How can Wilson Audio speakers sound that good if they are using OEM drivers?
Sometimes it's better to not think so much about how a speaker is made but rather to just enjoy it if you like it. Kind of like tacos... https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JuBGPylPVIU |
Lots of high end speakers use paper pulp woofers because they are lighter, (especially for larger drivers.) and offer better reproduction of live instruments and music. The “paper pulp” each manufacturer has is a closely guarded secret recipie usually a composite. As for using other brands for their tweeters and mids for example. They usually have it built or modified to their specs. It’s like hiring the best company for the job. For example in the past focal made tweeters for them, then they moved onto scanspeak (from Denmark) making their tweeters to their spec. Often even when a specific tweeter model is used the speaker manufacture will have it modified slightly or customized in some way to make it their own. |
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never mind any of those box speakers, the answer is that they do NOT sound that good, imhop, a box is a box! The new AkG Klipshorn from Klipsch for 14k will fill a room with music like a live venue, and according to the guys selling 300k horn loaded systems at the Munich Show, they "are the best kept secret" in hi end and give you 80-90 per cent of the sound of those systems..It is like a cross between best planar and best box speakers, but much better bass and dynamics, and emotional engagement with the music..btw, at 105 db, you can drive them with a clock radio! I have been at this audio thing for 40 years, they just kill everything out there! |
Having spent the last 5 years upgrading my system it seems I’ve gone full circle using stereophile recommendations I immediately noticed the amount of added detail from these all metal/ ceramic speakers and thought upgrading was going to be easy. I now believe implementation is more important than raw materials. |
It’s the cabinet. They use excellent drivers but the cabinet makes a massive difference. By having such a well damped cabinet, they deliver an amazing sound. The molds for those cabinets are pricey which is why Wilson’s are soo expensive. Without the cabinet, any DIY speaker will sound inferior. You could build a Baltic Birch cabinet to the exact dimensions of a Wilson Speaker, take the drivers and crossover out of a pair of Wilson’s and put them in your cabinet and it won’t sound the same. Very simply, MDF, Baltic Birch or Hardwoods will not dampen sound even remotely as well as cast phenolic resin. i have personally not done testing with cast phenolic resin, but I have tested 6 different cabinet materials and each has a decidedly different sonic character. My test was to build the same cabinet internal spec with the same drivers, crossover, port, polyfill etc. and the end result was a radically different sound profile. I tested MDF, Baltic Birch Plywood, Laminated Bamboo, Carbon Fiber Reinforced ABS, Fiberglass over a nomex core and Carbon Fiber over a nomex core. not shockingly the ultra rigid and well damped composites significantly outperformed the wood products. Plastic (ABS) even with Carbon Fiber reinforcement was significantly worse. |
It’s the cabinet. They use excellent drivers but the cabinet makes a massive difference. By having such a well damped cabinet, they deliver an amazing sound. The molds for those cabinets are pricey which is why Wilson’s are soo expensive. Yep. I've had plenty of chances of hearing speakers in baltic birch or MDF, used for getting the design nailed down, then the same speaker in a CLD cabinet of the same dimensions. No other differences in the speakers. The improvements are not trivial. Lucky for the DIY community, there are some very effective, and not to difficult to deploy, constrained layer damping solutions. Maybe not up to what the high end manufacturers are using, such as Wilson or Von Schweikert, but much better than plain MDF of birch ply. |
I agree with 4425 and I also have over 40 years of critical listening under my belt. It does not matter what's in the soup as long as it tastes good! With audio, to get the true taste, it must be a 'blind' taste test, not knowing what's in the soup, turn out the lights, close your eyes and your ears will open up like never before....and then just listen, use those enhanced ears and really listen and you will probably hear things in the music you have been missing all along. |
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