What am I missing? It already exists…. You can order speaker kits to your exact specs and put it together….
A speaker kit is just a speaker that has already been designed though. So it suffers from the exact same problems as ready made speakers.
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- You are creating problems & situations, then trying to solve them when just about nobody cares and just the existence of them is questionable. You continually try to ram this crap down our throats when it should be abundantly clear, to you, that just about everyone couldn't care less.
What problems have I created? The problems were already there from the start. They have been swept under the rug by the speaker companies and I am the one exposing them. I am the unsung hero of the speaker industry. A big part of why good speakers are hard to find has to do with the crossover not being custom tuned. Who would you rather tune your speakers. You or them?
It seems like your wish for attention is your goal here. Are you really getting the attention you want here?
You are the one whose intentions are questionable. Why are you always popping up in my discussions if you are such a naysayer? What are your true intentions Dill? Are you having doubts about whether your speakers are truly satisfying?
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The idea of custom speakers is a good one,
I must agree with you there.
but one at this juncture is likely to remain a small niche.
Yes but I thought the audiophile community is already quite a small niche isnt it?
Over time as fully automated, computer generated flexible manufacturing evolve, then the financial viability of customized speakers will become more viable as a market segment. We are not there yet.
Yes perhaps you are right. Eventually I will be vindicated and I will have the last laugh.
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@erik_squires
Is this the episode where Kenjit substantiates his claims with specific and actionable examples?
Is this the one where he shows us what and how he got around the very problem he is railing about? Or is that next season?
I personally got around the problem by refusing to buy any more speakers and tuning my own. But most audiophiles will not have the ingenuity I have to do the same therefore there is a need for companies to do it for them. Just because I have pointed out a conspiracy within the speaker industry does not mean I should be the one to solve it. Why dont you solve it if you think you can? Also part of the problem is the audiophiles themselves. If we cant convince them that custom tuning is the way forward, things will never change.
Incidentally, YOU are a bad example of how custom tuning should be done. You have gone to all the trouble to make your own speaker, yet you did not even bother to custom tune your crossovers you just tuned them flat as a pancake which defeats the whole purpose. So thankyou for joining the discussion, at just the right time. You are a perfectly bad example.
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then the financial viability of customized speakers will become more viable as a market segment
Actually the financial viability is an excuse. High end speakers can already cost tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars. So there is plenty of money already going into the pockets of the companies. I dont agree with you there is any issue with financial viability. Its more an issue with greed. We need to give audiophiles more for their money rather than pretend that it will cost even more money to provide better results.
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@gs5556
Obviously it wont be as proftable to do custom tuning as mass produced junk. So that just confirms the conspiracy doesnt it?
A consumer would not need to know their theil small parameters from their response curves. That would be part of the job of the company doing the tuning. The main thing is the end goal which is to ensure the speaker is tuned to the customers ears rather than the designers. I have said this many times but it keeps falling on deaf ears.
Equalization and room treatment is going to be only a part of the process of custom tuning. We are talking about tuning the speaker itself here. Neither room correction or equalization is a subsitute for that. We need the cabinets to be tuned. Do you want MDF, Plywood, Aluminum, or a mixture? Do you want scanspeak revelators or Sb acoustics? Do you want first order time cohesive slopes or 4th order linkwitz riley? Perfect .707 QTC or bessel? QB3 or flat? Consumers need to be made aware of what choices are available so that they can then decide what they want or dont want.
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@mceljo
The customers would receive a visit from our tuners. They would bring along a spherical cabinet or traditional rectangular boxes. A selection of drivers would be provided. Then the tuning process would begin. First a hearing test would be done. Then the customer would choose between linkwitz riley, butterworth or first order slopes. Most speakers on the marketplace use fairly typical slopes. Equalization would be done to match the sound to the customers ears / preference / room. Various other options would be possible such as cabinet materials, bracing, other shapes, or other requests.
Once everything is agreed and part payment received, the production would begin.
The rest of the payment would be required before the delivery date.
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- Are these "tuners" from your imaginary company?
Yes, hypothetically speaking.
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There must be well over 300 brands and styles of speakers, not even counting brands that are no longer in business. If someone can’t be satisfied with such a wide range of products, then I feel sorry for them.
Most audiophiles are not satisfied with whats available. So something is wrong. Even if there are 1000 speakers out there thats still a small number compared to the number of audiophiles. How many audiophiles are there? Must be hundreds of thousands. So to satisfy us all there would need to be at least 1 million speakers out there. Rather than spending a lifetime searching for the perfect match, shouldnt there be a quicker way?
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@dill
Dylan, you do realize that the alternative to my theory would be to listen to a speaker that was designed according to the designers ears in their room and their preferences dont you? Thats no different than going to a restaurant to eat food that has been cooked by someone else. If you want something mediocre then why are you an audiophile? Being an audiophile is about wanting the very best. If you want the best, you have to ensure that the speaker is tuned to your preferences and to your room. Why should the designer know better than we do about how the crossover should be tuned? Perhaps to his ears he wants +2db at 10khz but to my ears I need -1db at 10khz? perhaps he has chosen linkwitz riley fourth order, but what we really want is a shallow first order on the bass and a second order on the tweeter? Perhaps the cabinetry was made of MDF but in reality it needed to be made of metal or concrete to sound its best? The possibilities are endless Dill. Wake up and smell the coffee!
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Your example is no different than demanding auto companies design every car to each individuals size, driving style, taste in body style, number of cylinders, HP,
A car is more complicated than a speaker. It has much more parts. With a speaker, the main area that needs to be tuned is the crossover. Customizing a speaker is much easier than customizing a car. A speaker is just a wooden box with drivers. A car has hundreds of parts.
Your argument is like saying we should just make eyeglass lenses in specific sizes because it would be cheaper that way. Unfortunately the world does not work like that. Eyeglass lenses are made to measure as you very well know. And the same goes for clothes. If you want a perfect fitting pair of trousers, you need them to be made to measure because none of the existing sizes fits you perfectly.
It doesn't matter if "High end [cars] can already cost tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars. So there is plenty of money already going into the pockets of the companies." That money does not cover the cost of providing luxury cars to every car owner.
That is exactly the conspiracy which i am here to expose. If a speaker company can produce a speaker for $200, and it has no bracing and cheap parts, then it would only cost a few hundred dollars more to use ultra high quality parts. If you knew anything about the cost of drivers you would know that the difference between a cheap driver and a high end driver is often only about a couple of hundred bucks. Yet the price suddenly goes up by ten times. So dont give me this nonsense that there are costs to cover. You are speaking as though speaker companies make zero profit out of these high end speakers.
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I don’t know of any manufacturing model that is based on no profit. The model you are proposing would not be profitable and eventually fail, probably rather quickly.
Its not a model designed to make money. That is exactly the problem with speaker design. Its based primarily on maximizing profit. My technology would be based on meeting the needs of each and every audiophile. It has nothing to do with profit. Why shouldnt it be profitable? If the customer was present while the crossover was being tuned by the designer, he could then state his preferences based on what he was hearing and that would then determine the final crossover circuit. Why is that so hard to implement? How many people in the world wear eyeglasses? Millions. Yet we can somehow manage to get each and every one of these patients into the office for an eye examination and then fit them with custom tuned lenses. If we cared about sound just as much as we do about vision then perhaps it would be workable?
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Also, very few of the most dedicated audiophiles keep the same system for long periods of time, they are always looking to upgrade with the goal of improving things and also to satisfy their unquenchable drive to try new things.
and part of the reason for that is because their speakers were not tuned correctly in the first place. Potentially, the upgrade process that you speak of could be curtailed if the damn thing was custom tuned correctly. Dont you think its silly to upgrade a speaker just because the tweeter level was set just that little bit too high? All it needed was a change in resistor and that would have fixed it yet audiophiles spend thousands on cables thinking it will sort their problem out.
Even if it were possible for someone to custom design a speaker for a customer which would rely on the designer to understand the personal preferences of the individual customers, the market would be limited to people that had the funds, interest, and knowledge to desire it while also not wanting to approach it from a DIY perspective.
I dont think you understand how this works. Its not a question of WHETHER we tune a speaker or not. Its a question of WHO does it? The designer or the customer? EVERY speaker you buy is already tuned. There is no such thing as a speaker which is not tuned.
The points you make about the room, components and music choices influencing the tuning reinforces my point. Whose room, music choices, personal preferences and components should the speaker be tuned according to? Mine or the designers?
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- So, who exactly is going to do all the testing, designing and creating these imaginary speakers for no money?
Its not for no money. But its also not a money making scheme. We can charge as much or as little as we see fit. However we would not be overcharging customers unlike all the other high end companies. We could if we wanted to.
The problem with current speakers on the market is that its really just the luck of the draw. Both the speaker designers dont know what theyre tuning and the customers also dont know what they want. So it really is a recipe for disaster.
My technique would be based on a more systematic approach to tuning to enable meaningful comparisons.
We often hear audiophiles speak about diamond tweeters being too bright. This is hogwash. This is typical thinking by audiophiles who have no experience in custom tuning. Our goal would be to set them straight.
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@kennyc
Trying to design speakers to match each customer's "subjective" tastes is NOT an easy task - how do you know what I like?
Thats exactly my point. They dont know what we like. Therefore all speakers are just based on guesswork. Which is exactly why we need custom tuning to take the guesswork out of the equation.
There will likely be a lot of trial and error until meets customer's tastes
Audiophiles already spend their lifetimes trying to find perfect sound. The goal of custom tuning is to reduce that time.
What if the customer refuses to be satisfied with the results, will the manufacturer have to eat the time and effort?
No. Same as with ready made speakers. If you dont like em its your fault. You cant return them. Would a hifi dealer allow you to return a pair of $50K wilsons because you've changed your mind? Probably not.
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@mitch2
A high end speaker costing $20k typically comprises parts costing a fraction of that. So there is a lot of profit being made. Profitability has never been a problem. We already deserve better products for what we pay, not higher prices.
Current speakers on the market are not good enough. Even if they were, how does the consumer know which one to buy? You would have to buy all the models on the market to find out and that would be far more unaffordable than a custom tuned speaker.
there are already easier options to adjust the sound of an individual audio system through computer processing such as upsampling, DSD, MQA, etc., through cables and ancillary equipment, through equalization products, and through room treatment
Nonsense. If that was the case a cheap speaker for 200 bucks and an EQ is all you would need to get the same sound as a Magico.
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