I gre out of Be Tweeters

Hopefully your examples of "beryllium" and "affordable diamond" aren't Usher drivers because those are actually titanium/ceramic lol.

That said I really like the SB TW29BN beryllium. Ever have any experience with that driver?

I thought Usher fixed their faux Be tweeter issues??


The SB Be tweets sure measure amazingly well!! No, I haven't had the pleasure. :(

By "affordable diamond" I meant the glued diamond dust domes. Not the amazingly expensive Seas, Jensen or Accutons.

I used to avoid coaxials because everyone talked about so-called "doppler distortion" but I learned from Andrew Jones it's basically non-existent in a 3-way and I prefer the way coaxs image over the traditional vertical driver alignment.

Agree!!!!   Initially I was in love with a couple speakers that had BE tweeters and was chomping at the bit to get my hands on a particular brands.  Then I spent more time with them.  

With a couple exceptions/implementations I find beryllium tweeters to be a bit forward and by extension, radically limiting in terms of amp choice.  They offer a ton of detail but at the price of being fatiguing.  With one exception, I doubt I could live with them long term.  I know a lot of folks really like them but they are not for me.

This resulted in me opting for a ceramic/magnesium composite tweeter for my higher end speaker.  Assuming a rigid enough cabinet, it delivers all the detail of a beryllium without being fatiguing.  

Recognizing that everything is a matter of taste, I've heard things that I thought were good and bad with ALL examples of basic speaker technology and driver materials, so I wouldn't avoid anything in particular.  There are certain particular technology/materials that I tend not to like, but, even then, there are exceptions.  I am actually amazed with how wide a variety of approaches to design are available and have their fans.  If any particular design were outright superior, the market would have converged on that approach, but, that has not been the case. 

Even more amazing to me is how viable REALLY OLD gear is in direct comparison with anything currently available.  I have yet to hear a midrange driver that I would take over a 1939 Western Electric 713b compression driver and a decent horn.  

As for all of the rest of audio gear, I cannot think of any one particular design that I would categorically reject.  There are designs and types that I tend to prefer (low-powered tube gear), but, that does not mean anything else is crap to me.  I really like the sound of tape recordings, but, I would never own a tape machine because I am way too lazy to thread tape; aside from this, I could adopt anything.

I had a lovely Class G Hitachi sr-804 receiver for many years but as time went on it got a bit long in the tooth for whatever reason.

I was enamored with Heil Air motion transformers back when I first started but gave up on them when they kept getting fried.

I also punted with tubes in my DAC.

Class D has pretty much supplanted Class A/B in my house over the last few years.

I have a pair of Focal 1008 BE monitors that I've paired with my ARC VSI55 and my Peachtree Nova 300 integrateds, and I've been very happy with both combinations.  I started out with (and still have many) Klipsch speakers, so to me the BE tweeters are pretty easy to listen to, especially with the Peachtree, which is just slightly rolled off on top compared to my other gear.  I might get tired of them eventually, that seems to happen with much of my gear.

If things keep heading in the current directions, I could consider dumping amplifiers altogether at some point in favor of active speakers with all the goodies built in, but only if the cost of replacement when something goes wrong is not too high.

My first tally in that area is the pair of very impressive for the size and cost Vanatoo Transparent One Encore speakers I recently put in my wife’s very acoustically challenged sun-room. They sound really good in there (as they have when I have heard them at shows past) and easy as pie to set up.

I’ll probably continue with passive speakers for the foreseeable future unless maybe Ohm Acoustics comes up with an affordable pair of powered Walshes with all the goodies baked in like the Vanatoos.

I can't think of any audio technology I've fully turned against, but in reaching for something:   Electrostatic speakers.
Loved the Quad 63s I had for a while, and I've heard tons of other electrostatics (and hybrids), and in almost all cases they became a no-go technology for me.  I could never be satisfied once that "ghostly" un-dynamic aspect of the sound became apparent to me.
I really enjoy listening to electrostatics when the opportunity presents itself.   But I'd never buy one at this point.

With One Big Exception:   The ESL 57s.   Those are the only electrostatic I'd love to own (but as an additional speaker, not my central listening speaker).
t.

i gave up on the etch a sketch.....

and truth be told trying to get all 4 ESL and decca ribbons to work together.....let alone the Hartley subs...
the big Infinity had similar issues with woofer tower placement..argh...

In thinking about your answers, and my own experience, I have to restate my original post.
There are tweeters sporting a wide range of technology I like, including Be, but the sound I heard from the first, micro-motor Be tweeters is something I have completely outgrown.


I was entranced by the waterfall plots, which are very very good for Be, but ignored that what I was hearing was also the metal dome character of them. Something several modern Be tweeters have overcome.

I also realized, after posting, that there's some technology which I may like some examples of and not others. AMT tweeters for instance, share an almost mythical story, and can be had from $5 each to $500 or more each. They are by no means the same, and I've heard some speakers with them I liked and some I truly could not listen to.

I never cared for porters until one day in Winthrop tried their Bulls Tooth Porter. Freaking amazing. Turned friends onto it, they all loved it too. Even people who never liked dark beer. And this was VERY dark beer! But awesome!

Spent pretty much my whole life looking down on lagers. Anything light, really. Even as a teen, never cared for em. Till one day, Scuttlebutt Trippel Seven. Pretty darn light, yet somehow rich and creamy and full-bodied. Wish the Bulls Tooth was still around but at least we still have the Trippel Seven.

Not sure what this is good for other than to expend a few more milliwatts and eat up a few more bits on the interwebs, but what you said about technology, what you're talking about is the difference between technology or design and implementation, the particular details of how the technology or design is brought to fruition.

Rear engine technology for example is such an awful approach no one does it any more. Except Porsche, who somehow has managed to make the worst design into the best car in the world, a fact they have proven again and again for an incredible 60 years now. 

I may not like Bose products, but no one on earth spends more both on speaker analysis and marketing analysis than they do.

Like them or not, they are a model of having an engineering arm tightly coupled to consumer preference and experience.

I doubt if you can tell one decent tweeter from another if they are competently implemented.  Most audiophiles just can’t stand not changing things.

If you could afford it, diamond tweeters are probably the best. The one from Seas costs around $7K each. Ouch but I wish I could get my hands on a pair :-).

If not, then a high end soft dome from ScanSpeak or Seas can be very good. Good soft domes nowaday (those costing at least $200 or more) really offer the best of both worlds - speed, detail, but with the sweetness that we usually associate with typical soft domes. The ScanSpeak AirCir or Seas Crescendo are actually some of the best in the world. The Crescendo is a bout $350 each and the AirCir is about $200 - $350 depending on specific variation.

Ceramic tweeters may have a lot of details and may have less distortion but I don’t think they have the speed of the soft domes.

I haven’t heard Be dome personally but yeah people say they can have too much detail if not implemented properly.

A good tweeter can elevate the sound to another level.  Of course make sure you have some decent caps for the tweeter xover.

Change to Maggies and you will feel much better at the bar, I promise!

@andy2

I have not heard a high end diamond tweeter, but in terms of distortion, dynamic range, lack of stored energy and smooth frequency response, the top end AMTs are world class in my mind.

I've also heard horrible AMTs so YMMV.

I doubt if you can tell one decent tweeter from another

What is the bar for decent?  If most Be are decent, then yeah, I think you can hear the difference between the best and the decent.

Change to Maggies and you will feel much better at the bar, I promise!

Hm... Interesting  because I've listened to couple of Maggies and they lack the details of the conventional drivers.

I also like the AMT tweeter in the recent versions I've heard; they seem to integrate well with other drivers, something that is tough to do with ribbon-type tweeters.  

I have recently been wondering about what I really want a tweeter to do in a system.  I've heard some systems with full or extended range drivers with and without a tweeter.  The main benefit of cutting in the tweeter in these systems was not an extension of the frequency range, but primarily a smoothing out of the overall frequency response.

I have been listening to old and new (reproductions) versions of field coil compression tweeters (Western Electric 597) and I have been taken by how little one actually notices the tweeter--one just hears a smooth and natural sound.  It is not a tweeter that adds much obvious sparkle on top, but the systems I've heard just sound better with this tweeter.  The really bad news is the cost.  These things go from about $13k a pair to near $60k (souped up G.I.P. version), and they also need a power supply for the electromagnets.

I hate all modern hard and light material tweeters including beryllium, diamond, Spendor LPZ, Tannoy super-tweeters ...
All of them sound not natural, scratchy, itchy, intrusively, whistling, tiresome.

I have recently been wondering about what I really want a tweeter to do in a system.

This is true for many. I have grown out of sparkle, and air, and that seems to correlate well with smoother FR and lower distortion (when I've been able to measure them).

That doesn't mean you should. My point here is there's something like what I call a residual sound. Like scented body wash, and in the right music, environment that can be a lot of fun.

The most natural tweets, like Troels Graveson has said, to me, disappear. They sound like they are simply not there. The best AMT's can be there, as can the best diamond, and Be, and there are a lot of soft domes and ring radiators which are not bad in these terms.

The AMTs in Alta Audio speakers don't call overly attention to themselves.  I wonder what brand he's using.

Ultimately a large percentage of the final sound all comes down to implementation.  Even Be dome can sound very natural if implemented properly.  Inversely, one can have a pair of speakers with soft domes that can sound harsh and unpleasant if not properly implemented.  

Hi @andy

As some one who has made his own speakers and is active in the DIY speaker community (well, in terms of discussions) I want to say I think you are partly right, but partly wrong.
The crossover designer has a lot of latitude in making speakers sound balanced, bright, even control dispersion and lobing, but it is very difficult to "fix" ragged frequency responses and excess energy storage within a driver. You also can’t "fix" distortion, something it seems, in my opinion, some drivers are actually selling.

One other dimension is dynamic range. The ability to change output level while maintaining the frequency response and distortion profile. Can't fix this in the crossover.

At the same time, there are lots of smooth, extended tweeters out there at various price points.

So, I agree you can make a pair or triad of drivers sound bright, or dull or bassy or boomy with the crossover, but I also think drivers can bring a lot of character to the design.

Best,

Erik

The resonances of driver cone/dome itself can produce coloration.
You can't correct it with crossover.

That is by no means the only issue, @alexberger

I agree you can make a pair or triad of drivers sound bright, or dull or bassy or boomy with the crossover, but I also think drivers can bring a lot of character to the design.

I was speaking of drivers that don't have any inherent issues.  Of course, if you have some garbage drivers then there are only so much the xover can fix.

The cone material is only one aspect of the overall driver design and the "character" of the sound. So to simply lump all Be or Diamond or Al or soft domes in a category greatly oversimplifies each design. Also, as others have said, the tweeter is 1 of 2 or more drivers delivering sound to your ears. The crossover, cabinet type and material not to mention the room (and commonly lack of adequate treatment) and equipment all play a role in what finally reaches your ears.That said, IME the vast majority of tweeters (and for that matter speakers) aren't showcased with remotely how they can sound primarily due to the room size and again, lack of adequate treatment. That beaming Titanium or Be tweeter might just be your first reflection point's untreated wall and / or your sub - par source, amp or preamp...

Anyone got extended listening experience with hard-dome horn-loaded tweeters (hdhlt)? Some Klipsch or JBL models maybe?

Characteristics across different tweeter ’types’ are on my mind as I shop new standmounts. ’Be’ tweeters are in at least a few speakers on my short list, as is one (non-Klipsch) hdhlt speaker. I mostly listen to classical at low to moderate SPL. Closest sidewall is 4-6’ from right speaker and room has no treatment (in case it matters wrt reflection).

With respect to hdhl tweeters I found this helpful: https://forums.audioholics.com/forums/threads/why-do-horn-loaded-tweeters-resolve-more-detail-than-c...

I agree that implementation, that is, how a driver is designed with a particular technology, AND the crossover's matter a great deal.

What I probably should have said is, I grew out of the sound qualities I heard from the first Be tweeters (Focals) and really from ribbons as well.

There are horrible AMTs. I like good AMTs.

Based on the specs, I think I'd probably really love to listen to the SB Acoustics Be tweeters too.

I also like some affordable ring radiators a great deal.

BE tweeters are quite bright in my opinion, much prefer a silk dome....
Beer, can't drink Molsons (I am in Canada) Coors etc....all that highly processed stuff. Buy beer  brewed by Big Rock Breweries here in Alberta....very nice ales and pilseners...

Huge number of TL fans, and I always like Fritz speakers and value. 

Salk uses a SB Acoustics Satori.

Not quite as good as the ScanSpeak AirCir.  I've used both and the AirCir sounds more 3 dimensional.  

Over the years I notice I go on and off with ribbon tweeters.    I have a few different vintages of carver amazings .   With modern dsp they can really be amazing     Sometime pieces they sing better than my more modern speakers.   Some material they should thin.   Similiar to electrostatics in some regards .