Magnepan .7 vs 1.7 tech question?

I hope you meant to type incorrect.

The Magnepan magnetic-planar drivers have wire conductors glued onto the mylar diaphram.

You are right the new models don't have wires glued to the mylar anymore, it's a printed circuit now. You might call the panels all quasi-ribbons now but due to history of those particular loudspeakers you still can call them planer-magnetic and not be wrong.   

russ69

1,651 posts

12-24-2021 7:06am

bdp24 has it 100% correct.

I hope you meant to type incorrect.

!.7s and newer are all quasi ribbons, except for the 3, 20, and 30 series, which are true ribbons.

Thanks guys. Wow

I had always thought it was the resistor that cut some of the high end. I've never had a problem with 1.7, 1.7i or 3.7i on the tip end. I have alternated between wire and resistors as a jumper which will change the top end .

You do need an amp with plenty of power and available output amperage.

Hope that helps.

Happy Holidays

bdp24 has it 100% correct.

No @rankaudio, of the current Magnepans only the 3.7i, 20.7i, and 30.7 have ribbon tweeters. My Magneplanar Tympani T-IVa does as well, but has not been in production for decades. A lot of people---including Steve Guttenberg in his LRS review---incorrectly call all Maggies ribbon speakers (part of the blame for that rests with Magnepan. LRS is short for Little Ribbon Speaker, which it is NOT). Except for the ribbon tweeter in the above models, ALL Magnepan drivers are magnetic-planars, not ribbons. Magnetic-planars, electrostatics, and ribbons are all planars, but not all planars are ribbons.

A ribbon driver is by definition one in which the moving element (in the case of Maggies that is the mylar diaphram) is also the conductor. The Magnepan magnetic-planar drivers have wire conductors glued onto the mylar diaphram. That is NOT a ribbon.

A classic full-range ribbon loudspeaker is the no longer in production Apogee.

I thought all Maggie’s basically had ribbon tweeters. Am I missing something?

The tweeter section on the non-ribbon Magnepans are not perfect. The 1.7 can sound pretty decent with the right amp but never as good as the ribbon tweeter 3.7.

p. 9 of the PDF instruction manual on the .7 only appears to attenuate the top end  so it’s more rolled off. I don’t want that. I want the opposite. I want more treble. 

No but sources online indicate that the fuses are to attenuate the top end to roll it off, so I never bothered to try it.

1.7 Bypassed. Beautiful top end.

I have complete faith in my amplifier. (4b3)

Do not want any speaker fuses in the path.

Cheers.

I don’t doubt that the right boutique fuse might improve the high end, but how do you know that “The fuses that come with them appear to do the opposite.”?  Have you bypassed the fuses and compared?  Curious.  

the Mike Powell silver fuse (not actually a fuse) and silver jumpers made a very good improvement for my LRS...