Best Loudspeakers for Rich Timbre?

Depends what exactly you are looking for when you want Rich Timbre.


To some richness evokes a fullness of tone, where you really feel for instance the weight and presence of a tenor sax in the bottom registers or whatever, that may be thinned out in other speakers.


It that is what you mean by timbral richness, I'd throw the Devore Fidelity 0/96 and /93 have  in that camp.  That's their specialty.  Big, Rich, Thick full sound, so you feel that a piano or acoustic guitar has a vibrating sounding board,  low strings vibrate the air,  voices have a "chest" projection and not just disembodied mouths.


On the other hand my you mean something more like Timbral accuracy, in the sense of bringing out the specific timbral characteristic or tonal color of voices and instruments - e.g. that a brass cymbal really sounds like brass, a struck triangle silvery,  a trumpet warm resonating metal, the special combination of reedy/breathy/bell of a saxophone, wood sounds like wood, etc.

I've always looked for "Technicolor Sound" in the sense of a speaker producing a wider array of timbral colors, because through most speakers I immediately hear a homogenization, an imprint put over everything by the speaker.   Once I hear a sax, or trumpet, or cymbals on a speaker it's not long before I pretty much know what those will tend to sound like forever more on that speaker - unlike the truly endless element of "surprise" found in real life in that regard.



In that case, among the best I've ever encountered are the Joseph Audio speakers.  They are very accurate but with a particularly grain/haze-free sound.  Just the way colorful pebbles are more richly revealed through a clean, clear stream than through one full of fine silt, I find the timbral colors of voices and instruments seem more finely and purely revealed from the JA speakers - a greater "rainbow" of timbres and tonal colors seem to get through.   At least that's what I hear, though that seems to be echoed by a great many other people who hear them as well.  

cd318,

I find that Classical music and Jazz really become captivating when it’s easy to distinguish the sound of the instruments rather than just the notes they are playing.

That describes exactly what the Joseph speakers are great at. Pretty much every review of the JA speakers (look up the Pulsar reviews) makes a point about how easily separate and distinct the timbral qualities of instruments remain, even as a mix gets more complex.

You’ll see Michael Fremer describing that quality here:

https://www.stereophile.com/content/joseph-audio-pulsar-loudspeaker

Or from the absolute sound review:


http://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/joseph-audio-pulsar-tas-203/

"The first thing I noticed about the Pulsars was their midrange purity and lack of grain."
..................

"Of all the Pulsar’s sonic attributes, the one that impressed me the most was the high level of discernability. What I mean by discernability is, how easy is it to listen into the mix and pick out exactly what parts you want to concentrate on? The higher the level of discernability, the easier it is to do this. The Pulsars made it easy to recognize the essential banjoness of a banjo on Paul Curreri’s “Once Up Upon a Rooftop” [California Tin Angel Records]. Even when a harmonica is added to the mix, it’s easy to tell where the banjo stops and the harmonica starts."

I found this particularly intriguing when I played various mono recordings on the Joseph speakers - Chet Baker, etc.  When you have various voices and instruments "lining up" behind one another in the center, rather than spread out discernibly in the soundstage in stereo,  a less pure-sounding speaker can make it harder to untangle one instrument from another.  But on the Joseph speakers it seemed every instrument was effortlessly separate timbrally, making it more realistic and "easier" to listen to one particular instrument over another even in a really tight mono mix. 

inna,

It is remarkable that many don't understand that cables are components, they are equally important.

Everyone understands cables are a component.  You don't get sound without them, and they have to be matched at least in the most basic sense to the situation in which they will be used (e.g. right length/capacitance, etc).   


The question is, how much does one need to spend in order to pass along a signal with high fidelity?   The answer seems to be: not nearly as much as audiophile lore suggests.

Spending $10 on cables would get anyone nowhere, unless you steal these cables and $10 is your taxi bill.

What then is the lower limit you suggest, and on what grounds?


My speaker cables are Belden, put together by Blue Jeans cable.
If you buy two 6 foot lengths it costs $14.50.  


It seems to me $14 bucks for speaker cable is close enough to your 10 bucks that "would get you nowhere" claim.    And yet my system sounds incredibly good - as good and often better than plenty of the systems with audiophile-approved-cabling I've listened to.  So low cost cable certainly "got me somewhere" quite impressive.  (BTW, the appraisal of my system isn't simply my own,  I've had many audiophiles listen, including friends who review big priced audio gear, who think it sounds fantastic).  


So, I'm afraid your claim doesn't get very far in my experience. 

fsonicsmith,


Excellent comment!


I believe I know just what you are talking about in terms of a "woody" timbre and compensating toward real life.


I'm pretty nuts about correct, organic sounding timbre so that's always been job one for any speaker I have owned.  The problem has been for me that instrumental timbre often doesn't sound organic, but more glazed and electronic/plastic through most speaker systems.  I had usually found the best I could do was pick a speaker (and with judicious amp choice) that had traits consonant with what I like about real life sounds.  A number of speakers I've owned and ones I've liked have had a somewhat "woody" character or timbral tone because that at least imparted an organic quality to sounds that helped many things sound more "real" to me - from acoustic guitars, string instruments, even the "woodiness" of the reed in a saxophone.  Or drum sticks, and even to some degree voices.  (I'm not talking about some ridiculous level of woody coloration, but more the sense that the sound is made of organic material, vs plastic, steel, and electrons).  


The Devores are one of those speakers that to my ears has a canny bit of coloration that is very consonant with how real sounds impress me, so in that sense they often sound more "natural" to me than other strictly more neutral (or other non-neutral) speakers.  


The Joseph speakers are more like the Hales speakers I have owned (and still own), where I get the sense of much reduced distortion/coloration revealing timbral qualities.  So I find the sound a bit more varied from such speakers.  But then, they also sometimes miss some of the particularly papery, organic sense of touch from the Devores, and some of the realistic fullness and weight.   So....it's always compromises.  

audiotroy,

This is a ridiculous post. There is no such thing as a speaker that is good at reproducing timbre.

Sure there is.


All sorts of speakers can be better or worse at reproducing accurate, or realistic instrumental timbre. If you play a good recording (in this sense meant to maintain the natural sound of the instrument) then there are all sorts of distortions and frequency deviations by which a speaker can screw up the timbre. That’s obvious isn’t it? Regardless of the fact other components can screw up the sound as well, that’s true of speakers.

Yes there are "rich" sounding speakers but that is not necessarily going to reproduce all instruments naturally.

Yup. I think everyone acknowledges that.


But then even the most accurate speaker isn’t going to reproduce all instruments naturally, because there is so much variation in recording quality and styles. So you don’t win that way either, if you listen to a broad range of recordings as most people do.


So this problem can reasonably motivate someone to look for a speaker that produces a certain characteristic one likes with much of what one listens to.


For instance, one of the aspects of reproduced sound through most systems is, I find, a diminution of body and presence of voices and instruments. So that might be an aspect of sound I want to "get back" with the speaker I choose, within the limitations of budget, size room constraints, etc. (If you have the money and room size, well then no doubt the type of limitations I’m talking about can be transcended, but many of us are dealing with compromises).


To use the example I’ve given of the Devore speakers: They manage, to my ears, to reproduce sound with a generally fuller sense of body than the other speakers I’ve heard in that price range/size. It sounds "more real and natural" in that respect to me. I don’t know for sure that it’s a coloration or simply an aspect of sound reproduction better produced by the design, but even if it’s an added coloration, it’s one that enhances a broad spectrum of recordings to a more believable satisfying presentation than some other well regarded speakers I’ve heard. (This is of course just my own perception and taste, not some objective claim that Devore speakers are "better" - I'm just bringing them in as an example).


Would such a coloration actually impede in some other areas or recordings, making for instance some elements timbrally "too rich?"
Sure, most likely. But that’s a trade off, just like a really accurate system will often have you experiencing the trade off of thin recordings giving you unnatural, synthetic sounding instruments and voices.


But in any case, there is nothing wrong at all with discussing the contribution of one type of component - speakers - and *their particular effect in the chain* even if as we all know it’s one part of the chain.

cd318,

Yes I think we get what each other is talking about.

I haven’t spent a lot of time with much of the Tannoy line, with the exception of the Tannoy Dimension TD10, which my pal had for a while.They definitely had the "warm woody" thing going for timbre, string sections sound especially warm and gorgeous. (The big Tannoy Churchill speakers I heard long ago also struck me the same way IIRC).

The problem with such a coloration for me is not going too far. I’ve had a few speakers that had that woody, warm timbre that made me instantly like them - I’m thinking at the moment of the long forgotten Audio Physic Libras, and a couple Meadowlark Audio speakers I had. The issue I had was over the long haul it was just a little too much coloration, making the sound a bit too predictable, even if comfy.


The Thiel speakers I own now (I had the 3.7s and now have the 2.7s) are more neutral in that regard, definitely doing organic timbres like wood and voices really well, but not obviously overlaying everything with that flavor. So they feel like a more satisfying speaker for a longer haul to me.

It’s hard for me to know if the Devores would prove to be more like the previous speakers I mentioned and grow tiring, or not. My impressions from auditioning the Devores is that they strike a really nice balance between the richness I like in the midrange/upper bass while sounding quite neutral and open beyond that.

But...there are so many speakers out there!

(The most realistic piano sound I can remember hearing was through the Kef Blades at an audio show. Blew me away!)

audiokinesis,

3. There can be either too much or too little energy in the reverberant field. Too much and clarity and imaging are degraded; too little and timbre is degraded.

I’m sure it depend on how much you mean by "too much" in each case, but generally speaking I find the opposite.


The more reflected room sound the brighter "clearer" and more present the sound. But the cost is a sort of reflected/hash signature that starts to overlay the sound, homogenizing instrumental timbre. The more room reflections are taken out, the more I hear the subtleties of individual instrumental timbre in a recording.

This is certainly the case in my own room where I have good control over some of the liveness of the room (via being able to pull curtains across reflective area, or open them up, use some diffusors I have, or not, etc).

This has been true in virtually every case I’ve ever encountered (it’s my habit when auditioning speakers to investigate the direct-to-reverberant sound quality via taking different positions to listen - further for more room, closer for more direct sound. In every case I’ve ever known, the observations I mention have applied.


It just strikes me as strange that your comment *seems* to point the arrows the other way.

audiokinesis,

Ok.

Though I still find it interesting that my experience, at least with regular speakers (as opposed to a multiple array as you described) lead me to apparently the opposite conclusion.  I've never heard more room sound contribute to more accurate timbre.  (With the sort of exception that I alluded to earlier, that a more live room can make the sound more realistically bright/lively, though at the expense of homogenizing timbre among the various instruments/voices in a track).

I auditioned the Audio Note AN-E's and the Devore 0/93 and 0/96, and I preferred both Devores to the Audio Note.

audiokinesis,

Yes I'm aware of the effects of off-axis response.  I've had quite a number of speakers with good, even off-axis response (I tend to favour them).  

For reference, among the speakers I still currently own are the MBL 121 omni-directional monitors (radiate evenly), and the Waveform Mach MC monitor, specifically designed for wide radiating even power response.
Here's a review of a Waveform speaker that uses this egg-shaped mid/tweeter module (I had the Mach Solos in my room as well):

http://www.audio-ideas.com/reviews/loudspeakers/waveform_mach_solo.html

At least in my experience, even speakers that have good off-axis response sound timbrally more true and complex when reducing room sound.  

Though I can totally see how the right size/room reverberation can add "tonal richness" to the sound - the singing-in-the-shower effect, to some degree.

audiokinesis,

I don't know what speaker you are describing in your last response to me.  The Waveform monitor has a 5" woofer - both it and the Mach Solo measured quite well.

Total agreement. 6 inch woofer is simply too big for the mid range. B&W and countless other speakers never sound completely natural for this very reason. To sound natural a speaker must have wide consistent dispersion across the full frequency range.

Whenever someone says something "can’t sound natural" in high end audio, I pick up my grain-of-salt shaker and empty another grain.

This is because what is "natural" in audio has a subjective component - that is, given the vast majority of playback systems or speakers can not fully reproduce "natural" sound, and speaker designs involve compromise at any reasonable costs, it’s often a case of choosing the set of compromises, and focusing on what a speaker "does most right" to the individual’s ear. Speaker "A" with flat frequency response (or flat power response in room) may be capturing "natural" aspects than speaker "B," but speaker "B" may be producing greater dynamic life and hence be "more natural" in that regard. Then it depends on which aspect of "natural/believable" the individual listener tends to focus upon.  There are for instance those who swear by Quad ESl 57s or panel speakers in general as leaving any box speaker shamed in the "natural" department, but when I listen to these panel speakers as much as I love what they do, I'm acutely aware of how they depart in believability from what dynamic speakers can provide. 

Anyway...

I can’t go along with the idea that a 6 inch woofer is "simply too big" for the mid range to sound "natural." For instance, Harbeth speakers like the Monitor 30 and Super HL5 plus with their 7.8" radial drivers doing midrange duty are renowned among reviewers and listeners for their particularly natural quality. I owned the Super HL5 plus and it was stunning particularly with the human voice, in a way that few other speakers I’ve encountered could pull off.

I’ve heard other speakers with larger midrange drivers sound quite "natural" in their own way.

I think some folks start to get fixated on what they think is the "right way" to do something. This is good in a sense for speaker designers - most get fairly pig-headed about the path they’ve chosen and it helps focus energy and passion, so you get really good iterations of different speaker designs designed by different people who are sure "THIS is the right way to do speakers!" But the fact all sorts of speakers find different enthusiasts, and most of those enthusiasts finding something particularly believable about one design or another, indicates there are various ways to skin the cat. IMO.

twoleftears,

It makes total sense to point out the liabilities of any design choice, of course.   The proof is always how a designer manages those liabilities and to what degree the listener perceives the pluses and minuses of the results. 

twoleftears,

Agreed.

That quality of differentiating timbre as you describe it is something I really value in a speaker.

I think mono recordings can really be a test of timbre differentiation in that regard, because in a mono recording, say of a jazz quartet and some singers, the instruments and voices are piled behind one another in a central location on the soundstage. Whereas in stereo sources it’s much easier to be able to pay attention to each instrument individually, because they are separated spatially in the stereo imaging.

A speaker that is really great with timbre can make it much more effortless to untangle one mono instrument from another, be it two voices on top of one another, a guitar and a banjo playing simultaneously, vibes and piano, or whatever. When the timbral harmonics are coming through accurately, it’s easy to hear out one instrument/voice from another almost as if they were spatially delineated.

This is one reason I’ve been really interested in Joseph Audio speakers because to my ears they do this like few other speaker brands I’ve encountered. (I also found the old Hales Transcendence speakers were great for this, and many others).

Beware those who are bored easily, here comes a mini-essay concerning my further thoughts on this issue:


There is, to my mind, a difference between really getting the timbral character of an instrument exact, and giving enough information to let you know what instrument you are hearing. That may seem a weird distinction but I’d explain it this way:

Take the analogy of photographs. Imagine a BLACK AND WHITE photograph of 3 different string instruments: viola, violin, cello. Imagine it’s really blurry (.e.g poor resolution in the system) to the point of being hard to tell which instrument is which. As you in increase resolution, the instruments will come in to focus and you will at some point easily be able to say "that’s a viola, that’s a violin, that’s the cello." If you increase resolution even more, you may even end up seeing enough detail to discern the type of each instrument: "Ah, I can see that’s a stradivarius...or a Gotting...or whatever..."

But though the increase in resolution has allowed you to make some very fine differentiations between the instruments, and even identify tell-tale signs for specific instruments...the instruments still don’t in fact look fully real and accurate. Because the photo is in BLACK AND WHITE.
Adding accurate color is when the instrument takes another full step to what it looks like in real life.

A similar analogy is for instance the fact we can all easily recognize differences between voices on our phones, we can know "that’s my mother on the end of the line" but the fact we have been given enough sonic information to *recognize* one person from another on the phone doesn’t entail that the voice on the phone is just how it actually sounds from the person in real life in front of you. There’s a difference between the experience of recognizing your mother’s voice on the phone and what your mother’s voice actually sounds like in real life, without the technological intervention.

I suggest that many "high resolution" sound systems mimic this problem insofar as they seem like they can provide high levels of detail that differentiate instruments and voices *within the confines of the music piece being played* or within *the confines of music generally played on that system*. They can give plenty of detail in a "black and white photograph" sense to allow you to finely identify certain characteristics of singers and instruments, while still withholding the actual "color" or full timbral realism. I remember this experience really hitting me hard when, in the late 90’s or so I finally heard a massive Infinity IRS speaker system. Playing an orchestral piece, for the first time closing my eyes I had the sensation of something like a full symphony orchestra playing in front of me. Except....the "color" was missing from the picture. That is, though I could easily identify all the solo instruments or sections, timbrally speaking they seemed made of the "wrong" stuff, like plasticized/electronic/metallic versions homogenizing everything. It just missed the effortless timbral rainbows that I hear from the real thing.

That really impressed upon me the problem of timbral believability, and the value any speaker would have that can increase timbral variety and believability for me.

And we all bring to a system our particular personal template of how we have perceived real life sounds of voices and instruments we care about.

So on this view, when I hear or read someone saying things like "the resolution of this system allowed me to differentiate between X and Y singer or instruments" that is a good sign....but it doesn’t tell me whether the instruments actually sound like the real instruments. Whether the timbrally true color is there.

I used to have recordings of instruments I play, that my sons played, my wife’s voice etc, that I’d play on speakers I owned or auditioned to look for this timbrally-true quality. On many high resolution speakers I could certainly tell "yes, that’s my guitar being played." But they didn’t actually *sound* like my guitar REALLY being played in front of me, because it was the wrong timbral "color/tone." It was some other electronic confection. Only on some speakers has my guitar recording sounds not just detailed, but *as it does timbrally* when I’m playing that guitar. There’s an inherent "Yes, that’s it" sensation when this happens.

It’s depressingly rare, though.

cd318,

Interesting list.

The main problem I see is the subjectivity involved.   If we surveyed everyone here we'd see a huge variety of speakers being used, and I doubt many people would say "My speakers don't do instrumental timbre well."  In other words, that list could be expanded to the point it's not terribly useful.

That's not to say that I think that it's just entirely subjective whether a system produces accurate timbre, or accurate sound in general.  In principle, it seems to me, blind tests could be set up with, say, live vs reproduced sound and a large enough sample size of participants, and tests, over time could produce results showing some speakers produce sound closer to indistinguishable from live (and hence good timbre) than others.

But as that isn't happening much at all, we are left to what measurements can tell us, and ultimately our own impressions.

cd318

I'm somewhat puzzled by the fact it seems no one (or no speaker manufacturer I'm currently aware of) is doing the live vs reproduced tests for their speakers.  (With the exception of the occasional live musician brought in for some audio shows).

John Dunlavy claimed this was fairly routine when testing the success or not of their speaker designs.

schubert,

"Rich timbre" is not a description I personally would give the Totem line.
I've always found they had a superficially attractive sound - those sparkly highs allied to a deeper coloured midrange, but their completely obvious contouring of the frequency response for that "Totem sound" is just too obvious and intrusive for me to enjoy over  time.   There's an obvious dip in the upper frequencies that gives it a recessed sound and but comes back out still in the presence region to give the impression of sparkly, sharp transients.   But it results in a pinched sound to the upper mids.   I think it's probably that dip around 5K in the crossover region that you see over and over in measurements of Totem speakers.

It seems to me that Wilson speakers have for a while now entered a bit of a renaissance in terms of the feelings they engender in the high end community.   It used to be that Wilson was everyone's favourite whipping boy - that paradigm of the "really expensive heavily constructed high end speaker" that had tons of hype, and which some reviewers lauded, but which many people loved to hate "way to clinical, way too bright, way to colored, etc."

But these days Wilsons seem to get way more love, and words like "rich" and "realistic, natural" seem to accompany reviews and reports on many of their current models.  And they seem back in favour even with reviewers who may have abandoned them once before. 

These are all observations from a distance, as I haven't spent much time (if any) listening to a Wilson speaker for many years.

mheinze wrote:

Harbeth they are too warm, with very bad resolution

--------

If you are confronted, and willing to accept the fact that what you like is only 50% of the resolution (Harbeth speakers)

^^ File this under "Audiophiles say the darnedest things!"

You may not like Harbeth speakers, but I suggest you not go from there to making silly comments like the above.

You have your experience of course and have every right to  decide which speakers sound best to you. But you are taking your opinion into making objective claims about resolution. You aren’t in a unique exalted position in deciding among speakers; many of us here have long experience playing instruments, lots of exposure to acoustic instruments and other "real" sounds (everyone knows what a real person sounds like), and many of us are just as interested in understanding the difference between real and reproduced sound.

Harbeth speakers have been highly reviewed as having exceptionally accurate timbre for voices and instruments by reviewers well familiar with other high resolution systems. A great many audiophiles have agreed.

I have previously owned the Harbeth Super HL5plus and recently completed a several-years-long audition of many top contender speakers (including Paradigm Persona, Audio Physic, Joseph Audio, Focal, Raidho, Revel, Magico A3, etc). The Harbeth speakers held up quite well and showed plenty of detail and resolution.

As everyone knows, reproducing the human voice in a natural manner is one of the biggest challenges for any system, given how familiar we are with the sounds of real voices. Harbeth is renowned for the natural sounding reproduction of the human voice. And indeed, in my auditions where I specifically check this aspect out, between the Magico and the Harbeth speakers, voices tended to sound more realistic, natural and organically believable on the Harbeth speakers, to my ears.

The ridiculous claims about Harbeth being low resolution speakers, or having "50%" resolution are unfounded opinion. Harbeth has been just as fanatical about developing their radial driver, in terms of reducing coloration, as pretty much any other manufacturer attempting realistic sound reproduction, which is why they have some renown in the audiophile world. And the measurements support the high level of performance, as can be seen in the Stereophile review:

https://www.stereophile.com/content/harbeth-super-hl5plus-loudspeaker-measurements


Atkinson’s comments in the measurements section:

AD commented that "the Harbeth Super HL5plus sounded conspicuously, even startlingly, clear." It came as no surprise, therefore, to see that the Harbeth’s cumulative spectral-decay plot (fig.8) demonstrated a superbly clean decay throughout the midrange and treble. Harbeth’s RADIAL2 material does indeed result in a well-behaved woofer cone.

-----

Other than that lively enclosure, which is a deliberate design decision—note AD’s comment about "the consistently truthful, present manner with which they reproduce singing voices"—THE Harbeth Super HL5plus’s MEASURED PERFORMANCE IS BEYOND REPROACH.

So if I’m looking at evidence for a claim, I can see the great amount of praise Harbeth has garnered among reviewers and many audiophiles for
sonic excellence and truth of timbre. I can note my own experience actually owning Harbeth speakers and being able to compare them to a broad range of speakers I’ve owned and audiotioned. And measurements support that they are a high resolution speaker via excellent engineering.

Or...I can take the comment from a forum audiophile that Harbeths only give you "50% resolution."

Hmm...I wonder which is more credible ;-)

sciencecop,

You’ve got to be kidding.

So in response to my post, you are giving a link to one speaker manufacturer’s claims for "why our design is better?????"

As if that weren’t standard for pretty much every manufacturer/speaker designer to claim?

That’s a classic bit of advertisement of the type that can be found by most speaker manufacturers. You have the Vandersteen cone pitted against some selected "unnamed" paper cone, and oh-my-gosh, can you believe it? Look how bad the selected-unnamed-cone compares to OUR cone?

And, as if Vandersteen were the only speaker manufacturer that recognizes the desire for an evenly pistonic cone material????

Of course speaker manufacturers recognize the relevance, that’s why so many brag about the pistonic behaviour of their speaker drivers! Including Harbeth who make a big deal about precisely this engineering goal for their Radial driver. This idea is hardly a revelation.

And why are you posting a comparison between a Vandersteen driver and an unnamed PAPER CONE driver, as if it made mheinze’s point, when the Harbeth speakers use a POLYPROPYLENE cone of their own polymer design, specifically engineered toward attaining lower coloration through highly pistonic behaviour????

And the Stereophile measurements indicate that the Harbeth Radial driver is indeed low in coloration.

And you think all this "correlates perfectly" with the claims I’m objecting to like Harbeth speakers only producing "50% of the resolution?"

Do you want to point us towards measurements showing Harbeth speakers are only giving "50%" of the resolution of the audio signal vs Magico?..or do you think promotional videos from one speaker company comparing their driver to unnamed paper drivers actually make this case? If so, you’ve got a wonky idea of evidence and argument.

Nowhere am I claiming that Harbeth speakers are the best designs.  I've been objecting to the over-board claims that they are "low resolution" and even sillier, only give "50%" of the resolution.   Speaker design is about balancing compromises, and most speaker drivers/designs balance various compromises. The trick is how it all comes out in the mix, and the Harbeth design seems to have balanced these engineering problems quite well.

For someone who puts so much time in to this hobby (or at least writing about it), some education may go a long way; you should give it a try, your long posts will be much more interesting and relevant.

Oh, please.

Should you post something of greater relevance, that actually undermines anything I’ve written, then I’ll heed your gracious advice.

sciencecop,

How about 47%, would that be better ;)

Sure. If you can actually support that claim.

Which you haven’t.

Today, you can have a pistonic cone that will be well damped and will outperform anything Harbeth’s cone material is doing.

So you claim.

Where are the measurements showing Harbeth’s specific driver design results in "low resolution?’"

Agreed the tweeter crossover gets messy at 12K, but does THAT entail the overall design is "low resolution?" That’s the case you are supposed to be making, remember? Most of the measurements don’t support that claim and as Atkinson says right after noting the tweeter interference: "However, below the top octave, the HL5plus’s response is superbly even." It’s the radial driver that covers most of the audible spectrum, and it seems to perform very well...which you are studiously ignoring. You CLAIM that driver shouldn’t perform well, but we have MEASUREMENTS in support that it DOES work well and is low in coloration.

And note that if you look at something like the Focal Sopra with the type of drivers you laud, it’s got a hashier spectral decay than the Harbeth speaker.

Did you see the parts quality of the XO? The cheap magnets on the drivers,

And the evidence this results in a speaker design that is "low resolution?" Strange how you keep making assertions that fall well short of actually supporting this claim.

As to the lively cabinet, while Atkinson remarked that the resonant mode at 150Hz *may* be audible he said of the cabinet resonances:

"This suggests that the idea of using a thin-walled cabinet to maximize the quality of a speaker’s midrange reproduction —proposed by, among others, Harbeth founder Dudley Harwood when he worked at the BBC in the early 1970s—does work as promised. "

Once again, this debate has been over the claim that Harbeth speakers are "low resolution" and/or only give "50%" resolution.

You have not supported those claims, only made some assertions you haven’t backed up. Where I have owned the speaker in question, compared them to other designs, and I’ve pointed to reviewer listening tests and measurements indicating the Harbeth has overall low coloration, ESPECIALLY within the range of it’s Radial driver which you attempt to denounce, and that the speaker has superb sonic qualities.

Oh...and of course you have conveniently ignored the measurements and comments from the other review I posted, which suggest the high quality engineering of the Harbeth speaker.

That, and comments like these:

To look at something like that and have the nerves to say that it performs better then, just about anything I can think of, not to mention the Magicos, is a sad jock,

...show you do not debate these issues in good faith.  That’s a strawman.

I have not claimed that the Harbeths perform "better" than Magicos, either in measurements or overall sound quality.  (I'd give some areas to Magico, some to Harbeth.  As I said, to my ears vocals in particular sounded more "right" and believable on the Harbeths).

I have merely been saying that claiming the Harbeth speakers are "low resolution" transducers, especially that they only produce "50%" of the resolution, are to say the least, exaggerated.

You’ve done nothing to actually show the Harbeth design fits such a description. Snide remarks about the speaker designer don’t actually accomplish that, I’m afraid.

sciencecop,

You are being evasive, not "educational" which suggests "education" isn’t your actual motivation in responding to my posts.

Of course, nothing in what I’ve posted abandons "real science." That’s just a flip remark to try to make yourself feel superior without bothering to justify that claim.

As I said, I’m well aware...like pretty much anyone who has followed high end audio...that speaker designers have long understood the benefits of pistonic behaviour in drivers. Simply repeating, even after I pointed that out, that you think you are "enlightening" me on this idea is simply ignoring my reply to continue subtle chest-puffing on your part.

You’ve simply evaded the actual points I’ve raised. I have objected to mheinze’s over-board claims that Harbeth speakers are "low resolution" designs and only give "50%" resolution (talk about claims pulled out of one’s arse).

Pretty much all drivers have compromises of one sort or another, which is why various types are used by manufacturers, and debated among the DIY speaker crowd.

But we are talking about claims made against a SPECIFIC speaker company, Harbeth.

Every speaker designer chooses a driver for the characteristics that are desirable for their goal, while minimizing the flaws. Harbeth claims to have spent many years and lots of money to minimize the flaws of a polypropylene driver, increasing stiffness and pistonic behaviour, while maintaining the desirable characteristics, all with the goal of a low coloration speaker design.

Now, if YOU claim, along with mheinze that Harbeth has FAILED in that design goal, and that Harbeth speakers are in fact "low resolution" speakers or only produce "50%" resolution, then you need to show this, rather than post links to the performance of some other unnamed speaker manufacturer’s paper cone, as if THAT demonstrated your case.

For my part, I’ve actually supplied links to actual 3rd party measurements of the Harbeth SuperHL5 plus, and despite your (unevidenced) claim about whatever bias Atkinson may have, he has supplied measurements in support of his remarks that indicate low coloration in the Radial driver in particular, and a balanced well designed speaker in general.

But while we are waiting on you supplying actual evidence against this, how about some more 3rd party evidence in support of the excellence of the Harbeth speaker design.

From this review:

http://i.nextmedia.com.au/Assets/harbeth_super_hl5_plus_speakers_review_test_lores.pdf

Listening impressions from the reviewer:

First impressions are always important, whether it’s people, companies or loudspeak-ers, and my first impression of the Harbeth Super HL5plus was that its sound was amaz-ingly cohesive and stunningly real, very similar to what I hear from full-range designs (Lowther et al) but with none of the bass or treble limitations of full-range loudspeakers. It’s so stunningly real that although I will do so for the purpose of this review, it’s as if the bass, the midrange and the treble no longer exist as separate entities that need to be described as such, but you’re instead just listening to ‘music’—music that’s been freed from the normal transitions that must take place from a bass driver to a midrange driver to a tweeter.

The clarity and detail that are delivered across almost the entire spectrum in which musical instrument fundamentals occur is stunningly good.

From the measurements section:

Harbeth’s Super HL5plus proved to have an extremely smooth and superbly extended frequency response, characterised by a very slight spectral tilt that saw the bass/midrange region very slightly elevated compared to the output at higher frequencies. You can see the evidence of this in Graph 1, which shows the averaged frequency response using pink noise as a test stimulus. It’s important to first note the extension and linearity of the Harbeth Super HL5plus’s response, as measured by Newport Test Labs, because it extends from 45Hz to 40kHz ±3dB—EXTENSION AND LINEARITY THAT ARE, IN MY MEMORY, UNPRECEDENTED.

Be-tween 80Hz and 10kHz the response is within ±1.25dB which is, yet again, a superb result.

--------

To reiterate what I said in the introduction, the extension and linearity of the Harbeth Super HL5plus’s frequency response is in my memory, unprecedented. I’ve seen speakers with better low-frequency extension, speakers with better high-frequency extension, and speakers with greater overall linearity. But the Harbeth Super HL5plus is the first speaker I’ve seen that has been able to deliver all three of these very desirable attributes in the one package. Equally important, it’s done it with a design that’s an easy load for any amplifier to drive and using a cabinet whose dimensions are not even close to being visually intimidating. I’m not sure who to congratulate for this marvellous achievement, the BBC, Dudley Harwood or Alan Shaw... or all three. But whoever was responsible—individually or collectively—congratulations are most certainly due, and even more certainly very well-deserved.

So now I have presented links to two reviews of a speaker FROM THE ACTUAL SPEAKER COMPANY UNDER DEBATE where both listening impressions AND THE MEASUREMENTS indicate a low coloration, faithful presentation of the signal.

So how about, instead of just trying to knock me down a notch, you actually address the points I’ve actually made.

If YOU are claiming to have a scientific case against what I’ve written, show us how those Harbeth speakers in fact produce "low resolution/50% resolution," where the measurements seem to suggest excellent engineering.

Support your claim that I have refused to embrace "real science."

Show how my objections to mheinze’s remarks that Harbeth speakers only produce "50%" resolution, or are low resolution, are unreasonable.

sciencecop,

So if cheap parts,

No evidence from you the parts selection reduced resolution in the Harbeth speaker.

none pistonic jello cones,

Assertion, with no evidence, while there is evidence against your assertion. "Jello" cones would hardly provide the linearity and excellent spectral decay characteristics measured in Harbeth’s Radial Cone driver.
This doesn’t help anyone take your claims seriously.

no coherent signal above 12K,

Atkinsons measurements show interference around there. But it’s not like the signal stops there. Plus:

1. Most of the audible spectrum is below that, and even if the speaker didn’t even produce sound above 12K (which it obviously does with a super tweeter), that does not entail it would be "low resolution" within it’s frequency range, which covers most of the musically relevant range.

But more important:

2. You have been given more than one set of measurements for the Harbeth speaker. The measurements I linked to from the Newport Audio Labs show measurements quite inconvenient for your characterizations. Again, there are both the measurements to observe, with these comments from the tester:

"It’s important to first note the extension and linearity of the Harbeth Super HL5plus’s response, as measured by Newport Test Labs, because it extends from 45Hz to 40kHz ±3dB—extension and linearity that are, in my memory, unprecedented. "

This contradicts your claim the Harbeth SuperHL5 Plus has "no coherent signal above 12K.

Would it helps if you look at the gross THD between 200Hz and 500Hz? Last I checked it was part of the midrange (https://www.soundstage.com/measurements/speakers/harbeth_30_domestic/).

Yay! Measurements!

Does that single measurement (of a different Harbeth speaker), that node, warrant the conclusion that the Harbeth design is "low resolution?"

That would seem quite an incautious stretch for someone who is supposed to be waving the flag for a scientific approach to these things.
We’d want to know the actual effects in terms of audibility in the overall audio signal produced by the speaker, while not dismissing other excellent areas of performance, before such a conclusion, right?

You said you can find much better driver design from Focal at similar price, but Focal don’t seem above putting out expensive monitors that have similar distortion in that region, e.g. here:

https://www.soundstage.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=902:nrc-measurements...

So it isn’t good enough to simply point to any particular advantage or seeming disadvantage of single parts; it’s about how everything is implemented in the final design.

And the final design of the Harbeth SuperHL5plus seems to be lauded quite highly in the comments and measurement sections in the reviews I’ve provided.

If it makes you feel better, I am willing to let go of the 50% mark; you seemed to be stuck on that. After all, I actually didn’t say that

No, but you entered the thread in support of mheinze’s comments.
And you’ve tried to uphold the idea the Harbeth speakers deserve to be described as low resolution. (Mostly as a way to take jibes at me, quite obviously).

I’ve never once said that no other speaker design, or drivers, are not capable of higher resolution than Harbeth. But that higher resolution exists, doesn’t entail Harbeth are "low resolution." I have ONLY objected that mheinze’s comments exaggerate, to a silly degree and to a point that mischaracterizes Harbeths, when he says things like "low resolution/only 50% resolution."

Is it so hard to admit his comments go a bit far?

If he wants to make the case some other speakers are even higher resolution than the Harbeths...sure...why not? But there’s no reason that has to come with a misleading level of characterization of the Harbeth design.

I doubt we need to go beyond this point, so Cheerio!

cd318,

I’m fascinated by the diversity of designs and opinions among speaker designers and audiophiles as well!

It seems to me there are a lot of variables going on here.

First is that both designers and audiophiles come to audio with differing criteria. Some are most focused on, for instance, strict accuracy to the source, reproducing the electrical signal as accurately as possible. Others are more concerned with accuracy to "The Absolute Sound, " in terms of being able to reproduce a sense of reality, and if it takes a bit of fiddling from strict neutrality from the signal to get there, so be it. Others may be more in the "I just want it to sound good" camp, who aren’t demanding strict objective accuracy, who think that The Absolute Sound is a pipe dream, but just hold the criteria of ending up with "sound that satisfies me." Or "does it communicate music in a way that moves me?"

And then there’s the fact that even when you have people generally in one camp as to their criteria, within that camp there will be variations in which compromises are acceptable, which elements most important. So in the "Absolute Sound" and "As I Like It" camps, some may focus on timbral accuracy, others on soundstaging, others on dynamics, etc, so you’ll still end up with different designs. Even those trying to reproduce strict neutrality, accurate reproduction of the source, will have to contend with debates over whether to design the speaker to output a perfectly ’neutral’ flat signal, or how much to take the likely room effects, or even our hearing, in to the design, so it all sums to neutral at our ears. So there are different ways people design speakers to be "neutral" in that regard.

And THEN of course we have the subjectivity of the listener. Especially in the Absolute Sound/As I Like It camps, our hearing may be slightly different, our perception different, or we may even simply of our own preferences zero in on one aspect of the sound we like, where someone else will notice the aspects they don’t like.

I find it fascinating when I sit in front of some systems with a fellow audiophile and they are really happy with what they are hearing, but for me I am nonplussed and would be just as happy with that system turned off (or happier). They may be hearing great clarity and imaging, I’m hearing a bleached tone that leaves me completely unmoved.

So with different approaches, and of course everything in between, naturally we end up with a variety of design ideas, which satisfy varying criteria of audiophiles, naturally we end up with tons of different designs and preferences.

On a similar note:

I often agitate for a more rigorous, science-like approach to high end audio (for products that are essentially engineering problems, way too much of it seems to operate at the level of, say, alternative medicine).
And I certainly would love to see more high end audio equipment produced via more reliable testing/vetting methods, with objective support for claims etc.

BUT...that’s not to say I also don’t quite enjoy some of the Wild West aspect of high end audio, where you have designers trying out all sorts of wild ideas. I’ve certainly heard products whose marketing comes with really dubious design claims, but which sounded really impressive and fascinating nonetheless.

And I’m very glad that there isn’t the homogeneity in high end audio design that is suggested by the attitude of some posters - or manufacturers for that matter who become fixated on "designs ought to be THIS way and NOT that way!" e.g. People who will say things like you should never use X cone materials, or never allow any resonance in the cabinet, or never go with X, Y crossovers, never combine X, Y drivers, etc. A certain single-mindedness and hard-headedness in pursuing a certain design goal can really work for a speaker designer. But in the wider scheme of things, we want people exploring various approaches.

Thanks goodness we have designers trying different approaches. The recent example from my own experience I keep using are the Devore O series speakers. They have been criticized by the neutrality camp for doing everything wrong - "you never combine a tweeter with a 10" driver like that, the beaming! The mismatch, you’ll loose coherence! You don’t let a cabinet sing like that. It’s all just so wrong, any DIYer can even tell you that!"

But when I auditioned them several times against a bunch of more "neutral" speakers, sure some of the defects were likely there in the mix, but not remotely to the overriding audibility the nay-sayers make you fear, and to my ears they were doing SOMETHING really wonderful that most of the other speakers weren’t. (A certain combination of organic tone and body to the sound).

I also like neutral speakers too (as I’ve owned a number of them). But I’m very glad we have other choices!

So true cd318.

For instance, as many know speakers like the Revel brand have been designed using the research spearheaded by the great Floyd Tool and others, in which a scientific approach to studying listener perception and speaker design, combined with blind testing, yielded methods of predicting listener preferences for loudspeaker design.  And the Revels were built on those principles.

I auditioned a number of Revel speakers and they were indeed terrific!  They clearly benefitted from the research as they were hugely competent in just about every way.

And yet...they didn't quite do "it" for me, for whatever reason.  Not as much as a number of other speakers, some of the neutral camp, some of the "musical/colored" camp.

It would be fascinating to take part in the HK blind testing to see if I would in fact pick the HK speakers over some of the ones I like better in sighted testing.

fleschler,

Forgive me because I'm sure you've mentioned the speakers you own before but...which ones do you own now?

(A couple speakers off the top of my head that do particularly well over a wide listening area would be: Audio Physic, Joseph Audio)

One of my more surprising, and joyous pairings of amp and speaker actually turned out to be my MBL 121 monitors - spec'd at 4ohm/82db sensitivity, and my lil' old Eico HF-81 integrated tube amp.  A measly 14W/side.  It just sounded glorious:  rich, big, detailed, and the overall sound and bass just seemed to enlarge.  The speakers never sounded bigger and more authoritative than on that little Eico.  (Which, though out of my depth here, I presumed was likely due to some underdamping of the speaker, enrichening the bass).