof with both of them. The “scan”-tweeter sounds more natural,more open. The beryllium laks the “clarity” in the high tones. Ribbon tweeters are also very good: beautiful high and not over the edge.
I was a Yamaha dealer in the mid 70’s when they introduced the NS 1000... It was all beryllium vapor deposited in Yamaha facilities in japan.... Forming a dome was not possible due to the brittle property of be. ..Big dealer event...
Yes, I have heard them. I "think" I loved them but the NS 5000 are a little large for my room. I am thinking a new model in-between the NS3000 (monitors) and the NS5000 will be released soon, maybe NS4000. If they do not release a new model I am considering still buying the NS 5000 and put some DSP on the bass.
I had previously considered the Paradigm Persona 3F as the speaker to get. That speaker has the Be tweeter and mid-range. It is the second speaker to have that combo. The first was the Yamaha NS 1000 in the mid-1970's. The NS 5000 is the new version of the NS 1000.
The Persona was great to my ears, I know some people find it too bright. I love the detail from the Be drivers. Just sounded great to me. However, the Yamaha has all 3 drivers, including the 12 inch woofer made from Zylon. The Yamaha seemed to have the same detail as the Persona but it sounded even more coherent. The Persona has different material on the woofers than the other 2 Be drivers. I was thinking that having the same material for all 3 drivers made the NS5000 sound so coherent across the frequency range. A very realistic sound, especially realistic on piano.
My demo was in the same store, different room, during different months. The Persona was in a very good room and the NS5000 was in the worst room imaginable to put a stereo, a glass walled small conference room. However, even in that room I thought the NS 5000 sounded a bit better when you focused just on particular instruments. The room was idiotic, so that is why I "THINK" and it "SEEMED" better.
Since the store has both the Persona and the Yamaha I want to hear then again in the good demo room. I am hoping a smaller NS 4000 comes out before I go for that final demo. Covaid is also keeping my butt in the house for now. I will get 1 of those 2 speakers. The Persona 3F is a tremendous speaker and so is the NS 5000. The NS 5000 may have the advantage with the zylon woofer. The 3F has the advantage in the smaller space without DSP.
fyi... Yamaha or Pioneer claims that they are the inventors of BE. They might be the first person to use vaporized BE on the tweeter and midrange but not pure BE (To me it’s not consider pure BE). Only a few industries does pure BE that is Radian and TruExtent Materion, the rest are subsidiaries. Even Jbl, jmlab, seas, Paradigm and Scanspeaks do not make their own BE, actual (materials) are made by Materion TruExtent. Company like Usher and China made BE are not true BE, they are Faux n Vapor BE.
@yyzsantabarbara On their website they call it Zylon. It is proprietary composite material, so it might be hard to find out what it is. Engineering, most likely, will go that route, designing new materials with extreme stiffness at very low mass. Have you heard these speakers?
The motor in the Magico's far outclasses the micro-motor tweets in Focals.
It is only because of marketers that we even think of Be as a selling point. Don't get me wrong, Be is a cool high tech material, but a specific Be tweeter is a very different thing than the brand that Be has become.
In a recent speaker project, I went from a Seas Excel softdome ($322) to a Seas Excel Berillyum ($770). The change was night and day. The Beryllium was much cleaner and much more realistic with a higher resolution. No harshness at all!
hummm now ya got me reconsidering,,,after having read a bit of~~~insider opinion~upon mentioning my great appreciation for the SEAS Thor, especially the Legendary Millenium,,,said the rep, he perfers the Millennium vs the Beryllium. back when my set up had the Jadis Orch Refer with EIKT90 ~~although they voiced a harshness in upper range, their voicing in human vocals was outsanding **soundstage**. Employed Amperex Bugle Boys in the 3 pre slots,,as i was unaware of Telefunken's superior range at that time in my audiophile journey. Shoulda kept the JOR and moded it out with all new caps, new power 6550's (Svetlana vs Shugaung??) and employed the Telefunken,,I'd be alot further ahead and more cash in my back acct. searched all over YT for the Beryllium tweet experience, nothing, much, just a few low level muisc vids which made it impossible to determine the voicing of the Be. So just maybe , after I pay for my mod today of swapping out the new carbon Film resistors for Takman metal resistors (which jadis had employed originally in the Defy),,,just might give the Beryllium tweets a try, ,,there is a pair offered on ebay for $220,,from china,,so can not return. It is hard for me to imagine any tweet which can voice as the Millenium under optimum components. For me the Millennium is the benchmark for all tweeters. But for $220, i'm willing to take the chance. Can not afford to experiment with the Seas Beryllium,,as it is wayyy out my budget. After I pick up my Defy today,,I will upload a new YT vid with another cam which has a external mic,,as the Sony only offers builtin mic and offers poor sound resolution. Will post a YT vid here, tonight,,,My hunch is the Takman metal (plate)resistors are superior to the carbon film. Jadis employed Takman in the design for a good reason.
@kijanki I wonder where the new Yamaha NS5000 driver material fits into that list. Yamaha was the first to use
Berylliumin in the 1970's. They are saying that their new material is better than
Beryllium.
"Breakup distortion" is exactly the point here. Soft dome tweeters are great and forgiving, but they are not quite as clean and transparent as hard dome tweeters. The problem with hard dome / metal dome is the breakup distortion (the point where the material flexes and distorts from the movement). The breakup point of normal metal domes can range anywhere from 19 khz to 28 khz (on some of the best / treated / coated tweeters). However, they will still have a bit of a bright edge.
Alternative materials have shown a much higher breakup frequency because the material is stiffer. I think beryllium is somewhere around 45 khz or something. Diamond is upwards around 75-80 khz. I think ceramic is higher in these areas as well, but ceramic also presents a more controlled sound that is usually not as dynamic.
In a recent speaker project, I went from a Seas Excel softdome ($322) to a Seas Excel Berillyum ($770). The change was night and day. The Beryllium was much cleaner and much more realistic with a higher resolution. No harshness at all!
Steve Mowry says in the article "The Whole Truth About Beryllium Diaphragms: -
"For a given geometry the first bending (break-up) frequency is proportional to the material Speed Of Sound, where the speed of sound within a material is defined as the square root of the Young's Modulus divided by the Mass Density, (m/s); the higher the better. However, the Mass of the diaphragm must also be considered. Then the ratio of the Speed Of Sound to the Mass Density can be used as the materials acoustic figure of merit, (m4/kg/s); the higher the better."
After that he shows values of "Acoustic Figure of Merit" for different material (higher the better)in m4/kg/s
mozartfan.... i disagree with you on your assessment! If you are talking about vapor BE then it’s not musical but pure clad BE it is in a different league. I was always a soft dome guy until i own a matched pair of BE drivers, i was blown away how BE was so good. I have to say it’s very captivating, mesmerizing and lively!
You must have a verified phone number and physical address in order to post in the Audiogon Forums. Please return to Audiogon.com and complete this step. If you have any questions please contact Support.
